001All right. Well, good evening everyone. Thank you for being here tonight. Um, we do uh have the clipboard for public comment or Lindsay's taking it. I'm sorry. Is Lindsay outside? Okay, she's outside. So, if you did not get a chance to sign up for public comment, make sure that you had seen Lindsay out front. Um uh just to kind of lay out the meeting this evening. We're going to we'll call the meeting to order. We uh do the pledge of allegiance. After the pledge of allegiance, we sit down and we have a moment of silence and then we do roll call and then we will get into our recognitions this evening and the rest of the meeting. So um we'll go ahead and call the meeting to order now. And if you can stand with
002us, please remove your hats, gentlemen. We'll go ahead and do the pledge. flagisible. All right. Thank you very much. Um, we'll go ahead and do roll call here. Mrs. Evansson here. Mrs. Heights here. Mr. Jones here. Miss Lima here. All right. Do I have a motion to approve the agenda for this evening? Motion to approve the agenda. Second, Mr. Chavez. Mrs. Evansson. Yes. Mrs. Heights? Yes. Mr. Jones? Yes. Miss Lima? Yes. Right. Do I have approval to approve the meeting minute m excuse me meeting minutes and summary approval for October 1st, October 8th and October 15th of 2024. Motion to approve the meeting. Second. Mr. Chavez. Mrs. Evansson. Yes. Mrs. Heights. Yes. Mr. Jones. Yes. Miss Lima. Yes. All right. Um so this month is the Native American Heritage Month and so we do have
003a proclamation from the board. Um so whereas Native American Heritage Month is an opportunity to recognize the history, culture, traditions and contributions of Native Americans who are the original inhabitants of the land and continue to play a vital role in shaping our nation's heritage and future. And whereas the Native American community enriches our local state and national identity through their achievements in education, art, science, public service, agriculture, and many other fields. And whereas District 51 is committed to fostering a culture of respect, belonging, and understanding by recognizing the unique perspectives and valuable contributions of Native American students, families, and staff within our schools and community. And whereas this month, the importance of education in preserving and sharing Native American histories and cultures to ensure their stories are understood and honored by future generations. And therefore,
004be it resolved, the District 51 Board of Education proclaims November as Native American Heritage Month, encouraging our community to honor Native American history and culture while reaffirming our commitment to educating students about their contributions and legacy. All right. And now we will uh go into our recognitions. So first up we have the Chassa second place state golf winners. The students stay at the front um so that Kelly can get your pictures. Ah Junction High School golf team. Thank you gentlemen. The board would like to invite uh Jack Hull, Kyle Court, and Hunter Simmons, and Will Simpson to the front of the room. That's all you guys, right? The Grand Junction High School Boys Golf Club had an incredible 2024 season uh community with their second place finish at the Colorado Class 4A state championships at
005Tier Golf Course right here at home. Senior Kyle Cord led the Tigers with a strong third place finish, followed by senior fellow senior Jack Call in the sixth place and junior Hunter Simmons who placed 10th. Their top 10 individual finishes helped the team achieve a total stroke of 400 447 strokes, finishing 21 strokes over par and earning them the runner-up position behind Cheyen Mountain. The Tigers also shined earlier in the season, winning the 4A regional 4 tournament at Black Canyon Golf Course in Montro with an impressive team score of 27 strokes, finish six strokes under par. These achievements reflect the team's hard work, the leadership of coach Tom Lafere, and the support of their school community. The culture and discipline of sportsmanship and excellent has been key to their continued success. Additionally, senior Kyle Court
006was a standout leader throughout the season, earning a spot on on the all-star Allstate first team alongside teammate Jack Hunter and receiving the prestigious player of the year honor. Kyle's consistent performance played a pivotal role in the team success, including his third place individual finish at state, where he posted rounds of 72 and 73 for a total of 145, three streaks, three strokes over par. Kyle's dedication extends beyond the course as he looks ahead to continue his academic and athletic career at Colorado Mesa University where he will join the Maverick's golf program next fall. The board of education and superintendent Dr. Hill proudly congratulates these talented student athletes on an incredible season and the remarkable achievement. Balancing academics and athletes and athletics takes immense dedication, time management, and focus. The team has set a high
007standard for future players and presents District 1 with pride. Congratulations on a fantastic season and we look forward to your continued success. [Applause] All right. Next up, we have the Southwest League um all conference softball player and coach of the year. The board would like to invite Grand Junction High School junior Jackson Clark and Fruit of Monument High School head football softball coach Adam Diaz to the front of the room. Jackson Clark, junior at Grand Junction High School, was named the South Southwest Leagues Player of the Year for her outstanding season. At the plate, she achieved a remarkable 524 batting average, collecting 89 hits, drove in 38 runs, and scored 53 times, proving her reliability and consistency as a key offensive player. Defensively, Jackson showcased her versatility, maintaining a 946 fielding percentage and stepping up
008as a as stepping up pitcher when needed. Over two varsity seasons, she has posted a 5.73 erra across 29 games, demonstrating her ability to perform under pressure. Jackson's talent, leadership, and work ethic were vital to the Tiger success season, making her a force to be reckoned with in her high high school softball [Applause] career. Adam Diaz, head softball coach at Ruda Monument High School, was named the coach of the year after leading the Wildcats to the Southwestern League championship and a top eight finish at state. Known for fostering competitiveness and resilience, Diaz emphasizes teamwork and pride, helping his players perform at their best in high pressure moments. With standout offensive seasons, averaging over 11 runs per game, his leadership has been key to the Wildcat success. More than a coach, Diaz is a mentor who
009values effort, unity, and continues to work to build team that is strong and full of depth. Both Jackson Clark and Adam Diaz have made impactful contributions to high school softball in District 51. Their dedication and achievements not only elevate their teams but inspire their entire D51 athletic community. The board of education and superintendent Dr. Hill are proud to celebrate their accomplishments and are proud of the positive impact they continue to make. Congratulations to Jackson and coach Diaz on these well-deserved honors. We look forward to seeing what next year will bring. after every All right. Next up, we have the FFA National Individual and Team Winners. So, I have two members up here, but I'm gonna read this all out. So the board would like to invite Fra Monument High School FFA members Taylor Shot, Alexis
010Uurich, Raina Roberts, Ava Stevens, and Ryder Roberts to the front of the room. Yes. So we have we have a brother and sister that are Good job guys. Way to represent. There you go. Nice to meet you. So um Raina and Ryder are off at college right now. So Taylor will be accepting the uh awards for those two. The Fruit of Monument High School Future Farmers of America FFA team recently represented District 51 at the National FFA Convention in Indianapolis. An event that brings together thousands of students, educators, and industry leaders to celebrate achievements, develop leadership skills, and drive innovation in agricultural education. Fruit of Monument High School students excelled on the national stage with the milk quality team, Taylor Shot and Alexis Grwich, Raina Roberts, and Ava Stevens earning silver team recognition and placing
011in the top 25 in the nation. Their expertise in some interesting stuff. Milk, milk and cheese identification, defect detection, mastitis testing, and dairy industry knowledge demonstrated their passion for ensuring consumer safety and quality. Individuals or individually, Taylor shot and Alexis Uurich both received silver honors while Raina Roberts and Ava Stevens earned individual bronze honors for their outstanding performance. Additionally, Ryar Roberts was awarded the American FFA degree, an honor achieving achieved by only the top 1% of FFA members nationwide. Ryer is the 21st recipient in the 82nd year history of District 51's FFA program. This award reflects extraordinary dedication requiring significant community service, financial investment, and active participation at the state and national levels. Ryer also represented Colorado as a national FFA officer candidate, advancing to the highly competitive interview stage. The board of education and
012superintendent Dr. Hill would like to congratulate these students on their achievements. They've showcased their high standards of excellence in district 51 and highlighted the important role of agricultural education in shaping future leaders of our community and beyond. Congratulations, guys. [Applause] Let me get your certificates. Thanks. Congratulations. Thank you. And then Alexis Well done. [Applause] No worries. The board of education would like to invite Mesa View Elementary Principal Stacy Cohen to join us at the front of the room. The board of education is proud to recognize Stacy Cohen, principal of Mesy View Elementary School, for receiving the prestigious Terrell H. Bell Award for outstanding school leadership. This national honor is awarded to exceptional leaders who demonstrate dedication to their schools, communities, and student success. And Principal Cohen wholeheartedly embodies these qualities. Under Stacy's leadership, Mesa View
013Elementary has become a model of excellence, recently earning recognition as a blue ribbon as a blue ribbon a national blue ribbon school. Her commitment to fostering a culture of growth, collaboration, and high expectations has inspired her staff and students to achieve continued success. Stacy's ability to lead with compassion and vision has not only elevated her school, but has also made her a shining example of what strong effective leadership looks like within D51. The Terrell Hbell Award highlights the vital role of principles in creating thriving schools and Stacy's selection as one of the recipient speaks volumes about her impact. It is a testament to her relentless dedication and unwavering belief that every student can. The board of education and superintendent Dr. Hill are excited to recognize Principal Cohen for this amazing accomplishment. We are proud to
014have her represent our district on a national stage and pro and proud to have her as a member of our D51 family. Congratulations on this incredible welldeserved achievement. [Applause] I know we didn't put that in there, but that was she's one of only nine principles in the entire nation that won that award. So, I think it's important to point that out. So, congratulations. All right. Thank you everyone. Um, so unless you're really wanting to stay for the rest of the board meeting, um, those of you that were here for recognitions, we'll give you a couple of minutes to go ahead and leave. So, while they're exiting and now that we have additional seats, um security is going to uh funnel in more people to sit. So, we're just going to pause for just a second
015so um other people can take seats. Okay, I think we're good. We got most all the seats filled. Okay. All right. So, next on um the agenda are board reports. Um board, are you good if we just kind of bypass this this evening so we can move right to uh the things in the meeting we need to do? Okay. We'll we'll report out um good things and committee activity updates um at the December 3rd meeting. Um we now have day 51 celebrations and happenings. Hi board. I'm Sierra Coulson, marketing and communication specialist for D51 schools. here to share with you the district 51 happenings and celebrations. So, starting with our golden apple, Adam Aiden, a paraprofessional at Mesa View Elementary, was nominated not only for being an incredible paraprofessional, but also for being a true
016champion for our kids. He goes above and beyond, taking on extra duties to connect with students and even joining them at recess for some fun and play. His dedication to seeing the best in every single one of our students makes a huge impact. Thank you, Adam, for everything you do. You're truly appreciated. This past Saturday, over 300 fourth through 8th grade students competed in the first Lego League Challenge qualifier tournament at Fra Monument High School. They used their STEM skills to design, build, and program robots to tackle tackle challenges inspired by this year's submerged theme. A big thank you to Chevron for being such engaged and supportive community partners and for your generous support through the D district 51 foundation which made it possible for 42 district teams to participate in this tournament. Nothing says
017sweet quite like every teacher and staff member at school district 51 receiving a box of Enstrom's famous toffee. That's over 3,500 pounds in toffee. Thank you to Enstrom and the Simons family for this generous donation and for your continued support of our schools teachers, staff, and students. This week, first graders across the district are receiving a special gift from our local Rotary clubs. Three brand new books for each students to take home. These generous donations help spark the love of reading and provide our young learners with the tools they need to succeed. Thank you to all the Rotary clubs in our community for your incredible generosity and support of our students. The Mesa Club hosted an exciting cyber security competition at Mount Garfield Middle School where teams from Bookcliffe West, Mount Garfield, Orchard Mesa, and
018Redlands Middle School went head-to-head in a fast-paced hands-on challenge. Each team had one to two members acting as computers and one to two as routers tasked with sending and decoding encrypted messages provided by the judges simulating the roles of these key components in a network. The competition tested not only the students technical expertise but also their ability to stay focused under pressure and think quickly on their feet. A huge shout out to all the incredible teams who participated and a special thanks to the dedicated coaches who have been working tirelessly with these students over the past few weeks, helping them hone in their skills and prepare for this exciting challenge. It was a fun event to watch. All four of D-51's comprehensive high schools came together to celebrate National Letter of Intent Signing Day, marking
019the official start of the signing period for student athletes committing to their chosen colleges and universities. This day is a major milestone recognizing the dedication these students have shown in both their athletic pursuits and academics throughout high school. It was great to see these student athletes and their excitement about the future as they took the next step to continue their athletic careers at the collegiate level. This day reflects the hard work, discipline, and commitment they've put in. Congratulations to each and every one of you on this incredible achievement. D51 High School students had the chance to get a hands-on look at a wide range of healthcare careers from a radiology from radiology to pharmacy and beyond. Thanks to our partnership with Inter Mountain Health St. Mary's Regional Hospital in Grand Junction, even more students were
020even were able to explore in demand health care jobs and learn about the training pathways that lead to these rewarding careers. A big thank you to Inter Mountain Health for their continued support of our students and for opening doors to these valuable opportunities. With the spring healthcare event at Community Hospital always in high demand, we're excited to offer even more students the chance to explore these careers right here in the Grand Valley. As healthc care needs grow, District 51 and our college and career readiness department are committed to connecting students with these exciting opportunities early, helping them build a strong found foundation for their future. That's all we have for November happening and celebrations. Be sure to keep up with all the latest District 51 happenings by following us on social media, D51 schools, and
021wishing you all a happy [Applause] Thanksgiving. All right, thank you. Right, next up we will get into the superintendence report. Um, I'm not going to be able to see your slides unless we turn one of those TVs a little bit because or I can turn around and look at the screen because normally unless you want to share your slide deck with me so I can follow along. It It's fine. I I want to make sure the audience can see it, but I just I don't know. Can Can them and the I think if Dr. Hill sends it to me, sorry, a little just housekeeping here. Can they can you all back in the corner see? Okay. To my right, your left. Are you good? Thumbs up. Okay. All right. Thanks. Okay. Just want to make
022sure you all can see. Okay. Thank you, Dr. Hill. Um, so thanks to the board and um and thank you all for being here um in person tonight and uh online. Um so I have a series of slides uh with a lot of data and numbers and rationale etc. that I'm going to share tonight. Um, but before I get into that, I want toh say a few words to our community. Sorry. Sorry. Um, those here in attendance and watching virtually, um, I want you to know, uh, that I understand the emotions folks are feeling right now. Uh, I really do. the pain frustrations. I get it and I understand it because we uh share in those feelings with you. No one wants to be in a situation where they are having to close schools. Regardless
023of how well you cross the tees and dot the eyes, this will never be easy. It will never be the preference and it will never feel good and uh it will never be perfect. Um you feel that way. I feel that way. I know this board feels that way too. Uh regardless of what you may have thought walking into this meeting, that is the truth. Um I didn't become a teacher and a leader in public education because I want to close schools. No one wants to be in the situation we are in. Uh but it is the situation we find ourselves in as a community and it's not uh any one person's doing. I mentioned the words community and we because that's what we are. We are a community and when one part of our
024community hurts, we all hurt. I know that many of y'all are hurting right now and I wish I could change that. Uh it hurts me to think that I've contributed to that hurt. I can't control the circumstances we find ourselves in, but I can, as your neighbor, empathize with your situation. We all can. Because all of these facts and figures, I'll present our people. Excuse me. Behind all these facts and figures, I'll present our people, kids, teachers, staff, administrators, families. And while the presentation may seem cold in the sense that it is focused on the data, I want you to know that we understand the people behind the data and we understand the impact these decisions have on the people behind the data. So, as I present this information, uh, I want to ask two
025things from our community here and online, and you can take them or leave them. One, I hope for just a little bit that you'll lower your armor you may have walked in here with, take a deep breath, and truly be open to hearing, processing, and trying to understand the data that is behind uh the presentation. I'm not asking you to like it, but I'm asking you to try and better understand it so that we can all approach the situation with the same background knowledge and a better understanding. And two, whether it be tonight, tomorrow, or the next day, I ask that we think about our words. Words have meaning and they have power. Words can build others up. And words can break people down. And at the end of the day, we are all members
026of the same community that we all live. I'm sorry. My team's going to give me such a hard time. I never cry. Um, and I hope we will be mindful of what we choose to say and the impact that the words we use can have on our neighbors. These board members, my staff, myself, and all of y'all in this room. We're all humans. We all try to do the best we can for our community, and we all love our community dearly. Even if it may not seem uh like it at the midst of the hard decisions, I want to encourage all of us to be tough on the problem, but not on the people. Because tomorrow and the next day and the day after that, we all will continue to shop in the same grocery
027stores, let our kids play in the same parks, and serve our same community. And I hope that while we process these emotions um that we are feeling that we don't let them get the best of us and that we don't use it as an opportunity to break one another down. It's what we teach our kids to do. I really appreciate y'all being here. I really do. I appreciate the love you have for your school communities, for our school communities, and I hope you know that we will continue to love and appreciate one another tomorrow regardless of what decisions might be made here this evening. Thanks again for being here and thanks for giving me a couple minutes to share uh what's on my heart. Okay. All right. Thank [Applause] you. I apologize. Okay. I'm going
028to We've got a lot of slides and so I'm going to try to go through these uh and I'm going to pause along the way uh if board members have questions. So um some of this information is going to be information that y'all have already seen, but I know we have some folks that haven't uh Thanks. uh haven't been a part of a lot of these conversations. So, um we want to take some time to make sure everybody understands um where we're at. So, um if we're talking about elementary declining enrollment, obviously we had a EDC committee um that we put together and this was the problem statement. I want to remind folks of that problem statement. So, currenting uh current declining student enrollment negatively impacts D-51 resources and infrastructure. The impact limits D-51's ability
029to assemble the critical resources infrastructure to adequately support and implement the strategic plan. and we desire to reallocate resources to create safe, successful classrooms for students and staff. So that was the goal uh with the problem statement for the EDC. Um so let's talk a little bit about where we've been because this is has been a very long process um for our community. So uh back in November of 2022, so two years ago um was when Shannon presented his uh latest enrollment numbers to us and then projected um a continued decline. um December of that year, we presented that uh information uh to the board and then board members agreed that we would explore um different options including school closures. Um obviously East Middle School was closed that March um and the board charged the
030district staff to create a committee to address declining enrollment at the elementary level. So we we pushed pause on elementary and we uh focused on uh the east closure. uh the board voted 50 to approve that resolution um to explore pathways that were presented by the declining enrollment committee um in October 2023. So we put that committee together, they met and I'll talk a little bit about that later. And then in October the board voted to um move forward with those five pathways, one of them being closures. Um obviously this last December um a little less than a year ago, we uh closed fruit 89. Um and then in February um of this current year um I made the decision to delay the elementary school closures because of the timing. Um doing a closure in
031the spring is really hard on on really everything. Um and so we um we said we wouldn't uh close any schools. Then uh we worked with uh a group called&M um over that time to develop a decision model based on that criteria from the EDC trying to stick uh with the criteria. So we did we started that work in March. Um and then in September the board adopted a policy which we said was um something that we needed to do. Um and then this fall um we have been working through the decision model um the findings from that the enrollment numbers the projections to run different scenarios um to make recommendations. Okay. Um and so in October and November we finalized those scenarios uh and recommendations. Um November 8th I shared that report with the
032board. Um that's the first time the board saw that report. Um and then the 12th through the 15th we went out and met with school communities to let them know that they're they were being recommended in the report. We wanted them to hear it from myself um and not hear it through the media or other other avenues. And then on the 15th we released the report to the public um with the recommendations. Um we're here tonight for this uh presentation um and there there is a recommendation for school closures uh on the table. Um and then you know depending on what happens if there's a decision that's made um we'll finalize boundaries in December. Uh we'll engage with families at the impacted schools throughout December. January would be school of choice um for families to
033be able to take advantage of if they'd like to do that and then in the spring we'll we'll work through hiring and I'll talk a little bit about how we're going to support staff through that. So that's the timeline we've been on and that's where we are right now. And again this has been a two-year uh process for us as a district. So let's talk about enrollment. Everybody, I think at this point, realizes that we have been declining in students um uh over the last few years, uh since 2019. Um we've lost um over 2,000 students. And I say we've lost, we have less students within our our county. Um and we've also uh declined as a district. Um and these are just numbers for um utilization purposes, the amount of seats that we have
034available in elementary schools, um middle schools, and high schools. Obviously, they're lower at elementary school because the decline is hitting elementaryaries harder um because of the low birth rates and and less kids coming into our community at the younger ages. And so over time, that will impact the entire district. Um we we uh want to utilize our buildings the best we can. One, because it's just a good use of resources, but two, it helps us to be able to staff our buildings better with the budget that we do have. So, you look for an 85% or higher utilization. Um we are not there except for high school right now. And then I just want to point out that even when we were in our peak year, which was 2019, um we still were only utilizing
035between 71 to 78% of our uh available seats in the district, depending on which utilization number you use. So um even at that time, we weren't necessarily utilizing the amount of seats that we would like to as a district, but the decline has hurt us um in that way. So we're now under 20,000 kids. Um and that is the first time that that has happened uh that we're at a 25 year or 24 year low. So, I know I've had some questions about, well, we're a booming bus community and so it's just going to rebound quickly. That is not the situation we're in right now. Um, so we are at the lowest we've been um since around 2000. Okay. And the projections are that they will we will continue to decline. Um, Shannon, are you
036there? I am. Can you hear me? Yeah. I'm going to turn it over to you. I know you've already presented these slides last month, but I'm going to give you a chance to go through these real quick. Um, so just uh let me know and I'll click for you. Okay. And next slide. Um so basically we've been declining on average by about 400 uh students a year. Um the difference between our kindergarten and our senior class is also about 400. So a certain amount of that is built in. A certain amount of it has to do with generational change where young adults are having fewer children. We have about a 10-year history of a very steeply declining uh birth count uh in the district. And so a lot of what we're experiencing in neighborhood schools
037now is uh not a big surprise. Uh we are not alone. Districts all over the western United States are declining um and are facing a lot of the same challenges that D51 is. Uh, next slide shows that declining birth rate that I just mentioned. And you can see that we um have lost a significant number of um babies basically as far as a total count that we would anticipate. Uh 5 years later for kindergarten enrollment. uh from a peak in about 2006 2007 we started declining rapidly. Uh next slide please. Uh our gradetograde size between 2019 and 2024 you can see that almost every grade uh at least uh uh K through 10 is smaller. So um we are showing a significant amount of decline that also hit us as a result of smaller um
038families from millennial age um millennial age young adults. So um we're seeing almost every grade is smaller than it was 5 years ago. Next slide please. Uh here is my enrollment forecast for the next five years and um together with the state demographer um I'm expecting a continuing uh decline in the size of the K5 population. Next slide please. So here's our forecast for the next five years. will be down approximately uh 400 students a year with the majority of that decline being at the elementary level. Uh next slide please. Um here it is by school by grade and um we compare this to two different capacity bases that were um supplied by the Alvarez and Marsal A&M report and um a lot of our schools continue to be uh significantly underutilized. Uh next slide
039please. Here's our 2025 forecast uh for secondary schools. And you can see that we're doing better. We're more efficient at the secondary level. Most of our um underutilization is currently concentrated at elementary. Uh next slide, please. Here is an 8-year forecast. Um we uh together with the state demographers's office expect this trend to continue for at least the next 8 to 10 years as family size stabilize in the western United States. Uh most demographers that are looking at school enrollment all over the country are also forecasting a uh continual decline even on top of significant new housing growth. We do monitor new housing growth all over the district and we're just not um excuse me getting significant amounts of new ch new children from new housing. Uh next slide please. Here's the same data for
040secondary schools and you can see our utilization numbers are a little bit higher and we're doing a little bit uh better at the secondary level but we um expect to continue to decline at a lot of our secondary schools. Uh next slide please. So um and I'm going to walk through these slides. These are the uh state demographers uh slides and she wasn't able to join us virtually. Shannon, real quick, just um because I know we'll probably pause throughout if there's questions. I know there was a question about um the projections especially for the Redlands area. I know there's been some questions around Redlands 360 um and are we expecting a lot of kids to come from that area? And I know before um you had said that you thought we might be able to
041yield a lot of students from that area, but you've you've changed in your projections there. And I know they're all projections, but can you maybe speak a little bit to um those current numbers that you have and how you came to those? So, we were working closely with Llata Development, the developer of the of the Redlands 360 project, and had some pretty good phasing uh data that was um performing fairly well. Um unfortunately, 80% of the units in that uh development are priced over $600,000 per unit. So that's kind of the magic threshold for uh this district and other districts getting significant amounts of school age children from new housing. And during the last 24 months, we have not been getting a significant amount of um uh school age children from that development and from
042the eight or nine other smaller subdivisions scattered around the Redlands. We continue to decline in the Redlands even though we're building houses. And so we revised our forecasting based on the reality that we're not getting children from higher priced housing. And we've set record lows at um at least uh two of our three elementary schools in the Redlands with kindergarten and first grade size. So for example, our kindergarten at Windgate Elementary this year was 36 students. And um I can't recall in my 18-year involvement with the district ever seeing a number that low in kindergarten at Windgate. So um we're not getting primary kids and the birth rates in these new housing areas continue to go down. Okay, thanks. Any other question? Okay, go ahead Shannon Andrea here. Um, so outside of the Redlands, and
043I know that you probably went into a little bit of this information when we were visiting Fruda last year, but are you are you seeing any significant growth in any new developments in Mesa County? Um, Whitewater is moving fairly well right now. The Patterson Road Corridor continues to have infield development. Um, we're getting a diminished amount of development in Northwest Grand Junction in the Pomona uh, elementary attendance area. And then there have been uh, two or three multif family projects downtown and we're just not getting children from these new properties. So, for example, the Railards apartment only generated about eight children. And so what we're seeing is that uh the housing that families can afford tends to be more mature housing as opposed to new housing. And every year we reinventory what's happening around the
044district and kind of try to carefully monitor what's being built and we're just not getting children from what's being built. Okay. Thank you. Uh I have a question for you Shannon. This is Jose Le. Uh, do you see do you see that there'll still be a decline even though their schools of choice? Do you see schools of choice going up or stabilizing or will they be going down? Also, the um the pot of available children is diminishing for everyone. So charter schools all over the state of Colorado are beginning to see for the first time in their histories an inability to fill their maximum seat count up to their charter just because the pool of available children is so much smaller. And what I'm seeing is competitive behaviors among school districts that are adjacent to
045each other have magnified where districts are um trying to recruit children that are in border areas transitioning from one school district to another. And there are just fewer children available in all segments of the education market. Whether it's neighborhood schools, charter schools, private schools, parochial schools, the the pool of available children is just smaller. A lot of that has to do with housing availability in Colorado, people leaving the state because they can't afford to live here um and um other factors, but um predominantly housing affordability and a declining birth rate. Okay, thanks Shannon. I know, uh, we're going to come back to you later in the presentation. So, um, I am not a demographer, so I am going to try to do this justice, but, uh, the state demographer for the last couple years has
046given us a report as well, and it's just good to look at that data alongside what Shannon presents. So, I'll try to walk us through this information, and this was just presented to, um, our team, uh, just about a week or so ago. So um big picture trends for our state uh population growth at a slowing rate. Births are down, deaths are up. Uh migration and mobility is slowing. Um harder to attract and retain the best and the brightest. In migration, similar levels, growing out migration. Um and so the aging impacts everything. Large share of future growth is 65 and up. Uh early working age and youth becoming smaller share of total population and the uh growing race and ethnic diversity within the state. So this is um statewide numbers um and you can see
047uh some of the decade data that she broke out and then the last couple years. So 2010 to 2020 for the state was the second slowest decade um well for the US in terms of growth. 2020 to 21 was the slowest ever recorded growth rate. Um 17 states lost population during that time. Um and then 2122 some return to pre-COVID um states lost population and then 22 to 238 states lost population. So, it's not just hitting Colorado, it's hitting um the entire US and especially the western part of the United States. And then you can see the Colorado numbers up there as well. That 2010 to 20 uh20 um you can see the amount of um growth that we had as a state. Um and so you're looking at, you know, around 74 uh,000 uh
048population growth during that time. But then if you look at the years since 2020, um you're you're basically cutting that in half or even more so. So it's just the growth is not happening as quickly as it used to for our state. Um I know that's hard to see. Um but this is a comparison of um population change from uh 2010 2020 and then the um the current decade and then moving forward. in a lot of the growth, if there is growth happening in the state, she said that it's mainly happening kind of in the Weld County area and some of the front range areas, but not as much in other parts of the state. Um, and so 95% of the population job growth um being along the front range. Um, this is uh Colorado's
049population change um over time. And so you can see the um the natural increase uh is the blue um and then the net migration on top of that. And so the as Shannon mentioned with birth rates going down, we're seeing the the natural uh increase dropping as well over time. Um and then also uh the uh net migration dropping as well. And we'll talk about age groups in a second. Um and so this is uh births, deaths, and migration in our county um over time. And so as I mentioned before the births are down um deaths uh went up and then that net migration um you can see the trend line over that as well. And then you can see the difference in births from 2008 in our county to 2023 um that drop as
050well. Um so again births down um in the US compared to a peak in 2007. Um population under 18 has declined by over a million over over the decade. Um, again, 27 states lost population under 18. In Colorado, births are down 8,000 compared to our peak in 2007. Um, and so, uh, again, it's happening across our state. It's not just Mesa County. This is something that we've shared before, but it's comparing the 2000 to 2010 decade and then 2010 to 2020. And this is migration by age. And you can see that the last decade, the 2010 to 2020, um a high percentage of the in migration to our community was in the uh 55 and up age group um and not as much in the younger age group. And so while we are seeing growth
051in our community, and I think that's why it's it's maybe been um confusing to some folks is well, we're growing as a community and we have more people moving here, they're not necessarily um of the age of bringing kids uh with them traditionally. Um, and then again, Elizabeth would talk a lot if she was here about um how much jobs uh drive that growth or not. And so this is Colorado new jobs and net migration projections um uh over or where we've been and where we're headed uh into the future. Um this is Colorado population change by age um so far and then projected out into the um through 2030. And so as a state you can see that there's a projected decline of the zero to 17 um a small increase in the 18
052to 24 um and then you can see um the the different age ranges after that as well. So that's the state's numbers. Um but when you look at uh Mesa County um we're projected a decline in both the 0 to 17 and the 18 to 24 um over through 2030. Um so we are projecting to to decline in those areas um and the 45 to 64 but we do have some growth in the other uh age ranges. This is change in school age population. Again I know it's hard to see on the screen um but we are not projected to grow um as fast as other parts of the state. You can see like I said that Weld County area and the Front Range are. Um but we are not. Um, I think of all
053the slides, this is was probably the most telling to me when she presented to us. Um, a year ago, Elizabeth presented this slide to us and she and I remember her saying by um, she projected that we might be able to get back to prepandemic number of students living in our county. And remember, she's looking at countywide data, so she's not looking at the school district. So, she was saying maybe if the trends go the way that she thinks they're going to go by 2035, we'd have the same number of kids in our county that we had back in 2019 before we started seeing a decline. She has since changed her projections on that. Um she is now saying that um we won't get back to pre- pandemic numbers potentially ever um in our county
054unless something a major shift happens obviously. So, what she's projecting out is um you can see 20 um 43 down there. uh that's the highest we'll get back to the number of 5 to 11 age kids. Um but it it never gets back to um you know where we were when we were in our peak years. So uh it's a little scary to think about potentially not getting back to those numbers that we had back then um and then all the things that could change in that time as well. And then just thinking about the amount of time that's going to go by if we don't make some decisions around um what we currently are dealing with and the projected declines that we're going to see in the future as well. So again, these are
055these are less kids in our community. This I know there's a lot of questions about well the kids are leaving the district and they're going to other options and sure that always happens and we also bring kids back from other options as well. This is the amount of kids we have living in our community and it's projected it's already been declining excuse me our county and it's continued uh projection that we're going to decline in the number of kids we have available in our community. Dr. Hill, that is a question that um I've gotten a lot in the last uh week or so is the issue of homeschooling kids or kids going to a charter school outside the district or whatnot. Um can you just share a little bit about how really what we've got
056is a net zero number with kids going out and then kids coming back into the district. Yeah, so we do track that every year. Um and I did ask um Bonita to run new numbers for this year. So obviously when you open a when there's a new school that opens in the community, it is going to pull kids more kids than you maybe would have seen in the past. So the ascent classical did open in our community and and they do have you know some D51 students did go to that school but as far as like the in the past the options that have existed. So homeschool for instance we actually have brought more homeschool kids back this year than than left. Um and then we've seen either a net like a wash or um
057or a net gain um in some of those other categories as well. But the obviously we and Shannon did factor into his projections that we would lose some kids um through the opening of that um new school in our community. So, but traditionally in the past, um I know we had one year uh right around COVID that we did have more kids leave for homeschool than we brought back in. I think it was a difference of about 100 kids. Um but since then, it's been pretty much a wash or like I said, so far this year, we've actually brought more kids back from home school than we lost. Yeah. Um so, again, this is her forecast for the county. um over time a slight uh increase in um the birth projected birth projected birth rate,
058excuse me, but then uh kind of flattening out and then starting to decline and then flatten out again. So um she's not projecting that we're going to see a major um increase in that. And then you can see the projected deaths as well. So this is the last piece of it. Um I already shared the ones at the top here. Um, but she focused a lot when she presented to us on all the factors that go into what drives population growth in a community. And a lot of it is, you know, it's things that we do have an impact on as a district because the better we prepare our students for the workforce and we if we can keep them here and we have job growth and that obviously helps, but there's a lot of
059other factors within our community that we can't control. um things like um the labor force, um job growth, affordability, things like that that are going to decide whether or not we um we bring in more families um to our community or not. So um so that's um that is that was the state's uh demographers um presentation. This is back um last year when we were presenting. I just wanted to highlight that also, you know, Mesa County also looks at these numbers and it's just more of a confirmation that they're seeing the same thing obviously. So this is from last year. I do want to highlight that because they came and present it to us. But if you remember back when they presented to us, they highlighted the births being down um decreasing birth rate um
060for the last 15 years um and then um the contra contributing factors that they mentioned were greater access to birth control and then the inward migration of older adults like I mentioned before um contributing to that. Um and then this again it's kind of hard to see on the screen in front of us but uh you look at Colorado versus Mesa County on the net migration by age group. Um, and you can see the the zero to 404 versus the 45 and up in our community. We're just getting uh the proportion of adults 45 and older moving to Mesa County is significantly different from the rest of the state. So, we're seeing that growth, but it's coming from um an older population. Um, and then this was their um natural increase in net migration in
061Mesa County um over time as well, which matches what um Shannon presented as well. Okay. And then over time um this uh percentage of the population by age group in Mesa County older adults are making up a greater and greater share of the population within our community which has an impact on us. Okay. So that's all the um projections and the information that you all have seen. So talking a little bit about why what does that why does that matter? What does it mean for us as a school district? What are the financial and staffing implications? So I've shared this a lot especially if you heard my presentations um during uh the election season. Um but we we are funded on a per people basis. So the state sets the amount that we get per
062kid and then the amount of kids that we have we get money from the state um on a per pupil basis. So when you lose students or you decline in students that is a loss of per pupil funding um for our school district. And so if we were to take that 2,000 plus kids that we've lost um over time, if we still had that same number of kids, if we had flattened during this time and we had the same number of kids we have had back in 2019, using today's PPR rate, that would be like an additional $22.1 million that we would have as a district to work with that we don't have right now. Okay. Um so it's obviously had a financial impact on us as a school district. Um and then I've talked
063before about this that we just as a state rank pretty low when it comes to school funding. And then we rank 174th out of 178 school districts on a per pupil uh basis. And I know we had questions during the campaign season of like well um we should how do we make that like our my property taxes are going up. So that means that we're the school district's getting more money, right? Like our property tax keep going up. You're going to get more money. And really I I've told people to think of it like a pie. Um the size of the pie, which is our funding from the state, it's set at the state level. We don't get to influence that. And um just because our property taxes go up as a community does not
064mean the pie gets bigger for us. We don't necessarily get a benefit from that. What changes is what percentage of that pie is coming from local taxes and what's being backfilled by the state. So as our property taxes have gone up as a community and we've all felt that impact, it didn't mean that we got more money as a district. It meant that the state backfilled less funding and the local share increased. Um, and so I think that's also important to clarify that we have not seen an increase because of property taxes going up for us as a as a district. And Dr. Hill, what is the what's the probability of that changing? I mean, we we we're at the bottom end of the funding scale. Yeah. I mean, what are the chances of that
065changing in the next, say, five years? So the way I kind of shared during again when I was given a lot of presentations during the bond and mill campaign was really the only two ways we're going to impact that is either there's a change at in the formula at the state level which there's been some adjustments um and Mel's going to share some data in a second that's not promising um or we we pass things like mill levy overrides right local communities uh contribute more local dollars and then that those local dollars stay so even and I want to be clear about this and we talked about this during uh the campaign as well. So, um, passing the the, um, mil levy override that we passed 4B this year was great. I'm I'm super appreciative
066of our community for that. That did not give us any new money. Um, that just allowed us to keep what we already had. So, that 2017 mill levy override was was set to sunset soon. And so, we what we did was we removed the sunset from that, but we're not getting new money because of that. We're getting the same amount of money that we got before. And all the costs of those things that we're paying for out of those dollars have gone up. Um, so I just want to clarify that as well. So really the only way you're going to impact this is either there's a change at the state level um or you pass more milby overrides in your community and you bring in more dollars um for your community there. And like I
067said, Mel will share a little bit about what the governor's budget's looking like for us, which is uh not promising. Um so again, that's how we staff buildings. Um staffing allocations are assigned to schools based on the student counts and so schools are able to staff the school needs within those set parameters. So there is some autonomy at the school level on what they want to use that FTE for, but there's obviously some some guardrails with that. Um and so um allocations are systemic staffing equivalents which consider the number of hours worked and the average cost of position. So we we staff our buildings based on the number of kids um in the buildings. Um and so just to give an example and I know I shared this last month um but the reason why
068we even looked at a closure to begin with with East. So at that time if you were to go back in time um initially with the pre-conolidation uh or pre-closure for staffing for middle schools we were projected to be overstaffed uh 22.8 positions in the middle schools right and then you can see where the other um overages were at that time. Um and so the average uh classroom uh SSSE for a school so teachers classified support for a middle school was about 26.5. So you're talking close to a whole middle school's worth of staffing that we were overstaffing at the time. Um and seven of the eight middle schools at the time were over staffed based on projected student counts ranging anywhere from 2% to 23%. So um we were having the same issue we're
069seeing at the elementary schools we were having at the middle school at that time. Um and so and then due to prior reductions and use of temporary funding um addressing that level of overage while maintaining all buildings would have required cuts academic programs and student supports. And at the time, if you remember, we were hearing from middle school principles saying, "I'm having to cut uh teched and other programs because we're not staffed um to be able to offer those." So, we were hitting a a a breaking point with middle schools. And so, um when we when we closed East, which obviously was not a easy um decision to make, um but what it did was it recouped um about $1.3 million worth of um reoccurring SA uh costs that we were spending at that time.
070And then also uh addition in addition to East Middle School savings for SSC were reduced at other schools not directly impacted by the closure for about $300,000. So you're talking about $1.6 million um in the of the $1.9 million of unfunded position. So it was a reduction of a school. The students went to new new schools that were better utilized then. and we staff those buildings accordingly, but then we weren't um using uh dollars for these reoccurring costs and we could put those money uh monies back into other needs in our district um like salary increases for teachers and things like that. Um in addition to salary increases, it also allows us to keep programming, right? Yeah. That that that to me was a really big deal to make sure that we can continue to
071keep high level programming in our schools, not just kind of a barebones school system, right? Um, and at the time, this is old obviously, but the time, I think this is just showing that by by closing the school and then moving students into other schools, instead of reducing FTE at buildings, we were actually um giving staff to buildings because uh they had an increase in students. So, we've gotten that question, too, where you're going to stick a bunch of kids into schools and then you're not going to give them any more staff and the class sizes are going to blow up. Um, you you staff the buildings for the number of kids that you have. So, if there's an increase in kids, then you increase the staffing in the building. um moving forward. Okay. Um
072and then when we closed Fruit 89, it was a similar situation, right? In that area, we had a decline that was happening over time. Um we were not uh we were overstaffing by 9 FTE in those secondary schools out there and it was projected to continue to be an issue. Um and so um if you at the time the average salary with benefits for a teaching position, which is what we use for one FTE was around $90,000. And if you multiply that out, you're talking close to $800,000 worth of um overages in that fruit of secondary schools. And that wasn't sustainable. And so we were um we were using some ESSER funds and some other things to try to um subsidize that. But that knowing those dollars were going to run out, we had to
073make a decision out there as well. Um and so um based on those projections and the declines we were already seeing, u we were projecting that that was going to grow the following year as well if we didn't do something. Um and so subsidizing those projected uh de uh declines, excuse me, the decline in enrollment and subsidizing those positions due to that um that number was going to grow to about $1.2 million in unfunded positions from the 800,000. And so um we knew we needed to do something. So after the closure of 89, which again, these are never easy decisions. Um but moving to a traditional 6 through8 and a 9 through12 out there, we recouped about $2.1 million in those unfunded positions that again we could put back into um people and programs um
074in our school district. Um and then we've we've been able to do a lot with our dollars um over the last few years and you know I I appreciate the work that's happened um throughout the district to to make this happen. We've tried to really prioritize uh getting salaries up because they were uh lagging far behind other comparable districts and with the cost of living going up, it was getting harder and harder for um our our staff to afford to live here. So um so through these uh closures, we were able to better staff schools, receiving students from closed schools versus having to reduce staffing across the district. Um at the time we were having to go out every year to schools and say we're taking more staff, we're taking more positions, which is never
075an easy thing to do. And remember that 82% of our general fund is spent on our on people. It's spent on salary and benefits. So when you see a reduction in money, it's going to impact um people in the end. Um so by not spending money on subsidizing unfunded positions at the middle school and high school levels um with a smart use of those onetime dollars, we we have made a reduction also about $1.3 million um of central office staffing plus the application of new dollars from the state towards better teacher pay. um we were able to prioritize competitive teacher salaries for um our staff. And so starting teacher salaries, we got it up to 50,000, a little over 50,000. That's a 33% increase since 2020. Um still behind other comparable districts, but at least
076it's we're in a better position. You know, we moved to steps and lanes. Um and so we were able to through that process see an average teacher salary increase um of close to 40% over that time because we're paying staff um for continuing education, which is good. Um, so we've been able to do that as well. And then I just want to highlight the work of our um CFO and their team to um to build up our reserves. Uh an organization our size um you should have about three months worth of payroll in reserves for situations when you need to to dip into that, but those are onetime expenses, right? And so um we had at one point uh just about 5% in our reserves and we've been able to build that up to get
077to a healthy level uh which is good. So we have now met the objective of maintaining at least three months of payroll which is a positive for us and so if we need to use those dollars we can which as example we did that this year we had to dip into reserves because we didn't close elementary schools and we we funded those unfunded positions at the elementary level but we can't keep doing that. Um so that's important to highlight as well. So why does all this matter? So current staffing we are currently overstaffed by 30.5 FTE as a district and 26.7 of that FTE is coming at the elementary level. Okay. So, those are those are staff in our buildings that we don't necessarily have the kids for currently. Um, but we're still maintaining as
078we were going through this process. Um, and we're projected a decline um in student enrollment by 482 students next year with 277 of that happening at the elementary level. So, that number is just going to grow. Um, a loss of enrollment means a loss of per people pupil funding from the state uh which means a reduction in staffing at the school level. And our staffing projections for next year show that we would need to cut approximately 43 FTE um from elementary schools, which is obviously a lot. And if you're going to do the math on that, um the average salary of benefits now is around for a teacher is around 979 um at the elementary level. Using the average teacher cost, we're subsidizing staff at a cost of $2.6 million. Next year, if the projections
079are correct, um and we don't close schools, we would have to subsidize staffing at elementary level at a cost of about $4.2 $2 million. Um, and then this is kind of a breakdown of what that looks like. And so, unfortunately, even though we've made some decisions at the middle school level and even the high school level, we're still because of declines, it's still impacting um those levels as well. And I do want to mention like that the closure of schools is not going to solve this problem completely. Um, we're still going to have to make some staffing reductions in certain places, but it does help um with the problem. Uh, so I'm going to turn it over to Mel real quick. Um, she wants to talk a little bit about um some new information we
080have around state um budget forecasting because this also plays into um decisions for us as a district. Good evening. Uh while we likely won't know our funding for next year for quite some time, um the governor did just release his budget proposal uh for the state at the beginning of this month. And in the context of uh declining enrollment, I'm here to share just what we know so far, even though it is very preliminary and why articles such as this one up here on the screen are popping up um as next year is shaping up to be even a more difficult funding year um than we would have expected. So the governor's budget was released on November 1st. Um it's based on an inflation rate of 2.5%. So just for some comparison, the funding levels
081that we've been receiving in the last couple years had inflationary components of 8% and 5.2. So a significant decline there. Um and then the state is also battling to balance their own budget. So they're starting the year looking to fill a $640 million shortfall. Um that shortfall, as they explained in their proposal, is due to a variety of factors. Um, one there was some uh local share. They're projecting that the local share of property taxes will be lower due to some of the property tax relief packages that were passed in last year's session and then the special session. So, as Dr. Hill explained with the PI example, it that just requires and puts more pressure back on the state to backfill that funding. Uh, rising Medicaid costs um and then likely some Taber cap revenue
082limitations that will limit the amount of dollars available at the state level. So what that means for us in K12 um is that there was a new finance formula passed for the first time since 1994 last year that was set to begin implementation in this next school year 2526. But given some of those budgetary constraints, um the governor's budget proposal recommends slowing down that implementation. So already it was going to be a six-year phase in. Um now they're looking to change that to a seven-year phase in. Um however, something that wouldn't be phased in is the elimination of funding for average student counts which would end entirely beginning in next year in 2526. Um our current funding formula has long provided a five-year average student count. We've relied on that heavily during this time of
083declining enrollment. And we already knew that the new formula passed last year would have allowed for up to a four-year average student count. So that was already going to be a hit. Um so you might wonder why averaging is important to a district. Um why it's important. Here's a quote from case Colorado Association of School Executives last year dur during some of those funding conversations. Averaging is a proven strategy to transition responsibly with master contracts, curriculum and instruction implications and community involvement in decisions that impact students. So averaging in short provides us a window of time necessary to make expenditure adjustments. We've seen from the timeline that's been outlined here tonight, largecale decisions like this take time to implement. And so that's what averaging affords districts the time to do. And so without averaging immediately
084the full brunt of the loss of funding would be felt whenever there's a decline in enrollment um that's going to force districts to move faster and more decisively and making some of these hard decisions if that happens. So just to look at this a little bit visually. I know this is a graph that I've shared in the past um but it just highlights. So the blue bar is our total student count and you can see the steady decline over these years uh since 1920. But the way our funding works is that we're funded based on FTEES. And so just like we have staff FTE, we have student FTEEs where there are students in our system that might attend less than full-time and we receive partial funding for them. So FTE is always less than student
085count. Um but then that funded FTE count where we're funded at the higher of either the current count which that was the case in 1920. You can see those lines are all even. We are funded at based on our actual FTE count. But anytime there's a gap as there has been since 202021 um that's the result of averaging. And so that gra gap may not look very significant, but in our adopted budget this year, for example, that's about $11 million worth of funding that we're currently receiving above just what our current student count would provide. And so it's been very important. But you can see the sharp decline then if that averaging window is closed entirely next year in 2526 where that's about an 8.4% reduction to our funded FTE count just right off the
086bat. So, there's a couple different models floating around. Like I mentioned, this information is pretty fresh off the governor's desk. Um, but the information that I've been using to project is based on the num dollar amount that we receive per student, our PPR actually increasing by about nine and a half to 10% next year. And that's due to the inflationary components and the new formula impacts. Um, but like I said, that funded FTE hit that we would take by losing averaging plus the continued projected enrollment declines means that that increase would be nearly offset. And so we're looking at a net increase um rough estimate less than a percent 36% to 77% of new funding that might be available. Um but every year there are additional um contractual needs or required needs in our system
087that we would need to find funding for. Things like transportation, um the district's portion of employee health insurance, and then just utility costs increase from year to year. Um like the state, we're also starting from uh a deficit coming into the year of $2 million. And that's that 2 million that's coming out of reserves. And so while we were able to take it out of reserves for the current year, that's not sustainable. And so we knew going into that that that was the plan um while these decisions around elementary closures were made. But that's something that would need to be corrected for a balanced budget next year. Um so these revenue projections alone uh likely will not allow for step or cost of living adjustments for staff next year already. And that's tough in a
088system where knowing where we've come from and those uh the work that we've done there. It definitely jeopardizes the gains that have been made to bring salaries closer to recruitable and retainable wage. Um ultimately it's not the governor that sets the budget. It's set through the ledge session. Um that session is going to kick off January 8th and go through May 7th. Um school funding, as we've seen in the past, is typically saved towards the end of the session. So, it isn't typically until about late April or May um that we'll know what our funding looks like for next school year. Uh a lot can change, I'll say that, either for the better or for the worse. And so, obviously, we'll be closely monitoring what that means. Um but the bottom line won't change and
089that's that the state is needing to balance their budget once again and we'll need to be able to do the same with whatever is passed down to us. Further questions on that piece? Yeah. So, I have some questions, Melanie. Um, so if we don't if we were not to close schools and we have to subsidize 43 FTE at 4.2 million, which just escalates year-over-year, correct? Yes. um how that would obviously limit us in giving any other additional teacher or staff pay and what else would that affect in a sense what would it tie our hands of things that we would not be able to do yeah so it would be kind of like a snowball effect right that it only compounds when you don't make those reductions I think we've seen those in the middle
090school level before when we had delayed those um and even in the elementary we've seen how quickly those FTE accumulate that you're over. Um, so like I mentioned, there's always required increases that happen in a school district from year to year. Um, and the amount that we would be subsidizing would continue to grow and offset any of those things potentially that we would be able to do or want to do for our staff and students. Um, as well as just getting out of that $2 million use of reserves to begin with, right? And so then our our costs would continue to escalate and it looks like at least state dollars are looking like they would continue to go down. Yeah, exactly. And then now if we're projecting for a 400 um student decline, 3 to
091400 students, that's 2 to 3% that we've been able to average and kind of slow down the slope of that decline in funding. But just right off the bat, that would be two to three% in funding that any increases in state funding would then need to backfill first and foremost. And so then um if we went back to our community and asked for a mill levy override to offset the entire cost if we did not close schools, um what what does that look like? What does that ask look like? And what would that cost our taxpayers as far as additional property tax? Yeah. So, I've run some different scenarios just based on our current AV. The new AV is going to be released um in the beginning of December, so we could run some more
092in-depth projections at that time. But just looking at like a $350,000 home or non-residential property value. And so, that's what these numbers are going to be per um Dr. Hill mentioned, we're 4.2 million projected over staffed for next year. And so if we were to just close that current gap, um that would look like about $40 um per $350,000 home value per year. And non-residential is a higher assessment rate. And so that would be over $165 just to close that current gap. So that doesn't improve staffing levels, doesn't include things like teacher pay. It just keeps us where we're at right now. Um but that's a bit of a moving target. So we know that salary and benefit costs increase over time. And so at the very least um we would be needing to ask
093our community to support an MLO that would increase by inflation to at least help partially offset that. Currently we only have one MLO that does that. The other two are for a flat amount. Um so that would fill the current gap um but not increase not the increasing gap in future years. Um if we we would likely need to go back to our community as the declines continue. So, if I'm projecting out um Shannon's projections through 2032 333 at just the elementary level, that's potentially another 85 FTE that would need to be subsidized. Um so, in today's dollars, that would could easily be another 8.3 million on top of that 4.2. So, very quickly, we could be looking at 12.5 million that we would be asking our community support um just to continue doing exactly
094what we're doing right now. And so that for instance, $12.5 million would be almost $120 per $350,000 home value. Uh and almost $500 for non-residential and commercial for that same $350,000 value. And that doesn't actually so that keeps us where we are, but that doesn't actually produce um more dollars to put resources back into schools, right? That would just help us kind of stay at the level we're at. But for instance, when Dr. Hill was speaking about um at the middle school level when we had to um when principles were were cutting teched or interventionists or whatever. So none of those things would be added back into the schools at that mill levy amount. So if we wanted that, we'd have to ask for even more, right? And I think that's a tough sell. I
095mean, typically when we're going for to a community, we're asking them for additional dollars in order to provide something better, something more for students, but this would just keep us where we're at right now. Okay. Thank you. That's help. Thank you. Okay. Um, so that takes us to um the topic of closures. So, again, going back to the EDC um and some of the goals that the EDC had. So, you know, at the time working uh through that process, we identified that um in order to staff elementary schools at an appropriate level to be able to financially um afford the things that we want to be able to put into the schools, the resources we want to put in schools, like having uh an enrollment count around 380 to 400 was kind of an ideal
096number um based on our funding that we receive um and our, you know, our current salaries for for teachers and other staff. And so, um, that was something that we were looking at is how could we get closer to having that be an average, um, size for our elementary schools. And you can see the numbers on the screen there that, um, based on enrollment projections for the upcoming school year, um, the amount of schools that we actually have at those different levels. Um, three schools being above 400, 14 being between 300 and 400, six being between 200 and 300, and then two schools being um, below 200. And so, um, when we went through this process, you know, principles shared a lot about, um, the importance of consistent staffing, having to kind of do cuts
097one year and then maybe you get something back or you don't, it just makes it really hard. Um, also it hurts with, um, hiring and retention of, um, of staff in their schools. Um, and so this has become a challenge over time. Um, and over the last few years due to limited resources, with declining enrollment, um, it's just become a compounding issue. Um, and so to try to have what we called equipped and empowered schools, um, you you're trying to find a way to, um, increase the enrollment within the building so that we can staff them more properly. Um, and that's becoming harder and harder over time as we're declining um, and students. And I do again I want to point out closures alone is not going to be able to solve this for us.
098It just was the most viable pathway that the EDC um, identified through the process. So the recommendation um is to move closer to a right sizing of the district by closing elementary schools now so that we can better utilize uh and staff the remaining schools in the future. Um so again like we talked about with East and Fruit 89, you're re relocating students from a closed school through a boundary change and boosting enrollment at the receiving schools. You add staff into those receiving schools as opposed to reducing the numbers of staff there. Um we would still need to reduce FTE at the elementary school level. So I want to be clear about that. these closures don't solve the entire problem at the elementary level and based on projections we'd still have to reduce about 16
099uh in the schools that aren't impacted by this um because there are not the students there to to warrant those staff um but the closures would help with not having to reduce that even more like the numbers that we shared while ago and so but the schools that receive students would see an increase in FTE as opposed to a reduction um of FTE. Um so in 2019 uh which was a peak enrollment year for the district, our elementary schools had an average enrollment of about 388 students. So again it was around that um kind of ideal number uh to be able to staff the schools properly. Um this year due to declining enrollment since 2019, the average enrollment of our elementary schools has dropped to about 334 students on average, making it harder to staff
100the buildings. Um closing three elementary schools is projected to get that average back up to closer to 369. So again, it doesn't get us back up to where we need to be. And I need to be clear about that. Um closing four elementary schools or even five would help to get us closer to that ideal number. Um but uh we ran the numbers and we were worried that if we closed more than three that we would have to go through a reduction in force and we did not want to lay off teachers through this process. So the recommended um amount of closures at this time was three um knowing that that is not going to get us to um you know the numbers that we need uh as a district. So, we're still going to
101have to make some reductions of of staffing FTE and other schools along the way and we're going to have to continue to keep an eye on this over time obviously. Um, so let's talk about the individual schools. I do want to separate out um because NISLY is not a recommendation made because of the EDC criteria. Um, I know I shared all this in the report. Um, but the closure recommendation for NISLY is a recommendation outside of the elementary declining enrollment process. Um, it still follows the policy that the board passed. Um because within that policy we mentioned that schools could also be closed for other reasons including academic underperformance. Um in the case of Nisley the recommendation is being made to close a school due to academic underperformance. And we had CDE here to share
102a few months back. Um and so this is all review for the board. But Nisley has entered the year five the accountability clock. I remember when a school goes into one of the um two lower levels of academic ratings, they start the clock um and then you have essentially five years to try to get off of that clock. Um and and that has not happened. You have to be off you have to be at one of the top two levels for two years in a row to come off of the clock. And they're more than five years in actuality if we take into consideration that we that they got a little more grace around CO the COVID uh impact. And then also they did have one year that we um we did a request to
103reconsider and it bumped them up to an improvement level which was good but then it the next year they went back down. So that again you have to be two years at either improvement or performance to come off of the clock. So they have not come off of the clock. Um and they've been at those bottom two levels for the last seven seven of the last eight years. Um and so um we did have a review panel that comes in. That's what they do as part of this process. Um they took two days to do a site visit last year. Um and they um they they uh analyzed the school did interviews and um they have these different options that they make recommendations to the school district for. One of those is a closure. Um
104the panel um evaluates six criteria including leadership, infrastructure, personnel readiness, engagement with external support, potential impact of state investment, and the necessity for the school or district to remain open. Um and capacity levels are rated from not effective to effective. Um so Nisley scored uh in the bottom two academic levels on their school performance framework like I said for the last seven of the last eight years. Um and then within those um those uh ratings that the review panel gave um all but one area was in the lower the lower levels. Um, so, uh, even within that review that they received, um, it was not, um, you know, necessarily a positive review for the school. Um, I do want to point out that the that the state made a recommendation to go with, I think
105it was an innovation school or I can't remember what it was, but I've made made it clear last meeting and in the report as well, the the state is rarely ever going to recommend a closure for a school um because they're not going to be the ones that actually want to make that recommendation. um and with the context that we find ourselves in um that is why we're making the recommendation for um for Nisley to close uh during this time because that is one of the um pathways um that is an option through the state. Um so again the state's panel report following the site visit um assessed um all those areas and the school received that early developing rating in leadership infrastructure personnel readiness to implement improvements and capacity to engage with external partners
106um and not effective regarding the likelihood of positive returns on state investments in the current structure. Um and so um the recommendation for closure was was made. I thought I had it on here but maybe I didn't. Um, we've also just uh the amount that we've invested as far as easy dollars and um title one dollars over the years as well to try to um help boost uh academic performance there, but you know just has not uh resulted in um getting them off of the accountability clock um which is why we're having this conversation right now. Okay. Um so again, I won't go through all of this, but it's all in the report. Um, and you know, there's other factors that come into play here too with the turnover rate at the school. That's really
107hard to um, keep momentum going when you're um, having an average turnover rate of about half u or 50% every year. Um, and so um, the one area within the report that we definitely wanted to highlight and make sure that we um, take care of moving forward was the students who are served by uh, Nisley Elementary School and making sure that we provide the supports that the students need um, for whatever school that they would be attending. um the following year and Shannon will go through some of those um potential boundary changes, but the students would be uh rebounded into uh Fruit Veil or Orchard Avenue Elementary School. Um and so that's what it says here. Basically, uh Orchard Avenue is a performance uh rated school. Uh Fruitville is the second highest rating with improvement,
108right? Because at the state level, if we're if we're shuttering a school that's not performance or in the turnaround, excuse me, um our responsibility is to make sure those students are going to higher performing schools. Correct. For there's like there's stipulations on if you take students from a low performing school and I think if a certain percentage of the students end up going to another school then it impacts the accountability rating for the school. But I'm looking at Jen to make sure. That's right. At the receiving school. Okay. Jen, I hate to do this, but would you say that into the mic just so that everybody online I know there are a lot of people online. I could I can just repeat it unless you have more that you're going to share. So the the
109uh comment was that uh you just can't have more students from the from the closing school going into the receiving school than you have students at the receiving school. So, you couldn't put, I'm just making up numbers, 300 kids from the closing school into a school that only had 100 kids. That is going to impact the rating for the school that's receiving kids, but that wouldn't be the situation here um with the amount of kids that we're moving. Um and then just to kind of highlight, again, this didn't factor into the decision, but it's obviously it's a part of the equation that if we're um if we're going to uh not have a school open, um just taking a look at some of the deficiencies that the building had uh as well. And so there
110were, you know, that the school was, I think, rated a C. Um, which is better than than, you know, some schools within our district, but there are definitely issues that we would need to take care of if we were going to reuse this building for something else within the district. Um, or if we were not, then, uh, we can talk about that as well as far as what we might do with property moving forward to help with other needs in the district. Um, so that that recommendation again is separate from the EDC criteria. So, getting into the committee, um, and I just I'll go through this pretty quickly, but a reminder, we put a committee together because the the board asked for a committee to look at elementary declining enrollment. We did that. That committee
111was made up of teachers, administrators, family members from our community, community members, members of senior leadership. We had some board of education members on there, and then we also had um folks that were facilitating these meetings as well. So, we had a a uh group of diverse stakeholders uh in this process. Um I just want to highlight we did meet 10 times um with over 30 hours of work during those meetings not including the work that happened outside of um those meetings as well. And these were just some of the the things that we tackled um throughout that process. So starting with just understanding you know a lot of the issues that we're dealing with how that impacts uh staffing and funding before we would then even jump into what are some options that we
112would want to look into um as a committee for how we're going to address the declining enrollment at the elementary schools. So, um, those 10 meetings, we also had some town halls as well, um, to get us to the point where we had that final report that we presented to the board, um, in, uh, September of 23. Um, what came out of this uh, process was five pathways. So, pathway one, which was overwhelmingly um, the most viable pathway from the EDC committee, um, was school closures. Um, and so that was one pathway. We already mentioned a while ago, mill levy is something else that was mentioned. um we had to secure the dollars we already had first. So that's why we passed 4B this year. But again, that does not give us any new money,
113but there was a question if down the road are we going to have to do an additional milly? And that's something we'll have to talk about. Um we have also, you know, tried to increase um different options and uh programs within the district that we do have. Uh to the question around there was can we attract families back? Um and so we've been going through a process to try to increase those programs as well. Um, we already talked about trying to subsidize and provide flexible support through possible increases in state funding, uh, state per pupil funding, excuse me. Um, but Mel just shared that that forecast is not looking great for us. Uh, and it and it really hasn't been. Um, so that's been a tougher one. And then, uh, ongoing evaluation of central office
114staff. I already mentioned that we've reduced about $1.3 million worth of central office staffing already. And every year, this year included, we'll always take a look at that and say, are there areas that we can find efficiencies? Are we are there positions that we don't backfill? And so we'll continue that process moving forward as well. So we've been going through all of those. So the the other thing that the committee did was they came up with criteria and that was their biggest one of their biggest charges was if we're going to have to close schools, if it's the most viable option, what criteria should we use through this process? And they came up with six and we had a whole process for that as well where folks voted and then they voted on how much
115we should weigh the criteria and this is the way that it came out. So, six criteria, building adequacy being the the leading criteria with 45.3, um transportation and proximity being 20.6, um low enrollment being 11.6, logic of future boundaries being 8.7, school performance being 7.6, and geographic future growth being 6.4. And I mentioned before that we um we engaged with an outside group uh to help us come up with ways to calculate these scores and apply them uh in a way that would not be bias. Um and um and so we engaged with&m to go through this process. And so you can see the methodology that they used and the sources of data that they used as well um to to come up with those numbers. Um I just want to point this out. I
116didn't have this in last month's but I went back and looked through the EDC um meetings and the notes. And I do want to highlight because there's a couple of criteria that we've gotten a lot of questions about. Um so one of them is building adequacy. Why are why are we so focused on building adequacy? 92% of the committee said that this should be a top criteria. Um the top criteria um and this was some of the feedback that we got from committee members. Student physical safety is paramount. Safety and viability for students. We need to have buildings that can last long term and not become a financial black hole. Also, we need the buildings to be safe. Um this needs to be considered. It's very important especially financially long term. It's critical to building
117safety. Safety and learning environment must considers for fiscal. So you're hearing the same theme over and over again. committee members are saying if we're going to have to go through this process um then we should also look at which buildings we're actually closing and the ones that have the most deficiencies are going to take the most amount of money to put into them is that the smartest financial investment and also that may be unsafe versus keeping buildings open that have that are safer that have less deficiencies that we'd have to take care of especially in a time of um you know those only way we pay for those is through bond dollars and so we have to go out for bonds to take care of these things so it was overwhelming the top uh criteria
118from the from the committee for these reasons. Um, and then the other one because we've had some questions about performance, like why why didn't we wait performance more from the committee. Um, I just want to point out because I went back and looked at some of the voting that happened. 67% of the committee actually said that they did not want this to be a criteria at all. Okay? And I understand how that could you hear that and you think, well, why would you not want to weigh performance? These are some of the reasons in there. Um, but also I think as we were having this conversation with the committee, um, folks felt like what's the problem we're actually trying to solve here? We're not closing schools because of performance necessarily, right? I realize Nizzley is
119on there because of year five of the clock, but that's not really the problem we're trying to solve. We're trying to solve for declining enrollment, less utilization, which means less staffing and less ability to provide resources for schools. So that's why they took this as an opportunity to look at if we're going to actually have to make those closures, what is the criteria we want to focus on? If we were closing schools because of performance, that would be a completely different problem that we're trying to solve. Um, and we'd be in a completely different place, but that's not where we are. And so, you can see from the feedback, folks were worried that if we waited this heavily, um, that uh it's a moving target. Um, it's too many different things that indicate those different
120things. It also uh changes often. Um, there was a worry that achievement and growth aren't the same thing. Also, not all schools are currently given the same resources or have the same demographics or reflect positive achievement and growth. Um, one committee member felt like it it picked on low performing schools. There's so many factors that can impact the school's academic rating. Too many factors uh would only support growth possibly, but not achievement and maybe a lower tier uh criteria. Uh it's harmful to poor and bipok communities. The schools they attend um tend to not have the resources nor do the parents have the resources to pay for things like tutors for their children. Too many different variables. And then we did have um one committee member that said that they did feel like this should
121be one of the top um criteria. So I just want to point that out like this was because we've had some questions about that. Why didn't we wait that heavier? That that is the discussion that the committee had and actually there were way more than six criteria that we talked about in that process and we whittleled it down to this. There were things we talked about like school of choice and other things and the comm the committee just didn't feel like that should factor into um these decisions as much as some of these other criteria. So I sat on that committee along with director Chavez who was a community member at the time and and Dr. Schulties was was on. She was a board member at that time as well. Um this was a robust
122conversation. I mean we really we really hammered this and and debated this at length. Um, I'd be interesting to go back and see how many hours we went through and through and through this. And there was just such a it was so subjective that this is where this is really where the committee ended up landing on this. Again, there were other ones, but I just pulled these out because I know we've gotten some questions about them recently. Um, so thinking about all that, we have criteria that was developed by the committee. We had the final report. Then we went through a process with&m again I won't spend a lot of time on this but collecting data interviewing subject matter experts u proposing preliminary metrics which we worked with them on integrating and normalizing the metric
123results presenting the summary results u to the subject matter experts and leadership um and then updating that based on the feedback and I do want to point out that throughout this process um they maintain independence from the district and the subject matter uh experts biases by only presenting uh analysis methodology with um notional inputs or excuse me outputs ensuring methodology was understood and vetted but not allowing modifications based on results. So basically what it's saying is they didn't actually tell us the school name so that we could say well I actually don't like that result now because it has that school's name attached to it. It was these were blinded and um and they reviewed it with us all throughout the process until it got to the point where they actually um brought the report
124forward to us. Right. Because that was that was a concern last time when schools were named that there was um not some you know, objectivity when it came to the choice of schools. And so, I know moving forward in this process, um, we basically wanted it to be blind both to admin and the board up until the very end where we had to actually then know which name of the school was. So, I know as you were presenting information to the board, we didn't have any idea which schools were which until you all finally released the names towards the end, right? and we felt like that was important. Um, so I I went through this last month, but I'll quickly go through it. So, building adequacy, um, we utilized, uh, the results of the facility
125master plan, which was a process separate from this. Um, I know the timing, um, it actually helped that we actually had a facility master plan process and finalized because we didn't have that before. So, if we're going to have to make decisions around this, you want the most up-to-date data. And so, um, that's a combination of looking at building condition and also adequacy of the building. Um and so that we had that report that was happening um through a committee process as well and we had those results to be able to help us with this first criteria. Can you go into just a little more detail about um the company that we used and just sort of the process that they went through in order to go through all the buildings, assess those um and
126then also maybe address the assessment of the educational adequacy as well as the building itself. Yeah. So, um, so we worked with HCM, um, and they they facilitated the process, um, but they also contracted with folks that actually went into the buildings and actually took a look at every single building. So, um, these these results were based on, um, the analysis that they did of every single building within our school district. And that was very important for us as we went through this process to say um, we want to look at every single district facility, not just schools, but also central office. So, it wasn't just HCM on their own doing this. they were actually contracting with folks locally to go into all of our buildings to come up with these scores. Um, and so,
127um, yeah, there's a there's building condition, which I just kind of summarizes like how well is it actually holding up, and then there's building adequacy, how well is it actually meeting the needs of students today. And you can see they there's a couple examples that are given up there around safety, um, suitability, accessibility, um, and then also technology readiness within the building. So they they've got a a list of like nine different categories, broad categories that they use to come up with that score. Um, and then the building condition score is based solely on just the physical condition of the building itself and how well it's going to hold up and how much money you might have to put into fixing all the issues in the building or potentially replacing the building. And as that
128number as that amount of what it would cost to fix all the deficiencies starts to line up more with how much it would cost to actually replace the building as a whole, it starts to become the rating just basically drops on it. So, it starts to get to a point where why would you put that much money into fixing it when you could just go ahead and replace it um alto together. And so, within the report, if folks want to look at it, it is on our website. It does break that down further. Um but again, I just want to highlight that this process was was something that we were going to do regardless of whether we even going into the school closures because we needed a facility master plan to identify deficiencies in our
129buildings and figure out a plan for how we're going to address them. I've mentioned during the election season, we have $600 million$600 million plus uh dollars worth of deferred maintenance within our buildings. Um and so that all came from from this report as well. And I did pull this out because when we were going through that process and again we had a committee um that was part of this process as well made up of uh family members, staff, teachers, community members for the facility master plan as well. You know, there was there were definite uh principles that were guiding the work that we were looking at. We wanted to have a clear plan. We wanted to be something that we could update um regularly. Safety was a big concern um from the um facility master
130plan committee. Um they wanted uh spaces that were flexible um change and could adjust for changing enrollments. Um they also wanted to look at durability and efficient uh durability and efficiency of our buildings and our facilities and then also the accessibility um of our buildings as well. So these were the kind of six guiding principles that we worked off of and we developed um a plan based off of that with the facility master plan. Um so that's the first criteria. Again, it was weighted with um 45.3% uh was building adequacy. The second one was transportation proximity. Um and they the the way that that was calculated was looking at 50% of it was the average mileage increase by student if you were to close a school. Um and then 50% of it was the average
131percent distance change by student as well. And so they have a database that they pulled from to be able to run those numbers for every school. Um low enrollment which was 11.6% is basically looking at the utilization um current utilization of a school building comparing uh enrollment to capacity and we did have that updated with um with current enrollment as well um when we worked with them. Um and then logic of future boundaries, that's 8.7%. That was a combination of current enrollment versus uh current open seats that are available. Um so you're looking at as of today number of seats open within two miles of each school versus school enrollment. Um and then 25% of it was in the next five years using projections, the number of seats open within two miles of each school
132versus school enrollment. And so that's they came up with a number for every school based on those two um pieces of data as well. school performance. I already mentioned um we have uh we have a lot of data actually that we can pull from from that. So we 60% of it was weighted on growth academic growth and 40% was weighted on academic achievement which is how the state uh calculates uh school performance for our uh schools and our district. Um and so they utilized um five years worth of uh growth over time um or growth and achievement for schools as well. And then the last one just being geographic future growth. So using the projections over the next 5 years um for different uh schools uh within our community and that was 6.4% of the
133criteria. All that was calculated um the results were presented to us. Um and so it it ranked the schools based on those criteria. Um the schools with the highest total rating were scored highly on the criteria established by EDC and are the least likely candidates for consolidation while schools with a lower score um were the most viable um options. And then this is all on the report, but this is how the scores broke down for the two schools that were the most viable options for um closure candidates um being Scenic and then Clifton. And you can see the breakdown of the scores there as well. Um and then the next next uh option of a school would have been in the 40s. So it was 40.2. Um I did get that question from staff of
134are we going to release the rest of the names of the schools? And um I am not. And the reason why uh is I actually got a um an email from a staff member at uh one of the schools that was slated for closure a couple years ago and then we never actually closed them. And um their advice was um we've had to spend these last two years wondering if we're going to close. If you name other schools and you're not actually going to close them, all you're doing is setting those schools up to worry that they're going to be the next ones coming down the road. And there really isn't any benefit to doing that. And so um because we're only clo I'm only recommending three. We we I recommended Nisley because of the
135separate um uh year five of the accountability clock process. I'm only recommending these two schools moving forward, but I did want to share that there was a gap between these schools in the next um viable option as well. So, real quick, um for Scenic, this again this is all in the report um but the score that it received a 28 uh.1 um is rated as an F in the facility master plan. Um it has a capacity of 304 students. It's current enrollment is 241. Um currently 144 students are attending who live in the school's attendance boundary, 25 on transfer and 72 school of choice. Um it also currently has 27 students who live in that area but choice and option out. So these are just some some factors with the number of kids in the
136area. Um it has seen a increase in student enrollment this year but that has u after recent declines but that has mainly come from school of choice in the transfer process. So it hasn't necessarily meant that there was an increase in students in the attendance boundary uh in that area. It's coming from um from school of or school of choice and and transfer students. Um and then as Shannon already mentioned, there's a projected decline in enrollment moving forward for that area. Um this is a lot on the screen, but um we've had some questions about what all needs to be taken care of in the building. Um and there is a lot there are a lot of needs within the building. um everything from site safety, structural needs, accessibility, plumbing. You know, one of the
137biggest costs would be having to put a um an elevator in the school. It's not ADA compliant. Um and and there's just other issues as well. And I know that we've gotten a lot of feedback about the um the open concept and how folks like that, but from a safety and security standpoint, um it does become an issue. Um and so that's something that was factored into it as well that if you're going to create a safe uh safer learning environment, you're going to have to invest money into um setting the school up in that way. So this is just uh and again we can share all this, but these are um just some of the items from the report um that were um major issues within the building that we would need to take
138care of um if the building was to remain open. Um, and again, it's a building that is um max capacity to a little over 300 students, which when you're talking about before having a school that's closer to 380 to 400 is actually ideal for our staffing formula. And so, you're never actually going to be able to get there um with the current school um capacity. Um the closure of Scenic uh would require a boundary change. Um and Shannon will go into some of these in a second, but um current scenic students uh would be reboundary to Broadway or Windgate. Um and so um and those are obviously two great schools, two um high performing schools as well. Um and so and then the students who res currently are enrolled there who don't resided within the
139boundaries would either be um reszone back to their neighborhood school or they could go through the school of choice process if they were looking for a different school as well. Um and then Clifton was the second um viable option, most viable option for closure, scoring a 33.8. Again, they received a D from their facility M in the facility master plan. um they have a capacity of 492. Their current enrollment is 305. And then you can see the numbers of students that are um they're on u transfer or school of choice. And then the students that transfer school of choice out um and they've seen a decrease in student enrollment over time. Um and they're projected to to see a decrease as well um with the currently projected enrollment of less than 300 students as early
140as 2027. So that obviously factored into the criteria with a projected decline in enrollment. Again, if we're talking about the building, um, one, because it's such a it was such a huge component or criteria for, uh, closure, but also just thinking about the building moving forward, there are a lot of, um, facility needs in that building as well. Um, and um, and it would cost a lot of money to to be able to bring it up to the level that we need it to be at to be a safe learning environment for our students that meets their needs. Um, so this is just some of the issues that would need to be taken care of uh in the building. Again, I'm happy to share this um and we can put it on uh we'll put
141this all on the website after the u meeting obviously as well. Um and then if we closed uh Clifton, there's a couple different scenarios that Shannon will review. Again, the board's not asked to vote on any of the boundaries tonight, but just thinking it through. Um students would either be um reboundered into Thunder Mountain, Rocky Mountain, and then potentially some students to Chatfield as well. We did have a a conversation at one point about Taylor Elementary, but there's just some concerns with accessibility for families to be able to get out to the Palisade area if they don't have transportation. And so, um, we backed off of that one. Um, so financial and staffing impacts of closures. So, this is something that I shared similar to what I shared before about u with the middle school
142when we closed east. So, I just want to highlight if we were to go forward with closures and um use the boundary recommendations that I've um shared with the the board. Um this is the difference in what you would see um in the student count currently and then the change in students you would see at the schools that are being impacted. So, for example, Broadway 261 students currently, they'd see a 36 student increase. Um they originally were going to be overstaffed by 1.2. they actually would be uh getting an additional 1.5 FTE which would be a 2.77 change um between those two. And so you can see how it would impact the different schools. So Chatfield again instead of um well they were actually going to gain three which is really hard to to gain.3
143of a staff but because we would increase their enrollment they would actually gain 4.7 FTE for next year. Fruit Veil was going to lose 1.7. Uh they would actually gain uh 7.4. Uh Orchard Avenue would lose 1.6 six because of declines they would actually gain as well. So you can see the the differences in that fourth column versus the fifth column. And I do want to be clear, these are estimates um and they'll have to be adjusted based on the actual boundary changes. And then once we go through the school of choice process because that'll change numbers, but this is just kind of projections and it's to show the idea that if we if a school closes and you move students into neighborhood school or neighboring schools, um instead of pulling staff out of buildings,
144you actually would be adding uh FT into those buildings. Um, yeah. When you look at uh the schools and you look at student count and then you're when you move people over, what's the capacity of each of those schools? So Shannon will talk about that when he does um his his slides. So yeah, that was one of the conversations we had with him was making sure that we can actually fit the students in the buildings. Um and especially when thinking through that we're going to see declines moving forward as well. So um so you might have a situation where year one it may be pretty close to capacity there but it's the expected decline over time is um anticipated there but he has some slides on that as well. I you might touch on this
145later, but will you let us know what amount of FTE you're looking at cutting from the other elementary schools because I know when we were looking at the closure of East, we we looked at not just East and um the schools that were receiving East students, but you guys showed us the numbers of FTE that still had to be cut on top of um offsetting measure of East. So that would be okay that's a good question because yeah I I mentioned it a couple times but it is good to clarify that these these closures only impact these schools. We still would have other schools that would not be impacted by the closure and they are currently overstaffed and so we are going to have to reduce staffing at those buildings. And that's why um I
146mentioned before that closing four to five schools would get us closer to not having to do that as many campuses, but it would have potentially put us in a position where we're going to have to um lay off teachers, which we were um not interested in doing. Thank you. Um so, elementary schools are currently overstaffed by um uh 26 FTE right now. That's what we know. Um and then I already mentioned before that's about a $2.6 million cost of subsidizing. And then I already mentioned next year that that's projected to grow. Um and so uh we would recoup about $1.4 million um in unfunded positions. And then we like I said, we'd still need to reduce FT at the remaining elementary schools that weren't um impacted by the closures. Um and then the other thing
147I just want to throw in there, so this is some um numbers that um that our operations team pulled together. So, thinking about the buildings, um the amount that we spend on utility costs, custodial um supply costs, operational costs, um obviously you got to figure out what you're going to do with the building in the future. So, if it turns into something else that we're going to use, then you'd still factor these in. But if not, um and if it was something that we sold off and took offline, then you could anticipate that you'd also see a reduction in in costs in these areas as well. And so between those three school buildings, um it's we're spending about $326,000 on utilities, custodial supplies, and and operational costs for those buildings as well. Brian. Yep. Now,
148when we uh if if a school gets taken offline and the receiving schools, do we take in consideration how many kids are on IEPs and 504s and where they go to and what school is best for them? Yeah, and I've got a slide on that as well. um and that process that we would be going through um as well with the school district. Thank you. Um so another thing just to put out there is the numbers from the facility master plan on the cost of these buildings if we were to if they were to remain open, right? So let's say that we weren't going to close schools, we still have deficiencies within our buildings. And so if we were going to take care of those needs, um this is what those costs would look like.
149So for for example, so phase one cost, I just want to be clear because there was some confusion around this. Phase one was um if the bond were to pass, how much money would we want to allocate to the building to just take care of the highest priority needs, but it is not every need in the building. So, uh Clifton getting would get would have gotten around $3.8 million. That is money that we would not be putting into that building. Now, we obviously would put those dollars into other um facilities that would remain open in the district. And then you can see Nizzley and Scenic as well. But the total condition cost, which is the third column over, um that is how much it would actually cost to take care of all the building deficiencies
150in those buildings. So it would cost about $15 million to take care of all the the deficiencies in Clifton. It would cost about um $8.1 million for Nisley and about $7.6 million for Scenic. Um, and then this is an estimated cost in the LA in the next row of how much it actually would cost to build an elementary school today to the size and scope that we're looking for. And our our our um last example we had of that was building Monument Ridge, it's going to cost you around $30 million to build a new elementary school in today's dollars. And so if we were to try to replace these buildings down the road, you're talking about it even more of a cost. And then I just um I put the ratings up there that I
151already mentioned before for the building. So, these are also costs that would we'd have to factor into the equation as well of how much it would actually cost to take care of all those needs because if we're going to keep them open, we'd obviously want to take care of the deficiencies within the buildings, but that's going to pull from being able to invest in the remaining buildings. I have a question. Uh, you put down that the district would recoup 1.4 million in unfunded positions from Nesley, Sneak, and Clifton. Could you explain that to me? Because if we move all staff to other positions and they get jobs, how do we recruit that extra money? Could you explain that to me? Yeah, I'm looking at Mel if maybe she can help me with that because I'll
152butcher it. Thank you, Mel. All right. So again, just to start out with, I guess the re reason for the recommendation of three schools versus more is that every year there's natural attrition that takes place in our school district where people retire, resign, move, etc. And so there will be more positions we anticipate than will be needed even with the people that may be displaced here through this process. Um, but just about how the staffing model works. So there is a ratio, it's 14.4015 4015 to be exact for the elementary level of when you move students that number of FTE is moved but not all of the FTE will be needed at those receiving schools and so certainly classrooms will be staffed so there'll be teaching positions PAR positions um but what in what ends
153up happening is some of the other positions um such as a principal obviously we'll need fewer of those um and assistant principles counselors office support staff some of that ends up being the savings, but we would hope, of course, that other positions would open up for the staff there within the district. Does that help? Thank you so much. You're welcome. I promise I'm almost done. So, um, scenarios. Shannon, are you still there? I am. I am still here. Okay. So, I'm gonna turn it over to Shannon. Uh this is again all in the report that was put out last Friday, but um he's going to walk through some potential um scenarios for the boundary changes. Uh and again, it's not a decision the board would make tonight, but it's something we'd have to factor in
154for December. So Shannon, just let me know when you want me to switch slides. Uh yes, thank you. Next slide, please. Um so all of these scenarios work within the capacities defined uh by the&M report. The additional buses uh were uh conferenced with our transportation contractor very carefully and um were estimated to be about $50,000 per additional bus. Um there were um three scenarios generated for Clifton, three scenarios generated for Nisley and one scenario generated for uh Scenic. uh you can see the uh potential uh destination schools. Uh there have been uh preferred scenarios uh expressed for a variety of reasons. I'll touch on those just briefly. Um next slide, please. Here are the transportation impacts. Scenic would require a single additional bus uh at a cost of about $50,000. The um Clifton scenarios would
155require three buses at a cost of about 150 per year. And then the Nisley scenarios, all three of them require one bus. Uh next slide, please. Uh scenic um would be the movement of about 44 students uh north of Broadway or highway 341 to Broadway Elementary and about 101 students south of Broadway to Windgate Elementary. Uh there are about 90 students outside of the attendance area that would have the um open enrollment process available to them. Uh mentioned by Dr. Hill. Uh, next slide, please. So, here you can see the students that are um north of um Broadway that would go to Broadway Elementary and the students that are south of Broadway that would go to Windgate. Next slide, please. Here you can see the enrollment effect over time and uh both schools remain fundamentally
156within their capacities as defined by the&m report. Next slide please. Clifton there were three scenarios. Uh one divided enrollment between uh Taylor and Rocky Mountain. another divided enrollment between uh Thunder Mountain and Rocky Mountain and another divided enrollment between uh Thunder Mountain, uh Rocky Mountain, and uh Chatfield. Um all of those required um three additional buses at a cost of about $150,000 per year. Um next slide, please. Here is the um perspective of the option of keeping the Clifton students um in their Mount Garfield feeder by taking them to Taylor Elementary. But you can see that's about five or six miles along Highway 6, which would be a major change in community of interest. Uh next slide, please. Here would be the enrollment effect of that. And the effect on Thunder Mountain would um push
157the school just a little bit over its capacity according to one of the&m reports capacity rubrics and it would be well within capacity according to the uh comfortable fit uh scenario of their capacity calculation which was the second one. Uh next slide please. Clifton scenario two um which is uh again uh Taylor and Rocky Mountain uh both schools remain um more or less within capacity. Uh, next scenario here is the idea of taking the students that live um south of E and a half and dividing those between Chatfield and Rocky Mountain and that better balances enrollment among the three schools that would be affected. Uh on the next slide you can see the enrollment effects of that. Again, Thunder Mountain according to one of the uh&m reports capacity rubrics is over capacity and then according
158to the other the second capacity rubric they're well under. So we believe that the uh students that would be divided would fit into all three schools using this boundary scenario. Uh, next scenario, please. Uh, Nissley, there were three of these identified. Um, uh, basically it's a division between, uh, Orchard Avenue and Fruitville alone or including, uh, taupe in the uh, change. So, the first one shows uh, next slide please. shows the division between um Nisley moving um the majority of the students around the school and north of Patterson Road to Orchard Avenue and then taking the remainder uh to Fruitville. The next slide shows post enrollment uh post change enrollment and all of these are more or less within within the capacities of the schools. Uh next slide please. Uh this is a scenario where
159we would include TOE Elementary in the destinations and this results in moving a lot of children around basically. And so um uh this alternative is still um on the table but is less preferred and it again divides enrollment between three schools instead of two. Uh the next slide shows the enrollment effect of doing that. all remain within capacity as shown. Uh the next slide shows the um third scenario um which takes a a different approach to dividing among um Orchard Avenue, Taupe, and Nisley with a um a group of students immediately uh west of Orchard Avenue uh going to um Taupe. So there would be a some students that aren't affected by the closure would actually have a boundary change um associated with the change. And finally, this uh uh that's all three actually. Here's
160the third one here, which is um a phase change of part of that Orchard Avenue area that I just mentioned uh into taupe instead of doing them all at once. And I'll turn it back over to Dr. Hill. Okay. Any questions for Shannon? Because we also might lose him to another meeting in a little bit. So, any questions for him? Again, you're not voting on any of this tonight, but it's just conversations. So, um you guys are still going to work on this to come up with the best recommendation for the board. So, these are just proposed scenarios. you guys are going to still work um if if the vote goes forward um and if it's approved that you'll come back after looking at this and give the board the best recommendation. Yeah. And we
161want to boundaries we want to be able to do that ideally in December because families are going to want and as early as possible. So, you know, possibly December 3rd, um, because families are going to want to know where would my student go to school next year and then it gives them enough time before a school of choice window would open if they decide they want to go through that process instead. So, if we don't do it in December and we delay it into January, it doesn't give as much of a window of opportunity for families to know that information. So, we would want to bring something back early December um to the board. This be presented at our December 3rd meeting. Okay. Thank you. I would I would like to ask that when this
162is presented because I know that um it was said earlier that Shannon was going to give us some like 504 IEP information, but I would love to see that in that presentation as well. That way we have a good idea of what's going to happen with those kids and what the resources are going to be available at the accepting schools if this is approved. So, real quick, um this is information that we shared with staff, but I just wanted to share it with the board again and and then publicly. So if school closures were to happen, the different supports we would offer to staff at the buildings that would be closing. So um because the these three schools are recommended for closure, all staff in the buildings would need to apply for positions and that
163is because of Colorado law around mutual consent. We can't place staff into buildings. Um they have to go through a process, but we have um we have condensed that process down. We've learned a lot through the last couple years of going through this. So, um, the hiring process, we want to post positions for teachers, counselors, and support staff, uh, beginning. We have to wait for the school of choice window to close so we can know where kids are going to go and then do the final staffing numbers for schools. Um, but so we have to go through that first, but we're looking at midFebruary to be able to post positions. Um, that I mentioned that process would be a condensed version like we've done in the past. Um, so that current staff wouldn't have to
164go through the full-on application processes if you were coming into the district brand new. We offer we also are um wanting to offer an early retirement incentive for all elementary school staff who are eligible. Um and that ideally would free up some additional positions for folks to be able to take advantage of. And so we'll send that information out uh if if the vote were to happen for school closures, we'll send out information to staff about that. Um and then also just additional supports through things like um the EAP, additional sessions if staff, you know, this is going to impact everybody differently. And so if they need um in someone to talk to um additional sessions there, also sub days um for staff to be able to um if they need a subday in the
165spring to kind of get things together if maybe we've had staff that haven't had to go through an interview in a while. And so um being able to provide some time for that. Um and then also HR would be at the schools to help them um as well. Um, I mentioned the hiring process. We have to wait till after school of choice window closes. So, we're ideally going to get positions posted midFebruary, which is very, it's a lot earlier than we've done in the past, but that helps us to, uh, help find positions for folks quickly. Um, and then all non-probationary um, staff, uh, teachers, counselors, and support staff are guaranteed a position next year. So, that's also within the law. And so, um, but probationary staff would also need to apply for positions. and
166if they didn't find a position for some reason by May we would non-renew but um they would be able to continue applying for jobs and we always end up hiring folks through the summer and into the fall. So again our goal with only recommending three was that we can find positions for um for our staff that are in those buildings that would be recommended for closure um and we wouldn't have to do a reduction in force. Um just to kind of give you an idea of what that looked like for Fruit 89 because the process was a lot smoother than it was when we closed east in the spring. Um this is the percentage of folks from the school that were rehired um that were temporarily placed um that resigned and that retired and we
167had we non-renewed nobody through that process for the licensed staff which is a good thing. Um and then the same thing for support staff. We didn't have to non-renew uh anybody through that as well. And so that would be our goal uh here as well that we can find positions for our folks because we want to keep our um our teachers within our district and our staff within our district. Um, and then I just some of these things just we talked about a while ago, but um, so once boundaries are finalized, if school closures are voted on and boundaries are finalized, we'll communicate with families uh, informing them where the new school boundary would be. We would talk about transportation options um, being communicated with families. Um, we would obviously we've hosted events and opportunities
168for the receiving schools to reach out and welcome the new students and families into their schools. Things like school tours and things like that. Um, also, uh, we haven't done this in the past, but we've talked about, um, for those families that are on school of choice or transfer and they would be, um, either going back to their neighborhood school or they could go through the choice process again. We want to be able to provide a list to the, um, principles of the neighborhood schools to be able to reach out to those families and say, "I understand, you know, school closed. You live within our boundaries. We'd love to have you come see the school." Um, and again, families have choice in that if they don't want to, but it would be an opportunity to
169connect with their their neighborhood school and but everybody picks school of choice and transfer for different reasons. So, um, it's going to depend on the family. Um, and then we obviously would have those school of choice and transfer opportunities in the spring and fall like we always do. Um, I do want to highlight that we've every year we apply for easy grant dollars to support schools, especially schools that are um title one or um are uh looking at academic improvement, but there's also a pathway now for getting dollars to support families through school closures and and students and families. And so we've applied for that and if we get that funding, we'd be working with some folks to help support that transition for families in the spring and into the fall as well. And there
170would be actual dollars there to help with that. Um and then um also we want to make sure we're supporting families, especially families whose native language is other than English from our department of access opportunity and family partnerships doing different outreach to talk about um what those boundaries are going to look like, where the students will be going and kind of walking them through the process as well um so that we don't have language barriers um through that process as well. So we've talked about some ideas um for going out into um the community and talking to families there. Um there was a question about um students that are um receiving different services. So we already have meetings scheduled with homewarebound and that was a question before of how are we supporting the students um
171at Nisley and so we have a meeting set up and know Jen and the team are meeting with them and other community support services as well to talk about how we can best support students through this transition. um student services department's primary focus uh would be on supporting students through the IEPs um through um the CLLD CLLD department alps behavior attendance. So whatever those um uh the services the students are receiving we want to continue to have those services provided to students moving forward. So once we closures are announced, student services team will coordinate closely with both the closing and receiving schools case managers to ensure the uh continuity of support for students with existing plans. And then in the throughout the spring semester, student services will facilitate the metriculation and transition planning to prepare
172for shifts uh at closing, receiving, and supporting schools. And then again, once those closures are announced, our special education department will determine who's going where, either by boundary or by programming. uh and the case managers will work with the receiving teams uh and the parents to make introductions and begin those communications so that there's a smooth transition. Um and then other things just welcoming messages from receiving principles to all schools um first so that special education feels general education first. So they're receiving not just communication from the special education department from the schools themselves. Um and that sped team will develop protocols for communication and steps on this. And then the goal here is there shouldn't be um there shouldn't be new goals and the previous uh or excuse me the provision of services should
173not be interrupted by these changes and that's the goal for the department supporting students and families through this. Um and so real quick looking ahead I mentioned this last month um you know we are I mentioned Shannon's um Shannon's projections. So we're projected to continue to decline. uh it's impacting us in a lot of different ways and so um we we're trying to make decisions now knowing that uh further uh declines are coming down the road um and trying to balance um the amount of closures versus um wanting to take care of staff and our families and students at the same time as well. Um, I mentioned this before, but these are the themes that we've kept at the center of all this work. Trying to put kids first through this process, knowing that as
174you're declining enrollment, you're declining in resources. It act it is going to have a negative impact on students and it has um for us. Monitoring those trends because this is a national problem. Making sure that we're making decisions early enough and we're not waiting until it gets so bad um that we're having to make some drastic decisions. Um identifying those sources of savings through this process and being able to put that money back into our schools. Having an objective approach was very important for us obviously. And then I just want to highlight there is a cost of waiting. If we don't make decisions, the problem just continues to get worse for us as a school district. And again, as much as I would love to say that it's going to change tomorrow, it's it's just
175not. And that's the way the projections are going. And so, we're trying to keep these things at the forefront. Um, so I'll just close with saying that is everything that I need to share. I'm open to answering any questions from the board. Um, I I do want to end this how I ended the presentation last month. We are where we are. Um and and this is where we are and it's definitely not ideal. The declining enrollment problem unfortunately is not going away. We've been processing this issue as a community for two years. We've tried to be responsive to the wishes of the board and the community. Take some time, slow down, create a process, stick to the process, make decisions, and move forward in a supportive way. The journey has not been perfect, and the
176process will never be perfect. I fear that if we delay decisions, uh, as tough as they may be, uh, that we're going to put our kids in our community in a worse situation because inaction is an action, um, and it's a decision, uh, and inaction is not what's right for our district. We need to make some decisions, as tough as they may be, and we need to move forward as a community. I love our district and our community. I know everyone here and online does as well, and I know the board does, too. Um, my job and our job is to do what's best for the district as a whole. Um, and so we need to keep that as a focus. Um, and the way that we can take care of and prioritize each each
177individual school is by always putting the entire district's needs first. While school closures don't solve all of the problems, these are decisions that will ultimately help our entire district. And I hope we prioritize that. This process was objective. It was absent of bias. And as painful as it uh is to name schools, sticking to that objective process allows trust in that process. These are the data. These are the recommendations. And I hope um that I've helped folks understand how we got here and where we're headed. Um, I'll end the presentation and remarks by reiterating how much I love our entire community and I look forward to us continuing to work together to serve our students the best way we can in these trying times. Um, thanks and then I'll open up if there's any additional
178questions from the board. [Music] All right. While I'm pulling up my notes, I have a bunch of questions. Um, so when we were doing this, why were charter schools and the option schools like New Emerson and DIA not chosen or considered? So when we went through the elementary declining enrollment process, which actually some of those charters are not elementary schools, they're um they're multi-level. Um, so they weren't actually factored in. Um, and one of the pathways uh through the EDC process was looking for more um uh choice option schools, right? are magnet schools like New Emerson is a magnet school. It has an application process. Families apply for that school every year. There's a wait list that is a different school than like a traditional neighborhood school. So, there was not a desire from the
179EDC committee to eliminate those options for families because if anything, there was a conversation about how do we try to um retain or bring in more families. Um so, um so those schools that are that were magnets or option um schools with a lottery system uh were not included in that um process. Well, and with charters, they have their own governing boards, right? We actually have some rules on what we can and cannot do to um I guess for lack of lack of a better term, swooping in and just closing um charter schools, right? And then there's a there's obviously a renewal process every few years and so we go through that. So, yeah, we do have contracts with all those um with all our indirect charter schools uh with expectations tied to that. And
180you're right, they do have their own uh governing boards as well. Okay. Um, sorry, I have all my notes here. Um, so when when we were deciding this, I know some people thought that the district was sitting on this information while we went out for the bond and mill. Can you kind of I know you you touched on it briefly early on, but there's been a lot of slides. So, um, what like why did we not get the information until after the election? Well, a big reason for that was uh wanting to get the most accurate enrollment count numbers. And so you have to wait until October count is done um to get those numbers uh to make any adjustments that we needed to to the application of the criteria, but then also just running
181these scenarios with Shannon, it takes time um to figure out uh what the best options are before we would make any recommendation to the board. So yeah, I mean it's it's unfortunate. There's a lot of rumors out there. There's there was no delaying things because of a bond. Actually, that wouldn't even make any sense. Um because if the bond were to fail, that would impact the entire district and all schools within the district. Um so, no, this is just the timing that uh of the way things happened. I wanted to actually get it to y'all sooner. Um but the soonest I could get it to y'all, I think I put on there was November 8th or I can't remember the exact date. Um that was the earliest we were able to get the information to
182the board to have some time to review. So, um but it was waiting on some pertinent data. What is the process with the October count? like what what does a district have to go through and then submit those numbers and then get information back from the state? Yeah. And again, I'm going to butcher this, too. So, Mel, sorry, Mel, you should just probably have a permanent seat up here with us. There you go. Um, so the October count process, there's an official count day that's at the beginning of October, depending on how the days fall. And so, that takes place every year. And then within that um there's actually a count window on both sides of that count day where we can still receive funding even if a student was absent on that particular count
183day if they've established attendance. And so there's a whole lot of demographic data that goes into the data that's submitted to the state above just the number of students that we have. Um and so it's a huge database that we end up submitting. Um they have to clean up errors. There's a whole process that goes through in the month of October. And so Sarah and our department actually is responsible for doing that for the whole district. And so once it's submitted to the state, right now we're in the duplicate count window where say a student attended our district during the count window, but then another district is also trying to claim them. Um then there's some reconciliation there. And so that's the point where we're at right now where all of that needs to be
184cleaned up and resubmitted and then signed off. Um, but I think it's December 3rd, so we're super close to having final numbers, but it is quite a process above just the count day itself. Thank you. Um, I'll pause if Yeah, I go ahead. Um, let me see what other I'm We got a lot of emails and I'm uh read every single one even if I didn't respond back to everyone. So, I made a list of kind of the rip, you know, the the uh duplicate questions that we got from a lot of our community members. Um, one, Andrea, while you get Yeah, go ahead. I'm still looking. So, uh, there were several comments made regarding what we're going to do with the buildings or or our vacant land that the district is sitting on. There
185is, uh, maybe some connectivity between the Wildwood property and or being near scenic. Anyway, I think we need to just address with everyone um that there haven't been any decisions made about what happens with vacant land or with the properties of closing schools. So, yeah. And we and and it's it's some I think some ideas that just kind of got put together, jumbled together. Yeah. I um I Wildwood so Wildwood property was purchased uh I can't remember it was like 15 years ago or more. I think the idea back when that was purchased was that potentially putting in a high school uh in the area and obviously that hasn't um panned out and so we have had that property for a while. Um, and we have other pieces of property as well in the district.
186And so we've, you know, we've charged uh Clint and his team to do an assessment of, um, you know, working with Shannon as well and looking at are are any of these properties actually going to potentially need to be used by the district in the future? And if not, um, put them on the market and sell them. And we've actually done that with some pieces of property already. Um, I mean, the reason why there is the, uh, Clifton Community Center next to Rocky Mountain Elementary is because we sold those 20 acres to the county. And so anytime you sell off land or a building, um those are dollars that go back into our capital improvement budget. And so those are dollars that we can put back into our schools, which is a good thing because
187I mentioned we have 600 plus million dollars worth of deferred um maintenance in our in our schools. And the bond was only for 190. And so any land that we sell off or any building that we might sell off, that money would go right back into taking care of some additional needs um within our schools. And so we've we've been um working through what we would potentially do with East um if we need to reuse that building for anything and if not then we'd sell it off. Same thing with Fra Middle School having conversations with the city of Fruda and we would do the same thing here as well. If these schools were to close we would first look internally and say do they need to be used for some other need within the district.
188Um, and if not, then we don't want to sit on them too long and we'd want to put them uh to market. And then again, any proceeds from that would go back into improving the buildings that remain open. I do want to clarify though that that money goes back into capital improvements. So, it's not like you sell off a piece of land and then you go put that into salaries and benefits. It's it goes back into capital improvements. Right. Those would be onetime dollars. Um, that was actually my question was what was what was the district doing with vacant land? So, um, there was a question and I don't know if Shannon's still on because he has to be at a different meeting at 8, right? Shannon, are you still there? Maybe not. All right.
189You might have left. Okay. Well, um, one question and maybe Dr. Hill, I don't know if if after reviewing the information um so in the demographic data in the reports that was presented um it I think it was hard to locate the specific um either child per unit or children per unit that um Shannon used to calculate future growth um both in Windgate and Broadway and scenic attendance um areas. So I think it's specific to the Redlands 360 and other developments. So do we I can't recollect. I know that's definitely a Shannon question. Yeah, that is outside of my wheelhouse. All right, we'll uh um see if we can find that out or maybe we can uh shoot that off to him and see if we can get that answered. You had it as point
190two. Okay. I thought it as point. Okay, thank you. Um And then there's some other information in these questions. I'll likely have to get to Shannon. So, okay, board. Any other questions? Just a couple of things that stood out to me was was the um delineation between having fewer students versus losing students. And we're really not losing students where there aren't students. there aren't as many students to even lose. We don't have the we don't have even an op opportunity to gain students because of the birth rate decline. Yeah. I mean that to try to summarize what Elizabeth shared with us when she met with us. Yes, you're right that the total number of children within our county has been declining and will continue to decline. So the number that you're pulling from is going
191down. And then yeah, as if there's other options that open up, then they're ob obviously going to pull as well. So um so that's a factor that goes into play when that option opens. Um but yeah, we we can't bank on an in the number of the projection is that the number of students living within our county is going to continue to decline over time and so we're going to have less students to be able to try even try to attract back to our schools um if they did leave for some reason. And you mentioned before that we it usually ends up being a wash most of the time between the students who leave and come back to us. Um, so it's just it's as much as it's hard to believe because we have growth
192happening in our community, we are not generating more kids within our community and it's caused a lot of these issues um for us and they're going to continue to cause issues for us moving forward. And that's scary when she showed those new numbers because I think we all had a little bit of hope last year of maybe by 2035 we'll get back to those number of kids in our county. Now she's saying I wouldn't actually count on that happening. Yeah, it was actually worse. I had two. Okay, so I do have two more. Um, so a lot of um, emails we got were regarding like the specific building. So, you know, I I really appreciate, you know, like the scenic community said that a bunch of them could get together and and do things to
193improve the building and and while that had, you know, 45% weight in the um EDAC, you know, recommendation, the issue is that the building alone, like if we put dollars just in the building to keep the building open, it doesn't actually help us with the overall declining enrollment and putting resources into buildings. Um because we're still spread too thin. Is that correct? I mean because I know it's a little bit hard to I know initially when we were back doing this with East I know it took me some time to kind of figure out like there's the building aspect of it and then there's the people aspect of it of moving people to get those dollars concentrated in those buildings. Yeah. I think it gets back to what problem are we trying to solve? And
194so we're trying to solve for a decline of over 2,000 students within our school district. And um you know I had a chart back when we were talking about when we were going through that EDC process that compared our district to comparablesized districts and how many buildings they have. And a good example of that was Gley. So Gley is has about 2,000 more kids than we have. So they have more students than we have. They have 10 less school buildings. And so they are not spreading their students out to as many buildings which means that they're not spreading their resources out to as many buildings. And so as we've continued to decline, that's just gotten worse for us over time. So yeah, if we were going to put money into a building to try to
195improve the condition of the building, that doesn't actually address the issue that we're dealing with, which is the decline in enrollment, which means that we're our utilization as a district is going down and we're spreading our resources out throughout the entire district. So that wouldn't that wouldn't actually solve the problem we're trying to solve. It sounds like if that's a suggestion that that would be taking care of some building deficiencies at a building, but it doesn't actually address the the main problem that we're dealing with as a district, which is why we're even looking at school closures. So that would lead me to my second question. So let's just say in the next year or two um oil and gas comes back to Mesa County. Um I mean what and and a bunch of jobs
196comes with that and we know that typically attracts usually families. Um would we be able to handle growth? So, I mean that's there's a lot I'm not optimistic for that, but I'm just saying scenarios like if we hit a peak of growth real quick, where would that put us? Well, and again, I'm I'm not a demographer, so I'm I'm going to try to answer this the best I can. I if you're going to have a an influx of individuals, um it depends on where they're all going to end up moving to, where is there available housing um that's affordable. Um and so, as a district, we're only utilizing 65% of our seats at elementary. We're only utilizing about 70 something% of our seats at middle school. Um, and then again in the high schools are
197a little bit higher. So, so the answer to the question is, do we have space in our buildings? Yes, we do. And even if you were to close three schools or four schools or five schools, you still would have space in the buildings. But it a lot of that would be dependent upon where families would end up moving to and and would we see an increase in certain parts of town um versus others. And we would then have to adjust based on that. I mean, if that were to happen, we'd have to have some conversations about what do we do with that? Do we actually have the space in the buildings? If we don't um then then how do we solve for that problem? But that's a that's a hypothetical and like you said there's
198a lot that would have to go into making that actually happen. Looking at um the decline I mean we're talking about a thousand students every two years in a decline. So if it happened next year would be one thing but if it happens in four in four years that we've already got a deficit of 2,000 more students than what we have today. That's significant over time. So that would have to happen quickly for us to even I think be in that kind of a scenario at all. Well, and then I I think boundary changes could actually help accommodate for that so that we're not um building more schools because I I think when we were even considering this with East um and when when some of the initial elementary schools were recommended what a year
199and a half, two ago, we realized we were actually spread pretty thin even back as far as like 2015. Even when some of the numbers were higher, we were still at low utilization. So, if PBLO has currently 2,000 more students than us and greatly, sorry, and um 10 less buildings, um I'm guessing they're probably built to maybe about the same capacities, right? because there's kind of a standard for Yeah, I'd have to look at all of them, but um yeah, I think that that factors into the conversations we had with EDC, which was um the amount of students based on our staffing model that actually allows you to staff a building properly um or efficiently with the right resources would be higher than most of our our schools are at right now. Um and again,
200not every school would even have the capacity to be able to do that. So yeah, if we were going to have to rebuild a building for some reason, uh we wouldn't build it to the same size necessarily. Like you that wouldn't necessarily make sense financially for us. Um you'd want to build something that was larger that had room for growth if that were to happen in an area. Um but we through that uh facility master plan process, there was a desire to uh at least in the beginning to not have to replace school buildings because of the cost associated with it. I mentioned a new elementary school is going to cost you about 30 plus million dollars. Um, and then obviously a middle and high school would be even more expensive. So, it was a
201question of how do we put dollars into the existing buildings that we do have to extend the life of them, but also with the understanding that we're probably going to have to reduce the number of buildings over time as well, so we're not putting dollars into all these underutilized school buildings. [Music] No, I just have Oh, I'm sorry. And and I heard you correctly. If we do not close schools, then we have to terminate teachers positions. Correct. Well, so I I guess um I'm looking at Mel because we haven't really talked about this as much, but if we're going to if we're not going to close schools and we're over FTE for next year, we would need to reduce the number of FTEEs in schools. And so if the projection is 40 plus FTE next
202year at the elementary level, then we don't have we don't have the money to subsidize that. So we'd be pulling from reserves, which is not sustainable. Again, you saw the governor's budget um forecast or or proposal and so that's just going to get worse for us as well. So, I would say uh financially it would not be wise for us to try to maintain the staffing level that we have currently elementary schools. So, we would need to um reduce staffing at schools across the district. Yeah. So, the other thing that was brought up in in a couple of several of the emails was um talking about cutting upper administration costs. And I would just like to point out and Mel, maybe you can even shed a little more light on this than than what I'll
203go over, but we have made those reductions. Um, we have not backfilled positions to the tune of about $1.3 million annually. And if I'm understanding, Mel, that is at 2019 costs. So, if you consider the increases and everything, we're probably well over a couple of million dollars a year just in reducing upper administration. Yeah. And that's something that we look at every year and have and will continue to is just if there are opportunities to be more efficient. Um there's position vacancies that maybe um we need to let go and not um backfill or able to somehow address it in other ways. Um something I've heard a lot during the last couple weeks is that we used to always try to keep cuts away from schools as much as possible. And so I've been in
204this district a long time and this is a little bit different of a problem than we've had before. Um so before like going back to '08 in the recession, we had a steady enrollment and so we were still trying to serve the same number of students, the same student needs out in buildings, but it was the amount that we were receiving from the state that was being reduced. And so certainly um that put ext staffing and supports and then some. And so there were a lot of cuts that were made back even going back until 2008 2010 in central office in the past. But we're continuing to look at those adjustments too and make them um just to try to do it as much as possible even though this is a different scenario with declining
205enrollment. And as a board, we've we've discussed that well, three of us have been here now three years, and that was um a focus, I guess you could say, when we came into the district was was those kinds of efficiencies, and we still look to the district staff to find those efficiencies and move on them when it's prudent. Yep. Exactly. Well, and we also decreased um upper admin level salary too because before we they were given the same um percentage increase across the board. And we looked at that a few years ago and adjusted some of that on the the highest salary levels as well to try to help u move some of those dollars um into other spaces as well. We also I mean I just remind the board we did an independent audit
206um of the different departments and staffing categories as well and um and there were not uh the the results of that was not that we were overstaffing at those uh areas. If anything we were actually understaffed compared to other districts our size. So, um yeah, we it's definitely like Mel said, it's something we look at every year and and we will continue to try to find um efficiencies, but you also don't want to gut yourself to the point where you can't actually provide the supports that are needed throughout the district as well. And you can't you can't central office cut your way out of this problem either. You fire if you lay off every single central office position in the district, you have no payroll, you have nobody doing maintenance and operational, you still aren't
207going to find the money that you need to actually close these gaps. So, it's just it's not even a viable option. I understand that that's what people want to take their heads to immediately is like we'll just keep it away from the schools and do central office, but like mathematically you can't even address it by doing that if you laid off every single position in central office. We're we're getting into a hole that's really hard to climb out of. And as Mel said, it's a different situation than in the past. This is a reduction in funding because of a reduction in number of students. And so it's going to impact schools in the end um when you when you're not needing that much staff at the buildings anymore because you don't have the students there
208anymore, right? Okay. And when we were discussing this two years ago, we were also um you know, we were on the precipice of the ESSER dollars um coming to an end and our five-year funding average changing. So, it was kind of a trifecta of decreased enrollment, the ESRE dollars concluding, and our five-year funding average, which were all happening at the same time, which any one of those is is big in in and of itself. Yeah. And so just to remind everyone, our ESSER dollars did int as of September 30th. That was the date in order to have them spent by. And so those had been crucial just in getting us to the point um in managing this situation where we were where we were able to put several millions of dollars of staffing overages into
209that grant through some of the grant requirements and the allowable uses of that. So, we would have had to make these decisions um much more quickly um if it weren't for those SR dollars. Did you any other questions? Right board. Um so, next up we would have Thank you, Dr. Hill for that presentation and I know Shannon's not online, but thanks for his time. Um so, next up would be audience comments. So board, do you need a quick break to use the restroom? Say like 10 minutes popped. Okay. I would also say that as of Well, I know we've had some movement in the room. So there are 68 people as of right now signed up for public comment and if everybody takes their full three minutes, that's over three and a half hours of
210public comment. Um we're willing to stay here and we will listen to everyone. Um but I would highly recommend that please don't duplicate comments. If somebody comes up and says something you agree with, please say you agree with that and then please add your specific comments to that because I know there's little ones in this room. A lot of us all have to work tomorrow. Um but we do want to hear you. So if that helps you kind of um kind of summarize maybe your comments as you come up. Um we'd appreciate that and you do get your full three minutes if you want it. So we'll take a 10-minute break and be right back. Okay, I think we're going to uh get started here. So, if everybody can find a seat, please. Okay, we're
211going to get started with public comment. Thank you. All right. All right. So, um, just a few sort of housekeeping and, um, just reminders. So, um, Director Jones will be calling names. Um, we're going to do a few more people on deck. Normally, what we do is call the first person and then we'll say who's on deck so that you're ready to kind of make your way forward. He'll probably call two to three people in just so you know where you are. Um, so be ready when the person is done at public comment and just go ahead and start making your way forward. Um, please make sure you sit in the middle chair there and speak clearly into the microphone. So, we have a lot of people watching online. Um, there is a clock right
212there in front of you. So, it will be counting down. Um, at 30 seconds of time that you have left, you'll hear a longer tone. Um, so that's giving you the indication that you have 30 seconds to wrap up and then there's um a longer even longer tone um when your time is concluded. And because we have so many people that want to give public comment tonight, we will have to cut you off at the 3 minutes. Um, so uh please just keep that in mind. Three minutes goes by a lot faster too um than you realize. Um, also please be mindful um of your neighbors. um they may be trying to listen to public comment. So, if you want to have a side conversation, we just ask that you step out into the lobby
213just so everyone can hear um what is being said. Um we also ask that you are respectful um to the people coming up and giving public comment. It can be intimidating. Um and if you don't agree with what they're saying, um please don't no booing or anything of that sort. Um, if people do say something you agree with, you can clap. Um, but but and I know this might sound silly, but no distractive, excessive clapping. I mean, we just we want to try to keep everything um civil. Um, but we don't mind if you want to clap for those that you um agree with. But keep in mind, too, that's going to delay the process um as we're trying to give public comment. And let's see, is there anything else that I've missed. Okay, before
214we start, uh, we got some letters from children. Uh, I would like to take like five minutes so that everybody can read it because this is their voices of what they think of their school. I just finished reading them all. So, I think we should, uh, be kind enough and interested in what our students are saying. Okay. All right. Yep. Board, do you want to take a couple minutes and look through um the book? Why don't uh, Director Jones, I started earlier. You already looked. Okay. Um why don't um we so we are going to have students go first. Um that is actually also a rule or something that the board Yeah, let's get our let's actually get our students through first because I know some of these guys need to go to bed. Um
215me included. It's my bedtime as well. Um uh so let's get through our students first and then the board can look through some of these as well. Um, and we always at every board meeting um we always give uh students the first opportunity to come and speak. So, all right, Director Jones, go ahead and take it away. All righty, everyone. So, the way I'm going to do this is uh as as Miss Miss uh Andrea explained it, uh you guys should all receive a number. So, I'm going to call you by number name and number so we know what's going on. And I'll call you in order of one, two, three, four, and as on deck. The first our first one tonight is going to be number one, Kaden Porter. On deck is number two
216Marley Abbott. Number three Reagan Turner. So we'll start with Miss Porter. So Miss Porter, if you look right in front of you, I'm going to hit this timer right here, and you should see it going off. Do you see it? That's your time limit. Good evening. My name is Kada Porter. I'm a fourth grader at Cedic Elementary. My family chose school of choice. At my old school, things were not so great. I was bullied, told to kill myself, and told that no one wanted me in this world. I started to believe them. I hated school and I hated myself. I would lie to my mom and say I was sick, hoping she would let me stay home from school. I was hit at school and came home with new bruises every day. My mom and
217I tried to talk with the principal, but the bully got even worse. I even felt like the principal was bullying me. When my main bully quartered me in an area of no cameras and told me she was better than me, then punched me in the chest. I finally stuck up for myself and hit her back. She told the principal I hit her and he would not listen to my side. When I told him the truth, he called me a liar. He called my mom to come into the office. And when my mom found out he believed my bully over me, my mom started to ask kids in my school if they saw what happened. My mom found four kids who saw me get hit and told the principal to talk to them. My principal should
218have protect me, but no, my mom protected me. After he found out the truth, I still felt unsafe. My parents said I could stay home until I felt safe. Then my parents found scenic. Cedic is the perfect place for me. Sedic. Uh, at first I had a hard time trusting teachers, but before I knew it, I was a part of the scenic family. I was excited to go to school again. I felted by everyone and I did not have to worry about getting hurt. Scenic has become my safe place. I talked to Miss Scott a lot and she really listens to me. My teachers have become people I can rely on and trust no matter what. If scenic closes, I'm scared what will happen at another school. I have felt a family here at Scenic.
219I never knew school could be like this. I'm Miss Cena Fox. Please do not take away the safest place for us to be. Thank you for [Applause] listening. Up next, we have number two, Miss Marley Abbott. And then number three, Reagan Turner. My name is Marley. I am a third grade student at Scenic Elementary. You shouldn't shut down my school because I like an open concept school. An open concept school helps us learn how to focus with distractions. Scenic Scenic Education is at another level. When kids mess up, our teachers just show us what we did wrong and they do not get mad at us. If you shut down CIC, my best friends will go to win game and I will go to Broadway instead. I personally will be sad. I love how we have
220WHB and Fox Pride. To me, Fox Pride means we are a family as a school and we care about each and we care about the school. It would be sad if you close scenic because my sister wants to go to scenic, too. My school is full of nice kids and the loving teachers. The school itself is nice and doesn't fold. On Friday mornings, I like to ride my bike with my friends to the bike rock and walk down Baby Canyon to get to the school. It's relaxing. Our school doesn't have a lot of traffic outside, which I like. I beg you, please don't shut down Santa Elementary. [Applause] Up next we have number three, Miss Reagan Turner. And on deck number four, Olive Lawson. Parents, if you want to come up with your children, that's
221totally fine as as well. Uh the middle one if you Yeah. And it's adjustable so you can move it. Yes. You can even stand if that There you go. Good evening. My name is Rean Turner. I just turned 7 years old and I am in second grade at Scenic Elementary School. I came to scenic last year from Holy Family Catholic School and Scenic is a school of choice. I love Scenic. When I came to Scenic after Christmas last year, I was behind in reading, but now I have the skills and confidence to read for you all. I pray that you will all come together and save my school. WHBN, work hard and be nice. [Applause] Up next we have number four, Miss Olive Lawson. And on deck number five, Corali Baker. Hello, my name is
222Olive and I'm in Miss Gallagher's fourth grade class. I've been going to Scenic Elementary since first grade. I love going to Scenic. Some of my favorite things about Scenic are the teachers. They are nice and make learning fun. I really hope that I can be in Miss D. Rose's fifth grade class next year. Another one of my favorite things about Scenic are the students. They are all my friends and fun to learn with. At our school, we get to interact with kids in other grades, and this has made me so many more friends. I'm grateful for all the opportunities that Scenic has given me, like choir, band, cardio club, and yearbook club. I have learned to work hard and be nice. Scenic is like home, and everyone is like family. Please don't take that away
223from us. Thank you for listening. [Applause] Up next we have number five, Miss Coral Lee Baker. And on deck number six, Miss Adeline Austin. Hello, my name is Corali Baker. I have been going to Scenic for three years. I'm in second grade. I love Scenic Elementary. I think that if you close down the school, all the teachers, all those many of those teachers will lose their jobs. And I think Scenic is the best school that could ever be this a school. I would like to add that I love slushy day and we pull pop tickets. We are we are the top school of Elementary. What will be the top school now? Saint Nick is the best school [Applause] ever. All right. Up next, we have number six, Miss Adeline Austin. And on deck number seven,
224Miss Arabella Barbage. Good evening. My name is Adeline Austin. I am a fourth grade student who goes to Scenic. I love my school and the teachers. I wish all the kids had the opportunity to have these teachers. You shouldn't reward a top school in D51 area by closing it. My brother is in kindergarten and we were both looking forward to being at Scenic through fifth grade. We love these teachers. They are sweet and kind. They always help us and have taught us to work hard and be nice. Some teachers even went to scenic for elementary when they were kids. Teachers are the foundation of our education. Dr. Hill and board members, please do not close our school. All righty. Up next we have number seven, Miss Arabella Barbage. On deck number eight, Moses Cruz Arabella.
225Here she comes. On after Moses, we're going to have number nine, Jackson Dick. This school has motivated me to learn and be really good at school. I love this school because it helps me learn and it's just really makes me happy and it makes me learn a lot. And it's also really good. It tries to make all of the kids in this school be good and lots lots and lots. I love this school and this school is the best to me. I think this school has been so nice. This school has been so good to all the kids that come here, even the new kids. [Applause] All righty. Up next we have Moses Cruz. On deck we have Jackson Dick. And then our last student will be Lucille Rosen Bloom. My name is Moses and
226I go to Nisley Grizzly Elementary School and and my I will miss my friends and my teachers and I like my school and it's it's helps me to do everything And it it helps me to learn, write, read math and everything. And I get to do with my I get to play with my friends at recess time. And I and I uh I love my teachers, Miss Blink, Miss Castro, Miss San Andrew. They're at least my favorite teachers. I'll miss them. I'll remember them. I will not forget them. I'll never forget them. I'll I'll I'll keep them in my brain. And and I love how they teach me my friends and they're at least my best friends. And I like I like how they teach me. They they take care of us. They they let
227us be nice to everyone and they let us have let us be happy and and they I love them so much. my teachers, my friends. I I I will never forget them. I will never forget their names or nothing. [Applause] Up next we have uh number nine Jackson Dick and number 10 Lucille Rosen Bloom is our final uh student. We're waiting on Jackson. Jackson's up now. Oh, he left. Okay. I'm good with that. [Applause] Hello, my name is Presley. I have been a student at Scenic for 5 years. My mom went there when she was a kid, years ago. Scenic is very close to our hearts. It's not just a school to me. It's it's not just a school to me. It's like home. The teachers and staff are so kind, caring. They are like
228family. I feel so com comfortable and safe in this wonderful school. Our school motto is WHBN which stands for work hard and be nice. That is exactly what Scenic is all about. Everyone is nice and kind and welcoming. Scenic is a beautiful, amazing school. Please don't shut down our home. Please save Scenic Elementary. Thank you. [Applause] All right. Uh, next up is Miss Lucille Rosenloom. And our first speaker number one will be Kayla Meyer. Hello. Thank you for listening to my speech tonight. I'm Lulu Rosen or Lucille Rosenboom and I will be talking about Scenic Elementary. I love this school. It is such a great community. We have such good Fox pride and our community helps each other as work hard and be nice. It's called WHBN. Every day we follow that and very very
229much we love this school. It is a very safe community and we love to care about each other. We are very safe and we love to help each other be be nice and work hard. Our school is so amazing and so are our teachers. We've been here for a while. That may be a problem, but it's not. It helps us stay nice and it helps us think about how much we how much we are so good at. um at being nice. Thank you very much for listening today. All righty. Up first we have number one, Kayla Meyer, and on deck number two, Miss Kim Carville. Good evening, board members and Dr. Hill. I come to you with great concern regarding the potential closure of Scenic Elementary. I started my educational career back in 2008 and
230in 2009 I was held back. The same year I was informed that Scenic was recommended for closure. So even though that I'm graduated, I've experienced firsthand of what these students are going through. So I'm here to be their voice. When I got held back, I knew that there would be challenges not only losing my friends but potent potentially my teachers as well. My teachers believed in me and helped me see my true potential by introducing me to programs that helped me catch up with my peers as well as having teachers tutor me during the summer. Without the support of the teachers of Scenic Elementary that I see sitting in this room today, I would not be attending CMU on a full ride academic scholarship for the nursing program. To this day, the academic and personal
231lessons instilled in me by the scenic elementary school staff I still use today at university. As seen it closed back then, I would not be where I am today. I have the great honor of sending my nephew Steven into kindergarten this year. He was very shy and antisocial, but within the months he had grown excited to go to school and eager to meet his new friends and teachers. With the potential closure, he had grown scared and anxious to go to school recently with the fear that everything he could ever known would be taken away with a vote. With this closure, we will not only be displacing scenic kids, but also school of choice kids and overflow schools. This closure could change kids' perspective on the school's motivation and trust. We trusted that the closure at
232Fra 89 was in the best interest of students, but in my opinion, that was a mistake. As a community, we were informed that there would be enough room for students and other teaching opportunities for staff. Yet, when I talk to underclassmen and hear all the setbacks from struggling kids that teachers are overwhelmed with to learning in modulars because we in fact did not have enough room, which in my opinion is not the best learning environment. After all, there would be no school without students. So, I put my trust in the board and Dr. Hill to make that decision with the students best interest being made a priority. After all, they are our future and deserve the same opportunity that was given to me when Scenic was voted to stay open. As my old principal, Mr.
233Doug Levenson once said, "WHBN, work hard and be nice." Thank you for your time. All righty. Up next, Up next, we have number two, Miss Kim Carville. And on deck, number three, Shannon Spear. Good evening. My name is Kim Carville, and I sit before you this evening as a parent of two students attending Scenic Elementary. I had a speech that I worked on for a few days, typed it out, practiced, and as I sat here tonight, I decided, and I was going to try not to cry, but those sweet kiddos getting up here got to all of us. I decided to just speak from the heart. Um, Scenic Elementary is like no other school in this district. I'm a former district employee. I uh worked as a school counselor for 15 years in this district.
234So, I have worked in other elementary schools, larger schools with large class sizes, overflowing lunchrooms, not enough resources. And so, I can speak from experience that our small community at Scenic is the reason that our students succeed, not only academically, but emotionally as well. They feel loved. They feel one- on-one attention every single day that they are at school. Every single minute. Both of my sons require additional interventions, small groupoup instruction. You name it, Scenic has figured out a way to provide it for our students. It was mentioned earlier in the meeting that we have had to get rid of the extras in our school district because of lack of funding. In our school, we have found out how to serve every student above and beyond without the extras. Our principal, Mrs. Scott, has led
235our school and our staff to a place where it feels like home. It feels like a family, and it is a devastating idea to all of us that it won't be there next year. So, I am asking you to keep an open mind as you hear from quite a few of my scenic family this evening. We have ideas. We have creativity. We have possible solutions and we are asking for more time. Dr. Hill, you said earlier that you had been processing this decision for two years. We wish that we had the luxury of processing this decision for two years. We have had six days, six days ago, this was dropped in our lap. We have felt a lack of communication, a lack of transparency from this board and from the district as we have gone
236into panic mode. But as we've gone into panic mode, it has only brought us closer and brought us stronger. Like I Oh, like I said, I'm asking you to just keep an open mind and actually listen to the possibilities that we have come up with in six short days. So, I'm asking that a possibility tonight be that this vote be tabled. Does the decision have to be made tonight or can it be made in two weeks after we have all come together to see what's possible? Right. Up next we have Miss Shannon Spear. And on deck number four, Miss Sarah Dandro. I'm ready when you're ready. You ready? Go. Uh, Scenic is one of the few schools this year to actually have an increase in enrollment, an increase by 13%, bringing our enrollment to 80%
237capacity. A deep concern that I have about closing Scenic is that the neighboring schools are already so close to capacity. Between Windgate and Broadway, there are told to be 145 available seats to bring them to maximum capacity. They are meant to absorb the students from scenic. They will both surpass capacity. There are two areas in town which are both severely underutilized and they also have ugly outdated buildings. One being Fruda, the other being Orchard Mesa. Both are under 50% util utilized. Even by eliminating the 93 school of choice children scenic serves, that leaves a minimum of 178 students for 145 spots. 33 of our school of choice students are already zoned for Broadway or Windgate. Where are we planning on putting all of these students? Can you answer what size are these classrooms going to
238be? If you're not able to answer that question, I would argue that this is not in the students best interest to vote without knowing the very real repercussions of said closures. Those very same students that you are meant to serve and advocate for. Max capacity classes create situations where children are no longer going to have as many resources, individual time with teachers, or effective learning environment. By condensing these particular schools, we would be overwhelming our teachers by asking them to do more with even less. Studies have shown that overcrowding has a negative impact impact on academic achievement. It negatively impacts a teacher's effectiveness in a classroom, leaving behind children academically, especially those that are already considered at risk. Overcrowded classrooms are linked to bullying and a downturn in the mental health and safety of our
239students. The mission statement of the district directly goes against all of these scenarios. Class size aside, physically, where are we putting these children? If the out if outbuildings are the consensus, I would argue the safety and of those are inadequate. They are create a lack of community by segregating our students and they are not an effective or responsible use of funds. Another point is the extra amount of traffic this would create to both schools as a hindrance to not only drivers but to children alike. Have you ever been to Broadway at a drop off or pickup? It is atrocious. There are cars backed up onto Broadway and all the way out to the roundabout. It's very difficult to maneuver through the subdiv uh through the uh parking lot so people go around the residential area.
240One child has already been hit by a car this year. Extra traffic makes our kids at even higher risk for that. Scenic Elementary has given my children an education that's literally second to none in this district. It should not be considered for closure as there are several other options available that are not being talked about. Thank you for your time. All righty. Up next we have number four, Miss is it Delisandro? Delisandro. Yeah, you you almost got it almost apostrophe. And on deck we number five, Miss Eve Roberts. Awesome. All right. First, thank you all for your service to our community. I recognize the countless hours that you've spent on this issue. I know this is a difficult decision and I do recognize that something has to be done. I appreciate you all hearing all
241sides before voting. My name is Sarah. I have a kindergartener and a second grader at Scenic Elementary. The decision to close Scenic, Nisley, and Clifton has been described as objective and numbers-based. But we didn't elect you all to simply analyze numbers. We elected you to advocate for our children and community and to weigh the human cost of these decisions. If education were purely objective, we wouldn't need elected officials like you. We'd let outside consultants to make these calls. Your job isn't and shouldn't be purely objective. We need creative thought, leadership, and engagement with the community. So, I'd like to know why this decision that why this recommendation was made public only 5 days before the vote. Why rush this decision without giving us time to interact with the recommendations? This lack of transparency is deeply
242concerning and undermines confidence in these proposals. Shouldn't decisions like this involve thoughtful collaborative input. Re research shows that school closures have long-term negative impacts. A recent study found that students who experienced school closures were less likely to graduate college, less likely to be employed, and earned less. This isn't just about statistics, though. It could be the future of our students. Scenic boosts our district state rankings, fosters success, and serves as a model for what education can achieve here. Why close a school with more potential than any other in the valley? And it isn't just the students that have this potential. It's the school itself that boosts this potential. I know there are many fantastic ideas here tonight and even more, I'm sure. But you gave us 5 days, and the decision feels like it has
243already been made. This will lead to long-term regret with negative ripple effects across the county. I challenge you to not merely blame this decision on the numbers. Give us more time, include us, and let's think about creative, positive solutions. Thank you for listening and thank you again for your time. All righty. Up next, we have Miss Eve Roberts. And on deck, we have number six, Chad Chad Roberts. Hi, my name is Eve Roberts. I have a kindergartener and second grader. We started our dis our journey at D51 by winning the lottery at New Emerson, every parent's dream. Uh, but we were there for two years. My kid complained every day that he didn't want to go to school. So, we were looking at other options. We ended up choosing Scenic because of its openness, the
244smaller school size, and the property was safer than New Emerson that had parents coming out of their houses yelling at us in the pickup line. If we had to do it all over again, I wish we would have started at Scenic because my kid loves it and wants to go to school every day. There is something unique about that school that you guys need to be replicating online, which is the majority of businesses and buyers coming into this town are looking at stats online. Google it. On the number one page of Google, we scenic ranks number one. Greatschoolschools.org. We are the only 10 out of 10 school. And by closing it, you're going to destroy all those statistics that the out of town people are seeing because it is hard to get SEO uh ratings
245on Google. We all know that. What this has all brought to me um and I guess the other thing is uh closing a top school too. Like as a savvy business person, why would you close a top school? We should be emulating it and finding out why it's great and taking some of those ideas and putting it into other schools. Maybe every school needs a work hard and be nice philosophy. You can learn a lot from us. What the 25-y year facility master plan has has shown me and why we got an F is because there is not walls. And that is just not fair. Uh the model has been very successful. Um I do have such a high rating uh if if the walls were such a big deal. Um, you know, and because
246it doesn't fit into your traditional D-51 model, we don't have wings like your models show. Maybe we can turn it into instead a magnet school. You guys love the idea of DIA and New Emerson. So, shouldn't we have more? Shouldn't we make the district, you know, shine in a positive light? So, DIA is your dual immersion. New Emerson is your steam. And I propose that Scenic be your first magnet school. That's a project-based learning model. Our motto would be walls down, minds open. Imagine, investigate, innovate. Imagine a new kind of magnet school, a school without walls that redefineses education by empowering our students to become curious, critical thinkers through engaging realworld hands-on projects. Students foster deep learning, essential life skills, and a genuine genuine love for discovery. With flexible wall-free learning spaces, students learn to
247collaborate, innovate, and approach challenging challenges with confidence, preparing them for an ever evolving world. By turning it into a magnet school, it would also help make this transition uh to the kids out to Windgate and Broadway a little bit slower. The kids currently can stay in attendance and then as the kindergarteners come in, they could be on a lottery system. Thank you, Miss Roberts. All righty. Up now we have number six, Chad Roberts. And on deck we have number seven, Brian Austin. Chad Roberts. I I uh I have a second grader and a kindergartener at Scenic Elementary. Um I you know my biggest concern is the I feel like we're um we're taking more of a quantity over quality uh decision uh that can lead to burnout for teachers and which trickles down to a
248a poor education for our kids. Um, a recent Galllet poll uh stated that the burnout for K through 12 teachers, including elementary school teachers, is about 44%. Um, I I just have a few questions. Um, does Scenic have a lower operating budget and lower cost than other schools in the district not proposed to close? Um, is operating uh cost a factor in the school closures? Uh, why is New Emerson at 59% utilization rate uh when there is a waiting list to get into the school? Um, and uh can the vote to close be split up rather than lumping them lumping all the schools together? Um, I would appreciate it um if we had these questions answered before there was a vote. And thank you for all for the time and uh and for your service.
249All righty. Up now we have number seven, Mr. Brian Austin. And on deck number eight, Sydney Wood. Good evening board members. I'd like to speak tonight regarding the current development in the Redlands area and the immediate effect that closing Scenic has on these students and community. According to Jane Quimby, project manager for the Redlands 360 development, this particular development currently has 50 homes online. They will have 175 units occupied by the end of 2025. They will have 225 units by the end of 2026. The units they are building range from patio homes to town homes to condos and apartments and even a child care facility. In short, they are catering to a large and diverse demographic which will undoubtedly in include hundreds of kids. Jane confirmed that numbers were provided to the demographer in April,
250but they have since refined the numbers. They originally anticipated 131 units in 2026, but based on an increased demand for homes, they subsequently updated the plan to 225 units in 2026, which is a 72% increase over the April projection. These numbers are real and they're actively happening. This is not a long-term projection. Please refer to the email Jane Quimby sent to the board members today at 5:30. better late than never. Um, Jane also states in that that they expect 40 to 50% of the total houses to house kids. So, I would really urge the board to read that data, read that email before you make any decisions. We all know that declining enrollment is the main reason we are closing schools in the first place. While there are very underutilized schools in the district, it
251is not an issue in the Redland schools. All three elementary schools are currently at 80% capacity and growing. If you close Scenic and transfer all students to Windgate and Broadway, both schools will be over capacity. Even if you eliminate school of choice students across all three schools, the two remaining schools will still be over capacity. And this goes against your own mission statement to encourage school of choice. when you eliminate all school of choice students at these schools. The message from the district is saying you can only attend in Redland schools if you live in the Redlands. We do not agree with that message. As a community, we welcome the diversity that school of choice brings. All students should have the opportunity experience wonderful teachers. Closing scenic will eliminate this for the Redlands area. Tonight,
252I strongly urge you to consider these consequences. We can't keep turning closets into classrooms. We need all three schools in the Redlands area to accommodate the growth that is happening right now. Thank you. All righty. Up now we have number eight, Miss Sydney Wood. And on deck number nine, Jr. We get started. Um, my name is Sydney Wood. Um, I have a degree in education from Yale University and I'm a former teacher in the valley. I'd like to just speak from an educational policy perspective, specifically to this 380 to 400 enrollment number that is driving some of these recommendations and why studies show that this is not a formula for strong schools. In fact, empirical evidence proves that closing small, high-erforming schools like Scenic Elementary in favor of larger consolidated schools will have lasting negative
253effects on students, teachers, the district, and our community at large. I'd like to just list a few studies here. I also have a print out of 18 different studies that looked at closure school closures in larger consolidated schools. I have these for you if you'd like to look at them. Um, a 2010 comprehensive study of school consolidation found that students educated in smaller schools obtained higher returns to education and completed more years of schooling. Students from states with larger schools earned significantly lower wages later in life. The direct quote from this finding said, "Any gains from consolidation were far outweighed by the harmful effects of larger schools." A 2003 study of school size and student outcomes found a decline in achievement as elementary school sized increased. A 2018 study found that student achievement is directly
254adversely affected by school closures. Student test scores went down when schools were consolidated. A 20 2006 study, this one is especially pertinent to this discussion, found that increasing the size of Indiana elementary schools by school consolidations lowered student achievement significantly with a predictable future economic cost that according to the researcher far outweighed the marginal fiscal savings of closing smaller schools. And a 2002 study of school closures, quotes, the money that might be saved through school consolidation could be forfeited in loss taxes, declining property values, and lost businesses. I would add to this that any money that might be saved through school consolidation in this case could be forfeited in continued declining district enrollment. Dr. Hill mentioned that the district loses numbers when a new option outside the district opens. Conversely, the district will also lose
255numbers when a desirable option within the district closes. The district will not solve the problem of lower enrollment through closing your top ranked school that that actively attracts families to the district. As I mentioned before, I have copies of 18 studies here that tell the same story. School closures come at a great cost to our students and the economic benefits are inconclusive, marginal at best and non-existent at worst. This study I printed in full. If you guys would like to look at this, this is from the National Education Policy Center and their recommendation is to avoid school closures as a means of cutting costs. This is a large and complex issue, but my request to you is simple. If tonight you hear new data or evidence or anecdotes or questions that cast any doubt on
256this decision, I ask that you listen to that doubt and reconsider your position because the success of our students and the future of our comm community depends on it. Thank you so much for [Applause] listening. Hey, up next we have number nine Jay Herrari. And on deck number 10, Kelsey Stanley. Good evening board. Um, thank you for hearing from me. Um, I am a my name is Joseph Harawi. I'm a physician in the community here. I'm in private practice. Uh, I wanted to address specifically some of the uh uh demographic data that we saw uh presented earlier. Um, number one is the aging population. uh with a population over 65 growing uh we are going to need much more health care providers than we have available. We already have a physician shortage in the area.
257We have difficulty recruiting physicians in part because our school district is does not get great grades. So the idea of closing a u high performance school will harm recruiting not only physicians but other healthcare providers as well as others of our best and brightest as what you are calling uh people and having difficulty retaining them. Uh I also heard you say that um we are having difficulty that we it's not within our control to provide jobs in the community. But I would argue against that. I would say it is within the school district's control to attract uh educated and uh highly paid people who would be looking for a high performance school. Uh I would also like to address the increasing death rate which I can guarantee you will continue to increase if we do
258not attract more physicians into the area. Um on a personal note um I am the parent of uh one former scenic student and one current scenic student. We moved our sons from Holy Family Catholic School uh because we didn't feel they were getting everything they needed and we were very happy to see that they uh have been able to achieve much more academically, socially, and that they have gotten all the resources they've needed at Scenic Elementary. So, thank you for your time, and I encourage you to vote against closing Scenic Elementary. All righty. Up. Now we have number 10, Miss Kelsey Stanley. And on deck number 11, Phil Phill. Good evening, Dr. Hill and board members. My name is Kelsey Stanley. I'm a concerned parent of a third grader and an incoming kindergartener. I'm a
259substitute teacher in the district and a board member on our PTO. I want to start by thanking you for your service you provide. I can't imagine the impossible decision you're facing and I don't envy the position you're in. While I find the prospect of closing your highest performing elementary school baffling, I hope you will consider other options such as families who've committed their company resources to the suggested repairs, exercising fiscal responsibility like selling existing vacant District 51 properties, upper admin salary cuts, or crowdfunding. You've seen how our tight-knit community has rallied the last few days. Just think of what can be done if we had time to circle our wagons. I know you can relate when it comes to not making the decision of where we send our children every day lightly. And I know
260many other families will echo the same sentiment as my family when considering leaving the district should any of the three schools close. I truly believe that should be brought into the equation regarding statewide funding per pupil. Conservatively, that's a loss of $2 million to the district if you were to just close and all of students scenics all of scenic families leave. Closing this school would be a devastating loss to our community as it is truly a building that should be emulated as a standard, not shut down. An excerpt from the district's mission statement is, "We firmly believe that families should have a voice and an active role in shaping their child's educational journey. We are committed to providing our families options. Options for the education style their ch child will thrive in. Options at the
261school in which their child attends, options with the programs in which their child engages. We value communication, collaboration, and partnership between families in our district. By working together, we can create an environment where students thrive and achieve to their full potential. Options being an operative word in our mission statement. Scenic is at 240 students. 93 of those are school of choice. That puts us at 147 students in our boundary. 30 33 of those are school of choice zone for Windgate Broadway. That puts us at 180 kiddos. There are 158 spots available between those two schools. I would guess modulars would be put up, which is a direct contradiction to the district's stance on the use of modulars. The other option would be kicking out Windgate and Broadway School of Choice families. Furthering the effect of
262disrupting our children's elementary education, overcrowding neighboring schools is not the answer. As I said in my email to you, I bet you'd wish we would just go away. But here's the thing. No matter what your decision is tonight, we won't. Our community is so strong, as you've seen this week, we won't go quietly into the night. Thank you for your time and consideration. All righty. Up now. Up now we have Miss 11 or 11, Miss Phyllis Flower and on deck 12, Pat McBride. Good evening. Thank you for your time. I really appreciated Dr. Hill's um information that he presented earlier tonight and I do feel it was from the heart. So I am the mother of a boy who went to Scenic a very long time ago and um he's paying attention to what's going
263on right now and he's he's not happy with it at all. And I have very fond memories of Scenic as well. Having been in the workplace, however, for a very long time, I myself has been through um companies where we've gone through difficult financial decisions. I've been laid off because of downsizing. Um I've gone through restructuring. I know this is these are business decisions that are hard to make. And I know that that's what this board is is faced with right now. And I just want to say that I do support the board and I have been very happy with the thought that has gone into a lot of decisions in the past and I hope that you are listening to everyone tonight and I'm I'm hearing some new ideas myself and um consider everything
264in making this this other difficult decision. Thank you. All righty. Up now we have number 12, Miss Pat McBride. And on deck 13, Perry Cabbat. So I am going to change horses completely. There's a policy later in the agenda that's concerning community use of district facilities. I would urge the board to really think carefully about that policy. It's my understanding that there is a significant increase in the cost that will go be issued out to the people that are renting district facilities. Some of those groups are not very large and cannot afford the kind of increases that are being proposed. I would recommend and hope that the board would consider a slower timeline for increasing those costs so that the the groups that are using comm community the district facilities can think about how they're
265going to approach those added costs going forward. Thank you. All righty. Up next we have number 13 Perry Kitt and on deck number 14 IOT. Uh thanks for hearing members of the board. Uh my name is Perry Kbat. I'm an extension professor of water resources for Colorado State University. So I I live here in Grand Junction um as part of the agricultural experiment station system. And I uh I want to raise a couple points that I'm perplexed by and I would just ask you to ponder this because in the world that I operate in in water um we are projecting at least according to the Colorado water plan we're projecting double growth in Colorado. And so when you say the problem that's trying to be solved which is we have declining enrollment. I mean to
266hear some of these numbers you'd think there's not going to be a kid left in Mesa County in 10 years. Eventually, this is going to have to come back. Otherwise, I am literally trying to solve the opposite problem of having too many people. So, I'm trying to ask you to just reconcile that information as you consider your uh your vote as well. Um my son went to Scenic Elementary and he is a he's a member of the challenge program now and I do believe that it was a direct result of the education that he got at Scenic for all the reasons we've already just you've just heard. Um, clearly there's something wrong with an index that somehow associates a closure with nothing with a building size or facility index that then is clearly not correlated
267at all to the performance of the school. There's literally no I mean I'm a professional scientist. There is no correlation. The building has zero to do with the performance of these kids. So I would say Dr. Hill, I was proud of you. I thought it was brave that you cried during your opening statement and I relate to that because I was the president of a charter school that almost closed and we dug in and we were able to save that school. So I guarantee you it can be done. I would just ask you to channel that feeling and that passion and be brave and work with these parents so that they can actually figure out how to help this school move along and and stay open because I think you're going to find 100% support
268in this community. I've literally been watching the petition literally like two people every five minutes are signing this petition to keep this school open and after this hearing online you're probably going to get even more. It can be a shining example of how you actually involve parents. All we hear about today is let the parents decide, bring the parents together, help the parents, help the school district. This is exactly what we're trying to do. So, I'm just asking you to channel that feeling and be [Applause] brave. All righty. Up now we have number 14, Anna Elliot. And on deck number 15, Kevin Cordova. Good evening. It's good to see you all. Never disappointed by Dr. Hill's research into giving his report. I was blown away. Um expected expected to be here for a while. But
269I want to switch gears a little bit too. We had a talk about death rates. I want to um let you know that I graduated from a district school district in Southern California where it was a three-year high school that had over 500 in the graduating class. That was 1973. 1973 Row versus Wade came into play. Also in 1973 until now, there's been an estimated 63,459 Excuse me. 63,459,781 abortions. That's a lot of babies. That's a lot of babies. And if I want to remind a lot of people here, Colorado enshrined after Roie Ro v. Wade was overturned two years ago. Our state and six others decided to enshrine the right to have an abortion which is already legal and all of those states to be able to put it into our state constitution. We
270have become a state a nation almost of a culture a culture of death. I remember in ' 81 when I was pregnant with my son who attended Chatfield Elementary when they had to put four modulars into Chatfield to accommodate the bulging number of students in Chatfield and all the other elementaryaries. We had to go to year round calendar to track just to be able to get the kids within the facilities at the elementary schools. Everywhere I went when I was pregnant in 81, I was seeing bulging bellies everywhere. Now, when I see a bulging belly, I stop and praise the mom and bless her and the child that she's carrying. We wouldn't be having this conversation if there weren't so many abortions where we even fly in fly in women to be able to have
271them here and we shout abortions. You talk about declining in declining birth rates. This is the problem. Our nation needs to turn back around and praise God and thank him for life. We need to be a culture of praising and blessing the life that comes within a womb. Not ripping it out, not paying for it with our medical and government funds. This needs to stop. Praise the mother that carries the child. [Applause] Just a reminder all that the first tone you you still have 30 seconds left. So I don't want you to feel like you have to stop at that time. Up now we have number 15 Kevin Cordova and on deck number 16 Aaron Fedler. I'm a little nervous um as it feels like I I feel that some of the lines of questioning
272are leading to a decision already. But good evening board and thank you for allowing me to speak tonight. My name is Kevin Cordova and I'm here as a concerned parent to ask you to reconsider the recommendation to close Scenic Elementary. As I said, I'm a parent of four kids. I don't I actually just said that, but two of which been to Scenic students, both of these students are delayed in some aspect or another. having two that excelled through the system and two that are delayed. If you've never had a delayed child, I welcome you to speak to one of us and think of being a parent without the support like we have at Scenic. That being said, after reviewing the 25-year facility plan on Dr. Hill's school closure report, I found the information and mythology
273mythology used to justify scenic closure to be questionable and inconsistent. Scenic Elementary was given a 45% condition score on the building, but when I compared it to other schools in the district, the scoring does not add up. For example, schools like Orchard Avenue, Windgate, Thunder Mountain, Appleton, and others all have a higher condition have higher condition budgets for repair than Scenic. Yet, those schools received higher condition scores. Some significantly higher. Orchard Avenue, for instance, has a $1 million more in repair needs than Scenic, but was giving a 64% condition score. It's worth noting noting that Orchard Avenue was on last year's closure recommendations, but now it's off even though its utilization still remains low at 7 below the 75 90% um threshold. So, how do we how do we explain the sudden change? Similarly, Lincoln
274OM requires nearly $100,000 more in repairs than Scenic, but has a condition score of 62%. Thunder Mountain with a repair budget 58% higher than Scenic was given a condition score of 50%. These inconsistencies cast doubt on the accuracy and the fairness of this process. Even more concerning is the decision to close Scenic over New Emerson. Oops, I totally meant to pass that because you answered that. Okay, so let's not forget the financial investment the community made in these schools. Between Scenic Clifton and Nisley Elementary, the taxpayers approved $10.498 million uh the A bill. And I know that things had to be moved quickly, but to to be fiscally responsible um and allow the community to have all fairness that those things should have been tabled till the next election before we did those and roll
275those out if we were going to be closing schools that we were asking for 104 10.459 million repairs. Thank you. All righty. Up now we have number 16, Aaron Feed Feedler. And on deck number 17, Shaina Almar. Good evening. I am a parent of a fourth and second grader at Scenic. I also have a seventh grader at Redlands who went kindergarten through fifth there. Um, I am a family that moved from the Front Range, researched schools, looked up school grades, partially picked Scenic based on its school grade, which has improved since then, recommendations of colleagues, and when we went to Scenic, we were warmly greeted, and it you can sense that community feel the minute you walk in the door. We have since moved to Fruda and have never once thought about changing schools. We
276I don't know what the future's going to hold for my family and its plan if Scenic closes. I know that our choice will be taken away. Our choice for scenic will be taken away. Our choice for Redland school will be taken away. That will not be an option for us anymore. And I also know that there are almost 60 other parents at scenic or school of choice students at scenic in the same situation. They are not from Redlands schools. We will not have that option. We are parents that chose Scenic, parents that drive farther, parents that make the extra effort because we want that school. If it closes, we will be looking at all options that are left and that involves options outside of D51. I ask you guys to just take into your consideration
277if you're trying to keep numbers from declining to remember that maybe closing a school which such high school of choice is going to lead to even more students being pulled. That's all. Thanks. All righty. Up now we have number 17 Shaina Homer. And on deck number 18, Andrew Fitstroke Good evening. Due to declining enrollment, you plan to close schools and are planning on packing classrooms, which at first seems to make sense to recoup money. However, the future sociological and economic implications are not considered not just for our school and children, but the other schools children and our community as well. The implications of school closures are eliminating our options for schoolish choice, a decline in enrollment, decline in migration to our area, and overcrowding resulting in a further decline in academic achievement, migration, and enrollment.
278For example, with these closures, not only will our children be funneled from Scenic into Windgate and Broadway, overcrowding those schools, but Clifton and Nisley students will be funneled to Fruit Veil and Orchard Avenue and other schools, causing overcrowding there as well, thus creating a further disadvantage for an already disadvantaged population. What will happen to the general population of these schools? let alone what will happen to the children on IEPs, medical 504s, and in special education. There won't be enough room for kids to be in intervention classes or have the individualized attention that is necessary and that they deserve. Can you guys guarantee with these closures that these children will get the specialized attention that they need and deserve? We don't want super schools and overcrowding. That's why scenic is so great because we are able
279to give individualized attention they deserve. Overcrowding causes a lot of problems. And if you take children that are already at risk, kids where you you're already questioning their performance, performance will decline further. School district 51 prides themselves on school of choice. However, due to two previous school closures and resoning, a lot of parents were already stripped of their rights to school of choice due to schools being overcrowded. Parents want to give their children the opportunity to go to schools that excel and Scenic is one and Redlands Middle School is another which did not accept any school of choice this year as a result of of the closures of the Fruit of 89 and East Middle School two years ago. We voted you guys in to be our voice and we are sincerely petitioning you now
280to be our voice and make decisions on our behalf. I for many years was a school of choice mother. I am everybody assumes that you know the Redland schools are wealthy. St. Nick is a school of diversity. 39% of school of choice. I was school of choice for many many years. I wanted my son to see outside of our circumstances and see that he has an opportunity to be outside of poverty and our circumstances so that he can excel. Thank you, Miss Sha. [Applause] All righty. Up now we have number 18 Andrew Fitzgerald and on deck number 19 Jim Rush. Thank you board. Thank you for having us. Thank you for making these decisions and trying to stay ahead stay ahead of the game and on behalf of our our children. I am an attorney
281practice has practiced for 25 years in both Utah and Colorado. So, I'm licensed in both states and I have a son that graduated from Scenic. Um he did his entire um his entire five, six years there. I guess it's six. Um he's autistic and the gift that scenic and its staff and that community has given to my family is irre irreplaceable. He is a child of statistics that um are not in his favor. And this particular school and these people and this culture that has been created there long before I've come to this state has made it so that he can succeed and s um and succeed into his next step at Redlands Middle. I have a daughter there now who is in the second grade and um she's very much fond of that school.
282We've talked a lot about costs, their opportunity costs. We haven't talked a lot about those those opportunities costs. In my profession, I've dealt with dependency cases, meaning families who are have kids removed. Um, I've dealt with in I've been in the criminal courts for many years, seeing families torn apart due to drugs and crime and other hardships. And I've been a divorce lawyer as well and a whole bunch of other things I don't even want to mention. But I have never seen something like scenic that takes children from all ranges of diversity, economics, puts their arms around them, holds them, brings them in, and takes them to academic standards that are the highest in this county and have some of the highest rankings in the state. We're always looking for interventions as attorneys and social
283workers and teachers, etc. to find a way to problem solve and to bring children into success that come from places that are statistics are against them. And Scenic Elementary somehow because of its culture, because of its teachers, has found a way to take a kid from anywhere in this valley with all kinds of problems and bring them up to an academic standard that is unheard of. I have never seen this. If we could replicate it and sell it to the rest of the country to save these kids and create success for them, we should do it. It would be such a travesty and a tragedy to take a culture that has been built for many years and to take it from these children and to take it from this whole valley because these children All
284righty. Up now we have number 19, Jim Rush, and on deck number 20, Donald Hunger. Good evening, board, Dr. Hill. Uh, my name is Jim Rush. I'm here on behalf of the Colorado West Area Square and Round Dance Council to address the policy KF, which is uh community use of school facilities. The Colorado West Area Council has enjoyed long partnership with district 51. We've been hosting our yearly peach prominade square dance at D51 middle schools since 1984. That's 40 years of continuous good dancing and good community relations. As district 51 taxpayers, we applaud your efforts at fiscal responsibility. However, we have some concerns with the third party facility scheduler, Facilitron. We understand that Facilitron has published a set of facility use costs that they represent as typical hourly operating expenses for gymnasiums, cafeterias, and the
285like. Uh we understand that the policy KF intends to set these costs as the basis for building use rates. Apart from the fact that Facilitron has a vested interest in districts charging community groups as much as possible, our council wonders about how accurate these rates these rate targets might be. Where did Facilitron get their numbers from? Even here on the Western Slope, expenses in Montros or Craig are likely to be different from Grand Junction. Uh, and let alone what energy costs might be in Denver or Kansas City or De Moines. Not only is the geographic location of school significant, the size of the building, the age of the building, the efficiency of the equipment, all affect quit costs to operate a school. Our council urges caution in blindly trusting these facilitron numbers. They might be
286too high, they might be too low. Um, our council suggests that a prudent course of action would be for the board to ask your facilities department to spot check a few of these facilitron numbers. If the staff finds it's too difficult to isolate what it costs to operate just the gymnasium for one hour, that would be a red flag about the silletron numbers. In short, our council applauds the board's efforts to achieve a balanced budget, but we also strongly urge the board to rely on the expertise of their own staff to doublech checkck these facility use rates made by a distant thirdparty vendor. Thank you. All righty. Up now we have number 20, Donald Hunger. And on deck number 21, Autumn Fitzgerald. Hello, my name is Donald Hunger. And I would like to read, I
287know this is difficult for many students and parents. When the data started coming out about birth rates and that young families were moving out of the area, it was confusing. Our area is growing in overall population yet our students age population is shrinking rapidly. After corroborating the information, it became clear that our entire community would have to reckon with this at some point whether they were ready or not. Yes, some families have also left the district for homeschool and other opinions. It is not as many as some people might guess. rather than being upset with those parents. School district across the county need to ask why some families are pulling their kids out altogether. This is a natural issue across the board and not a lot more families would be pulling their kids out if
288they could. Specifically with district 51, it has become clear that less families are able to facil financially survive here is we have a housing crisis specifically hurting young families and we aren't even building starter homes that young families can buy if they wanted to. Young families are not moving in the expensive homes. They also aren't moving into the apartments. They are being built. Instead, they are just moving out of town because there's no way for them to start pulling down putting down roots. Local officials can't even get on the same page about this. So, this problem will persist for years until they figure it out. And even then, it will take some time for affordable housing for young parents actually want to raise their children. This combination of factors makes it clear that shutting down
289some schools is not something the school district can avoid. It's actually surprising that you're only shutting down three schools right now. To be honest, I support Dr. Hill, his team, the committee, and the board for making these extremely tough decisions. And I hope the community can somehow start to grapple with the gravity of what is happening without tearing itself apart, without going. We're not going to turn this big ship around quickly. However, we can use this as an opportunity to come together and find situations. Even those solutions will take years to come to fruition. And I want to add this is not new information. This has been going on for over a year. People are starting to show up coming out of the woodwork. You guys have been working on this for a long time.
290We are government of the people, for the people, by the people. If we just come up and start plummeting you guys for your decisions and the work you're done, we're not a great community and I'm sorry for the way we are responding to what you're doing. We've been working very hard. Thank you, Mr. Hunger. Up now we have number 21, Autumn Fitzgerald. And number 22, uh, Sam, is it my Thank you, board. Um, thank you for your time and your effort and your dedication. Um, we understand the really difficult job that you have and I want you to understand that we are not adversaries with you. Um, it's really important that we as constituents have a meaningful opportunity to participate in this process and weigh in and provide solutions. And that's what we want to
291do. um we need to support each other, the board and the community and work together to find an appropriate solution on this. A great time to do that would have been the March 9th, 2023 special meeting that you guys held. Um it was scheduled at a prior meeting on March 7th, which gave two days notice to the public to participate in which is not meaningful notice. the March 9th meeting is meaningful um because that's where the board discussed um relying on the demographer and creating uh or building a committee to create the criteria to close elementary schools. That would have been a great time for all of us to come together and receive information and share thoughts. Um but there was only two days between those two meetings and there were votes that were made
292during the March 9th meeting. Um that didn't give us a meaningful opportunity for the public to weigh in or for us to be a part of this um really important decision. Similarly, the meeting the meeting at Scenic Elementary on November 14th should have been an open meeting. There were more than three board members there. Um, Dr. Hill was there. You certainly discussed public business. Um, and it sounds like the decision to us. It sounds like the decision had already been made at that point. I remember the email that came to the elementary schools of Broadway and Windgate the following day warning them to prepare themselves to receive students from Scenic Elementary. To us that feels like the decision has been made and you're supposed to vote on it today. Um this creates a lack of
293transparency and importantly it erodess confidence and trust between the public and the board. We don't want that. Um, you will note from the comments made today that we are surprised. We feel like we did not get notice of these things and we haven't had a meaningful opportunity to participate. We are all a we want you to understand that we want to work with you, but we need more time. We're asking you to table this and give us an opportunity to work with you on this and give you more information that we think is important to your decision. Thank you for your time. All righty. Up now we have number 22 Samsop. And on deck number 23, Ginger Barry. Hey, I just wanted to concur with all the thoughts of the kids that uh that they
294shared. I think those were pretty strong and uh very brave thoughts and I think they have a lot of value and my big concern is that you guys were presented all this data about birth and death and dollars but there and you want to make a choice on that or a decision on that but where's all this sophisticated data on what will happen to all those kids and I mean aren't you curious about that or want to look into that a little bit more before you make your decision? Can you make a decision without knowing what's going to unfold? Um, and I feel like you should have that equal amount of that super sophisticated data about what's going to happen to the kids, the the effect on the kids, the use of modulars, the traffic,
295the home values in the area, the effect on the staff and the neighborhoods. Um, this all just seems super focused on the dollar end of it. But what about the kids in a community? I mean, that has what's their value? um you are a board of the schools. You're not a board of a maintenance company, you know. So, don't look at the dollars, look at the kids, and look at the community because you have a very special school here, and that's pretty clear with all the the responses you've received to this. So, don't make a one a decision on this one-sided data. I think you need to take the information that Sydney brought up here from, you know, her Yale experience about what happens when you close schools and consider that and look at that
296before you just make a decision based on dollars. Um, believe that's all I got. And um, fold the other side of my paper to see if everything else I wanted to share. No, that's it. Thank you. All righty. Up now we have number 23, Miss Ginger Berry. And on deck number 24, Joshworth. Good evening. I'm going to change directions just a little bit. I'm speaking tonight in order to express my concerns regarding the potential violation of the open meeting law during the school closure announcements, excuse me, last week. After speaking with attendees at the meetings for Nisley Scenic and Clifton school closures, it has become clear that more than two board members were present at each of these meetings. I understand that there were three members present at the Nisley announcement and there were four
297members present at the scenic and the Clifton me um announcement. The open meeting law is designated to ensure transparency and public participation in governmental decisionmaking. It requires that public bodies such as school boards conduct their business in public meetings where the public can observe and participate. The meeting law clearly states all meetings of three or more members on any local public body at which any public business is being discussed or at which any formal action may be taken or declared to be a public meeting open to the public at all times. A meeting is listed as any kind of gathering, including a work session, retreat, or other board gatherings convened to discuss public business. I would argue that public business and formal actions were being taken at these announcements of excuse me of school closures.
298Well, or with the attendance of a quorum of board members, there should have been at least a 24-hour notice of a special meeting and an agenda posted online for for to allow for public participation even if the board considered moving into an executive council session which could have included only the staff members of the schools that that attended. In addition, any minutes or any in addition minutes are to be taken where any formal action occurs. Announcing school closures is definitely a form formal action and I await the release of the minutes within the next 10 days. I urge the board of education to review its practices and ensure full compliance with the open meeting law. I believe, excuse me, I believe that the transparency and public participation are essential to maintaining pro public trust in
299our school district. And I'll leave you the law. Thank you. All righty. Up next, we have number 24, Josh Worth. And on deck number 25, Danworth. First off, I just want to thank you for listening to every one of our concerns. I find it very admirable and I appreciate it. Thank you, Andrea, for asking those important questions during Dr. Hill's presentation and I urge you all not to vote until you have all those answers. There are too many discrepancies in Shannon's report to make an informed decision. For instance, Shannon's report states Broadway and Wing will absorb 125 kids, but Scenic's population excluding school of choice and transfers is 178 currently. How did he miss those 52 kids? His report didn't count for kids that attend Scenic that already live in the Windgate and Broad Broadway's
300boundaries. His reports are inaccurate. Do not include future students for all the 17 active new developments, not just the Redlands 360 development. We have 16 other small to large developments going on in those areas. The demographic data does not back the closure of Scenic, particularly the children per unit for future developments. Using the 0.2 2 children per household for active developments at Scenic Wingate and Broadway's boundaries. It will add an additional 430 children within the next several years. And it sounds like that's timetable could be accelerated given Jquy's uh words with another 49 children coming from planned developments that are in Redland's pipeline currently with the city of Grand Junction, including uh it's not in the pipeline, but there is a potential 75 unit development right next to Scenic. I want to reiterate Brian's point
301that Jane Quimby, the project manager with Redland 360, has confirmed the development will progress faster than anticipated. They will build a child care facility in one of their first commercial lots in the filing, too, to fill the need of new children. Why would they invest this much into catering to families if they are quote planning on no children coming from the homes in 360? To overlook this data is dangerous, and how will Broadway and Windgate have adequate room for these future students if the absorption of Scenic will already exceed the capacity of these two schools? Scenic Elementary is projected to decline in enrollment, yet this year's attendance increase. Prior demographic reports show otherwise. Ironically, Shannon's 2023 report predicted Scenic would exceed 100% capacity by 2027, aligning with the current scenic enrollment trends being that it's
302up this year. Ignoring this data risk overcrowding at all three schools and a limiting school of choice options, especially for the IEP plan kids and special ed students, I'm not worried about my own child. I am worried about the child that will be missed and overlooked through his transition. I have sent you my full eight-page report with the discrepancies I have found so far, and I urge you to answer every hole in the data before making a decision. Thank you for your time, your service, and most of all, your compassion. All righty. Up now, we have number 25, Dan Worth. And on deck, number 26, looks like Andre Suarez. My name is Dan Worth. I've been teaching for a while and I still hope to teach for many, many years. I teach at Scenic Elementary.
303I just want to address several things. One, the pathways of that the EDC committee came up with to address declining enrollment. The first is the the uh providing options that attract students that are currently not in D51. Scenic fills a unique niche in our district. It's a hybrid school. It's it has its attendance area, but it also has very high school of choice. As you've heard over and over, not a new trend. It's been as long as we've been tracking. It's very, very consistent. Next year, we're going to have 92 school of choice. That equates to about a million dollars in revenue as been stated. Over a third of that is from the Windgate and Broadway. Um 24 of those kids are from out of the district. $264,000 worth of revenue brought into our district.
304If every school brought in as many as our little school did, we'd have over a thousand new kids added to our district, uh eliminating this whole declining enrollment issue. Our enrollment's up 13%. That will I have absolute confidence with the way we're going that we'll continue to grow. The word is out. When I read through the school closure report that was released four days ago, I noticed that New Emerson, another F-rated school as ourselves, was mentioned, it was listed as a school, quote, whose programming is good," unquote, in that it meets Edex pathway of having school choice options. The exact argument I sent to the board and Dr. Hill in my letter a couple of weeks ago about scenic question. How can one school with almost exactly the same number of school of choice be
305valued over another? Why was quote a good program not mentioned in the report about Scenic? Now again, this is no knock to my friends at New Emerson, although I just found out tonight that they're not one of the buildings that was evaluated. We were told that Scenic was the lowest and now I find out New Emerson wasn't even evaluated in that. It got a pass. Why is that? Why is Scenic not listed as a good program in that report? We've had the highest school performance framework report card from the state in the last four years for this district. We've had seven governor's distinguish improvement awards. The state looks at improvement. That's not achievement. Gotten two. That's because the state values growth. that is to help level the playing field for schools. I'm not knocking again,
306New Emerson. I just don't understand why a lottery system is valued over scenic. We take all of our school of choice kids. We're like a hospital. That's why you hear all these stories. And if you read the letters, you will see that's what these parents have found. My idea, take Nizzley, pay for a bus, bus them to scenic. How many scenic parents would like that opportunity? All righty. Up next we have number 26 and on deck number 27 Chris Porter. Hi, my name is Andrea Sanchez and I am the lead custodian at Scenic Elementary. I see these kids all day long throughout the day. And one thing that I like about Scenic is we don't tolerate bullying at our school. We work on getting kids to get along, work together. Um, and not just that,
307we have awesome staff there that really care for these kids. They come in on their days off to get work prepped and ready for the next day or for that Monday. Um, and also I um one thing that I wanted to bring up too is if it's funds and money that we need for for school um for a high academic schools, they have a grant for building repairs that the school district can apply for um as well as um matching dollar grants as well. I was looking into that and letting you guys know that, you know, we can apply for it because we ain't the school district, but you guys can. So if it's seven million, eight millions to fix our school to make it to where it needs to be, scenic is a safe
308place and the area that we are located in is not a hazardous to the community for driving up to the school and leaving the school because there's actually I think four ways that you can get out of scenic. If you take the the road up the hill and around there's three three areas you can pick the fork to which way you want to go. um listening to the parents that talking about um Broadway that is a pretty dangerous street um even crossing. So just so you guys keep an eye on that and and be aware of that. Um but we also ever since we had a new principal come to our school, our school has pretty much um turned out to be an awesome school. Um we are a big family. the principal leads and
309supports family, kids, and staff as well. So, just so that you guys know that, um, please really think about Scenic and as a board member, you know, really listen to what the community is talking about because Scenic is a pretty awesome school. All righty. Up now we have number 27 Chris Porter and on deck number 28 Casey Celich. No Chris Porter. We're going to move on to number 28 Casey Celich. And on deck number 29 Travis Baker. Good evening. My name is Casey Celich and I have a second grade son that attends Scenic. And in the short time that we've been there, and when I say short time, I quite literally mean just over two months, this school has become a lifeline for our family. We made the decision to transfer to district 51 from
310a non-district charter school because we were unable to find the support and resources that our child so desperately needed. For years, we hesitated to make this transition because we feared placing him in an overcrowded classroom. And here we are. Since joining Scenic, our son has made remarkable strides. He will tell you himself that the support he receives at Scenic is unparalleled. The school has provided him with opportunities that are often lost in larger, more impersonal school environments. Any parent of a child with an IEP will attest to the fact that not all schools are equipped with resources to meet the unique needs of these students. We deserve the right to choose the educational environment that is best suited for our families. For us, that means choosing a small community focused school. I want to emphasize
311this point because it's conflicting to Shannon's comments that were presented earlier this evening. Um, sadly, over the years, we have faced repeated challenges in trying to find alternative school placements. We have been unsuccessful in securing a spot at multiple lottery schools over the years. And just this year, a little over two months ago, when we tried to transfer to Windgate because we didn't know about Scenic, we were informed that the school was already at capacity. Ironically, Windgate is expected to absorb even more students as a result of the proposed resoning of Scenic. Given this, I don't think the utilization percentages mean much at this point. Scenic is a model for what our school should strive to be, not one that should be closed. If children are thriving in this environment, shouldn't we be asking to
312understand why? Unfortunately, the process that has led us here tonight has been rushed. Families were notified that their schools would be closing, and yet they were given less of a week to respond. Before a vote is made on these school closures, we need answers to several specific critical questions. I'm going to skip over most of them because I think they've been covered. Um, I really want to touch on school of choice. It's my understanding that school of choice is up to the principal of that school. Why would they say yes to taking more students if they're receiving more from these consolidations? Is there going to be accountability to hold these schools accept school of choice? When are they going to take them? No one here tonight is questioning the difficult decision that the board finds
313itself. But I urge you to recognize that closing schools is not the only option. It's not the best option. Closing these schools means sacrificing the quality of education for our children. The school board is composed of elected officials who are entrusted with the responsibility of representing the interests of our community. Let us work together to find solutions that benefit all students rather than making hasty decisions. Thank you, Miss. [Applause] All righty. Up now we have number 29, Travis Baker. And on deck number 30, Shannon Cordova. So, I'm going to speak for with uh for Travis Baker. He's uh there's been a few things mentioned that he appreciated. Can you state your name then? Yeah, my name is Dylan Weaver. Um you guys saw my daughter speak earlier. I am heavily threaded into the community. I
314help out in many ways, which isn't the point why we're here, but um basically, you know, my daughter goes to the school. We live in Fruda. It's a school of choice. um we choose to send her to scenic and we are threaded into scenic um it goes back throughout our whole family has gone there basically. Um so you know as a voter anytime the district 51 needs my help and no matter how much it costs me on tax dollars or whatever it's going to cost me I vote to help um and I choose to help my kids and and see that money go into the schools that we have. um since we choose to go to Scenic and um my daughter goes to Scenic, you know, anytime that that help is needed, I'm thinking about
315the school that my daughter goes to. Um so, you know, with the community that we've built with Scenic, it's just crazy that to think that you guys could close it down. Um so, we're just reaching out to you guys as a community for your help. Um and to hear everybody. So, you know, we all work together as a community and we just hope that you guys can see that. Thank you, Mr. [Applause] Weber. Up now we have number 30, Shannon Cordova, and uh number 31, Miss Caitlyn. Hi, everybody. My name is Shannon Cordova. I want to start by telling you I am a mother of four uh past and present students in D51. I am an early childhood teacher and the director at an early childhood facility. So what you should know is I am
316pro- education. I am pro- teacher but above all I am pro- kids. I am that parent that they are talking about. I live in the Windgate boundaries. I choose scenic. I choose scenic for my son. My son is on an IEP. He has dyslexia. He has ADHD. He gets everything he needs at Scenic. It is more than just a school. I have been a proud member of the Scenic family for nine years. I have a daughter who started at Scenic. She's now an eighth grader. Let me tell you about these people at Scenic. They are special. My children have the been the recipient of teachers who take time in the summer to tutor. My children have been the recipients of teachers who look past the behaviors and their disabilities and they see them as people
317valuable members of their school family. This is a very very special place. What you are telling our children is and our teachers their hard work is going to be punished. They are being punished for working hard. They are being punished for putting in the time and the hours. That is not okay. We can't do this. As you have found out tonight, us scenic families, we are an underestimated and we are an underutilized group of people. You should have been asking us a long time ago. We would have been coming to you with answers, solutions, ideas, whatever you needed. It's frustrating that you talk about the money, the money, the money. You never asked. You never gave us the opportunity as voters in this community. I like many other members here tonight when when you needed
318money, we voted yes because we believe in education and we believe in our children. We are what you want. You want parents fighting for their kids. You want teachers kids. You want teachers that go to work every single day because they are proud of what they do and they believe in the children at that school. Please, please consider all your options before voting. Thank you. [Applause] Hey, so before I get to you, Miss Caitlyn, I we still have quite a few names, but I want to do if you have kids that are in the audience, will you please just come to the front and let me know your name so we can get you guys in here and get you out of here with your kids? Yeah. Yeah, what Director Jones is saying that if
319you're a parent with a child, we want to be able to have you be able to make your statements. So, because we know you probably I'm going to get you and I just want to make sure the kids that are in here can get home and Yeah. So, that then if you need Have a seat. Tell me your name. I'll mark you off and we'll get you going. Gotcha. All right. So, my daughter is a second grader at Clifton Elementary. She suffers from severe separation anxiety, has panic attacks just at the thought of being away from me. She does not do well with change, and the thought of losing her school is causing her stress. It is with the love and understanding of our amazing teachers and staff that my daughter is able to go
320to school and not only thrive, but succeed. She loves going to school, is at or above proficient in every subject, and loves when she is able to achieve her perfect attendance. She is terrified to lose her second family because that is what we are at Clifton is a family. I personally feel so much love when I walk in the building that it made me want to volunteer and spend time there as much that this year I became PTO president so that I could be part of something bigger for our students and our staff. I have two adult children as well and both of my boys attended Clifton 30 years ago and there are actually a few teachers who were there then. My niece had the same kindergartener teacher 20 years ago that my daughter had.
321Clifton has generations of families who have wonderful memories of being a Clifton Star. This year, we had some teachers move here from other places to become Clifton Stars. They have bought homes here and become part of our community and our family. We have a lot of families who walk to school and if you close our school, it will impact them severely. We also have a wonderful woman who provides a before and after school program free of charge to families at Clifton. Our hub program is specific to our school. So if you close our school, families will also lose this program. This program also helps us with events, providing a free meal to families who attend. A lot of our kids depend on our school for meals and clothes. Some kids come to the office to
322get their hair done, pick a Halloween costume, and the list goes on forever with the wonderful things that our staff provides. The people in our school are what make it so special. Our kids are terrified to lose their school and worried they won't get to stay with their friends and will miss their trusted teachers in an environment that they feel safe and secure in. Instead, you want to take them and send them to other schools with overcrowding. Our school is one the only one in this district who is meeting our goals for our sped program. We are the only one that meets. We are at a 56.5. The district isn't a turnaround sped. We are not. I'm begging you to keep our school open. And my daughter did not get the chance to say what
323she had asked because she was not brought the slip to sign up to speak. So I would like to let her say something. I have I am in second grade and I really want to finish um school to because I want to get to fifth grade and I want to teach and I want to be with my friends all these years. Thank you for allowing me to speak tonight. My name is Heather Cochran and I'm a parent of a second grade grader at Clifton Elementary. I also have a soontobe preschool student next fall and two 16-year-old twins who attend in Clifton from preschool through fifth grade. Clifton has played a significant role in my children's education. If it weren't for the dedicated teachers at Clifton, my son would not be where he is today. Sorry.
324At an early age, his de sorry, developmental delays were identified and he was placed on an IEP for speech, occupational therapy, reading, writing, and math. to receive extra support. We endured some challenging times and I often worried we wouldn't make it through. But with the support, he was never held back and successfully met the necessary goals. He is now an academic letter letterer and a three sport athlete at Palisade High School. I firmly believe that he would not have achieved this without the unwavering support from the Clifton teachers and staff. I want my younger children to have the same opportunities that my older two had. However, if they are forced to attend overcrowded schools, there's a risk that they could get lost in the system, just like many others did in the 80s and 90s
325when I was in school. In closing, I ask that the school board members consider our situation before voting. Think about your own children, how they would feel to be told that they cannot attend the school where they've formed friendships, built relationships. It breaks a parent's heart to hear their child express and desire not to go to another school. Remember, we voted for you trusting that you would prioritize what is best for our children and their education. Thank you for your time. [Applause] So before I there any other parents with kids in the audience that I know she's a parent, but I'm kids that are in here right now. Come on. Come on. They're both here. Check the cute little blonde one in the back. The little curly head one right here. Them's mine. Go ahead,
326Miss Caitlyn. All right. Um, um, I would like to thank all of you who have taken the time to hear our hearts, heed our concern, and consider our questions. I would like to open by saying, when a flower does not bloom, sorry, when a flower does not bloom, do you blame the flower or do you blame the environment? You adjust the light, you check the soil, you make sure that it's getting the water it needs. scenic. Make sure that we get the water, the light, and the soil we need. There are children in this stool school. Specifically for me, I have a son who is in the process, not even currently, but is in the process of being on an IEP. What does his future entail? I saw where you guys had a slideshow that
327you know touched this topic very briefly. This is not a brief topic. This is a heavy topic. This is nights and days of trying to adjust habits and ways that you've done things for years discovering that your kid does not process things that way. Scenic has provided us a culture of support, love, teachers who, for example, Missy, well, my son has a bad day. She looks at him and she says, "Hey, what's going on?" And he, if he says he doesn't want to talk about, she's like, "Hey, can I give you a hug?" That is embedded in them. That is not taught. That is embedded. These teachers mean more than just teachers. They are olive branches to be seen as more than children who need a good quality education. They will get that. Scenic will
328guarantee they get that. But they will also guarantee quality heart, soul, culture and that you are seen as a person and not a data point. Everything we have discussed this evening is a data point and it is so beyond that in business which is what I do. I do not go off of finances. I go off of pour more into my people and replicate myself so that we can do better and the finances will come. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your consideration. And please ask yourself the tough question about the IEP student. And insure, don't just say maybe or we'll think or we'll try or we'll reach out. Give us a plan because these cannot be left behind. Thank you. All righty. Up next we have number 32 Morgan and on deck
329number 34 Jen Brent Binley. Hi, I am Morgan Laida. Um I didn't really intend to speak today. Um so I don't really have anything prepared but um I wanted to start by saying um I really did appreciate you coming to Nisley. Um the board coming to Nisley when you were announcing the closure. I know it was hard. I know it sometimes feels like you're being bered. Um and that is not the intent. I think the staff at Nisley were kind of a safe space for our students. Um and I have a lot of pride in being an RN for the school district. I left the hospital and I love working for the school district trying to keep it together. And so I know that a lot of what we talk about with Nizzley is our
330low test scores and that's all we talk about. But I want to talk about some of the things that we do really well which is look at the whole child and we wrap around services. One program that Nisley has that no other school in our district has is the Skipin program and it's a student- centered project where we partner with Western Colorado Pediatrics where we meet monthly with pediatricians um and we talk about our students. We wrap around services. We get parenting classes. Um, we get medication orders needed to give medications in school. We get counseling. We we skip lines for to get students counseling services that they so desperately need because we all know that there's weight lists. Um, and a lot of those providers couldn't be here today, but one in particular, Cecilia,
331Dr. Cecilia Weaver. She's a pediatrician at Western Colorado Pediatrics. She wanted me to read for you guys. I wish I could attend the meeting, but I am unable to make it. As a physician on the Skip-Pin project, I have learned so much about the struggles these families face and how much you guys are doing to help them out. I am so sad that as we are starting to see progress from our program, we received this news. I am really worried for these high-risk families that are going to be hurt by this decision. I do not see the district being able to transition these families smoothly as moving them to further schools will only present more barrier barriers for their education. We all know that beyond providing education, school provides a safe place with food and
332support which is a necessity to some families. I think what I would really like to point out is a lot of our families, it's a single mom or a single dad. We service the family homeless shelter. And so a lot of these kids roll in at 10:00 because there is not a parent at home or there's not a parent at the shelter to make sure that they on time. My gosh, I have so much to say. Um, and by busing those children, we're not going to see them. Their attendance is going to continue to slip because they are, you know, they're struggling. Our parents are not here because they are struggling to survive. We have Marilac Dental come into our school and we had two students that needed general surgeons to provide their oral surgery
333due to the decay and poor oral health and I just can't imagine not having Misley. Up next we have number 34 Jen Binley Binkley Binkley and number 36 Enzo. You're you're on deck my guy. Yes ma'am. Um I would just like to acknowledge some of the difficult decisions that I know that the board and the superintendent is facing in terms of the budget. like I have been following this and so I understand that decisions and difficult decisions have to be made. I have been a proud teacher at Nesley Elementary for six years and I am very passionate and I love these children and these families and one of the things that I am very disheartened by is that I feel like the voices of the most vulnerable and the poor have not been taken into
334consideration into enough into these some of these decisions. Um, I would like to talk also about our dedicated staff. Many staff uh get there early and stay late. They're there on the weekends and they are there late in the evenings and sometimes those are not quantifiable in all the results that are looked at and that is not always something that is easily translated. I also want to give and talk about our families who are absolutely amazing and that do some of the best jobs at what they know to try to provide for their families. And I'm very concerned that their voices are often not heard in these decisions because they are often left out of these um the poor and vulnerable families are often left out because they're busy trying to survive. Um I would
335like to point out that sometime and I read in Dr. Hill's report that some of the resources that were looked at and you know he gave a a number and I was just wondering where was everybody to make sure that those were the right resources for the right time and for the right problem and for the size and scope of the problem. If things had been looked at earlier, would we have gotten to year five? And why why weren't some I mean, why weren't staff members um interviewed by district by the district to investigate what was going on with some of the issues? Um but moving forward, the decision I think is already made and I beg you to please investigate how best to help these children transition into whatever the future holds. And by
336doing that I think that you need to investigate what the work by Dr. Ruby Payne, Dr. Pearlman. There are specific trauma and neurological social needs that all our students need and I don't think enough resources and research has been done into adequately moving these students in or successfully transitioning these students into different locations. I en encourage you to take courses or talk to the CDE about how to move vulnerable students successfully, how to engage families successfully, especially when they are vulnerable and they have incredibly tight schedules. All righty. Up now, number 36, Enzo Wendler. And on deck number 37, Miss Elizabeth Hi, I'm Enzo Wler. Um, I'm here to talk about the school closures. And one of my big concerns is I understand we want to be objective and I completely get that. I think
337understand why we want to say that, but to me objective can also mean checking boxes. It is does it satisfy this requirement? And when something is different at a school, often it gets scored lower just because it's different. Um, and I think on the report, Scenic, for example, got the um comment that it would benefit greatly from physical and acoustic barriers. I think if you ask the students, the teachers, the people who are there, the parents, they would disagree with this comment. Now, objectively, if we put in But walls are good. Scenic will score very low. I think this is done on this is one example. I think there's more than one example of this, but I want to give a very concrete example. Um, I understand that maybe from school safety perspective, it seems
338initially walls would be great. However, there's other considerations to take into account. For example, teachers are much more aware of other parents. They all know me when I walk in, even if I have no idea who they are, which is kind of amazing considering I'm one out of 200 parents. They're one out of 10 teachers. I know a lot of them, but there are they recognize me before I recognize them. They know who my kid is. All of this actually increases safety. If there's someone on campus or on the school property, they identify them very quickly or bring the concern to another teacher as they are right there with no physical barriers. They don't have to leave their kids and they get identified quickly or I think recently they had to call security. It was
339a parent but the teachers didn't recognize it and it got identified extremely quickly. Um, another thing was I think from a financial point of view maybe that 380 to 400 students is the best thing. I'm not disagreeing with that. But our students, one size does not fit all. I think we've heard from many people here that the smaller class size, smaller school really helps these students. And again, objectively, it's not that we want diversity in our schools. Um I also think smaller schools have safety issu less safety issues. Um you can look this up online and um yeah um I also wanted to point out that we appreciate magnet schools but school of choice was not taken into account while it is a magnet. I thank you very much for your time. Thank you. Thank
340you. All right. Up next we have number 37, Miss Elizabeth. And then on deck number 40, Judy Alexander. Good evening. My name is Elizabeth and my son is in fourth grade at Scenic Elementary. He asked me to be here tonight because he knows how very important this decision is. On Thursday, as we were learning that the district's decision to close his school, my son cried the 20 minutes it takes us to get home. As he was getting ready for bed that night, my son approached me expressing his concerns for his education as he is not able to finish his elementary school at Scenic. We decided to go to Scenic after attending a private school here in the valley and I drive my son from Clifton to the Redlands every day because I know Scenic Elementary
341is where he will receive the best education District 51 has to offer. I am so incredibly grateful I made this decision because my autistic son is excelling socially. He has joined Lego League, the yearbook club, and modern band. All this year, he has been able to cultivate and grow relationships with his peers in these extracurricular activities. To close scenic and to deny him school of choice will set him back in his social progress. My son has been incred has had an incredible opportunity by attending a smaller school. He has surrounded himself with a loving community. When we are out in public, we have administrators and school employees, not just his teachers, approach us and tell us how amazing he is. Even tonight, I had a teacher who my son has never attended her class tell
342me how incredible my son is because the school is so small that we have the opportunity to grow relationships with each individual there. A school of 400 students would not provide a familiar enough environment for such relationships to blossom. My son had his second grade teacher who was able to push through to get him onto a 504 plan before he was diagnosed with autism in February. Without such a small class size, she would not have had the time to advocate for this individual student. Also, because the school is smaller, I have been able to work to keep him in enrichment. He is in the book club in enrichment reading 20,000 leagues under the sea. I have never heard of an elementary school student reading that book, understanding it, being able to tell me what's going
343on. And he is doing it. He's doing it better than I am because I'm reading alongside of him just in case he doesn't get it. I have never It's just amazing. And then I also want to point out Dr. Hill is comparing our district to that of Gley wanting to copy the school structures. and I did a quick Google search to G's top elementary school rating. Gley's number one elementary school is number 190 in the state of Colorado whereas Scenic is number 61. Thank you. Up now we have number 40, Miss Judy Alexander. And on deck number 41, Miss K. Sinstrom. Hi all. Appreciate you all. I am a retired teacher and I'm a grandmother and I work at Clifton Elementary with a with the hub which Susan mentioned where we go early in the
344morning like 7:15 to be there for parents who work who have nobody to take care of their kids and then in the afternoons they're with us until six o'clock at night. I can't even tell you what it means to me to walk into that school and to the teachers, the principal, the everybody has such a love for the kids and the parents. I go to the programs and parents with flowers for their kids and and and people look at Clifton and say, "Oh, you know, pretty shaky. We have problems." We do have problems, but I've found such loving people there and I've found such loving children and I just to me our priority and I know money is big and we have to consider that but our priority is our children. And when those kids
345came crying and in pain over not being able to be in their school or at hub, my heart broke for them because I don't have an answer for them. And I know you all are working hard to have an answer. But I would hope and I would pray that we remember that they are our priority and they matter more than any money or any program. They matter and we need to do whatever we can to save their lives and to grow them so that they can be the adults of tomorrow that we need. Thank you. Thank you. I pray that you make the right decision. Thank you. All righty. Up now we have number 41, Kate Sinstrom. And on deck number 42, Sarah Fletcher. Woo. It is 10:00. Wow. I wish we were up doing
346something more fun than this, but this is important. So, here we are. Uh, my name is Kate. I am a parent of a first grader at Scenic. I want to truly thank each of you um for your part in the board and for all of you being here with us. Um I don't know what drew you to this role, but I choose to believe that it was to do something good for this community. Um last year I chose to homeschool and um it was mostly because I was against public school. But after talking to basically everyone I could about scenic um and hearing literally only raving reviews um I decided to try it and it has obviously won me over. Um the small school environment, the ex excellent educators, the community feel have made me
347feel has made me fall in love with this rare gem. Um hearing that you're closing Scenic because of various reasons just doesn't make sense to me. I personally have seen in my tiny little neighborhood nine kids in the last year move in. Um people are aging out and established families are moving in. Um and I'm zoned for scenic. In my opinion, getting rid of your top school will only exag exacerbate your decline in enrollment um for families like me. On your website, you claim to be a community dedicated to fostering academic excellence, continual improvement, and a sense of belonging. You want to embrace diversity um and empower each student every day. Yet, you are choosing to close a different style of school with academic excellence and wonderfully run as a community behind it unlike anywhere
348else. You want more kiddos in your district. Parents want this type of school. Closing this school will only confirm my doubts in the public public system. My family and I will not go to an overcrowded school where there is no place to keep our children safe and meet their academic needs and their independent needs. Um the district will lose a family like mine and I am just getting started. I have three kids. This is my first year. Um, I urge you to remember that you were elected to be our voice and it is your duty to listen to our voice. Thank you for listening to our voice. Um, and we are saying that we love Scenic. Um, I know that your job is not easy and that you guys are real people. Um, that your
349decision is invo is important. So, please consider our voices. Thank you so [Applause] much. All righty. Up now we have Miss Sarah Fletcher and on deck Lelle Ellen. Okay, it's melleen. All right, so up now we have Miss Lelle Allen and on deck we have Jessica Murphy. Hello, I'm Lelle Allen. I'm a staff member for D51. This is my 27th year with school district teaching at Clifton, opening Rocky, opening Chapida, D51 online, and now Grand River Academy. This information is important because I've taught the majority of my career at heavily impacted schools. We all understand the importance of making financially sound decisions. Earlier in the meeting, we heard Mr. Jones inquire about students who have different learning plans. As you move forward, we hope you not only consider students with IEPs and 504s, but also
350students with behavioral plans, read plans, and students who are CLLD. Please consider all of these facts when redesigning classes. Students who have one of the plans I just listed needs smaller class sizes, not larger. Please address address class size for all of these schools and their families before making any of these decisions. Parents and staff are eager to hear more about how all of the great needs of these children will be met without increasing any class sizes for all of these impacted schools. Remember, our community is not like the Denver area, and we don't want to be. This community would community would really rally around a different path if you pursued other options like trying to get more money from the community. This is a great community to live in and they would be willing
351to do other things. Thank you. All right, up next we have number 44, Jessica Murphy. And on deck number 45, Ethan Turner. I know it's late and none of us want to be here this late. So, I thank you for listening to each and one of our concerns. I am I am a mom of three great kids. One who has already graduated. Clifton was on a reading plan. Sorry, a reading plan and an AEP. Her fifth grade year, she jumped reading levels by bounds. My son, who is also on an IEP, who has been on an IEP since preschool and is now in kindergarten. Those around him can finally understand his speech. My husband can finally understand his speech. Being a parent whose own partner can't understand her son is extremely difficult and being one
352of the only ones that can understand him. And now you want to send him and three others 300 other students to schools that are already large class sizes. You you talk about sending him to Rocky Mountain, Chatfield, or Thunder Mountain. They're all schools that have issues, high studenttoteer ratios. It just doesn't make sense. You talk about having to add three buses to ship students from Clifton to these three schools. What happens to the parents that are walking to Clifton and their their student gets sick? They can't take a bus home. How are they supposed to go get their kids if they don't have transportation? And they're now at Thunder Mountain, at Chatfield, at Rocky Mountain. When they walk to Clifton, they're wowincome families at our school that that don't have transportation needs. They're walking. We
353have Marillac Dental come into the school. We have a vision program that comes into the school and offers screenings and gives students new pairs of glasses for free. And you're going to take that away. Not only are you taking away our family, you're taking away other jobs as well from our wreck program, our Eureka program, the hub. There's so much you're taking away from our community by closing Clifton and I beg you, I beg you, please reconsider. Thank you. Thank you. All righty. Up now we have Mr. Ethan Turner. And on deck, uh, looks like is it Karen Day? Good evening. My name is Ethan Turner. I'm a trooper with Colorado State Patrol and a father of six children, four of whom are in this school district already. Three of those attend Scenic Elementary on
354school of choice. They all returned to the district from Holy Family because of what Scenic had to offer. My nine-year-old son has an IEP and has always been extremely behind grade level due to autism, ADHD, and other learning disabilities. Since attending Scenic, my son is at grade level and excels daily. My seven-year-old daughter was behind grade level in reading and comprehension. She now excels in school and loves to read, as you heard her speak here tonight. As a parent, I had questions about the safety of an open concept school, too. But students have mutual respect of others. Come to school for a day and see how quiet it is. All three children broke down crying when I told them scenic was set to close. All summer break, they continually ask my wife and I when
355they would get to return to school. It's not every day children cry because they won't have to go back to school or want to give up summer vacation to be there. I'm a law enforcement officer and I was present during a lockdown for a police activity on Halloween this year. Every single staff member knew exactly what they were supposed to do. Every student knew what they were supposed to do. One of the best parts of Scenic is their safety plan. They don't have doors to identify where innocent sitting targets are. When a safety issue arises, the children are not in an inescapable room. They are hidden and secured in special hiding places not meant to be found. I was proud to not only be a parent watching how well they cared for my children, but
356also a law enforcement officer who knew those children and staff were safe. They went from outside receiving candy to completely locked down and secure and under four minutes before the SRO got there from Redlands Middle School down the road. No one was upset they got pulled away from getting candy, they knew what was important. My primary role is traffic safety and crash investigation. If Broadway and Windgate elementary schools are due to receive the 240 students from scenic or 147 students who are not school of choice, the traffic around those schools will become more of a nightmare than it already is. Broadway sits on State Highway 340 or Broadway as it's known. Wgate sits on a two-lane residential road with limited access close to the same roundabout as Broadway. There are already plenty of traffic concerns
357and crashes along these roads and combining these schools will significantly increase the traffic and safety concerns of these additional students. That is when we have perfect weather and we all know how Colorado weather works. Not to mention Broadway would be over capacity and Windgate doesn't allow school of choice. As far as security concerns go, scenic students and staff are much safer with their safety plan in secluded area off of the highway where most people don't know they exist. next to a state highway. Thank you, Mr. [Applause] Turner. All right. Up. Now we have number 46. Is it Karen Day? Number 46. All right. Number 47, Miss Deb Morland. And on deck number 48, Nova returner. Tucker. Turner. Tucker. Tuck. Hi, my name is Deb Morland. Um, I live in Fruda and I don't have any
358kids or grandkids in school, but I'm a concerned citizen and I'm I just um this is just an incredibly hard process. It's hard to even watch. I want to really thank all of the, you know, the board members for stepping up and and serving us. And this is not an easy job. And Brian, you're I want to validate what all you said and how passionately you said it. Everybody here tonight has been so sincere and so genuine and heartfelt. It's just kind of heartbreaking to I would do not want to be on the decision end of this. But one thing I'm a retired um counselor and crisis clinician and what it just occurred to me that um you know I'm seeing stages of grief here. you know, disbelief and denial and anger and bargaining and
359uh depression, they're all showing up already. It's just a hard process and and um it's not going to be easy to get through. But the last stage is is uh acceptance when you finally are down to if you've lost a loved one or if you've lost a school, what do you do? And the the kids are the most important thing here, right? Everybody agrees on that. So at that point the only thing that you can do have any control of is um your uh modeling the behavior and the uh um emotional abilities that you want the children to have. And that comes with um helping them with acceptance and helping them understand that um you know re resiliency is one of the most important traits that there is for getting through life and and that
360can be modeled and that can be uh you know acceptance of change. Those are things that we all need to get through life and that will be an opportunity when dis hard decisions are made and there are going to be everybody's not going to end up happy here and I just want to in just encourage everybody to be able to make that last step and adjust your attitudes to help the kids accept whatever they have to accept. Thank you. All righty. up now. Number 48, Miss Nova Tucker. And on deck number 49, Miss Laura. Hello, Nova Tucker. I live in Grand Junction. I raised my kids here. They were all um they're graduates of D51. And um I know most of you personally. I saw a side of Dr. Hill tonight that um I was
361very impressed with. your compassion and your desire to do what's best for the kids shows through. And I see that in all of you. And I urge the families in this situation to understand that it comes down to a fiscal decision. And you guys have the most difficult decision to make. And somebody's child is going to have to shift and move. And if the parents will stand strong behind their children and lead their children with guidance and direction, this transition will be easier for everyone. I grew up half of my life homeless. I grew up going from school to school. My sister went to a a high school reunion a few years ago and she was in every single picture that fed into that high school. She went to three middle schools and ultimately Grand
362Junction High School. We understand very deeply what it's like to be displaced. And because our parents just said this is this is what we're doing. We did it. And us giving these kids the the guidance to accept our situation will make the transition easier for everyone. And we have to understand that somebody has to make this transition. And so I don't know which schools are the best schools to to transition through that. I know that you guys did a blind study. I know that you looked at numbers, not names of the schools, and it was strictly based on the numbers of what was found with these schools, whether it's the structure of the building. And these parents are sitting here saying, "Oh, well, we'll step up and we'll fiscally figure it out." Well, this community
363cannot fiscally figure out millions of dollars. It is not possible. And we have to look to you to make a good, sound fiscal decision on our behalf. And that's why we elected you and we put our faith in the fact that you will make a good fiscally sound decision. And I hope that the parents will stand for their children and stand behind their children as they transition and know that the services and the the things that are available at their schools are also available at every school in the district. Those programs will find a new home. No, you guys cannot talk while someone else is speaking. I said this earlier. You have to give respect whether you disagree or not because they all gave you respect when you were up here and were quiet. Nova,
364you could was that a minute just a few seconds? But, you know, I'm I'm trying to help the parents understand that they are the ones that can give their kids the guidance that they're going to need to transition through this. [Applause] All righty. Up next, number 49, Miss Laura. 49. Okay, moving on. Number 50, Jared Miles. And on deck 51, Shane Burton. What's Yes, sir. No, you're good. I just said it. I think I voted for some people in here, so that's cool. Thank you for being here. just go. All right. I work in it, so I don't know how to speak publicly now. Um, I have had all five of my children attend Scenic Elementary. My oldest son, Zayn, now 19. Zayn only spent one year at Scenic, his fifth grade year. He was
365behind in every skill they could test for. He could barely read due to changing his school so often. By the time he left Scenic, he was recommended for honors math. Scenic in one year was able to not only catch him up, they propelled him ahead. That momentum allowed him to graduate Bruta Monument High School and CMU Tech concurrent enrollment as a pharmacy tech with a GPA of over 4.0. He is he was awarded a full tuition scholarship to CMU where he is studying premed to become a medical doctor. Perhaps one day your doctor and after hearing us today you will be happy he is all WHBN for brevity. I will summarize my middle boys who all face moderate to significant learning disabilities. Two are on medication for ADHD and one has autistic spectrum disorder in
366addition to ADHD. Needless to say, I was on a firstname basis with the principal, Ben Alexander. Not once were any of my children suspended or expelled. I'd get daily calls and we would collaboratively work out a problem. We we'd work out a solution. Because of Scenic, not only were my kids never placed on a formal 504 plan, which aligns with future military service goals, they are now in high school and middle school with no accommodations because they remain scenic strong. My last kiddo, Melody, who is in fourth grade now, struggled with reading, but through Scenic's unwavering dedication to students first, she is now proficient at reading and excelling at math. I believe in fiscal responsibility, which is why I mentioned Scenic's role in my children's lives. You may not have considered district that district 51
367has not had to pay an additional scent for diagnostic testing or any other accommodation costs. Further, can you tabulate the per pupil funding of my five children? I urge you to count the costs. All five would be homeschooled without [Applause] Up now, number 51, Shane Burton. Moving on to number 52, Robera Baker. And on deck, number 53, Andrew. Good evening. Um, my name is Robera Baker. I am a grandmother of three students at Seni and the parent of three students that previously went to see and I have a letter that I want to read. This letter was um given to me by my son's fifth grade teacher and um it touched my heart and I hope it touches your heart. Stated September 4th, 1990. Dear parents, a few years ago when I was teaching In
368sixth grade at Cherry Creek schools, a co-teer of mine told me of a small, wonderful school in Grand Junction. She spoke of the positive and supportive staff, high level of parent involvement, and the school's natural setting which was used as an outdoor classroom. That school was scenic, and I feel extremely fortunate to be a member of the staff here this year. And that h was that was the case back in 1990 and it continues to be the case with senior is the high level of parental support. Um if you just think about that trying to take your kids to another school setting you won't find that that type of support that they have at scenic. It's just they're just one of the best schools for that. Um, Seni had the support back in 1990 and
369they continue to to this day with that type of support. And then the teachers from Denver were speaking of Scenic, small little school. Our wonderful small little school. Scenic is unique. We love the open concept. It feels like home to everyone. The children are always talking about how how they feel at home at Scenic. They don't like they're like we don't want to go to school in a box with creepy hallways. I have a coworker that I work with who went to school at Scenic or excuse me, she went to school at Fruda and she was two grade levels behind. She was going to be held back. They transferred her to Scenic and within a year they brought her up to grade level. She she goes around saying Scenic saved her from being held back
370and you know you I've heard it tonight. There's many many stories about what scenic does for the students in this valley. So I think we should do the right thing. Think about the kids their needs not what what everybody else what the adults want basically. And I urge you to um to reconsider let's try and fix the problem before we um close the schools. And uh if if it means anything, I'm willing to have my my taxes increased to save scenic. Thank you. [Applause] All righty. Up now number 53 Andrew and number four Ashley Baker. All right. Good evening. My name is Andy Alexandro. I'm an emergency medicine physician practicing here in the valley and I'm here to express my concern about the recommendation to close Scenic Elementary. Though closing scenic clearly saves money, does
371it best support your broader goals. The recommendation relies on purportedly objective data, but all data tells a story and the story inherently contains some bias. Take the building adequacy criteria for instance. Scenic scores poorly in part due to its open concept design and the inclusion of educational adequacy which does not account for the emotional safety our community and many others. Look at Eisenhower Elementary in Boulder, also an open concept school like Scenic and of similar age. It's one of their county's toptail elementary schools like ours, demonstrating students can excel in these flexible spaces when done right. In fact, D50 own's own 2024 facility master plan cites flexible spaces as one of the seven guiding principles. Scenic's open concepts not a liability, it's an asset that makes it unique. And does closing scenic eliminate unique offerings,
372which if further improved, might draw more families back to D51. Families like mine chose Scenic for the reason. It's part of the school's special sauce that can attract more families in the D-51. Have you considered transferring New Emerson into scenic? Close Scenic move New Emerson into the building. New Emerson's building adequacy is lower. Its future capacity for growth is also 70 students less than scenic and lacks flexible space in decreasing the commute for families to the building. Could you further attract students in the D-51 with even greater capacity for growth? Not to mention Scenic's 17acre property allows for creative outdoor learning space plus physical space for further facility growth. Financially, the estimated cost for Scenic's immediate safety and maintenance needs is 2 million, nearly fully covered by Scenic's anticipated share under the recent levy bill.
373What about the remaining five bill 5 million, excuse me, in costs? What are the additional line items within the total building budget? And can we make these details public? Some examples I've heard include 150,000 on facility cosmetics. And we'd love to understand the entirety of the exact building needs. And if two million's covered, what's the needed timeline on the remaining five million in the condition budget? Some final questions. When it's all said and done, the plan saves money, but does it best serve the community? Is there a better way to serve students within our financial constraints and move forward with more creative thinking, integrating, and utilizing our flexible space? I implore you to look into and account for the multiple insights and opportunities identified by the community tonight. There's clearly an army of parents here
374willing to invest in the school. Use it to your advantage. And to the parents and everyone listening here, our school districts clearly struggling to find funding. Let's pass some more laws to get money into the [Applause] schools. Up now we have Ashley Baker. Moving on to number 55, Jessica Hearns. And then on deck number 56, Brenda Hines. Hi, I'm a longtime lurker, firsttime commenter. Um, and really my comment tonight is just a comment of support for the board, for Dr. Hill, the leadership team, Amy, everyone at D51. Um, I know many of you, um, and I know your dedication to the students of D51 above all else. Um, I know tonight's hard. Um, it brutally tugs at the heart. Families may be impacted and it's gut-wrenching, but I just want to thank you for your
375continued support in the public process. It's my favorite part of all processes. It's it's the heartwarming part to me where stories um give context to what seems like sterile data and figures. Um and I think that's important for a really vulnerable time. Um but I want to remind you mostly the board um that you're here because the majority of taxpayers chose you. They trust you and they believe in you. And I trust you and I believe in you. your community trusts you and believes in you so much. So, they passed two ballot measures this election, which I think is huge. And what's been really great about the the sense in the air tonight versus all the other meetings I come to is everyone's positive and they're super loving and I even got to see one
376of my old students. Um, so I think that also shows that your community has trust and faith in the public process. They come here because they know you haven't voted yet, that their stories might matter. They might give you some criteria to think on or make some different decisions or help you understand your current decision and then how to do better going forward. So, as you've heard and will hear comments that hurt your heart, uh please know that I know that you've done the work and that includes the rest of you, not just the board. And I know that you've painfully researched these choices. You've heard some new ideas. And however you vote, you're doing the best for our students. So, thank you. [Applause] Right. Up next, number 56, Brenda Hines. Brendan. Okay. I was
377supposed to talk earlier, but I was crying and I couldn't. Tell me your name, sir. Travis Baker. My sister just actually passed on her. Same reason. But um my mom just went. My daughter went um earlier tonight. Um, my friend Brennan and me both went to Scenic 40 years ago. Um, I can't really sit up here and talk. Just start crying. Shocked that scenic would even be considered to be closed. Um, I grew up in the Redlands. I've lived here my whole life. And I'm one of the parents that if my daughter can't go to Senic, I'm not really sure where I'm gonna send her. Up next we have number 57 Amira Dawson. Is a mayor here? Number 58 Shasta Rosenlum. She left. All right. And our final one, number 59, Alicia Marberry. Mabberry. Thanks,
378guys. Mabry, help me out. Okay. My name is Alicia Mabry and I am a scenic parent and a proud member of our Mesa County community. First, I would like to start by thanking you for serving on the board. You are tasked with the impossible and I am confident these decisions are wearing heavy on your heart. Andrea, thank you for always making time to answer my questions. Please know I appreciate all of you and I pray for you daily. I would like to start off by saying we recognize there is a significant problem with the funding in our district. The reality is school closures may be something that is needed. However, I do not believe there was due diligence to ensure that this was a last resort. As I keep hearing the comparison that this is
379what other larger districts are doing, we aren't other districts. We're district 51. Our goal should be to keep these cuts as far away from our children as possible. With the budget presentation, I kept hearing a lot about recruiting staff to our district, but right now you're eliminating our staff. That seems contradictory. Also with slides presented today, there were two different slides in regard to Redland's elementary school numbers. Both are inaccurate and it proves that possibly the demographer is not giving accurate data. One was off by 55 pupils, the other by 35. Let's talk safety. Board members have said they find the open concept annoying. Parents feel more comfortable with the open concept because their kids are not behind closed doors with an adult. It's not a subject that people like to discuss, but the reality
380is our children are not behind a closed door with an adult. There is accountability and mutual respect in every corner of that building. Let's talk scenic staff. The district provided physical bodies in our school for the two days following the announcement of our school closure. Our staff showed up. They didn't utilize that help because our students are their priority. Did they cry during their planning? You bet. Did they cry during their lunch? You bet. But they were there for our students because they knew that was what our children needed. Not the face of a stranger, but their family. Sorry, guys. I would also like to share that I don't feel like enough research has been done to figure out what is pulling families that are currently residing in our county outside of our district. This
381year alone, Ascent has 75 kindergarteners with a weight list. Many of our district schools barely have 25. Scenic has been a school that has drawn 23 students in our district to this year alone. I encourage you to delay the vote. I have no idea how anyone can feel that closing Nisley Elementary is going to benefit those students. They're not going to get on that bus. They're not going to have the only spa safe space they know. I'm going to be transparent. When I first evaluated school closures, they were first on my list for test performance. Further research proved to me that closing the school is detrimental to our Mesa County students and same with Clifton the overflow schools. Thank you ma'am. Thank you. [Applause] That includes our audience comment. Um board, do you need a
382break? Okay, let's take a quick break. I I think there are some things we can discuss that were brought up during public comment and then uh we can proceed with the rest of our meeting. So let's um if we can let's maybe come back in 5 minutes 10:45. Thanks. Yes. Okay. So, the board does have um some more work to do, but what we'll do um is I think there are some questions that came up during public comment that we can address. And we typically do this in our meetings. If there's um some things that we can address right away, um we do like to get those answered um quickly after public comment. So I know I was not the only one um taking notes. So board, I'll give anybody else an opportunity if you
383had some specific questions you want to try to present to Dr. Hill or any other staff um that were presented or I can start but I want to give everybody else an opportunity. You good? Okay. All right. So um let me see. Sorry. Start them here. Okay. So um classroom size was um mentioned quite a bit. Um, can staff go into a little bit about um sort of maybe a little bit more into the transition plan of of working with the class sizes for uh receiving schools? what is um can you kind of give us a what the plan is on the transition and what we work to to keep class sizes at um certain student levels because I think and this came up when Orchard Avenue and Lincoln Orchard Mesa were named a couple
384of years ago was the concern of having overcrowded classrooms. So um yeah, so I'll try to answer that. If we're increasing students at a school, we're increasing staff in the building as well. And that's how the um staffing formula is calculated is that you take the number of students that you have within a building, you provide FTE for that school, and then the um um the principal actually does have some autonomy in that. Um they obviously want to have classroom teachers in there, but they also can have some flexibility on providing other positions. So, um, it does make it a little bit challenging when we try to compare school to school because sometimes there are decisions that are made to say, I'm not going to, um, hire that position instead, I'm going to hire a
385different position. But, um, for the most part, that is how the staffing formula is is, um, calculated. I don't know if Mel, if there's anything else that should add towards that. I think if there's a misconception that we're going to stick, you know, 100 kids in a building and then not give them any more staff, um, I definitely would want to clarify that. So, Okay. Um, so I think the only piece I wanted to add to that, sorry, is just to talk about rounds. So the schools that are receiving um, students will be receiving teaching staff and support staff to go along with that um, according to the set ratios, but that means that they're adding rounds as well. And so just what we have found through this declining enrollment, when you have a school
386that is less than three rounds per grade, it makes it really challenging to control class sizes because when you're down to two classrooms that you're trying to divide the kiddos or even one or having to do combo grades and those are all things that different um schools of ours are in those positions, you either end up with a really small class size, you end up with a a bubble of a larger class size. But when you're managing class sizes over three or four classrooms, you can much better control the class sizes as well. Okay. So, Clint, I don't know whether this is for um she needs all those papers. If we can just take them over to the side. Sorry. Um, so Clint, if we're talking about moving students into other buildings and and audience,
387I know that you wanted to blurt out questions, but you have to let us do this process. So, please just let us ask the questions. Um, because otherwise the meeting will get we just we have to have rules of decorum, please. Um, so Clint, with students going to other buildings, um, and if they're saying there's there's not little classrooms, um, what has you and your team looked at? And obviously maybe Dr. Hill can expound on that as well. So we have started to look at buildings and the classrooms that are available and what we've found is that some of the rooms are being used um differently uh maybe uh used for um uh general ed space or just open space. I'm not sure how they're using the classroom, but we have found that there is
388could be some space that we could turn into classrooms. Jen and I have talked about uh doing walks through some of the buildings and identifying all of those classes or classrooms to make sure that we can utilize them for classroom space. And then modulars were bought up. So I know we had to do modulars at Fruda um at the high school level. Um has is modular something that you have all looked at if there is more space needed at any of these schools? So Dr. Hill touched on this a little bit and as we looked at some of the numbers for for some of the buildings we've we noticed that some of the some of the buildings have uh capacity larger capacity to hold kids students in them. Um we're looking at a 26 to1
389typically, but the building itself will hold more students. And so there is a there is an opportunity to some of the rooms may be larger stu larger class sizes, but um if we have to put modulars in them, we we can we don't plan on it right now, but we can. Right. And that would truly be that's really and I think from our other discussions even at Fruda was that's really kind of a last It is a last resort, but you guys still there's still some work to do with that for sure. I mean, remodeling and moving. Yep. Yeah. Okay. Um well, and just to clarify like that that is that is part of the process of the facility master plan. When they went into the buildings, it was identified and we have four plans
390for every school. They identified how many they called them teaching stations. So, this is an actual classroom where you can have a class. It's the size of a classroom. it's not a closet or some other space in the building. And then you base your um your utilization numbers off of two different factors. You're either going to base it off of a 26 to1 which again we don't necessarily want 26 kids in a class but you're just kind of using as a rough number and then there's the um the other capacity which is basically CDE's numbers which is saying square footage per kid like how many students could actually comfortably fit within a classroom. So you that's why you end up having two capacity numbers for each school. So, um, you know, this idea that there's
391not classrooms in the buildings that that is that was part of the facility master plan process was actually walking through the buildings and saying this is how many actual teaching stations there are. Multiply that out. That's how many students could actually fit within this building. So, there that's what where those numbers came from. I know Shannon mentioned, it wasn't&m, it was htm when they went in and did the facility master plan for the schools. All right. And then I think hold on, Clint, I'm going to try to ask all my building questions while you're here. Um I think it was mentioned and and and I might have misunderstood but they were saying that the new Emerson building was not evaluated. I thought we evaluated every single building. New Emerson was evaluated and that was given
392a score of F. Okay. Um so with that and this again Clint might you might need to be here or Dr. Hill. Um it was brought up that the condition hold on. So, no, sorry. Emerson is at a 59% utilization and yet they have a waiting list. Um, I think that's because they don't have the space. So, they have a waiting list because they can't take the students they have. Um, but can you elaborate at the 59% utilization of the building? Um, and yet it was brought up that there's a waiting list of, you know, for students at that school. So, that might be both of you number in front of me. I don't know if you And I I mean this may be more of a question about program like that that school is
393a one round school. Like they they literally are limiting. So if they expand it to two rounds, they would they have a weight list every year of families that don't get in at kindergarten. So they would just expand to two rounds. So I I think it's um and that's why I said earlier, you're not comparing the same situation. That is a magnet program. That is a lottery system um that every single family at that school applies for. um and they do have a wait list. If they wanted to open up that weight list, they would just add another round at the school. So there there probably is space in that building to add more rounds. They just have programmatically not done that in the past. So, and that is a that's a conversation we've had
394before is do we expand it to to more rounds if there's actually families that are wanting that that option. Um but again, you're when we looked at the schools for elementary declining enrollment, um we were not factoring in magnet programs in these um these lottery system schools. Um and again, that was part of the conversation with the elementary declining enrollment committee. If you're going to have a conversation about trying to attract more families and bring more families in, if you have a 100% lottery system school, um that's not one that's going to end up being closed. Now, they do have a poor facility and that is a conversation that we're going to have to have and continue to have. Um, but those are those are two different types of schools. Okay. So, um, it was
395brought up of the traffic flow at more so Broadway but also at Windgate. So, um, what has your team looked at? Um, and again, I know you guys you're running some scenarios. Um, and then you kind of get into it more once once if a decision is made, but what what could you address concerning? So, traffic flow is something that we will look at. And traffic flow was something that even in the master plan on all of our buildings, we looked at um now that we know where we're going and what we're doing, we will do a traffic flow, a study, uh, a plan for the building to figure out what we've got. Nothing has been done to date. And is that partially because of spending the time and money on that? If if it
396were to happen or not happen. Yeah, absolutely. Because if it wasn't to go forward, we wouldn't want to spend the time and resources to do it now. Do to do that. Okay. Correct. But but it's something that can be addressed. And I I think it's also important to know I mean I I haven't been in the community for as long as many folks, but I've talked to folks who have worked in these buildings before. The all these buildings have had way more students than they currently have in them. and they can still function. So I understand the idea of saying we don't want to cram buildings and but this is not unique to the districts. These so many schools have been um much more full than they are right now and they completely functioned fine.
397Um so I know it's a shift and we're looking for ways to say like we don't want this to happen because we don't want this to happen somewhere else but it's happened before in the school district and we figure out ways to make it work. And so what I would not want to do is not have classroom space obviously for kids within the buildings. But again that was part of the analysis through the facility master plan process. Yeah. I'd also add just with the with the parking issue and the or the traffic issues uh with Fruit of Monument this last year uh the first couple of days we had some issues with traffic but that's to be expected when parents are trying to figure out movement through the parking lot and how the traffic flow
398is. within within a week, we had all of that figured out and it's not ideal. Um, when you've got a lot of people trying to get in and out of a building, but we've worked it out. And I'd say that even with Broadway or any of these other schools, once we uh once we develop a traffic pattern and we work through it, people are pretty flexible. They can work through it. I just wanted to clarify something really quick. So there hasn't been any work done on the traffic no module because we don't know where we're going because we don't know. Correct. Okay. And so was that the same situation that happened with Fruda? So we you know we had the Fruda 89 and then the FRA middle school move there and then with the realignment
399of that I mean was there a lot of was the talk after the vote for that? Once we knew, we met with the city of Fruda, we met with um with PD there and we worked through traffic flow and um with the principles as well developing a plan in and out of the parking lots for both buildings um with Fruda Middle and Fra Monument. So dependent upon tonight then there'll be there'll be work to be done for sure. Okay. And part of the the problem, Barb, was the the construction that was out front um at Fra High School and and the middle school. Now, that was unexpected. That was is one of the So then going over to Nley. Um is there is one of the busing routes going to be closer to pickup by
400the homeless shelter or has that been looked at or addressed or thought of? We It's been a a topic that's been brought up. No decisions have been made. Um, and we've talked I've already talked to STA. Um, just to throw some scenarios out there, but yeah, it's something that we've talked about. Okay. What are some options? There could be an option to make sure that um there would be easy like access potentially a hub provided. Um, I mean, we have to look through some of the scenarios that would would be able to transport students to the receiving schools. Does anybody have any idea how many students we serve from the shelter? 16. Okay. So, 16 students from the homeless shelter. Okay. Okay. So, less than 20 students. Okay. Thank you. Um yes, other board please.
401Um so have you have you thought about your plan because somebody brought up like uh if a child is sick, how do they get back home because in the Clipp Nesley area they don't have rides or back or if they're in the homeless shelter, how are we going to work it so that the children will be able to return back home because they can't go back home on the school bus? And I don't know who would answer that one or not. Yeah. I guess how do we handle it because we have a lot of unfortunately we have a lot of homeless kids all throughout our district. Um so how are we handling that aspect when a student is sick and mom or dad um or guardian family can't, you know, can't come and get them.
402I mean I'm guessing our counselors and our other team like how we work with these families in the building till we it's a case by case. Yeah. So obviously these are things that we are already um yeah addressing and working with because I know I think when we looked at Chatfield some years ago, we actually had a high population of um of you know of homeless students, you know, there and I think Dave was talking about how they were helping their students at Chatfield. I'm sure that they were having to get back and forth transportation wise. So I my point is it's not a new conversation. And I think these are things we've been addressing in the district. Correct. Absolutely. Can we get you Can you take a mic? Sorry. Because a lot of people
403who have already went to bed are going to finish watching the meeting tomorrow and we'll want to hear what you have to say. Yeah, we do. We we currently uh provide assistance through our reach program which is our our program that supports our homeless families uh with food, shelter, insecurities and then also transportation. Uh we also have McKenna Vento um funds that are available that we often use for uh public transportation or transportation you know if there's a situation that we need you know student transported uh to and from school. So we've got we've got two programs in place that that can help assist in that area. Okay. So when you're doing your transition plan, you can put more detail and put that those type of items in your transition plan. Yeah, absolutely. Yes. Uh
404Jose Luis, we are we're certainly waiting around obviously for for a possible decision. Uh we've got those identification those locations. Uh we know the kids will know the kids within those particular boundary areas. Um, so within that transportation plan or that transition plan, but also for the rest of the plans that were discussed tonight, uh, our department's just, you know, kind of waiting to see what happens. And then we'll get kids identified in those new boundaries. Um, kids that have IEPs, kids that have CLLD plans, and all other plans that were mentioned tonight, and then we'll be ready to support them in in a transition. Thank you. Yep. Sorry, my mic's not I did this to myself, didn't I? You did. Well, actually, it's good that you're up here because part of um the IEP
405was obviously brought up, but we did this with East, right? We obviously had students and we worked through a transition plan also with the consolidation of Fra Middle School and Fright 89. So, we you know, we were able to maybe, you know, execute that but also learn from some things that worked better for families. Correct. Right. Absolutely. Um certainly we have uh more than half of our year left. We still have a lot of student plans that have not had their reviews, their annual reviews for the year. That will be part of it. Uh we are looking at a metriculation plan. We'll look at sub days um in which we're going to be able to work with receiving schools, closing schools, be able to match up case managers, be able to have, you know, transition
406meetings um all the way up until the end of the school year. So, uh John Paul, our sped director, right now is working on that plan as we speak. Uh we're just kind of waiting like I said until we know exactly how many students and where those students lie within those boundaries. So going to Clifton, two things that I were expressed of concern was wreck, which is the Riverside Education Center, because they do a lot of work there um with our families and students and then the Clifton Hub. Have those things also been looked at as far as um things that operate outside of the school and how we'll work with those organizations um or those groups that help serve those families because uh you know if if people are showing up at 7:15 to
407receive kids um you know and then staying till six o'clock at night um until parents come and get them. Are those um are those things happening at other schools or will we help offer those things or um I just want to be able to address those concerns? Might be able to answer that. I think probably all should come on up here because it's going to probably run the gamut of senior leadership questions here. Yes. Um I meet with our um the executive director at Wreck at least once a month. We've uh talked actually a couple of times knowing that um we were there were some decisions that were going to have to be made. So we yes we will continue to talk with Jack and that wreck program. they too are trying to they're under
408um considering on what their programming is going to look like going forward as well. So, um, yep, I've been in contact and I will continue to to work with Wreck, um, and Eureka, um, to identify those needs and where do, um, we need to continue or shift. Um, okay. Um, I think that's it. Does anybody else have questions for fed or facilities or curriculum or IEPs because I'm going to shift to um some numbers on I think like budget numbers that were allocated differently per buildings. I I I have one. Yeah, go ahead. Uh somebody brought up that uh if we schools are closed then there will be no school options to go to if they want to go instead of Woodgate to go to Broadway. Is that true or is that that is not
409true. So, school of choice will open um in the beginning of January um and all parents have that or guardians families have that opportunity to apply for school of choice and then once that window is closed um then transfer um would open up later. I think what was conveyed yeah do those schools have the right to say no you can't come here we're full or we it depended upon availability so that and that would be with whether we're closing schools or not if you've got a school that doesn't have space to take school of choice they're going to you you don't have to take school of choice um by law so it's just whether or not there's actually available space to take school of choice kids and that's why Jen was saying sometimes schools can't
410take school of choice but they might be able to take transfer once the school year starts because maybe some kids didn't come back and it opens up some spots and those end up being yeartoear um versus school of choice where they're there the entire all their years are at that school. So yeah, we'd have to look at that. I mean it's it's sort of like Junction right now. Junction's probably not going to be taking school of choice because they've got a lot more students than than we had planned to be there um because they don't have the space to take it. But if a school has space, they'll they'll take them. So, we're we would be working on any incoming schools to make sure that that we're obvious I don't know. I'm sorry it's like
411it's late, but like coaching to make sure that they're working because I get it. They're going to have a higher overall capacity. Um, which Dr. Hill you kind of touched on. I think I'd like to revisit that again because I think those capacity numbers are a little confusing. Um but we we'll work with the receiving schools to make sure that if there obviously are are spots that we're going to make sure that school of choice um can be a absolutely and when we look at um the the diagrams it shows we are every year this class that is leaving and especially including this year that fifth grade class and we look at the um the incoming or where our kindergarteners are right now, there's a difference of a couple hundred. And so we know that
412as each class leaves the school, the incoming class is much smaller. he had. Yeah, there were a number of slides that showed that. Um just at the high school in particular, the um but if we look at the fifth grade, we look at our fifth graders and our 12th graders. Um the 12th grade is the biggest class, but the current eighth graders that are going to be um 9th graders, it's one of the smallest classes that the um that the high school will have seen. And we're seeing the same thing then as the elementary. The fifth grade class is the largest. And our current kindergarteners are the youngest. I mean, I'm the smallest. They are the youngest as well, but they are the smallest in numbers. So, there seemed to be some discrepancy between some
413of the numbers that were thrown out um regarding the three schools, Scenic, Windgate, Broadway. How confident are we that the numbers are correct? because they it seems to be fairly tight and and we need to make sure that that we've got the room that we think we're going to have in those other two schools. Um well, without having Shane on, um I know we tried to get him back on, couldn't get him. Um I think the one that I I would need to talk to him about is the there was a question about whether or not some of the um SOC students are actually already residing within that area. So, I don't know if he factored that in or not. I just I can't answer that. So, um, I would need to talk to him
414about that, but other than that, I mean, he's basing that off of historical data and, um, what he's seeing as projections. And so, you know, I'm not a demographer. I guess you can always have things be a little bit off. But that's the one question that was brought up tonight that I don't I don't have an answer to. And without being able to chat with him, um, I wouldn't be able to give you all an answer. Can I add some? So, just from looking at some of the the data that's been provided to us um over the past four or five days, I mean, I was gathering that there's 230 current students at Scenic. Is that And I had 97 that were 245. So, so 245. I'm gonna do public math here. My goodness. All
415right. So, put us I did carry the one. Um, so that puts us at 148 that are zoned, it appears, because we had 97 that were either school of choice or um what is the other transfer, right? So, that puts us at See, I told you I don't do public map. We have it in um his slides. Yeah. The the consolidation scenarios he shows uh 44 students going to Broadway next year and 101 students going to Windgate. That's 145 students. Again, that's the part where um he's my assumption is he's pulling out school of choice and transfer kids and he's saying these are the remaining kids and they're split between the two. What I don't have an answer to is is that number also including if you close the school um and the school of
416choice kids are sent back to their home schools are some of those home schools uh Windgate and Broadway and I I wouldn't be able to answer that without talking to him and he's not on. So yeah, I think that discrepancy where there was like 35 kids and then there was 52. So, if we could get clarity on that piece. Um, okay. And then it was also mentioned so that some schools had higher condition budgets to other schools. Um, Clint, maybe you can speak to that like how how are we allocating funds to different buildings for certain things? I mean, is from a facility standpoint? Yeah, I mean it was just mentioned that I think what they're talking about, if I can answer it. So when they're they're probably looking at the facility master plan, the
417facility master plan is taking into account what's what's the square footage of the building. Um what are all the deficiencies within that building? And then they're taking the cost of replacing the building at the at the current size would cost x number of dollars. And then this is how much it would cost to actually fix all the problems in the building. And then there's a ratio there that says if it starts to get too close where it would almost cost the same amount to replace the building at the current size, then it it dings your score. But again, what I shared in the slides earlier is we wouldn't necessarily rebuild a school at the same size. So when you know um I'm just going to pick on Scenic because it's a smaller school. I think
418it's like 29,000 square feet. Well, we're not building new elementary schools at that size. Like I think um Monument Ridge was 40 something,000 square feet. So it's going to cost more to build a larger school. And that's why I threw out the $30 million number. So your condition budget is how much it would actually cost to fix all the problems in the building. But your score is based off what is that compared to the cost of replacing it this at the current size it's already at. And again, I would assume that if we were going to build a brand new elementary school right now, we would not be building it at the same size as some of the schools that are currently um in existence. And we wouldn't necessarily design them the same exact way
419that they're designed right now. So they're going to end up costing more money. So I my understanding is that's how they came up with that the percentage for the building condition was that um amount of cost to fix all the problems versus how much it would cost to replace it at the current size. So yeah, you're going to get a school that you might have a school that cost 8 million to fix all the problems and another one that costs 8 million to fix all the problems, but they're completely different sizes. They're completely different buildings and so you're going to end up getting a different score out of it because it's a it's a financial decision you're basically making. like which one would you want to invest more of that money into a larger size
420building that um you know those dollars are going to go further versus it's getting closer to the point where you could almost replace the whole building but it's smaller. Hopefully that makes sense. Okay, I think that's all I had highlighted for right now. So, I just have a question. So, even if we were to throw money at at a bddling or put money on a building and and say we were to pay $7 million off, it doesn't change the fact that we're in we're still declining and we're still going to have to cut jobs at some point or so we could possibly lose those teachers anyway. Is that correct? Um yeah. So, the Yes. So the idea is that we have a set number of buildings um with a set, you know, amount of capacity
421within them. And as we're declining, we're we're underutilizing buildings across the district as a whole. You might have a building that is increasing in enrollment because of school of choice or whatever it might be. But that doesn't necessarily change the fact that the total number of kids in the district is down. And so that's why I mentioned earlier like what problem are we actually trying to solve? We're not we're trying to solve for the fact that we are declining at a pretty rapid rate and that is making it harder as a district to staff our buildings properly and every building is going to be impacted differently. And so while I we may want to focus on our one school building or this one area of town, it's impacting the entire community and we're having to
422make uh decisions that are, you know, in the best interest of the entire community. Um, so yeah, I I think again that if the problem was just how do we fix the buildings that we currently have because we need to use all the space in all of our buildings, that would be a different conversation. We're at 65% utilization in our elementary schools. So we're not even using all the space that we have. So the conversation of putting all the dollars into all these buildings just means that we're spreading out money that we don't even necessarily have across buildings that we're not even utilizing. And if the projections are that they're going to continue heading that direction, it's just going to get worse. we're going to we're going to have less utilization of these schools buildings.
423But then we have to make some decisions then. Do we do we hold off on putting money into buildings? So then we're not creating safe spaces for kids in the buildings. We're not taking care of the deficiencies in the building because we're not really sure if we're going to close it later. Like I I financially it doesn't make sense to um to take care of the $600 million worth of needs in the district when we don't necessarily need all that space that we currently have, if that makes sense. So I just think they're two different problems that we're talking about um when it comes to that. So it was also mentioned that um I think someone had brought back up like Lincoln Orchard Mesa when we were looking at consolidating that school a couple years
424ago and the utilization of Dos Rios and Mesa View. Um and and I maybe this is just more rhetorical but um I think it was mentioned that some of the utilization in those buildings was less than what Scenic has. But if if the board was, you know, basically implored to put a committee together um because some of us were ready to make a decision two years ago um based off of a recommendation um so but we were implored to do the committee. So we did and you put the committee together. Um the committee obviously weighted different you know different criteria with different weights. So those buildings who have lower utilization those just didn't rise to the top because building adequacy was better. I mean, I'm just trying not that we need to not try to
425justify why we're not closing the schools there, but we followed the certain criteria um that was set before in the committee. And I guess my question would be what's going to happen with some of our other underutilized, you know, buildings elsewhere in town? Yeah. So, it is hard to compare the two outcomes because they're completely different processes that we went through. Um, I would say that the schools that are being recommended now were still part of that conversation two years ago. Um, they may not have been the final recommendation from Shannon in the end, but they were ones that were considered. Um, but we're using a completely different process with a committee this time and came with criteria. So, it's hard to compare the two. Um, I think to answer your question, uh, as I
426mentioned in the presentation, any school that's not impacted by the closures, we're going to have to make staffing reductions there. Like we're we're overstaffing those buildings right now. And I those principles know that. Like they know that um we're going to have to staff them to the students they actually have, if that makes sense. So, and that's why I mentioned this is not going to solve the problem for the entire district for declining enrollment just by closing schools. Um, and we could have gone deeper. We could have we could have closed four or five and that does help a little bit more with that problem, but again, it it became a conversation of um potentially having to do reduction of force where we're going to have to lay off staff and that was a concern
427of ours. So, right. So when we did the process a couple of years ago, obviously you met with your team um Shannon had given us um some projections and some information and without having the long range facilities plan um and other things obviously you guys were coming to some conclusions on your own. I think there were 10 schools identified um in there that we we kind of rated um and and yes, the schools that are being named now were also on the list at that time. And then I know you and your team had to basically assess the information um and bring that back which it wasn't blind at the time. You guys were looking at what the schools were and and then brought that information to the board. So, I guess my sorry I'm
428just trying to think about how to put this all in coherent thoughts um so late. Um I guess to just clarify we we had two different processes, you know, so we we let we let the district you and your team basically take the information and make the recommendation two years ago. That was put on hold and we were tasked with doing a committee. So I think what you're say like correct me if I'm wrong but you're saying that like the process we used two years ago is obviously different than the process now but in the end that group of 10 schools all still waited it's all still in they were all still in there one way or the other. Well and I would say two years ago the recommendation came from Shannon like we we
429tked him with he had his own set of criteria he applied and there was there's overlap with criteria we use now he was looking at building condition. Um, you're right. We didn't have the facility master plan done at that time. So, he was using other data sources. Um, I think he's using CDEs. CDE does assessments of the buildings every a couple years, but it's not as uh intense for the public to to understand the process that we went through on the facility plan was indepth. I mean, that was it really got down to every nook and cranny of these buildings. So, like you were saying, what we were going from on before It's just a completely um different process than having excuse me this master facility plan that really assessed all of our buildings and
430and assessed them equally at the same time. Right. And we and two years ago we just we tasked him with coming up with a recommendation. So he had the recommendation based off his criteria. That was a recommendation that was put forward. Um obviously we didn't close elementary schools through that process and because there was a request for a committee we did the committee the committee came up with the criteria um and then we applied it. So yeah they are not the same exact process both times um but there was some overlap with what the different types of criteria that he looked at that the committee also felt like was important uh in the end. So anything else? Okay. Well, there's just a couple of other things that I think we can clear up just for
431for the community. Um the first one is about the F the changes in the facility um usage fees and it was brought up that that maybe that uh Facilitron gave us those numbers and we really didn't have anything to do with those and um I was on that committee. Um, we worked diligently with our numbers that those were not general numbers that Facilitron came up with based on, you know, the other schools that they work with or whatnot. Those are our numbers. Those are specific to buildings. They're specific to um our district. Yeah, they're very specific. And just just to add some more detail to that, thank you. Every um every number that we have for our gyms to our fields was calculated by square footage. Um costs for employees. Um costs, actual costs, what
432it cost us for utilities. Um all of those numbers were inputed into um they weren't just third party guest numbers. We we inputed all the numbers and those base costs are what we're we're starting from. So we got a base number of what it costs us just to break even uh in our buildings for any usage and then we adjusted costs from there for each of the other tiers that we developed and we did go slow with the rating with with we know that this is a jump. Yeah, it's it very slow. We're keenly aware of it, but when you start at zero and with the way that um energy costs, staffing costs, all of those things have gone up significantly just in the last few years. It was costing us a fortune to do
433that. We've got to start to right side that rightsize that some way or another. And this we we are waiting into that water. This is not even close to where many districts charge for their facilities, but we knew we had to start to dig out of that hole. Yeah. Just to paint the picture, if we were to charge all of our facilities for what we use right now, uh last year, we would have been able to recoup $1.8 million. Um now, not all of the not all of the entities that use our buildings get charged, but um that is what we're spending and what we're subsidizing right now. Then my only other thing is Tammy, can you just come up and just clarify for the for the community? Oh, yeah. Yes. Yes. If it's on.
434Yeah. Could you explain um tier three, four, and five what that event would be that you would charge 41, 20, and 12? I could just understand that. I don't have it here in front of me to to look at for each of the tiers, but um I can get back to you on it. Sorry, I don't have it here in front of me. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. All right. I'm Here's where I'm struggling. Yeah. I'd like Go ahead. Can you just wait a sec? Sorry. Sorry. Um, I know we're doing this a little out of sorts because normally we make a motion for something, we second it, and then have discussion and then So, but um, so here's here's where I'm struggling. Um, so in the feedback that was given to us and and I
435I don't mean for any of this to come across insensitive, but I'm just trying to digest what I heard. Um, and then I'm just going to kind of just speak from my heart here. Um, we were given data from a a Yale graduate who says don't close schools at all because it's going to be detrimental to kids. So like don't close any of the schools. So my question back to the community and you cannot answer um is I what what would you propose for us to do? because in in the emails that we've received and again I'm not I'm not trying to be insensitive here. I'm trying to work through this thought process is if money grew on trees, this would probably be an easier discussion. And I appreciate the people who have come up
436here and said, I'm willing to do whatever. Um I'll vote to do um a tax increase. I would love to say that I'm confident in the rest of our community that they would follow you in that, but I'm telling you, the mill levy override, it passed, but it passed with less votes than the bond. And that was just asking for them to take the sunset off. We weren't even asking for more money. We did a robust survey prior to going out to the community to see if there was even an appetite um for people to do that. And we had a lot of people who said if you take, you know, you can't do anything, you can't do a mill here without a sunset. I'm so thankful that we voted to keep the six and
437a half million so we can have the five contact days and everything else that that mill um provided, which by the way in today's dollars is $7.4 million. And so we have to actually subsidize or not subsidize, but we backfill that with like specific ownership tax and things like that. So again, those dollars could actually be used for other things, but we have to use that because when we go out for a mill or a bond, we actually are are dedicating ourselves to what the voters voted on. And we have to we have to follow through on those items no matter what they cost. So the 6.5 million in 2017 costs us more now. And we have to do those things. We can't just be like, "Nope, we don't do them." So again, I'm just
438it's rhetorical, but I'm just saying like if if you're saying don't close schools at all, and I get it. Like my heart I'm a mom. I get it. I know many of you in the audience. I've either worked with you or I know you very closely. And this is very hard. Um then on the other hand, I hear don't close our school. There's other schools that seem like they should be the ones to be closed. And I'm going to tell you that when this rolled out last time, and I'm not saying anybody here did this, that language gets very dangerous because that is an us against them. And I understand that there's programs at every school that you love. I mean, I was very encouraged to hear all the things that everyone's doing at all
439the schools. And when a community member came up and obviously said some things that y'all didn't agree with, um, we have to be very careful with that, guys, because when you say because when we say that, and I'm and I'm talking to myself here, too, right? Because we're we're all having these conversations in our head. Um, all of our schools are doing the very best that they can. I know every single one of our teachers do the very best that they can. I know many, many people show up every day early and stay late. So, honestly, probably any school in our district could say a lot of the same things that everyone said tonight. And that's why this is so hard. I don't like picking winners and losers. This is why we went with the
440process. And I think it was actually Barb when she first came on said, "Make it blind. Don't don't name the schools so that it we could be completely unbiased by staff and board and everything because I know many of you in these schools. I'm friends with you. But we had to have a process that kept all of us, you know, objective. And I know that you I know that was even brought up tonight too about it being objective. And this is where this is hard hard, right? Because we're talking about a financial decision that has to meet a heart decision. And they almost and they're conflicting, right? We have competing commitments because we have a heart for our students 100%. Nobody in this room, you know, I think most of us as board members, I
441I'll speak for myself, but I would I would guess my colleagues here agree. We did this because we care about our district. I'm a graduate of D51. My kids graduated from D51. I am, you know, I want to see our district not just be the best in Colorado. I want it to be the best, you know, ever. And so we, you know, we love our kids and being the best means that our kids are getting they're all getting a great education, right? In our strategic plan, our goal is to make sure that every single one of our schools is in the top two performing levels. I mean, I my goal would be that every single school is at performance and then parents don't have to worry about it because you're going to send your kid
442to a performance school no matter what. Now, will they have different cultures and niches? Of course, I get that. The other thing I'm struggling with is um it was said the open concept of scenic is your secret sauce and I honestly haven't heard anybody at least my colleagues on the board or Dr. Hill say that they don't like the open concept. I think the challenge that we have nowadays is that when that school was built at that time that was a completely acceptable building and we all know that school security and safety has changed over the years. I mean I was newly in college when Coline happened and I think that unfortunately changed the way that we had to look at how we built our schools. I like the open concept. I think it's great.
443I think there's better collaboration, but in today's world with what we're tasked with, and if you talk to anybody in security, there are different setups that are preferred with security. And the law enforcement gentleman that was here earlier, I think he had some great points, but there's some different things that from a board level and a district level that we have to work with. And I'm sure Director Evansson could could speak to that. So, so on one hand, you know, I hear that the open concept building is the success. Um, but then another person came up and said something that like the open concept had nothing to do with performance. Um, so the only reason I point these out is because you guys, this is this is what's hard, right? There's no one great answer
444for any of this. And there's even conflicting opinions amongst, you know, all of us, right? Even this the the same parents in the same building. Um, and this is the stuff that the board just has to um think on and digest on. Um, you know, I understand that, you know, you you guys were notified five days ago. We got flack for the way that we um presented that. I will tell you that when this was announced a couple of years ago to the other schools, um you know, we we let all three schools know at the same time and then feedback was given to us that they wanted the board there and they wanted the superintendent. They wanted district leadership there when the school was told. So that's what we did this time based off
445of the feedback that we got from last time. So um and in that you and I spoke to every uh principal, every elementary school principal and got feedback on that and got feedback of when this comes down, how do you want this? And that's exactly what the district and and joined them. And even in saying that, none of this is perfect. No, this isn't going to be perfectly executed um at all. It's just this is just in in some sense a messy a messy process. Um, I'm tired. Um, I don't know that I want I don't feel I'm clearheaded enough to to make a decision. But I'm going to tell you guys, I don't I don't know that we can give like weeks and weeks of time to come up with other options because here's
446here's the other crux like we've talked about and it's competing it's competing ideas, right? If it was just the building, I get it. It's just the building. The issue is it it's putting people together so that we can pay for the resources that are needed for our students. I mean, many of the teachers and principles we talked to, they need reading interventionists, they need math interventionists, they need art teachers. I I know Pomona has to do um you know fundraising every year um so they can pay for an art teacher. Now some schools might be able to do that. Um some of our schools in other parts of town their families don't have that kind of disposable income to pay for those types of um you know um resources or individuals at their schools. So
447and I'm thankful for the people that are able to do that in their schools. So, I want to have you all pretend that you're sitting So if you were all sitting here, if you were sitting in our seats and we have to think about 19,000 kids and all the staff and all of the families. Some are blessed to be able to drive their kids across town for options and some are not. I lay awake at night thinking that if we make these cuts, is this going to make somebody lose their home because they lose their job, which is why when Dr. Hill said he could have suggested five. That's more than bending the system. That would break the system. So just in sharing my heart, these are the things that I know it's hard to
448get angry at the people who have to make the decisions. But I want you to know that the time and the effort and the emotion that it has taken to try to really digest and assess this information. I read every single email that anybody ever sent me. Some of you guys obviously have my personal cell phone or messaged me and I tried to get back with everyone as much as I could. Um, obviously met with some people um, one-on-one as well. This is just a very very heavy decision. And for some of us board members, this is now the third third time we've had to do this. So, I'm just going to leave it there for now. and I would like to come back in a couple of days to make the vote because I'm
449tired and I'd like to digest the information. And unfortunately the one caveat for me though would I I think we can proceed on the vote for Nisley unless other board members because that one is um if if we don't do something there the state is going to come in and take over that program and I feel that as a district we have better programming and options um in our district than letting the state come in and take over that school. So I will let the other board members um say if there's anything they want to share. I would say that I was part of the committee of the declining committee as a community member and I attended that committee uh with Senor Lima here. And so one thing that we discussed regarding how to decide
450about how do you measure schools and weight them? One of the biggest discussions was performance and why one school is better than another school. I am able to argue the scenic side easy enough, but I work with the Clifton community and I could argue just as passionately, maybe even more with passion regarding the Clifton community and what their needs are in the Nesley. That's emotion. That's where your heart is. That's what you work at. That's what you want to resolve. So when we were in that committee, we ended up deciding if we just discussed those emotions, we weren't going to get anywhere. It was going to we were going to be there for years and I didn't want to stay there for years. Uh so what we decided is to discuss is to look at
451the conditions of a building and go on that because that's more easier. It's made straightforward. It's more toward how much money do we have budget-wise? Can we afford this or can we afford that? And it was more cut and dry. And I appreciated that much more than doing emotions and talking about the great school and the great teachers of one school versus another school because I don't think that's healthy. And I can't say that and I won't say that the Clifton teachers are worse than than what city teachers are because that is incorrect. Every teacher cares deeply for their students and they want them to be successful and they want our community to be successful and we can listen to emotions all day long and I could process it and I like you didn't sleep
452at night did a lot of stuff uh walked around went in the hills did stuff by myself to think of different options with this work with that work with this work and I just worked it all down and going yes nope nope all the way So, I understand that you're willing to not vote in for a couple days. Totally understand that. But I know the information that I have. And if I move away from the emotion part of that and I look at what we have moneywise and I look at what you said, the all the students, the 19,000, that's what we're looking at. And we, as we went to each school, they said, "Our job is to take care of all students." And I was hoping they meant all students, not just their students
453of their school, but all students. And if I'm going to do that, I'm okay voting tonight. That's just where I stand because I believe that I could argue, like I said, emotionally like Clifton should stay open and not close. I'm a Clifton community leader. I work with the Clifton community. I work with those kids and I know what they are and what they do and what their needs are. Same as with Nestle. It hurts me to say that we may have to close Nes, we may have to close Clifton. And it hurts deeply. And the same part is it doesn't hurt any less to say we may have to close SI. It's the same to me. It's it's the same hurt and the same degree. So that just where I'm at. I think for for
454me um I'm okay with I'm okay with giving it a couple days just so we can get those answers from from uh from Shannon that we may need. And um I don't want to make a rash decision. I mean, East, we knew what we had to do, but then we all agreed later on it was kind of fast. And but I I I agree with Andrea, we can't wait weeks, so I'm okay with waiting a couple days. Um, but uh I just want to make it known that I mean a lot of people have come forward with emails and letters and they've seen me and I've been in this community for a long time and uh we're we're all about kids. I mean, I do everything with kids for this facility, for this community, uh,
455coaching football, various things, and just the things that have been emailed to me and sent to me and and saying that I don't care and and my own kid goes to school here. And and if it had been my daughter's school, I understand I'd be right there with you. I would understand that. But to to say that people don't care and you should be fired and things like that, I understand you get frustrated and get mad, but to get nasty and dirty and like that is it's not right. I mean, Dr. Hill gives everything for us. Um, this community, this this city, I mean, he's at every function he can be at. He gives up gives away time from his own family to be at everything he can be. Um, and it's just I understand
456frustration, but when we start meeting people's characters and things like that, it's just it's really really frustrating and and and I I just uh I just want to say I mean, yeah, I know you elected me to be here in this position and I'm here because I want to be, you know, it's it's not a highpaying job, you know, it's, you know, it's I know there's rumors that we get paid, but we don't, you know, and and I love to do it. I it's it's something I've enjoyed doing this past four years or three and a half years or three years or whatever it is. Um but we do it because we love our kids and we love your kids. Yes, we understand that your kids, but there are our kids, too. So, when we
457say we have 19,000 kids, that's exactly what we mean because there are our kids together. So, we're all in this together whether we're here or not. And just for the fact for me, it's so hard because even if you don't close schools, we have to lay people off. So, those people have families. So, what do we what what do we do with those people? You know, and that's I and that's what I'm not hearing. I'm hearing a lot of, "Okay, we can throw money at it, but what about the families that we have to lay off now because we fixed the building, but we haven't fixed the problem?" So, nobody's coming forward with, "Hey, what are we going to do with those families? How are we going to take care of those? How are we
458going to look a teacher in the face and say, "I'm sorry, you don't have a job now because, you know, we we you know, we did what we had to do." That's so either way it's hard whether we save a school or we lose a lose a teacher that teacher you know that that your kid's favorite teacher could be gone. So it's not a guarantee that even that teacher that's touched somebody's life is going to be there next year. So all these are difficult decisions. So I just want to make sure that we long story short just make sure we give it a couple days and Right. I think Director Jones you make a good point. It's saving saving the positions and knowing that we were to retain those teachers versus saving the building because
459like I said what when I shared my concern is that we we've been very confident and and very fortunate to be able to place everyone who's wanted a position and um in the district and obviously offering the early retirement option will help uh create more positions as Well, um, Director Evansson and Director Lima, what are your thoughts? So, I'm kind of with Director Jones. I agree that, you know, I mean, so that we can get some answers from Shannon. I think it would be beneficial. Wait a couple days. I'm not willing to go into weeks. Um, but I think a couple days would be good, you know. And just like he said, I wrote this down because you guys know I'm I'm an emotional wreck when it comes to kids. So, the same thing. These
460emails have kept me up at night. I didn't run for this position because I don't care about kids. I hear people talk about President Height's kids all the time and where they go to school. I homeschool my children. If I didn't want to be here for your kids, I'd be at home with my kids. But I love your kids. I worked with your kids as a security officer for two years in this district and I fell in love with every single one of them. I've been in every building in this district and it breaks my heart that we have to do this. But when we when we swore into this position, we said that we would we would represent our entire community. And that's not just Scenic and it's not just Clifton and it's not
461just Nizzley, it's Mesa County. It's District 51 and it's every kid and it's every teacher and it's every staff member and it's every family. So this sucks. This is really hard and I'm sorry that it's going to affect families, but just like Director Jones said, it's either going to affect families now or it's going to affect families later. And we have so many good staff members right now. And if we make decisions now, we have the opportunity to put those staff members in positions throughout the district. There will still be openings in this district. But if we don't do something, we're going to slowly we're we're going to slowly destroy the district. Like we're going to lose quick. Yeah. I mean, within a year within a year, this this district I mean, we will lose
462so many positions and then all of those amazing staff members that deserve to have jobs here will be gone and we'll be searching for positions elsewhere. And we don't want to see that happen. So, if we can save those positions now and get those staff members elsewhere within our district where they can continue to touch the lives of children and do what they love, then that's what we want to do. But on the short note, yeah, I'm good waiting a couple days if you need to. So, it's been brought up a couple of times that, you know, it shouldn't be about the money. And I agree, in a perfect world, it certainly would not be about the money. And it's not about the money in in the way that negates caring about the people. And
463at the end of the day, we have to take care of the money piece. We don't have a choice. We won't have buildings. We won't have heat and air conditioning. And we won't have people in them. certainly not in a way that is going to positively impact the students in this district. The only reason um I would like to wait that couple of days is I think we need we need to get those numbers. We need we need to be certain about that and until we can talk to Shannon, we we're not going to have those. Um I am not suggesting any more than no later than Friday. And thank you everything the rest of you said. Um, I concur with everything that was said at this table. So, that's what I'd like to do
464as well. Okay. Are you are you wanting to wait on all because we have two separate resolutions. We have a separate resolution for Nisley because that's was on the turnaround clock. Um, and then we have the resolution for the two schools named under EDAC. I'd like to um take care of everything except for um the resolution from I mean yes we can take care of the policies we can take care of nizzley and then we can focus just on this that one additional piece and then that will happen later in the week. Okay. I can concur with that. Okay. Right. Um we're well so I'm on I'm just going to go through the rest of the um agenda here. We kind of we're a little out of sorts but so we're we're at the consent
465agenda. So the consent agenda contains personnel actions and items um acceptance of gifts that are routine and can be approved by a single motion. Items on the consent agenda will not be discussed individually by the board unless an item is removed for individual consideration. Is anyone requesting any items to be removed from the consent agenda? Okay, seeing none, um I will state that the total of gifts that we received this last month was $21,6645. So, we're very thankful for our generous community that gives so much each and every day. Um, do I have a motion to approve the items on the consent agenda? Motion to approve the consent agenda. Second, Mr. Chavez, Mrs. Evansson, yes. Mrs. Heights? Yes. Mr. Jones? Yes. Miss Lima? Yes. So, next up, we have the first our first reading um
466of many policies. Um and as director Lima pointed out um well we had a couple comments on policy KF. Um when people did we get contact information for the public comment if getting back to those who had questions on those because I know Clint answered a little bit on Okay. Well we okay we can get with that. So we just have first readings which so we there's no vote on first readings and then there's several policies that they're repealing or removing because we're there's just some redundancies and we're trying to clean up our policies. So board between now and um is this the third that we'll vote on the policies or is it the 10th which okay so this is a lot so I would say maybe by the 10th because these are a lot
467of policies for the board to work through will would be the second and final readings for these so please um get with uh Tammy with any questions you have on these policies um all right so then we're moving to J2 we have um a resolution. Um so do I have a motion for the resolution to close? Yes. Motion resolution to close. I'm sorry. I can't resolution to close. I went to Nizzley. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? Right. Seeing none, we can take the vote. Mr. Chavis, yes. Mrs. Evansson, yes. Mrs. Heights? Yes. Yes. Mr. Jones? Yes. Miss Lima? Yes. Do I have a motion to table the resolution for Clifton and Scenic Elementary Schools until Friday? Second. All right. During open board discussion, is this room available on Friday? We need to take
468the vote on this. Oh, I'm sorry. Thank you, Mr. Chavez. To table the vote. Sorry. To table the vote. Yes. Mrs. Evansson. Yes. Mrs. Heights. Yes, Mr. Jones. Yes, Miss Lima. Yes, thank you. Um, so board, um, is everyone available Friday after school time and is this room available for the board to be able to come back for a special meeting? Um, can can we are you confident we could have answers from Shannon by Friday, Dr. Hill? board, look at your calendars to for Friday. Well, we usually try to accommodate after school, so if anybody wants to attend, we're not doing it during school hours. So, elementary. Oh, that's right. Um, right. I think um the issue that we always run into is that you may have folks that like want to come to the
469meeting and they don't get out early at least. So, right. So, 5:00 you can accommodate five. I think it's probably better, but if not, then I can do five on Friday. That's fine. And board if you can't be here physically, you you do have the remote option in. Okay. So, five o'clock on Friday. Um, any other discussion, board? I did want to say one thing. I don't just homeschool my kids. It's my husband and I. He's a rock star. I'd be lost without him sometimes. Give credit where credit's due, right? All right. So, we do um so for future meetings, we will have a meeting um this coming Friday at a special meeting. Um we also have one December 3rd. Um and then the board is actually going to be at our um Colorado Association
470School Board retreat um the 4th through the 7th and then December 10th um the board that'll be our last meeting for the year. Do I have a motion to adjurnn? Motion to adjurnn. All right. Thank you everyone.