001and we have six board members present. The second item is adoption of the agenda. >> I would move for approval of the agenda as presented. >> Second. >> It's been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. [Music] Motion passes 6. That brings us to item 3A, public hearing for resolution 2025-8, exceeding the revenue neutral rate to finance the USD253 budget. Is there anybody here that would like to speak? Okay. Uh per the process we need to wait five minutes before we can close the meeting. So >> actually we can go ahead and close this one and then wait to do the next um item 3B. >> All right. Thank you. Do I need a motion? I move to adopt resolution 2025-8 authorizing the exceeding of the revenue ritual tax rate to finance the US 253
0022025 20226 budget as submitted and close the hearing. >> Second. >> It's been moved and a second. And for this we're going to do a roll call vote >> or a hand is it a hand vote, Casey? >> All right. If you'll just vote yay or nay when I call your name. Jennifer Thomas. >> Yay. >> Thank you. Grant Riyals. >> Yay. >> Lillian Lincolnfelter. >> Yay. >> Leslie Staley. >> Yay. >> Art Gutierrez. >> Yay. >> And Jamie Reaper. >> Yay. >> Motion passes. 6. Okay, it is now 5:50 p.m. and I'd like to open the public hearing for the USD 253 2025 2026 budget. Is there anybody that here that would like to speak to the budget? Okay. I move to close the public budget hearing for the 2025 2026 USD 253 budget.
003>> I second. >> It's been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. motion passes. 6. >> Yes. And now we're going to uh hold off till six o'clock to resume the rest of the meeting. Okay, that's we're going to move to item 4 a, public comments. Public comments will be allowed for a duration of three minutes and speakers must sign up in person for public comment by 1 pm the day of the board meeting. Uh, is there anybody here for public comment? Okay, >> we did not have anyone sign up. Okay, >> thank you. Uh, next is the consent agenda. The items on the consent agenda are considered by the board of education to be routine business items. Approval of items may be made by a single motion, second, and majority vote with no separate
004discussion of any item listed. Should a member of the board desire to discuss any item at his or her request, it will be removed from the consent agenda and considered separately. I move to approve the consent agenda as submitted. >> Second. >> It's been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. >> Motion passes 6. >> Great. Thank you. That's going to bring us to item 7A, annual resolution for the 2025-9 established maximum local operating budget percentage for the 2025 2026 USD 253 budget. We'll bring uh interim assistant superintendent for business and operations Josh Schwarz up because he's going to be up here for the next two or three items. But this is a relatively routine one that uh the board approves on an annual basis to just approve the uh the LOB percentage not to
005exceed 33%. >> I really don't have anything to present on this one. and it's part of of our budget conversation and as a need in order to hit that 33% for the budget later on. >> I would move to approve resolution 2025-9 to establish 33% as the maximum local operating budget percentage for the 2025 2026 USD 253 budget as submitted. >> Second. Okay, it's been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. >> Motion passes 6. That brings us to 7B, adoption of the USD253 budget for the 2025 2026 year. And our primary presentation would really focus on this is the code 99 that goes into the newspaper. We did have some focus points and it's there are probably se I think there are seven different points that we wanted to address tonight. And I have
006Kate Cape up here as well if there's questions that come up related to some of the the finer details. Her and I have both worked on this together. So, uh I think one of the main questions we wanted to get addressed though there is an increase. We're proposing an increase in in the mill rate and specifically that number is I think it's 924 mills is what the increase is. And so wanted to dig in a little more about what is causing that increase or why would we recommend that increase. A portion of that is to help offset a a mill rate increase for the bond and interest payment um of.3 which was also that.3 was going from what 113 to 116 which helps to um put the district on pace to keep those payments rolling
007the way they needed to be. Um that payment will also that three also represents some other funding coming in for some of the project funds that were in place yet. We will have more details on that later in the year, but that's specifically one of the.3 part of it. N24 mills for supplemental general though is one that had is is more significant and really looked at what does that create as far as additional funding. So there's 274,000 of that is in tax revenue. Another key piece to remember is of of that 168,000 also comes in in state aid uh to help bring that total to 443. And then we listed four main items we felt like that were driving some of the needs that we have in the district. Um utilities inflationary impacts are are
008causing those to go up. We also had a 2.28% increase in in salaries. Um, repairs is probably the larger piece of this puzzle as we do have capital projects that continue to impact by day-to-day operations even. And we're trying to really plan ahead and use some funds to help strategically get some things replaced before they become emergencies. And then which kind of goes also into the deferred maintenance concept of that, trying to get ahead of some of these emergency repairs that are taking place. But it all does take resources and and money in order to do those things. And then some of the other pieces that we made note as well, and I'll have Kate visit a little bit about that one. One of the things, and Dr. McGee had asked us to address this
009in the meeting, is the increase in cost from the actual budget last year versus the expenditures this year. And a big part of that is the budget for at risk. We're constantly working in the district on how we can utilize those funds better, but if we don't budget for the full and we're not going to spend the full 17, but we budget the whole thing so that where whatever costs we can, we can take out of that and increase how we're utilizing those funds. Um, some of the other areas that we talked about, the bilingual fund, we always budget a little higher. I know if you remember a couple years ago we had to republish that fund because we ended up getting more money. So we had that a little but the actual budget we
010put in Skyward will be based on our waitings we get and we'll know those once September 20th count has been uploaded to the state food service. That's a high budget. That's a thing we have a lot of questions about and it's not their actual budget, but it's right in the software that they want you to budget for additional meals above what you think you're going to serve because at the time we're doing the budget, the reimbursement rate from the federal government isn't set yet. So, we don't know what they're going to re reimburse for meals. So, we want to make sure we have budget authority to receive all of those funds. The special education increase in expenditures was tied to um increased assessments this year, costs going up, the rate reimbursement rate from the state
011going down. This year there the max they said we could estimate is 296. It may be a few hundred lower than that. So that's been going down. Um and the last note is to keep in mind the transfers at the bottom. When you're comparing expenditures from one year to another, you want to look at that after transfer because that transfer is money we get in the general fund that we move or the supplemental general fund that we move other places and then we budget to expend that. So, it's almost like if you look at the before transfer number, you're almost recognizing those expenses twice. Any questions for us? Thank you for all of your work on this. I have a couple of questions. Um my first question is as we go back to um the
012the top on um like one um we had heard you know with Tyson closing that that would impact our budget because of you know their property taxes their and so I'm wondering do you know what the impact to our budget will be? I'd heard maybe around 10,000, but I was just wondering if you all >> had that information. >> No. And I we could speculate, but it would I don't we haven't heard anything on what the exact impact would be. We I think common sense does tell us that there will be an impact of some some sort. >> We just don't know the exact number yet. >> Okay. Thank you. And then when you presented the budget, um one of the questions I had um was whether or not we participated in the CACF or
013the child and adult um food program um for our childare centers and I was wondering if you had explored that further and if that might be a possibility so we could see a savings of around $40,000. >> Um we have explored um with both um child care lead and food service department. Um the at this point the the key piece is for that reimbursement to take place the children in the program need to be from income earners that are would be free or reduced. The significant portion of the children in the program are from would be considered paid meals which then you wouldn't get the reimbursement because they would be from from a paid meal standpoint. So that we are looking at some options with the infants because you can get some reimbursement for formulas
014and things like that. But we're not getting super strong guidance from even the state that it's worth looking at some of those funding options because of some of the demographics we have in the program, but we did look into it. >> Great. Thank you. I appreciate that. I don't have any specific questions on the budget, but I do appreciate the property tax explainer document. Um, I I think that's really helpful. Um, it helped me kind of see like how much of an increase I could expect for my own taxes. Um, and you know, for when people um ask those questions of us. Um, I just really appreciate you having a tool um for us to to share and be able to reference back to um so that we we have answers and not just well,
015you know, it's the budget >> and I'm not an accountant. >> Dr. McGee on that. >> Yes. So, thank you. Thank you very much for that. >> Okay, this is an action item. I move to adopt the 2025 2026 USD 253 budget as submitted. >> I'll second it. >> Thank you. It's been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. Motion passes 6. >> Thank you. >> And that's going to bring up item 7C, health insurance renewal for 2026. >> Yeah. Um I I'll turn this over to Josh and I don't want to steal too much of his thunder, but um you know, we're seeing some significant rate increases um on our fully insured program. And so we've started to explore options with our broker. And u it's my belief that the the public and the
016board should see and touch these items several times before being asked to uh vote on them so that we're clear um and that everyone knows that when it does come time to make a decision exactly what it is you're deciding and and all the the ramifications and benefits of such. And so we'll start that conversation this evening. This isn't an item of decision. It's just, you know, an initial conversation about potentially moving to a self-insured program that could um potentially cut our rate increase for just this time around in half. Um if it if if it's comes in the way that it's being projected at this point. So, I'll just turn it over to Josh and let him run through the presentation. >> Okay. So, health insurance um was a bit of a sticker shock
017kind of item when we first saw this a month ago or three weeks ago. And again, this is like we will talk about this for the next three meetings. Um tonight, it's just a really trying to get a a sense of where the group is with fully insured and versus self-funded and kind of what the difference is between those two and then just why why why go through this? And so the slides we have review some of the the price increases and just um this lots of numbers on this sheet but there are our insurance is currently set up with three options. So when a staff member wants to choose insurance they're going to choose option one two or three and then underneath each of those options there are four different categories. You can be
018employee only employee children employee spouse and employee with the family. So that's what the color codes across those rows help to see how those prices are different. And then across I'll just use the employee only of option one because it's the top row. Um each we have a number of staff enrolled so you can see how many are enrolled in each of those plans and then the which also then we show a percentage of that. So you can kind of see the percent of that. And then across that row, employee contribution goes from 285 and then it goes to 515 with the current proposal that would have been which is the same exact apples to apples um plan which collectively is a 26% increase when you look at the grand total piece of that. It's
019a the numbers we see on this won't be exactly 26% because we as a district you you pay for a portion of that premium. So the out of pocket may be way more than 26% even because of that change is is somewhat hidden in that um that benefit from the district. So really that's that was probably the main reason we started looking at some different options. Um, so column 2620 2026 renewal is apples to apples. And then the next column over renewal with plan changes shows how you can save a little bit of money for employees by adjusting how that plan looks. But with any plan adjustment, what you're doing is changing deductibles or changing the internal workings of that. So you what you save on the premium, you most likely if you use that
020insurance, you will end up paying more out of pocket in the long run. So, you're not really gaining a ton of um savings for the the employee on that end. And then the very far right column is the one that would be that I'm going to say self-funded and it's going to be a partially self-funded um which has a different feel to it than a, you know, a fully self-funded kind of thing. So, we self-funded is partially self-funded and that increases quite a bit less. I think the the overall increases on that were about 8%. Um, but if you were to compare that, we put a dollar amount in and Kate put a dollar amount in there to see what that change was. So you could see what that looked like. So that was really
021the our why. Why look at this self-funded piece. And when you start looking at the out of pocket for staff, you can see there's a pretty significant increase if we don't look at something different. So questions on this slide, there are there's quite a bit of information here. Didn't know if I wanted to make sure we got those answered before we moved on. Okay. All right. So, next the next part of this really explains or what we have learned the difference between fully and self-funded plans and I'm guessing insurance has been in front of this group a couple times. I don't want to repeat something that has been shared a few times where what the main thing for why we would want to go even self-insured. it has a lot of our claims are coming
022through the um pharmaceutical portion of that puzzle. So that piece of pie that's on that middle part of it that talks about network PBMs stop loss and then third party the TPA's third party administrator. Um PBM is the pharmaceutical piece of that and by going self-funded we can start to shop and find some better ways to purchase that portion of the insurance. That's probably the quickest way I've learned that where the savings comes from. And then and these are all from IMA. IMA had shared this with us to help put some of these together and they will be back in a couple weeks to go into more detail. So tonight, as you have questions, be think tonight's purpose is to be coming up with some the questions that you might ask in a couple weeks.
023We could ask us tonight even we can collect those and go forward from there. But then um I think I'm ready for the next one because one of the the key pieces we felt like that make self-funding a little risky because that is that's the other thing with the other component of this if you go fully funded to self-funded the district is taking on risk. Um currently we pay premiums to Blue Cross Blue Shield and Blue Cross Blue Shield just asks for a certain dollar amount they collect it. if they have a ratio where they collect more than they pay out, they make money on this that year. If it's the other way around, they lose and they charge us an increase. And so that overunder is becoming a risk for the district to take
024on. So that's probably one of the the main pieces we're trying to look at. How do we do that in a way that is conservative, is smart with the district funds, yet also keeps the prices low. So, two big pieces that go into um selfunded has to do with the stop-loss. So, stop loss would be from a a big picture standpoint like the deductible that you would have on your personal insurance, but this is more for our entire group where if a a claim gets to be above um 75,000 100,000 all of a sudden stop-loss insurance kicks in. So the district is not paying more than that 100,000 every every claim that for that one person that's coming in. So that's a that's like an individual stop loss. And then for the whole year is
025one that's called an aggregate stop loss. So that way your grand totals don't go above a certain dollar amount. Now how do you collect the money to to make sure you're at least hitting that gap between zero and 100,000 if you're individual is that? That's what the premiums are that you're collecting from the employees. And currently we have that funding go directly to Blue Cross Blue Shield. This model has the a bank account in the on the district's end. We collect those pay the claims and then if that stop-loss gets kicked in then we pay um we would get a reimbursement back from the insurance on that end. Um questions on this piece of it though. This is probably one of the bigger most significant pieces of how self-funding works. >> Well I have a
026question. >> Okay. Um, so if I have to have a procedure done, um, with my standard Blue Cross Blue Shield plan, I assume what happens is they approve it. You know, you know, the doctor talks to Blue Cross Blue Shield and Blue Cross Blue Shield says, "Yes, approved." How does that work on a self-funded plan? >> On the on the front end of that or the user experience, it all would look the same. So that we would stay with Blue Cross Blue Shield. All of the same framework pieces that are there with deductibles and all those pieces would stay the same. So teachers wouldn't notice a difference. >> So we wouldn't have someone in our business office, you know, making Okay. Correct. Good. And do we I assume that we this would take some um
027of our own resources to manage this. Um, so would we do we have the appropriate staff to do it to manage it now or do you think we might have to add staff if we were to go to a self-insured model? >> We're exploring that piece. We've talked to a couple districts that are part of the self-funded plan that IMA operates. And one of the districts we talked to is similar size to us and they haven't added anybody extra because we're not adding um part of this model is because it's not a fully self-insured. We have partially so we don't have as many vendors that we're really paying. I think there's only a couple that would get paid. Um, and based on my understanding, there's also it would be an AC kind of journal entry
028transfer. So, it would that would help expedite the process as well where that is going on. But based on our feedback, it doesn't really add a ton to it doesn't add really anything to the internal workings of things. I'm sure there's a learning curve like with anything when you launch it, it takes a little bit of time to learn it, but long term it doesn't sound like it's a thing that's um super we would need an extra person. >> Thanks for asking that, Jamie. That was my question, too. I'd be really interested to see like what an approximate monthly hour increase or you know time necessary to dedicate towards that if we can even guess what that would be because I know we we you know everyone's busy >> right and I'll probably lean on
029Kate on this one because this is probably more >> her question as well asking the same thing going okay how >> and I'm going to preface that with I don't want Kate taking this on right >> when you're already doing a lot of other things. Yes. So the district we talked to was very interesting on the second district that I joined him in the meeting. They are a similar size to us, a similar number of staff in a similar plan. So the initial step that we're talking about taking would just be a partially self-funded with Blue Cross. So there's no change for the employees and they would have a wire. So, it's a it's like about between four and 10 entries between the administration payment and then the once a week a special account. So,
030there's an extra account to balance. We're already balancing the Blue Cross Blue Shield bill anyway. So, we would just be balancing those claims against the premiums, making sure that we're put depositing what we've taken from the employees and the district's portion of that insurance into the account and balancing the account. So I don't see in what we're proposing now there to be a big increase in workload >> questions. >> Okay. >> You did reference that you spoke to a couple of other districts. Can you tell us a little bit about their experiences? I don't know if you can share which districts they are, but I I think I'd be sort of curious to know how it's worked for them. I think we could share. Um I mean so one was Osawatami which would have been
031by 600 700 students quite a bit smaller than us but um the person that had stepped into the role that I had visited with um was pretty nervous about it had never been around the model before and things since they've been I think they'd been there two years and really they were like this is one of the better things that I've learned over the course of doing anything with insurance and really spoke highly of it actually spoke pretty highly of IMA even as far as their ability to help manage how to make these decisions because we would lean on them to have the expertise on how to really set some of these even the stop-loss numbers. Um and then the other one was Levvenworth. Levvenworth would be the one that's similar in size to us
032and again the same kind of thing. I think they this was their third or fourth year and similar questions as far as how much time would it take um how risky was it? How much cash did it take to get this thing started even because you what and we have another slide we might talk about this a little bit more in the presentation but it was overall positive I would say positive just feedback on it was a smart move it's good use of our funds it's a good use good thing for our staff and so overall a pretty positive set of feedback from both districts >> so for your example districts and you might have said it but how long have Each one been on self-funded. >> I think they were both around three three
033or four years. >> Okay, next slide. Um I'm not going to spend a ton of time on this one. This was um really just pros and cons. Um we've talked through quite a few of these as far as why you'd want to do this with control and you can design some things differently. the downside would be the the cons would be some of that. Yeah, learn the I mean budgeting for this and how that would work is one of those and just the risk piece. Um I'm trying to think what else I don't have anything else on any not a lot on this one. This this slide though is a little pretty interesting from a cash flow standpoint and shows how we would start adding funds to the bank account that would pay the claims.
034So, um, currently the blue represents the premiums we're currently paying to Blue Cross Blue Shields. And the December 15th payroll, this would be this December would be the last time we would, if we would go to selfund, this would be the last time you would make a payment to Blue Cross Blue Shield. If you go self-funded, then you start taking those payments and putting into its own bank account. and claims take a bit to get turned in because the Blue Cross Blue Shield plan that's in place is still paying for things after Christmas. I mean, right before Christmas. And then the existing plan would take 30 to 45 days before those they go to the doctor, it has to go through the insurance process. And so during that time frame, you're building up funds from
035the premiums collected. So by the time the claims roll in, then you have some cash in hand to be able to start making payments on claims. So there's a gap in there that shows how you really build up some cash flow. I think I would say the the gold piece in the middle, that golden green kind of shows where there would be no payments being made really at that point. You're just collecting funds. So that in our mind that was the way that you launched this without having a ton of cash on hand to be able to start this. So questions on that part? And the last one I believe is timelines. So the health insurance committee met on the 27th of August. Tonight's the initial discussion. We would have another health insurance committee depending
036on how the conversation goes tonight with with pieces. Um the health insurance committee would look at not the decision about fully insured or self-insured, but how would some of those plan components look. So we would want some feedback from the health insurance committee. And then the 20 924 108 meetings would be with IMA and with October 8th being the decision night as far as what to do with the um what kind of plan it would be and whether it would be self-funded, fully funded and then open enrollment would start the 20th. So um it all happens pretty it does happen pretty quick. So questions or general thoughts? I guess I guess one thing with the information I've seen is that's I think it's important is that part of the reason we're having this these increased
037premiums is that the percentage of payments that we're making from premiums we have a very high number of claims into that 90% area. So that's I think I want the public to know that that's part of the reason if if we didn't have such high claims, we would be looking at a lot less rate quotes, you know, high increased premiums. So there is a piece to this that we're we're really using the plan we have, which is a good thing, >> but the outcome is that is that it's not as >> profitable for Blue Cross and Blue Shield. So they're passing those costs on back to us. >> Yeah. >> Based on our use of our plan. So um I I think overall health care costs are increasing. So that's >> typical I guess not
038not that we'd appreciate that but um there's just a lot of factors coming in here and and I do think um we should explore a partially funded plan uh to help reduce costs for employees. So >> thank you for your work on that. Um, I don't know if I have Well, I do have questions, but also just like kind of general thoughts to share. Um, and for the public as well. Um, I didn't know there are other districts in Kansas that are part of like a service center or some sort of consortium's insurance plan. Is that something that we have explored and would that be a more affordable option? >> Okay, you go ahead on this one. So in a previous year we did look at the plan like that ESU has. It's cost prohibitive
039for the district because they require significantly higher contributions by the employer than we currently do. So from a budgeting perspective, it wasn't a manageable situation for us to get on those plans because they dictate how what you have to contribute. >> Okay. Um I don't know which one ESU is on. I do know that other districts are part of like Greenbush and that might be a different option um because it seems like some schools that are part of the service center plan ha have something different but I'm not sure about what ESU does. Um I am concerned about some of the risks associated with self-funding and I'm glad that you brought them up. I'm certainly open to continuing the conversation but I want us to be aware of the risks. Are there only two other
040districts in Kansas that currently use a self-funded plan or just two that you know of? >> Two that work with IMA. >> Yes. So, this these two customers would be the same >> part of the the piece that we work with. >> Okay. And then I was just wondering which you might not know the answer to if there were other districts that were considering switching to a self-funded plan if we are all sort of experiencing the same increase in healthcare costs. Um, I guess I I can lean on my experience from last couple years of my prior district. We had explored it as well and we were part of the the ESDAC insurance pool. Um, and you know, costs were going up with that insurance pool. So, we were trying to look at some other
041options. So, we did we found out there were two or three others that were like Hugen, Kansas, for example, is on its own self-funded plan. Um, and there's I think part of that is depends on how you look at self-funded and how you put all your pieces together. Um, but I I don't think we're alone. I know there was there's another product that would have been in front of this group. Gravy is one of the vendors. I know some I know one district in particular that started that on that one last year, but I don't have feedback on how well it's gone. Um, overall I don't think it's a a concept though that is unique to Emporia. I feel like across the the state districts are trying to find ways to best use insurance money.
042>> Yeah. Um and then lastly, and I know the board has heard me say this about 10,000 times, but I am very concerned about the rate increase. And I like as someone that has worked in public schools for almost a decade, I am not paying this regardless of the district that I've worked for. And it is very frustrating to me that this continuously happens year after year. I feel like we as a board have the same conversation. Um, and it is sometimes like, okay, insurance is back up and it's like groundhog day up here. I don't know if the other board members feel this way, but it feels like we're always having this conversation. And I wish that we could find a way to do better for our teachers because they deserve better. >> And
043that's a big part of why we're exploring this partially self-funded option because it's come up before. every time we get renewal presentations that come to us um that has been on the table and we've looked at it and with the option that we have we haven't felt that it was the right time but when they brought the renewal to us our only options our best option was Blue Cross Blue Shield as it is or changing plans which the insurance committee there were members of the people there was not a lot of attendance at that meeting but the people who were there cons shared concern concern that adding a deductible or raising your out-of- pocket max to reduce the premium wasn't benefiting the employees. And that's why we really are taking a deep look at this
044partially self-funded model because there are benefits some of the re drug rebates that right now they go to Blue Cross. we could share in some of those so we could get the benefit. And there are a lot of options that you can start finding ways for our employees to get their drug their prescriptions at a lower cost. >> Thank you for sharing that, Kate. I'm excited to learn more about this. >> Graham, I have a question. >> I was gonna I the examples you gave me in Levvenworth and I appreciate that. Um, I was also just wondering possibly with your contacts if you know of anybody any districts that were self-funded and have backed off that and and maybe why just to so we're aware of what what their concerns were on that. So >>
045we can do some searching on that one back >> and hope I mean I like the potential of this but just so we >> look at all sides of it. Mhm. >> I thought it was interesting um on slide five that has the pros and cons um the stability where it says employers rarely return to fully insured. I I' I'd be interested if there's any specifics on that. Uh especially um that's just self-funded entities in general, but especially like Grant said, knowing well is it pretty rare within school districts that they ever want to go back? Um, my first interaction with uh self-funding was when I was helping do wellness for a local company and I remember one of the um big pros that they had um and I think they had 250ish um employees.
046Um but I don't know it was Detroit Diesel. I don't know if it tied into all of I mean it's a huge company but I don't know with the self-funding like if it was just that plant or I don't I don't know that but I do remember them saying that they were investing so much in because it was my students and myself that were doing their wellness stuff that it made the employees more invested like they paid more attention to their health to their decisions to their options because rather than the money coming out of some magical pot in the sky, you know, which is Blue Cross Blue Shield, you know, and you hope that they're going to cover it. It was more much more well, that's our money that we're all putting in every
047single, you know, and there's just kind of more accountability in a good way, just more accountability. >> And then I'd also I don't know about you guys, but I'd like to hear more about the stop-loss because I do know at one point they had and what are the odds, right? that they had a preeie birth and some sort of I don't remember it was kidney liver something transplant and I mean you can imagine with both of those but and and I always was a part of their you know insurance updates and meetings and and I remember it was called catastrophic at that time stop loss is probably a little more soft in terms of the wording but you know to have two catastrophic cases that really add up >> quickly >> I mean it's eyeopening
048what how fast you can hit that amount. So, I'd like to know more about that on on the off chance that, you know, multi one let alone multiple catastrophic things happen. You know, when you've got hundreds of people, it it is going to happen at some point where boom. >> And that's the benefit of having the individual stop-loss and the aggregate stop-loss. So, it it minimizes your risk on each person as well as the plan as a whole. We did ask the question not for specific districts but about why why district why employers leave self-funding and that was one of the things they said is they cut corners on their stop loss and they had it too high and they had claims. So that has been one of the things that we're asking a lot
049of questions on is stop loss and making sure we're protected. >> This brings up another point that has to do with the slide with the the horizontal bar graphs. If you go back from self-funded to fully funded, the opposite occurs, which I think is slide six. So, where you have the, you know, that 90 days of not having any payments. Well, if you flip back, then you'll start paying Blue Cross Blue Shield right away. Plus, you'll be paying claim payments on pieces that were in your self-funded plan. So you end up what you were saving in that first night 45 to 60 days, you end up h needing cash is you'll be doubled up for a bit. So that that's another reason I'm sure why you wouldn't want to go back. So if you commit
050to self-funded, it does become a fairly you don't want to do it if you think you're going to change in a year. You got to commit to it. And plus we've learned also from Levvenworth and OAM or any any of them it takes three or four years to see see this work the right way. So, that's another key thing to be thinking about. >> You know, as I've sat here for four years now, um, and we talk about insurance, you know, I don't know about any of you, but whenever I pay my insurance premium, I just think it goes into that magic pie in the sky and all of our claims get paid. And it's like sitting at this table that I realize that in so many ways, we're already self-funding, right? you know, like
051we know how much money we're putting in and we get to that 94 96% we just aren't assuming the risk. So, I feel like we're already doing it, but you know, without the risk. So, I think it would be an easy transition for me. Um, there's just a couple of things on my mind like this rate increase is just so absolutely unacceptable and it makes me angry just to be sitting at this table year after year. and I'm not blaming you, but just in general that we're here and our employees are paying the cost. Um, and it it's it's getting to be just too difficult to stomach that. I think it's also hard and I'll save these comments for a couple of weeks um when IMA is here, but also to hear through the summer
052months, oh my gosh, our numbers are looking great. We're going to be good. we might see a decrease, you know, and so that sort of faux optimism has just been really frustrating because then we're here. And so I think we need to ask a lot of questions to get to the heart of how we got here when in June and July I felt like we are being told just a completely different message. I I don't want to hold, you know, anyone put anyone's feet to the fire or or point fingers. It's just we've got to stop because it's been what's happened four years at this table and it is not fair to anyone because then we get blindsided like this. Um so I guess my one question is you know earlier this year we passed
053a policy that employees who exit our employment can have our health insurance um paying for everything fully 100% of out of pocket. And we passed that policy thinking um nothing was going to change with our health insurance. And so I'm just really curious and maybe this you could think about this, you know, get some answers um for next time, but was that a great decision or was that a really risky decision if we go into a self-funding model? Um it feels kind of risky to me. Um and so I would love to know also in some of those other districts, do they that have the self-unding model, do they allow their exiting employees to hold on to the plan to pay out of pocket? And would I does IMA recommend that as a good thing
054or a bad thing if we you know continue to do it you know through this next school year or beyond? >> We can bring that back. >> Thank you. >> My personal opinions on that is that we need to really revisit that decision and that it is more potentially a negative than a positive. Um, and I believe that it sets you up it it sets our district up for the opportunity that someone who's having a very difficult time finding insurance applies for position and gets hired by the school district simply to access the insurance. Even though they may have to pay for it themselves, if they resign their position, at least then they have access because you wouldn't be able to deny them um based on whatever their health condition might be. So, I think
055there are some some potential risk and liabilities associated with that. I understand what the uh approach was about in the conversation. You're trying to keep maybe some of the younger folks that are leaving the district on, not just the retiring folks. And that's that's a part of, you know, I can say this because I I'm retired from another district and I'm one of the old people now um working working here, but u school districts in general, you you know, the way the way uh policy is, you know, state policy and and that your retirees can stay on your plan. They're paying for the plan, but they are staying on it. You're you're absorbing, you know, that that 100% 101% or whatever we end up at the end of the year. oftentimes, you know, can tie
056a large portion of it back to folks my age or older that are still that are still on that plan because as we get older, we I I can remember being a young young teacher and not utilizing my plan ever, you know, and um as I've had hip replacements and things like that, I've been one of those folks that then used the plan. But um I think it's not unusual unusual and I think Lillian's right. You know, school districts in particular and some other other entities too that have similar similar mandates and requirements get into this. You know, it's it's even exaggerated. These costs are exaggerated because of the way some of the just government policies work. >> And to you know what you said, Lillian, here we are again. Um, but we're also consistently
057not negotiating the contribution from the district in IBB. Um, because that's that is a negotiated item and this is I think our third year of not negotiating that. Um, so maybe we can talk about that this coming IBB negotiation as well as in our cost containment um, committee. if it's what we're talking about tonight to see, you know, what we can do to to reallocate and maybe figure out a way to contribute more as a district. >> Yeah, I think that we should um certainly I agree with you. Yes. And I think that we have used that as maybe not an excuse, but as sort of a oh, it needs to come up in IB, but then it never does. Here we are again. And I think that that maybe um excuses the district from
058having a conversation about how insurance affects recruitment and retention of teachers because it is a factor that people look at when they're considering where to work. And if we say, well, it's up to the teachers to negotiate that on their behalf. They need to talk to the union or we need to have that conversation in IBB. When we negotiated earlier this year, we didn't have these numbers. How are we to have an informed conversation during IBB when now it's schools already started? Um, and I agree. It should be part of the IBB process. I think it's a bit of both, though. >> And I wasn't trying to explain. >> No, no, no. >> If in I can remember back to being here in 2023 and being in the business office and, you know, while we
059weren't really, we didn't really know what our rates were going to be insurance wise and so on. We knew what our rates had been. We knew what kind of increases they had seen. And all of the options that we um presented to the IBB group then and then um coming out of IBB to the board all included both you know if we do this much on insurance if we do this much on site we we did a variety of scenarios at that point in time so that everyone could see that you know these combinations eat up this much of the the money that's that's available and I think it's just a good practice for us to do that. um you know, you're not you're not looking at you don't know what your rates are yet,
060but you know what you're paying and you know what your employees are paying and so there can be consideration for if we do this in IBB uh from from a salary perspective um you know this is what we could afford on the benefit side and just give variety of scenarios and at that point in time what we were doing is basically giving the employees the decision as to where they wanted the money that the board had to spend to go >> on an early slide. Maybe it's that slide there. Um it shows that 47% of our employees are enrolled in one of our plans. Is that I know it varies some each year, but is that a fairly stable number that participation? So over the years that I've been working that and pulling numbers for
061IBB, it's been pretty consistent that it's about 50%. >> Okay. Any further questions? If not, thank you very much. >> Thank you. That's going to bring us to item 8A, board reports. >> And do we have anything for the tech college? >> We had our meeting on Monday and um it it was a relatively short meeting. I think a record setting meeting for us. We were out before 5. Uh we did have a RFP for a drone for our new precision a program. So that was we're anxious to see um where we can go with that with our Patterson family grant money. Um infrastructure and insurance were also issues there. Surprise surprise. U the tech college has also chosen to broker with um IMA uh for their upcoming year and um yeah boilers, you know,
062all the all the fun things that we talk about here too. >> Okay. And I know Jeremy's not here for the rec commission. Uh, Jen, do you have anything? >> Um, we have not met yet, so I apologize. Um, I think we're going to meet soon, but I haven't received any information or minutes, so I think to wait. >> Okay. Thank you. That brings us to 9A superintendent report. First, I just want to um reiterate that that was great conversation and discussion on self- insurance and that's why we wanted to bring it because we knew, you know, there there's just a lot that needs to get out on the table and uh we we want to be sure that we all have time to to look at it. Um, a couple of things that have
063popped up um that are not on on this written report. One, just wanted to make note and thank uh Commissioner Randy Watson for his service. he did um announce this afternoon that he'll be retiring once they've found his replacement um as commissioner of education and so just wanted to acknowledge that I think he's you know I haven't been in Kansas all that time but certainly appreciate some of the things about uh the state department in comparison to where I where I did most of my work in education and feel like it's it's um way more supportive and less compliant than it could could it be and uh I think that that always comes back to leadership. So, appreciate that. And then finally, just just making sure that the public understands that if they had looked
064at our agenda earlier um when we first posted it, they would have seen a an item on there for an emergency expenditure repair. We were implementing the emergency policy for for some plumbing issues at Village where we almost had to shut a school down for a day or two. We appreciate the staff and the students and and uh Brandy working with us there to keep that school open and and functioning during some during those issues. Um ended up um as a literally dug into that problem more that it wasn't going to exceed the $20,000 limit and we didn't need to implement the emergency policy. And so that item was removed for that reason. just make to make sure everyone knows it it didn't get pulled off and we did it out out out of outside
065of the public eye or anything. It just wasn't necessary for a good reason. It costs a lot less or is anticipated to cost a lot less than we first projected. So, on to the written report. Just a quick little a brief update on middle school track and field. And really what I want you to know is that our middle school students are now able to use the field. Um, of course the project is not finished, but uh I think the biggest thing is to get them out there and utilizing it and it's safe for them to do that and and that started this week. Um, I included some information here again on the cost containment charter. We've been I've been pulling that together. I dropped the the current version as it was current at the
066time uh into this document um earlier today. We continue to keep tweaking it and adding members as they as uh we get folks volunteering and and letting us know who who say some of the parents are going to be that are going to um represent and so on. And so that group again going to be reviewing um more than just enrollment which is a big issue for us. We know that. But uh just look everything will be on the table. We're not going to tell them what they can and can't look at. And I think it's important for us to just look district-wide at at our efficiencies and and anything that comes to the table, start putting numbers to ideas and eventually um eventually come back with some uh good cost savings opportunities as well
067as look at revenue opportunities. We want to uh investigate revenue opportunities as a part of that team. Um, so there will be over 60 people that will serve on that team and uh we will meet seven times from early October, October 7th I think is the first scheduled meeting through the first part of February. the uh this is structured as a team that is chartered by the superintendent's leadership team and so initial recommendations will come back to that team and then uh that team along with myself will we'll sort through those recommendations obviously communicating with the board along the way but eventually um I will come um to the board and share what the recommendations are are from from that leadership team based upon the input that we get from um from the cost containment
068group. uh you can see that we've outlined and again this is kind of the way I want to do business uh in the district is to charter teams like this to study big issues and big ideas and um so hopefully you'll see this modeled um as we address other issues across the district trying to model I mean even a building could take this as a model and they're addressing something buildingwide that they want to look into they can they can tackle it with a charter similar to this because sometimes you get into a you get into solving a problem and there's not real there's not clarity on what are we really trying to solve what's the problem and uh you know what are our boundaries and so on and so that's all defined in this
069charter you can see the membership um I believe that Leslie has agreed to serve as the third member of the board of education so we have Lillian Jamie and Leslie have agreed to serve on this team as members of the board and I've been trying to group folks in into threes as much as possible on some of the other categories stories because I envision uh facilitating a large group for portions of the meeting and then splitting into three smaller groups of about 20 folks to uh everybody try to everybody in in their own space solving the same problem coming back synthesizing those ideas. Um, I think that's the best way to generate the the the great ideas that are going to help us move forward and be fiscally responsible and and um anyway, I have
070that that whole charter in there. Public can log on and see that um if they're interested and my the building principles are the ones working on identifying parents and teachers for me um to include on that team. And if you have folks from the community, some of you have already um sent me some some names as far as uh community business folks um um some of our support organizations and nonprofits and and it's important to hear from them as well. I've only had one no so far and it was for a very good reason. So people are willing to serve. Um I also dropped in there I've been talking to you about this but for the public public eye just kind of what we're doing with needs assessment. Um we're going to be starting our
071needs assessment collection a little bit earlier this year. We'll do that in October. But prior to that, I had I've been offering myself to come out to building leadership teams and just talk about my vision with regard to how this needs assessment would wrap into um a lot of conversation about the strategies and actions that need to occur to actually address the needs identified and roll those into uh becoming a part of our strategic plan. so that we're all taking this as serious as we should and understanding that there's actually, you know, there's going to be something that comes out of it um on paper that we're going to hold ourselves accountable to. Um I think from a district's perspective, we always felt like that was happening, but I think in some people's perceptions, um
072you know, if you don't follow all the way through and and and get stuff into a very organized and structured plan, they aren't sure that their input was heard or that it mattered. And so I want I'm trying to reiterate that it is um it's always mattered but we're going to make sure that they understand that so that they take the process very seriously. I highlighted some uh opportunities that uh we will formally come back you know to the board as a part of a a board meeting or work session um to highlight some of this work and get feedback from the board along the way as well highlighted December, March, April and then June. Again, um there's a lot of work here. If you think about these two two things that we that I've
073just shared about, there's a lot of work in it um that has to be done. So, it it'll be it'll be one of them will be about a five to six month process and the other one's a 12-month process. Um, and then after after we get it all in place this first year, then kind of January and June is when we'll come back to the board each year to talk about mid-year progress, adjustments, revisions that have been made based on new new needs assessment data that comes in from a from a year-to-year basis. Spend some time in our retreat each each summer um reviewing our progress and just um keep keeping this to be a living document that we keep revising and progressing toward. um all about meeting those those three big priorities that we've
074set in the district previously. Uh interesting to note I shared this with the with the uh NEA group that I met with earlier this week. I can't remember which day it was and uh I think the best compliment that came out of it was just thanking me for including the acronyms at the bottom. And I said, "Well, I have to I'm doing that because I am hearing so many acronyms that are uh specific to programs that are in in our school district that maybe I haven't heard before that I'm constantly having to ask questions. So, if I can answer some of those questions by just putting it down first." And Ryan, Dr. Garula did did indic did share with me u our district has an acronym document um that it might need some updating but
075that was good information for me to have as we started talking about this he shared that with me I think that is everything for this evening thank you >> all right thank you for that update uh that's going to bring us to 10A executive session superintendent evaluation >> I move we enter executive session for 30 minutes to discuss the superintendent evaluation pursuant to the non-elected personnel exception under the Kansas Open Meetings Act and we'll return to open session in this room at 7:29 p.m. No action as anticipated. >> A second. >> It's been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. Motion passes 6. >> Thank you. to return to regular session. Second. >> It's been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. >> All those in favor, please raise your right hand. >> Motion passes.
0766. >> Thank you. That brings us to 11A future board calendar dates. Our next meeting is Wednesday, September 24th at 6 PM. And uh you can see the other meetings and and items on the calendar. I would entertain a motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> Been moved and seconded. Please cast your vote. It's there.