001so I'm going to call the August 14th board meeting to order is can I have a motion for approval of the agenda a move we approved the agenda for the August 14 2023 board meeting a second Jones yes Byers yes Kimball yes could do Blackwood yes Gordon Ross Yes van motion passes 5-0 okay we'll move on to the first item on the agenda which is a recess to the executive session is anyone willing to read the motion I moved to recess to Executive session for the purpose purposes of discussing personal matters of non-elected Personnel in order to protect the Privacy interests of the individuals to be discussed with Dr Anthony Lewis and Ron May invited to be president with the board to return to open session in this room at 6 36 with no action
002to follow second buyers Campbell yes could do black whip yes Gordon Ross Yes Jones yes this is 5-0 the executive session for 10 minutes I moved to recess to Executive session for the purposes of discussing Personnel matters of non-elected Personnel in order to protect the Privacy interests of the individuals to be discussed with Dr Anthony Lewis and Ron May invited to be present and with the board to return to open session in this room at 6 50 PM with no action to follow second yes Gordon Ross Yes Jones yes buyers yes motion passes 5-0 executive session with no action to follow so we'll move on to the report of the superintendent of schools president Jones good evening board members and members of the community those that are watching online first of all I want to
003welcome back Janice Dunn who's a legend in the board clerk World here in Lawrence Public Schools um someone decided to have a baby or is having a baby at least the nail is having a baby and so Janet's done that is actually on the board's consent agenda tonight to approve Ms janistan as the board clerk in Elise Daniel's absent so we're glad to have you back awesome our schools have been hosting a lot of back to school activities with their Scholars their families and communities they've been eating a lot of popsicles corn dogs cotton candy snow cones certainly appreciate Billy Mills Middle School for inviting me to DJ their back to school blast last week we had a lot of fun we saw a few staff members friends and I think their SRO enjoy some
004time in the dunk tank as well the new certified Master agreement is available which is much earlier than usual due to the successful completion of negotiations staff online benefits open enrollment continues through 5 PM Thursday so if staff are new or making changes they should be sure to enroll in their medical dental vision or any voluntary benefits by that deadline as you know the school board continues to pay for single benefits package for our employees uh the Lawrence schools foundation and our Community Partners have been busy donating collecting and packaging school supplies we have more than 1 500 stuffed backpacks in our schools waiting for our Scholars who need them in addition the foundation is working with our student services team to invite families to a private event Saturday right here in this room where
005they can pick out a pair of shoes and a pair of socks thanks to the generous donations of our several local Civic organizations and churches we certainly appreciate all of our children and family who stopped by to say hello at our back to school safety Fair a week ago that was in Saturday Saturday a week ago Saturday that was in South Park the school supply Drive hosted by the Lawrence Police blue Santa program also brought in a lot of supplies in addition to Lawrence High alumni JD woods and Anthony Harvard Jr are hosting the fourth annual kicks for kids donation drive and shoe giveaway this will take place Saturday from 9 to 12 30 at Lawrence High Southwest parking lot tomorrow morning we will kick off the new school year with the board and all
006of our staff at the lead Center we have not been together in a few years due to the pandemic so it will be extra special to have everybody back together and as always um it's that's the case when we're at the lead Center and we're appreciative of the lead Center hosting us after our staff kick off all staff will participate in training associated with our now our new Pre-K 12 social emotional curriculum character strong staff who have already been involved in character strong training have had very positive things to say about this program particularly with the ease of incorporating it into their all what they're already doing in terms of teaching our Scholars I want to thank our administrative team who have been involved in preparations for the new school year they've been doing this
007all summer I want to welcome our new to the district I have about 16 new teachers to the district um we have 44 um get this right we have you have 16 new and 44 veteran new teachers to our district 16 teachers are returning to Lawrence Public Schools and so they joined us on August 1st for four full days of induction all of our teachers returned on August 9th and have been busy with either professional learning sessions team building in their schools and preparing their classrooms today teachers began reaching out for conferencing purposes with families to welcome them to the new school year and to start building those strong Partnerships we want to make sure we're maintaining open lines of communication with our school families should they have any suggestions questions or concerns we will
008provide a half day of transition on Wednesday for students entering kindergarten in the sixth and Ninth Grade A number of schools also use this time this Wednesday August 16th for transition time to welcome students that are new to the district on Thursday that's the first day of school for all K-12 students and so we're certainly excited to see their Bright Smiles and faces as they return to school on August 17th and the following Thursday August 24th our Early Childhood Program will begin that's all I have we just want to say welcome back to all of our Scholars and staff thank to this so next we reported the president of the Board of Education I just have a couple quick things I look forward to getting to welcome everyone tomorrow so I'll save my comments for
009the staff kickoff Erica Hill wanted me to mention that she is on her way it's just delayed oh hey oh hey nice to see Erica Erica's here y'all and Paul is joining us remotely so we're all here everyone's accounted for um the committee assignments have been made in elt have been informed which one of us they have to work with instead of deal with for the next school year those committee assignments will be posted on the website shortly I'm asking board members to look at the descriptions of each committee and their objectives which are in the board manual and make sure that those are what the committee would want for the website so that's the next assignment and we also have been getting our invites from principals to attend the site Council and I look
010forward to participating in those meetings as well so thanks everyone for doing that this is also a reminder to board members to make sure that you check your spam folder we've been seeing some it's good to have the safety so high filter but we have been seeing some communication go into spam so make sure that you're checking that Weekly along with your other mail and then finally um there is a request to consider a 5 30 start time for the meetings but I recognize some of you might have work conflicts or Child Care conflicts so if you want to let Elise know if that would be doable to you if you have an aversion to that that would be helpful for planning the idea would be if we can start earlier we might be able
011to end earlier but I recognize that could be challenging for folks so perfectly fine if it doesn't work out but if it does we could start earlier so for your consideration and other than that that is all I have and I'm going to move on to public comment all right would someone mind reading the public comment form I think we have one to start wait before we start let me double check that we have one that's not related to a yes we have one the USD 497 Board of Education welcomes public comments and thanks you for taking the time to talk to us about our policies and procedures we set aside at this time during our regular meetings to hear from the public patreon to wish to participate in public comment must fill out the
012public comment form so that District staff or the board can follow up with you regarding your public comment as necessary this is your time to share your opinions however public comment is not the appropriate form for making complaints about specific staff or students if needed the board president and presiding officer of the media may direct a Patron's comment to be heard by the board an executive session in order to protect the privacy of the individuals to be discussed before participating in public comment to share a complaint the board requests that public commenters followed the complaint procedure set out in board and District policy as appropriate if you need assistance in these processes please let the board Clerk or other District staff know the board president will invite comment on topic not included on the agenda
013at the beginning of each meeting comments related to agenda items are welcomed after the board has had an opportunity to discuss the topic please limit your comments to three minutes the district assumes no responsibility and our liability for the information shared during public commentary the views expressed or show those that the speakers and do not necessarily necessarily reflect the views of the Lawrence Public Schools thank you and so it looks like we have Jody Meyer that would like to comment on substitute pay good evening I'm Jody Meyer I substitute teach occasionally for USD 497. I was pleased to see there was a small raise for substitutes on the consent agenda this evening as you know the current pay rate for substitute teachers in our school district is 105 dollars per day I think what people
014don't realize is that Lawrence has been consistently one of the lowest paying substitute teaching districts uh that our employment agency Morgan Hunter Services Morgan Hunter utilizes or works for 11 school districts in the KC metro area including Lawrence and as of this evening only Baldwin City or Baldwin School District pays less at a hundred dollars per day the new proposed daily sub rate of 115 dollars a day I think is a small step forward but I want to make it clear that this really does not make us competitive in terms of substitute pay raising it to the 115 I think now ties us with Eudora but is still considerably less than Bonner Springs who pays 140 a day and DeSoto who pays 150 a day and I actually think that Topeka School District pays higher
015as well um I might also note that the hourly rate for a partial day is actually not competitive at all at the amount that you're proposing to adopt um the it's still less than all other Morgan Hunter schools that they service with the exception of Baldwin and Tonganoxie and I think that's important because there's a lot of substitute jobs that are not full day assignments so the hourly pay for the six hours or less is really not competitive so I hope that the board seriously considers moving that along sooner rather than later so that we can get substitute teachers because as somebody who does it I know that it is a real problem getting substitutes in our district thank you thank you [Music] okay see seeing No Other Board commentary that or excuse me public
016commentary that's not related to an agenda item we will move on to board commentary um just a couple things uh since our last Board of meeting was able to do a couple things August 1st was able to attend the fiber Network ribbon cutting with Shannon and Dr Lewis and Dr ingebrick and a couple other people uh Bob was there and that was an exciting uh moment for us to complete that Network and I'm excited to see where the next phase of that project goes so that was that was really awesome and then August 9th Shannon and I had a facilities committee meeting um Shannon's going to talk about the bulk of that meeting um I'll I'll talk about items on consent that came out of that meeting um and then later uh later that evening
017on August 9th I was able to go to Langston Hughes uh one of the schools that I'm assigned to the site Council they had open tours so I was able to go hang out there for a while and then I'd like to say good luck uh fall sports tryouts for high school started this evening so I'd like to say good luck to all athletes trying out for fall Sports uh um there's four items on consent tonight from facilities just to talk touch on those really quickly there's a Cisco Flex five-year renewal that's used for warranty on critical networking infrastructure and phone systems there's a boiler preventative maintenance service agreement some updates to that agreement we're updating the definition of covered items to include not just basic boilers but specifically heating boilers to domestic water boilers
018and pool heaters and then adjusting the scope to include preventative maintenance billable hours billable hourly repair and emergency services at Free State High School as we're doing stone work repair on the Press Box we also need to add some additional stonework repair on the ticket booth and the concession stand and finally per policy we are accepting two plaques to be displayed at the free state and Lawrence High School football stadium to honor the late Randy wiesman former teacher and administrator who served our district for 33 years that's what I got go ahead Jen okay thank you Kelly um I too was pleased to attend the August 1st ribbon cutting for our private uh fiber wide area network um that project represents a great step forward in terms of network security for our district and reliability
019as well as cost I'm excited that we are able to invest Capital dollars and access federal funds um in a meaningful way I think the the gentleman from the state Broadband office in the Department of Commerce said that he thought this was a textbook example of how to leverage Partnerships with outside agencies and other other government entities to do something that will be a long-term benefit to our district and potentially to our community and will save us a substantial amount of money over the life of our contract related to our internet service on this project um the policy committee will be meeting on August 21st we will begin our review of policy updates that have been suggested to us from the kasb June 2023 updates as gr mentioned facilities committee we met on August 9th
020we received updates on some school garden projects that we'll be taking place our school garden coordinator is doing a fantastic job Ponta thank you very much um we also got an update on the status of the solar power bids that we received there's some additional follow-up that is happening with that before it is ready to come to the board for consideration and approval we talked about the move of all of the community connections programs from East Heights to Pinckney and how that has been completed and what next steps are I drove by Pinckney this weekend and was pleased to see that the new signage for those programs occupying fully occupying that building is in place in addition Native American student services has been moving this month and consolidating all of their operations from different spaces
021within the district into space at Broken Arrow to better serve the families and students that receive Services through that program there's a lot of things that happen in the summer that we've mentioned before continuing HVAC work we had some delays related to a project at Woodlawn because of some problems with the pump being defective and then the new pump that they sent us didn't fit didn't fit right so but that's in process and things should be working improperly cooled for students to start school this week and then uh updates on finance purchasing and technology and also updates that are related to road construction around some of our elementary schools as schools and middle schools as school start this starts this week and I understand that those issues have been well communicated to the families affected
022but we did review those with our with our staff I am newly appointed or reappointed as it were to be the board's representative on the public incentive Review Committee I did not attend the meeting earlier this summer where the NRA that's on our agenda tonight was discussed that was before I was reappointed but I did attend a meeting this last week where the project that is being proposed at 10 000 or 1000 New Hampshire which is right across the street from Miceli's the MD Lots that are where they used to be able to park but they don't park anymore there's a low-income Senior Living project being proposed for that space and we did review that and recommend the perk committee voted to recommend that to the city commission for for approval and then finally I
023attended a women for pan Kansas panel on Saturday at the library with a group of reporters from the Kansas reflector um it was an excellent discussion from from a group of people who've been covering the state house in Kansas and also one reporter who covers Kansas and Missouri um and that group of people had been doing so since the mid early 2000s and so they had a really full discussion about what is going on currently in Topeka what has changed in Topeka I particularly appreciated one of the audience members asked a question about the current prevailing anti-public School sentiment within the conversations within the legislature especially this last session and these reporters who've been covering these issues for the better part of the last 20 years talked about the history of how we got to
024where we are right now I'm going clear back to the mid 2000 to about 2006 when school funding really peaked in terms of its relationship to inflation and all of the challenges with school funding and how that has driven these conversations over the years in Topeka was really great I think they videotaped it I'm not sure if it's available yet but I'm going to find out because I think it would be a really great conversation for board members to see so I will share that if I'm able to get access to it that's all I have um oh actually one more thing just wanted to remind board members that kasb convention is coming up in November it's an excellent opportunity for board members to engage in professional development to improve our own craft and Service
025as board members and um two of your board members will be presenting an educational session on on our wide area network project at the convention so I'm really excited to be to be doing that with gr this year that's all thank you thanks for doing that other board members Carol uh let's see this is Carol I just wanted to I'll be very brief I would like to thank one of our partner one of our local business what's not local it's a chain but it's Planet Fitness they open up their doors this summer to allow our teens to come in and use the facilities they provide countless hours in service so I'd like to thank them and acknowledge them and also they are hosting a back to school shoe drive and they're collecting new and gently
026used shoes for for those in need so I just wanted to put that out there and I had the great opportunity to help distribute school supplies at the new Native American Student Services offices located at the Elementary School formerly um as well Broken Arrow but um for me it was a it was it was a powerful if you will because when I moved here in 1978 the then the University Student Services office has moved around within this this city and to my recollection we've had eight locations and so far the feedback from the families the students I mean it was it was really great feedback because um as many of you know I was highly involved with the belly mountains Middle School name change and within my research I found that the land that was
027donated to Haskell was over a thousand acres and so that land I was giving the history lessons while I was out there Distributing backpacks and school supplies but the land the donation began and I say donation very Loosely because it was a dollar an acre but it began from the fence line to be on the Wakarusa River and included areas around Walmart and there's a old farmhouse at 27th and Alabama that was The Farmhouse for the Haskell dairy farm so I mean it's fascinating but it was it was good for our families to see that they're like okay we have a space and they wanted Assurance is that you know our Student Services office would not be relocated again so I just wanted to you know thank the district for allowing us to you know
028have some more physical space and finally I am so excited to be reassigned to Sunset Hill the as a site Council liaison because that's where I began my educational career was at Sunset Hill so it's a full circle for me because that's where I started kindergarten I'm excited thank you thanks girl um Paula did you have anything tonight you wanted to contribute other board members oh I saw you light up Paula did you have did you want to jump in or you haven't uh no it's it's okay um can you hear me we can hear you now yep okay I must have cut it out because I started to talk but um no I don't have anything to add thanks Kelly thanks Paul okay so we will now move on to the consent agenda uh
029is there a motion I move the Board of Education adopt the items listed on the consent agenda second go do Blackwood yes Gordon Ross Yes heal yes van yes Jones yes buyers yes Kimball yes motion passes seven zero we'll move on to Old business there was a request for additional discussion about the adoption of the amendment of board policy if and it's on its second read um the uh Paula Shannon and I had opportunity to discuss if and I'm going to let Shannon start with some context about its relationship to um ksb and banning books Etc thanks Kelly so um as you've heard me mention when I report on the policy committee we do participate in policy in a policy update service to help keep us keep our policies current getting updates from attorneys who
030are working on these issues and updating stat related to changes in statute and other circumstances iaf is a policy that came to us as part of a set of updates previous to this Summer that the policy committee has worked through and largely almost entirely the language that you see updated in the the draft that's before the board for approval comes from that set of best practice recommendations from kasb some of it is responsive to experiences that districts in other communities in our state are having but also looking at experiences that districts in communities across the country are having with respect to challenges to materials [Music] that um some districts are receiving you know hundreds of challenges to a single material or hundreds of challenges to hundreds of pieces of material within their Collections and so
031some as you read through this policy you'll see some of the language changes as design it's designed to allow a fulsome review process while at the same time giving staff flexibility to consolidate similar complaints to toll timelines during the time of year when students are and therefore staff are not in school or in session so that you are better able to pull together a Review Committee to review materials that that may need to be reviewed under the policy so that's really that's really where this particular set of recommendations has come from Kelly the two issues raised or that we were asked to address were really one was related to Ken staff object to content or curriculum and the answer to that is yes they have a process separate and we do have examples of materials
032being challenged and actually Dr Lewis you want to give an example yeah um I like to say that our Lawrence Public Schools is kind of leading the way in this work around the country our staff has always had ways to inform Us in terms of curriculum related materials whether it's assessments that we adopt anything that we put in front of our students so for example there was a fast Bridge passage that um had some insensitive things as relates to a certain group of students we notified fast bridge this is a national company who pushes their products out to all a lot of schools around the country and because of our staff our teachers brought that to our attention they were able to remove that from from there from that passage in addition we've had some
033books come in into this this District some from National Publishers that again the books are all around the country I just remembered on two different occasions where our teachers brought that to our attention we alerted the authors the authors were so appreciative thank you I didn't know that that would harm this certain group of people but again because of Lawrence Public Schools leading the way in this area and because of our work ground Equity we were able to um let the author know when they republished a lot of their books because of that work so yes our teachers um he can always challenge material or bring it to our attention starting with the building principle that's a resource for making those decisions objectively and then of course leading on the expertise of library media Specialists
034which we appreciate their contributions as well so the second point was related to what if a Community member who was not directly associated with the district had a or did not have a child in the district wanted to make a complaint there's nothing precluding public comment related to concerns for materials it just wouldn't necessarily put into to motion the if specifically but if something came up that we thought was harming children and it was brought to the board the board would still be able to take action and of course our you know Patrick Kelly is here and Dr Johnson are here at board meetings every night listening to that so that would be part of the opportunity and likewise when we receive Community input in other spaces as well so via email or directly to
035a teacher that that also gets circled back let me just say this you've heard me say this um numerous times I always say yes schools can't do this work alone and so we depend heavily a lot of time on volunteers and so for example if there's a volunteer that does not have a child here in this district and say they're reading uh with a child and they notice something in a passage they can always go to the the building principle to let them know about that passage they can reach out to us here at the district office and as you mentioned public comment is always an opportunity for them to share with the board I just wanted to add on to that for the boards um understanding if you look at the draft policy there
036are several cross-references we made sure to include cross references to all of the policies that relate to staff into general public so that it was clear that there are um well this is particular to this kind of review process there are other processes and policy that may be applicable depending on the particular facts of the circumstance of the particular circumstance so Paula not to put you on the spot again but I just want to make sure if there's anything we missed from our our conversation that you wanted to add no thank you though thank you are there any uh we do have a public comment related to this are there other um questions or or do we move to the public comment actually that's a question for you Shannon oh yeah um if there are
037questions from the board we can do those and then do public comment okay thank you discussion okay I appreciate that and then um Patrick Kelly can help answer questions as well so mine's not so much of a questions I appreciate the work and the policy committee has put into this with getting some clarity on my question about the community parks and I think about our strategic plan it's our community strategic plan so I want to make sure that we're not cutting off the community from their investment and seeing our school system succeed and so I'm happy that there is a process that you've reminded the community there's a process if they see any concerns they can go through that and their concerns will be heard so I appreciate the work that you all have put
038into this and it makes sense everything that has outlined here and I'm happy that we're aligning with best practices as well so thank you Erica any other questions or I just had one that I'll direct to you specifically Kelly so we we had had a commenter that had emailed that was that was attached that was had specific questions about language in terms of the word Guardian yeah so we had opportunity to talk about that um so our language in our policy is broadly stated so that if if a person is Char is charged with a child in a legal capacity they have they are able to contribute and then Bob do you want to say a little bit about that as well yeah my having been in however for a few years my understanding sorry
039about that that actually if you look at most of the statutes in that IT addresses that relationships I don't think it's a policy issue that we need to deal with as a board okay perfect that was my only question and for uh so that we're not being vague and folks I understand there was a a question regarding ensuring that foster parents and and other Guardians who are not parents have opportunity to provide input as well okay so we do have one public comment related to this um so if you want to come up Jody now would be the time foreign as I mentioned when I was here last time about this as a practicing attorney one of the concerns I have is about due process and community and I think I was looking at the
040Kansas Association of school boards uh website talking about as a school board member you'll have a central role in defining your District's Vision but yours should not be the only Viewpoint considered teachers administrators community members and students more likely to support the board's Vision if they have a part in developing it I would suggest to you that I don't understand why we're changing this it seems like a solution in search of a problem I'd like to know how many complaints I've made for this formal process I think it is a little disingenuous to say there's processes for other folks that don't meet this criteria to make a complaint I think saying your process is contact a school board member when oftentimes people's complaints and school board members get ignored is not really a process so
041I don't know if you have that data in front of you but I would be curious to know how many people have complained and none of those people have complained how many fall outside the purview of this it seems like this is something that should be left as it is for community members to be able to speak a foster parent for example who's temporarily taking care of a child as I've represented before in cases should they be able to have more say so of our curriculum over a child's grandparent who may be providing daycare for a child I mean I don't think so so again I come back to the idea that I think the community should be able to have a part in this process as it's written and I haven't heard anything that
042suggests that there is a legitimate concern in USD 497 that we should have such a restrictive policy okay so is there a motion I move the Board of Education approve the recommended changes as reviewed from July 24 2023 board meeting with an effective date of August 14 2023. I second Warden Ross Yes Hill yes Dan yes Jones yes buyers yes Kimball yes could do Blackwood yes motion passes 7-0 all right we'll move on to new business it's a 700 New Hampshire Street NRA request um we have do not have my joining us I'm sorry oh Sam nice to see you at camp camp for economic development analysts from the City of Lawrence and I believe there are other folks here that might be able to step in as needed would you like to yeah let
043me just try and get the presentation up okay despite my young age I am not a Mac Pro so neither am I and I'm not young but we do um if you turn the mic we're a little bit concerned about you being sorry there we go thank you all right I'll speak louder as well thank you Oh no you're good okay all right I'll use that one um all right so can everyone see the the white one because on the screen I'm showing the the background version but okay all right um so yep uh good evening board members my name is Sam Camp I'm the economic development analyst with the City of Lawrence um tonight you're going to hear a presentation on the 700 New Hampshire incentive request that does involve the school board the
044incentive request isn't is for uh industrial revenue bonds which is a city component so you don't need to worry yourselves too much about that but the school board involved component is the neighborhood revitalization area um so just a short outline for tonight after I'm done presenting we have the applicant here as well first Management Inc they're going to do a short presentation on their project and then we also have Sheldon Bartel with the national Development Council who conducted the but for analysis he will be able to answer any questions or concerns regarding the the analysis that was at the end of the the technical report apologies it looks like there may be some different uh formatting um you'll get the gist of it essentially the commercial Area Office Space there's going to be about 20
045000 square feet on the first floor the project is adding a second floor so that's that 10 000 square feet that you see on the second line the plans call for an interior a complete interior remodel the construction of a second story Edition creating about approximately 30 000 square feet of usable office space with some several exterior finish improvements as well as the restoration of the historic Livery on the north wall and I believe the applicant will have some pictures to show you of that if you're not familiar so the incentive uh the full incentive request tonight for the board is a 15-year 65 percent neighborhood revitalization area rebate and I'll go into that in a second again the the IRB is not a school board portion um so as a reminder to the board
046because I think it has been quite a while since the school board as a whole has seen an NRA request a neighborhood and an NRA request is a property tax rebate program the rebate only applies to the incremental valuation only the incremental valuation is determined after improvements have been made a base level is set before construction starts and then it is reassessed after construction and that increment is where the rebate comes from so again the base property tax is shielded and then the property owner continues to pay the property taxes to the three taxing jurisdictions the city county and school board for the remainder of the project so as a little visual you'll see this is kind of the the scaling of the project over the lifetime of the project the blue bar is what
047is currently the the base tax the red bar is the increment that will be collected so that the 65 percent is where the rebate comes from to the three taxing jurisdictions it will be the base plus the 35 percent that is not captured in the rebate and then the green is where you see the the NRA rebate portion as a whole you'll see on the bottom the approximate base tax value um will be about eighty seven thousand dollars split between the three taxing jurisdictions that will be shielded um the approximate collected increment between the three taxing jurisdictions um will start at around sixteen thousand and then go up to about twenty three thousand by the end of the 15 years and again that is across all three so that's shared between um the city county
048and school board and then the approximate rebate value will be about 29 000 at the beginning and then 44 000 at the end of the project uh so this is just a list of current nras that exist throughout the city that the city county and school board have all approved over the past years a couple of them are some info affordable housing developments some of the more uh like projects or similar projects our 1040 Vermont which is a commercial Redevelopment for the new trainer headquarters back then as well as 1106 Rhode Island which is a which is a commercial and historical rehab which is now home to herling Associates um we don't need to concern ourselves with the slide the cost benefit analysis I know at the at the public consensus Review Committee Shannon had
049brought up some concerns about how this relates to the school board um so with the cost benefit essentially um with the school financing formula and if somebody from school staff maybe wants to correct me on this I'm not super familiar with the financing essentially you're collecting taxes which are then brought up to the state and then you're kind of receiving those funds back down through per student assistance so the number the ratio that 1.47 may not necessarily reflect the full cost benefit to the school district but that the the NRA that you see there the 212 000 is what is being collected I also have part of the school district levies there's a capital outlay Levy which is permanently shielded through most if not all uh local tax incentive programs I have the number um
050foreign for the 15-year total through that through that Capital outlay Levy which is about 7.3 7.34 the school district will collect approximately 137 000 through that single tax levy over the 15 years and that you're assisted through the Improvement because you're collecting all of it so no matter what happens to the property or the the shielded rebate you'll be collecting 100 through that tax levy Sam could I ask a question about that because I think that's that's actually the first time I've ever heard that um about the capital outlay Levy not being not being one of them that is rebated um through this process so um is that the only one that's like that out of the school district's Mill levies for the nras I know there may be one other one through a tax
051increment financing incentive or like a a constitutional tax abatement I don't have that there's a chart that we have that helps us I don't know off the top of my head but with the NRA specifically the capital Levy outlay is shielded shielded from the rebate so basically in that eight mil because that's the max it can be it can be Max eight mils it's always a little bit less than that um uh when the final calculations are done so basically what you're saying just to restate is that um if a project like this goes forward and as the value of the property increases we are getting a hundred percent of the taxes into our capital outlay for that eight Mills from that project because they are not being rebated correct so when when the county
052the county treasurer's office because they're the ones who calculate you know how much is distributed to each taxing jurisdiction when they distribute that when they do the calculations they remove that Capital outlay Levy when they start doing the math and then they just will send you the full amount for whatever that is they won't rebate it they won't cut it down they'll just send you whatever the full value is whatever the assessed value is against that Levy okay Cindy I'm going to look at you and you might have to answer this so in essence the levees that are rebated in an NRA for the on the school district's part are the 20 Mills which is actually the state's 20 mils it doesn't we don't ever that money goes directly to the state and then it's
053redistributed um based on the school Finance formula that's like their their state share and then the additional local option budget Levy um which we generate based on off we we calculate that based on a formula to generate a specific number of dollars and are those the only two then that are subject to the rebate I'm sorry I'm sorry to interrupt them I mean this is a little confusing you know like I said I so I think this might be my third time on perk and this is the first time I've heard this so I want to make sure I understand all right yeah Sam and I talked several months ago about this and that was the first I had heard about the capital outlay as well um and talking to the state general fund would
054not be impacted because the state makes us whole at the end of the day taxes go to the state and they pay us out exactly the amount of our state aid so the state would actually be paying what we need regardless of the tax situation so my understanding then would be we'd have lob left adult education um cost of living and bond and interest what bonding interest is always calculated to generate a certain amount of dollars so even if so if in a year that the that the assessed evaluation were already decreased for what we're talking about as long as it's as long as we have the net amount of the assessed valuation then technically um it depends on how you look at it for for Bond and interest but if we're only trying to
055get our tax payment out of it then we wouldn't need to worry too much about Bond and interest and that's what we're doing this year with the budget okay I think I understand I won't I won't stop you any further right now but I may need to go back to this after I think about it for a few minutes thank you no and I will say um I was speaking with the the um company that comes up with this analysis or we use their software to come up with this cost benefit analysis and I think Shannon we had talked about um maybe there's a better representation with some of the financing that happens and so we may come back with um some better representations part of the analysis includes you know estimated number of school
056children that may be brought into the district for for bigger projects that have a lot of employees um specifically this Capital outlay Levy so in the future um we'll we'll come up with a better way to represent all of you kind of what these projects mean to the school district okay thank you thank you um so with the the financial the but for analysis um the national development council's final analysis and underwriting report indicate that the incentive request is reasonable to alleviate the challenges and with construction and The Debt Service of upfront costs and if there are any questions regarding that we do have the analysts on standby for any questions so the additional considerations um on the part of the the city the project is is in alignment with the city's Economic Development policy
057our downtown master plan and our plan 2040 our comprehensive master plan it meets the community's goals of increasing adaptive reuse and providing employment um with the with the new jobs between the two companies that will be housed at the new headquarters there will be an addition of about 21 new jobs with salaries ranging between 50 and 100 and 20 000 which currently will exceed the meeting income of about the individual meeting income about thirty five thousand in the in Douglas County um it is also a Redevelopment of a historically underutilized parcel back into productive use as well as the preservation of the historic components of the Livery wall so the recommendations it's kind of cut off at the top but um as sorry about that um City staff our recommendation is the project meets requirements
058for the NRA and achieves the city's goals as part of the public incentives Review Committee when they first voted this project was initially requested at a 90 NRA so that is where that that two to three vote happened it has since been reduced when it was brought before the city commission for the first time to 65 percent and they they voted four to one for the IRB but again that doesn't really concern the school board and then the city commission voted uh recently three to two for the 15-year 65 NRA and then voted four to one for the IRB incentive um so tonight you're going to be considering your participation both the percentage and the year once the area is established the city has to establish the area through the final passing of its ordinance
059and then the the school board the County Commission will be receiving a Cooperative agreement to outlay the terms of following the NRA plan which establishes the year the Year and rebate period as well as any other special considerations between the county and the county City and School Board okay so with that I'll switch it over to the applicant's presentation are there questions for Sam before we move so so did I understand it right that we're voting on participating in something that isn't technically finalized yet because we're voting on participating in a in a finalized area that isn't actually no there's not an official document The Cooperative agreement is essentially what will bind you to that 15-year 65 percent you're essentially giving your preemption when that document comes before you after the district is created when
060the city approves on second reading that ordinance The Cooperative agreement will come back to you on consent having already known through this meeting that you will participate at a certain level otherwise the city would have to go through the creation of the district through the first and second reading not knowing what participation any of the other taxing jurisdictions are going to go in on and then if you were to say you know the city the county and the school board vote to not participate at all and the project doesn't go forward then it becomes an issue where we have to kind of walk back or kind of cancel all these legal obligations so that's kind of what we're doing here beforehand okay can you speak more to you'll have to cancel legal obligations and walk
061things back does that mean things are already in place and so should we have been engaged before now I'm having a hard trouble I'm having trouble following this whole thing yeah I understand there's a lot of yeah there's a lot of different steps and I don't think the school board has seen an NRA request in about four years I think the most recent one was 2019 with the Penn Street loss if anyone was on the board at that time so essentially the first step is the city has to on first reading pass an ordinance to establish the neighborhood or revitalization area and then kind of start to agree on the city's participation in that tax rebate in the NRA and the IRB um the area isn't officially isn't officially established because it is a city
062initiated process until that second reading in between now and then in that second reading there's not a requirement for for it to happen within a certain amount of time um so in between now and a second reading we go to the county and the school board to determine your level of participation and then once the ordinance is signed which includes the Cooperative agreement and the NRA plan which determines the level of participation from each of the taxing jurisdictions um that is when everything is cemented so if we were to go and cement things before we've even talked to you guys um you know there's a whole ordinance that was passed that would now have to be walked back legally if the project were to move forward if the applicant can't make the project work without
063the rebate I am not an attorney or a legal expert I don't know the exact steps to walking back or renegging or canceling all these legal obligations but essentially whatever steps would be involved would have to be done so we're kind of trying to take care of things beforehand if that makes sense before it gets too far Sam could I ask a clarifying question that might help um yes so the reason that it's done that way is because the state statute says that school boards and Counties have to decide their own participation because we have a share of the mill Levy but it's the city is The Entity that corrected I've created the the legal structure in which the tax rebates are approved and happen through this stuff and it can only start at the
064city as far as I know right the county the county doesn't have Authority Under that state statute to do this it's just the city as far as I know yes I'm looking at Patrick yeah he's nodding his head yes so so it is confusing because the I've always felt this way the legislature throws us all into it because we're taxing jurisdictions um it it's also a little confusing because there are other incentives um that we don't particularly yeah particularly the the tax increment financing where there isn't this level of involvement You're simply just given an option to veto the project but that is not the case with this one there is a an obligation to directly indicate your level of participation through this process ah Sam this is Carol uh I'm coming into this with
065trepidation what is the guarantee that first management won't want they won't pull up Stakes after 15 years so I think we I mean we have the applicant here they haven't given their presentation is that something we want to give them some room to okay do I do okay I mean they have a whole presentation to give you guys so if is there any other questions for me while I'm up here before we okay um see you all back in the back uh I have noted um Sheldon Bartel and Brandi Sutton and I'll let you introduce yourselves foreign I'm Doug Compton and I want to say thank you to the members of the board of education for allowing us through this presentation tonight I was going to give you a quick a little bit of history
066about me and the company and the borders building and then Brandi Suttons who are director of operation is going to do a little follow-up the president or company Robert Greene is here as well so I'm Doug Compton I founded first Management in 1991 with six employees in 2005. I formed First Construction and first management First Construction are both owned 100 by myself we both share the same headquarters 32 years later we have over 80 employees and we need more room to grow we were 10 years we were downtown at 901 New Hampshire Street above Milton's on the corner of 9th and New Hampshire Street we outgrew that space and we built a new Facility North of TP Junction we outgrew that space in the last 12 months so that's where Borders bookstore came into picture
067because I've owned it for several years and has been setting empty and we thought that'd be a good place to not only allow us to move to but to expand for the additional office space that we need we actually almost double our office space of where we currently are right now so that's water's bookstore right there 700 New Hampshire Street we've identified that building for our new joint headquarters the building has been abandoned since 2011. that's when Borders bookstore closed several projects have been proposed for this location but none of them have come to fruition slide three is the block view it encompasses half of a city block on the corner of 7th and New Hampshire Street slide four is the Liberty stable wall that was preserved and Incorporated when the building's border was built
068as you can see in the photo the walls and poor condition we intend to preserve the wall make needs of repairs to the wall the interior has not changed um it's been vacated for 13 years now and a little bit of history about the borders building of why it's been sitting there um April 2011 Borders bookstore closed May 26 2015 myself and some other investors purchased the borders building September of 2015 we announced plans to bring a grocery store December of 2016 we were sued by The Neighbors in Hobbs Taylor Loft to prevent a grocery store April of 2017 Price Chopper commits to the grocery store and apartments with 15 being affordable housing that was our second applicant that wanted to go in the building in June of 2017 the neighbors lost their lawsuit of
069district court and appealed August the 27 2017. an application was filed with the city to proceed with the grocery store may of 2018 the neighbors finally lose their lawsuit and they go to the court of appeals and they appealed to the Supreme Court I believe March of 2020 covid uh comes along June of 2020 the May the neighbors lost at the Supreme Court September of 2022 I bought out my other two partners um in in the property slides uh 12 and 13 are the restoration we're going to retain the overall character of the property we're going to retain the existing footprint to avoid encroaching and joining residential neighborhoods we're going to restore the exterior including tuck pointing painting a new roof mechanical electrical we're going to add the second floor inside without changing the exterior
070of the building we're going to preserve the historic Livery wall we're in compliance with guidelines at downtown Lawrence plan Horizon 2040 sustainability we are repurposing existing building on the slide you can see just some of this stability we plan on using during construction the diversity our current construction projects include requiring that 26 percent of our subcontractors be minority and or women owned we'll be using a lot of these same vendors on this project when it comes to jobs 25 growth for first management First Construction staff seven full-time employees with salaries ranging from 90 to 120 000 14 full-time employees with salaries ranging from fifty to seventy thousand dollars during construction we'll have between 100 and 120 temporary jobs and it increases the jobs for our local business partners we're excited about being downtown we miss
071being downtown after 10 years of being at 90 New Hampshire Street so we're looking forward to this project and I appreciate you taking the time to listen to us tonight I'm gonna let Brandy follow up with a few of the other hi I'm Brandi Sutton um just kind of briefly as Sam mentioned this does meet the economic impact and alignment with the city goals that have been set out for public incentives in Lawrence Kansas we do align with the economic development policy it is a high priority site given its location and abandonment it's also been designated as an Economic Opportunity Zone by the state it is Redevelopment of a dilapidated structure while preserving the historic Integrity while there will be a rebate the existing amount of taxes will still be paid to all taxing jurisdictions
072it is just that portion of value increase that would be shielded by 65 percent with 35 percent still going back to the taxing jurisdictions at the end of the NRA 100 of that becomes taxable so you've taken an asset that had a very low tax value as it currently stands created into a large asset tax value which should only appreciate as we know about Lawrence property over the next 15 years and bring on additional Revenue to both the city the school board and the county this is a 5.1 million dollar investment in the building and Equipment it's also going to encourage residential development and additional children in our school districts by bringing new employees to Lawrence it's also an increased opportunity for our local construction Partners we have four different construction partners that are lawrence-based
073companies including Alpha Roofing Air Tech lead electric and select one security all of which will be partnered on this project it also will increase sales tax revenue for the City by bringing our employees back downtown to shop and dine and support those other businesses that are located downtown and are important to our community the reason for this NRA request is it's a challenging project before covid it's even a more challenging project now that interest rates have been rising when we originally started this project we've seen about a four to five percent increase in interest rates and so the original decision to try to move forward with this the coveted closures first Management's reliant on apartment revenue for its income when KU closed down the schools that Revenue dried up it also Major Impact to our
074Construction Division when we had supply chain issues labor shortages so we're seeing all those start to come back up but in order for us to grow and meet the demand that we see in the future we do need these rebates to do this project so as Sam mentioned we are asking for a 65 rebate over 15 years obviously the IRB is not relevant to this board and the 65 percent would not be applicable to your capital outlay budget we're happy to answer any questions you might have I'm opening it up for questions uh let's see um can you please go back to the slide of where uh I saw where revitalization revitalizing neighborhoods was on there just um what is the plan or how will that be done what I'm sorry which what are you
075referring because one of your slides about revitalizing neighborhoods uh revitalizing the neighborhood and I don't know which slide that was let me see yeah I'll stop when I hit it I just saw it in there real quickly it was about there was a bullet point about revitalizing neighborhoods I just wanted to know what that entailed or what that what that entails currently just to give you an example we've been broken into it borders five times in the last three weeks because it's sitting vacant uh we've had horrible problems with graffiti we actually pay a security patrol every night between 7 P a.m and 6 a.m and we can't keep we can't keep the people from breaking in um I know one of the major concerns of the neighborhood was encroachment since that is a half
076City Block the actually downtown Lawrence master plan says that the highest and best use of that property is to scrape it and build it zero lot which would come right up against that Vermont Street residential neighborhood so by keeping it in its existing footprint going up instead of going out we are protecting the neighborhood from that encroachment we're also bringing back to life the Livery wall which needs tuck pointed and painted and improving a structure that's really just unfortunately we haven't ever been able to get a grocery store there and it just has set and we've now figured out a use that we can do something with it and bring life back to that neighborhood I think you also have the parking lots over around the Lawrence Journal World site that have been underutilized and
077underdeveloped and I think that by bringing these employees back town Town we're encouraging other developers to see we're not just retail shops downtown thank you other board members um the the specific bullet point she was asking about was infill development that will Revitalize the neighborhoods of that triggers anything you want to add to that you can um as far as infill development instead of raising this project we are redeveloping on-site and bringing it back in um you know we could go build our corporate headquarters out in West Lawrence out by the new hospital that's not going to bring jobs Downtown that's not going to encourage people to re utilize existing sites we can buy a patch of dirt and build anywhere or we can take something that is already there and make it better um
078the the original ask was 90 and then this second ask was 65 percent how did you settle on 65 percent that was the conversation between Craig Owens the city manager myself so how did you so how did you get there it was basically what it what is the absolute bottom number we would still proceed with the project at and we went I know Doug went back and forth with our CFO went back and forth over all the numbers and to make it viable 65 percent was the number to be able to proceed and do this project I mean we started this process um a year ago last February almost a year and a half ago interest rates were three percent you know today they're eight and three quarter percent so it even makes that much
079time from a project by going from 90 to 65 percent uh I just I just want to make sure I understood for me I understand revitalization I get that um I was more into the tax money stuff um and I want to make sure I understand that basically for our local option uh budget wait well I'll have a little outlay at Capital outlay stays at full value no matter what so as you as you reach your well as you do your improvement and the value goes up or Capital outlay will see that increase yes you'll you'll capture 35 more so what you collect right now on Capital outlay you capture 100 100 on Capital and then on the others we would capture 35 of the increase increase yes over that 15-year period then at the
080end of the 15 year period we capture all of it okay so I do understand it okay you've been collecting on an empty building for the last 13 years you're still going to get that same tax right it's it's automatic we get that no matter what what yeah so I get it 10 35 on top as we go forward yeah yeah I think I'll go last if there are otherwise okay um well I was just gonna I was just gonna say then Shannon can correct me if I'm wrong or Cindy can I mean is is this as the this property value as this property increases in value we're not going to see additional money accepting capital outlay in Capital One in capital outlay yes but anything else we're not because anything else is strictly based
081on the formula right so any other any other local option budget or or anything any any anything that's short in that if it's not coming from here it's coming from somewhere else if it's a straight dollar amount so that's I mean that's important to understand yeah we we capture it and be captured well the state reimburses us anyway for for that so we're made whole on that anyway yeah so if I can maybe interrupt you when I was speaking with the the analyst earlier to kind of go over that cost benefit analysis one of the things that we had one of the understandings that we had kind of come to was that essentially with projects like these you're not looking for maybe that specific dollar value capture you're more looking for at the end when
082this project is now worth a certain amount and you have to have a certain Mill Levy to meet your you know a corded budget you can reduce the mill Levy because you'll have the the property values will be higher so I mean this is one project out of you know the hundreds of millions of dollars of valuation in the city you know in the the city in the county but essentially that is the thinking is after improving so many property values you can now lower what you're charging residential property owners which are 75 80 percent of the property value in Lawrence Douglas County um so with commercial projects like these you're able to kind of reduce the pressure on them that's that is the essential thought with that so Sam while you're at the mic
083one of the questions I had written down and I um one of our one of the news articles that was written about this said that this if the school district were to vote Yes it would cost the school district over two hundred thousand dollars I just I want to clear up that is that true or not true based on my understanding and the the kind of confirmation tonight from from Cindy no it is from from what we've talked about tonight you you are essentially you know given what's owed to you through the state kind of no matter what that dollar amount is kind of just the value of what is given through this NRA okay um this is a question maybe for um for our folks from first management um so the city has agreed
084to participate um what happens to this project if uh this board said no or if the county said no would you be able to go forward if I will not it's been said in there for 13 years this is what it's going to take for us to to feasibly make the project work for us okay so if we don't do it you're still going to get the same tax base that's set in empty versus 35 increase on the the new value of the building when it's done and that really has to do with the financing of I'm not sure where the question came from um you'd be losing 300 000 well I think I just I just I want to understand um and I want the board to understand um by ask my purpose in
085asking the question is to highlight the importance of when I know from serving on perk that when when applicants come to perk with these projects they have done pretty extensive um evaluation of the cash flow of the project and whether it's feasible or not without the incentives I mean that's you have to give all that to people like the NDC to to evaluate and to create the recommendation so um I I didn't I didn't mean to be confrontational I really was just asking because I wanted to highlight for um my boy I'm I'm the only board member on the board currently who's ever served on Park so so I'm trying to highlight for them like in this process like it is important for us to consider what um what the actual impact on the applicant
086is if we choose to participate or not to participate or we choose to participate at a different in a different way as we are allowed to do Under the statue I'm not proposing I'm not proposing that I just wanted to um because that that really hadn't come up in any of the the notes that we all read from from the prior proceedings so that's really the reason for the question I guess I mean the other thing I'm hearing in the underlying piece as somebody that lives close to that area that you would leave it empty for another 13 years would is that what I mean because of the challenges that you've had and I understand I can understand why you're having to make this this decision based on the um circumstance of the interest the
087current interest rates and your considerations of having to uh your financial considerations but I I did hear you say I believe that if if the county and the and the school do not support the decision made by the city it would continue to be a place that has been unsafe that has what has been unsafe for in terms of like the the examples of who's been populating it been inside of it and and it's been empty for a long time so it's certainly not contributing to the NRA is that is that where we would be at yes the kid basically go back it'd basically go back on the market for somebody else to try to figure out what to do with it okay so far in 13 years nobody right I hear that yeah I
088appreciate that thank you so okay additional questions so I'm just really trying to understand like if our vote that the board of education's vote has so much weight to whether this proposal goes through or not should we have been engaged earlier in this conversation because it sounds like just from the questions that's being asked like we're trying to piece all these connect the dots and put this all together and it just seems like I'm not quite understanding the urgency and why we weren't updated along the way I'm just trying to understand the process here yeah so I mean part of that um when we receive these kind of applications um part of that there's a lot of due diligence up front that we as City staff take care of there's also kind of a waiting
089period the NDC analysis that's conducted through this outside party um currently at a at approximate takes about a month to complete so we don't have kind of these full numbers until maybe two months after the city has kind of seen these projects so we don't want to give the the voting taxing jurisdictions kind of preliminary information part of that is also why the public incentives Review Committee has school board and County members on it so that way they can inform maybe some of their other other members as part of that discussion kind of beforehand or anything like that we also try as as early as possible we try and give a courtesy kind of notification to uh Dr Lewis and Sarah palinski the County Administrator to kind of give them a heads up um and
090so I I know it's also a little challenging I don't know with I know and this is only just my information or my regular recollection from the news that there's been a lot of board change over so in the future we can we can give you all as much heads up or notice as you would like as as what we as staff can think is comfortable to give you so that you have the full picture we don't want to give you something that's that's half done and give you half information and then switch things up halfway through and so we we want to be able to give all of you the best picture before you take on this vote certainly I can speak to that a little bit Erica as board president last year I
091assigned K Emerson to the public incentive Review Committee I believe this the perk heard this in June yes I do not believe K participated in that meeting I only just recently rejoined perk on at the beginning of this um business operational year so um it would be my practice as the board member on perk as I did this evening to update the board on the proposals that have come before and what I've heard and I would share that to start that conversation a little earlier um and because I think you're right I think hearing unfortunately with this project that didn't happen yeah and I completely understand that I'm just saying if I were in your shoes and I didn't see a USD 497 board member at the table I would make sure like hey they're
092not here we need the board to be updated we're going to be asking for their vote we want them to be informed before they vote and it's that didn't happen I agree so I will commit to making sure that um I have no doubt that that as best as I can I will attend these meetings they they're meeting right now about once a month on a Wednesday afternoon um correct you know if you if there's anything either that Shayna may not have an answer on or whatever relationship you want to have communication with with myself and other City staff is perfectly fine with me I'm happy to answer any questions that you see in kind of these preliminary meetings um but just some of that caveat you'll see that like for example the city commission
093received the very first step is a receipt and referral item on consent that is just for the city commission to receive and approve the application the application does not have any kind of analysis by staff or NDC done there's just a lot of kind of open questions so we could you know if you see that and you want to ask us questions we can give you as much information we can at the time but until that analysis is done we can't give you a full picture so however we want to have a discussion as perfectly fine with staff and I also didn't hear a confident no to Shannon's question I was like no it was kind of a gotcha question I know the answer to that is not I know but he didn't give a
094confident no yeah I I mean I apologize with the city and the county their financing is more straightforward than what I'm familiar with with the school district um so that that's why there was a little hesitant hesitancy what I understand from tonight's discussion speaking with with the the finance staff with the school district beforehand is the state will kind of make you whole kind of no matter what or to the best of their ability so what what essentially is being given up is some of that taxing the tax dollars that the state will just have to make up a little bit more um that's essentially where that's coming from Reckless I have a question Kelly uh Paula I can hear you but just barely uh is this better yep okay um just a quick question
095the doctor list do you see this um proposal in alignment with our current strategic plan and it sounds like it'd be moving into the year of 2038. I don't see how this you know is part of the Strategic plan this is something that's that's on the outside I guess it will fall upon the data informed decisions um I will say back in May um I did send this out in a Friday update but it was it was a 90 then and are you saying that the interest rates were high higher back in May of this year than they are now because it was in the application it was it was a 90 request right and when NDC did their original analysis based on the 90 percent they did approve that um it is still needed
096at 90 percent we've gone back and crunched numbers and just cut and cut and cut to where we could get it down and the bottom bottom Place we've got to be is 65 percent if we're going to make this happen with eight percent interest rates compared to three when we started and construction costs we're up 30 percent okay okay um Kelly and Dr Lewis I think one thing that might be helpful to the board um would be for the city to communicate to you when these hit their initial agenda um so that you can continue to let us know that they're in process and and when to that'll help board members be informed about when to expect and to be cognizant of watching these discussions thanks okay thank you so um I think at this
097point we'll um unless there's additional board discussion we'll move to a motion up this is Carol I just have a quick question well maybe not quick but um too but uh I'm looking at the first Management Properties website and I'm not seeing a lot of family friendly housing a lot of its apartments and studios are there any plans to for development and the lower enrollment districts yeah I'm not sure if you're aware but we closed this board close to elementary schools in lower populated areas are there plans to for development in those areas to bring families back where we close schools we actually are in conversation with the city manager right now on doing some affordable housing thank you and I don't want to put Dr um we've met three times in the last two
098weeks Kelly on the spot but he voted against this so I just I have a lot of questions around this sorry I mean that's uh and still in front of us there's a recommended action so is there a motion I moved the Board of Education improved the school district participation in a 15-year 65 percent neighborhood revitalization area NRA for first Management Incorporated to redevelop an office headquarters at approximately 700 New Hampshire Street on a second Hill no man no Jones I'm sorry I'm really worried about the neighborhood staying yes buyers yes Kimball yes could do Blackwood no Gordon Ross foreign yes motion passes 4-3 Kelly mix blame my vote you mind absolutely okay so I am glad that there's a plan to restore and Revitalize that area it's it's really important I understand that um
099my no is based on me being uncomfortable with the lack of information beforehand as well as a lack of understanding just here um there are more questions and answers in my opinion during this conversation and I don't like to piece things together when making an important decision such as this and so it's not that I don't think it's a great project I don't you know I think revitalization is very important to sustainability to our community I understand that so I I'm glad that the board will get regular updates especially something of this magnitude if we know what's going to be coming to the board it's important that we're all informed I'll apologize for that but as an applicant we just went through the process of what we were told yeah I mean we started this
100year and a half ago with the city we've met with the Consultants we've been providing them with information for months we've been working with City staff I mean I I would have been in front of you all if I was told that was my job or part of the process to do it so but I'll apologize for that um if I ever do another one I'll come to you personally individually and discuss the project I really I really did not discuss the project but the five City commissioners the city major asked that I came to him and and discussed the project with him and it was my understanding that he then wanted to educate the Commissioners on on our project and what we were asking and why it was a good benefit for the city
101so that's kind of the process I went with the city so I understand like I said I apologize okay and I've been doing this for 35 years I made a mistake okay I know I I don't know that I would agree that you made a mistake I think you followed a a process I'll I'll explain my vote too I I will say that I came into into this tonight with a lot of the same concerns that that Erica had I was very um apprehensive about this vote I will say on a personal basis I don't know that coming into the meeting tonight prior to the presentation that I was not in favor of the incentive and I will say that the presentation you guys did a great job of explaining what it was and how
102it worked to Erica's point we just didn't we just didn't have that coming into it and so I think I think tonight for me personally you did a great job for me as an individual of changing my opinion on what this was what it's for and and and and and and why I voted the way that I did but I think I think walking away from this I think there are some changes that can be made not just for us but I think the the whole process I think could be a little smoother for you as as as as well but I appreciate that you that you took the time and that you were willing to stand up there and and and take some shots and and and and and even be willing to stand
103there and apologize when I don't I don't really think that that you need to do that but I appreciate that but I want to apologize I want to thank you for that I'm used to taking shots after 35 years of being a developer so it's called change and not a lot of people like change but I do think this is a project you'll be proud of I mean we're taking a building that's been blighted and empty for 13 years we're going to bring 80 new employees in downtown Lawrence put some life I mean as somebody that owns other buildings in downtown Lawrence it's it's it's really a hard time right now in downtown Lawrence I mean it it needs a boost in the arm not just for my project but hopefully with some of the
104stuff that's happening in Allen press and you know we we did build four other structures on New Hampshire Street the 901 building where Milton's is the Marriott Hotel I built a 888 building where Great America Bank is and then I bought the pajamas restaurant we built four stories on top of it we've tried to reinvest our money in downtown Lawrence and make it you know a better place but you know it's it's between covid um there's just it's been a really interesting time in the last three years but we've made the commitment to go there I appreciate your support um that I do think it's a project you'll be proud of when we're done Kelly I have a brief explanation about when you when you're ready okay we do need to move on we have
105at least another hour I do want to and I want to make sure that Erica's point is not lost well Erica's what I think I heard was we need better communication from the city not Mr Compton um and and uh we will make sure that that is occurring and then um it real quickly Carol and this channel real quickly I just want to explain my vote but um as I've yeah I grew up here I've watched the town change and grow but I I don't see how it could be fair to their business and I'm glad you pointed that out that you talked about our businesses downtown suffering so I didn't think it'd be fair to the other businesses downtown that's another component but I'm also worried about the taxes and property values around the
106area areas around first management so that's that was 500 no thank you Carol Shannon um so coming into this evening obviously community members reach out to board members and one of the things that that I heard from the community was some concern about the real desire to have the grocery store in this location and and that it didn't work out and I appreciated that you provided an explanation um I was persuaded by that application that explanation particularly the litigation history I was unaware of the extent of that and how much it held up your discussions around that project so um I think that was an important component of my vote in addition there are two other things one um the city and the state have made a policy decision to allow these I think it's
107really difficult for the school board being required to weigh in on them but we have to I try to keep in mind when I vote on these um the the particular goals that the city has set forth that they're trying to meet with these projects and I did feel that this this project met a number of those goals and finally um for me and probably the most important one is the fact that this does not have any negative impact on School District funding and too much to my surprise and actually this is a positive it will bump up our Capital outlay fund um a hundred thousand dollars plus is nothing to sneeze out in that fund that is money that we need to do things like fix our roofs and upgrade our sidewalks so I
108am knowing that it hasn't it has a positive Financial impact on the district long term with the potential that it could have a settling or downward effect on the mill Levy over time as we have more of these larger development projects I am cognizant of the tax burden on homeowners in our community right now so thank you for that opportunity Kelly thank you okay we are going to take a five minute recess and come back at 8 30 to move on to 4.2 which is social media litigation thank you all for coming thank you now move on to item 4.2 which is social media litigation um let me see who I am actually you know what it would be very helpful because I I sincerely apologize I cannot um I don't see your name Larry
109could you thank you Larry I apologize I'd be more than happy to I wasn't refreshed there you go Dr Lewis board members were pleased to have as a guest this evening uh Brad Arnold from goza and Arnold law firms you may recognize the law firm from their work in litigation on the jewel case representing the school district Brad this evening will be talking about a new opportunity for litigation concerning social media and the impact and concerns it has on young people and their education so I'll introduce Brad Arnold to you at this point right thank you I'm not trying to Brick good evening uh Dr Lewis members of the board thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak with you this evening um my relationship with USD 497 started back in one of your
110this board's last meetings before the before covet one of the last live meetings when I came forward on behalf of our Consortium of lawyers that were working together at that time on the jewel case uh we brought forward at that time and that was late 2019 early 20 2020. we uh our Law Firm goes and huddled in Overland Park had started representing young young individuals adolescents teenagers and young adults who were addicted to uh Jewel electronic cigarettes and we're representing them individually in personal injury actions and as we started dealing with them and their families it became clear to us that not only did that affect those children and young people their bodies and in their homes but where do teenagers and adolescents young adults spend after being at home where do they spend more
111time and that's at school and we quickly got introduced through some families of children that we're representing impacts that were happening at school in terms of the distraction and impact that Jewel uh addiction not only to the jewel product but to other vaping electronic cigarette products impacts that they were having at school in terms of disruption of the educational Mission uh that school districts have a statutory obligation to provide uh disciplinary issues uh distraction from instructional time creating health issues creating mental health issues and we came up with the concept of representing school districts in a novel way at that time the opioid litigation was starting and going on throughout the country on behalf of government entities and we said why not represent school districts for the impact that vaping is having on districts people
112thought we were crazy uh and it was wonderful that USD 497 was one of the early pioneering districts along with many other districts the Northeast Corridor the districts in in the state of Kansas were one of the first handful of districts that signed on to the litigation so USD 497 with Shawnee Mission with Olathe with blue valley with Kansas City Kansas with Mill Valley with DeSoto Spring Hill we're a strong Consortium of districts that joined onto that lawsuit that were filed on behalf of all those districts in early 2020. um uh proudly as a professional I say proudly because we are involved with it and spent the past three years of our life doing it but in December of 2022 representing the unified Public public schools of San Francisco had a trial date in the
113Northern District of California and Jewel settled before that trial not Not only was San Francisco but with all of the about 1200 districts around the country that had decided to participate in the litigation Altria that invested 12 almost 13 billion dollars in the company did not settle and San Francisco continued to pursue them in a trial a case that actually went to trial and our firm was involved with our Consortium of firms in April of this year where after we present our evidence the case Ultra then agreed to contribute 235 million dollars to the global fund that would go to school districts the theory of the case is one that's based upon youth Public Health grounded in addiction it's easy to understand the addiction model in nicotine but once you immerse yourself in the science
114of social media and its impact and how it's marketed to youth it's the same concept social media from the youth perspective is an addictive not just Endeavor but it's an addicted product the lawsuit that we're pursuing is a product's liability case we are saying that the algorithms that the social media companies use are defective products they're defected because they prey on children in such a way that makes their product addictive through the use of amplification likes notices constant scrolling the way that content is manipulated and delivered based upon the user profile and really are the case is really about these companies are engaging in malicious intensely intentionally malicious operant conditioning of children children get addicted to it the way it's presented they are preyed upon and content is delivered in a way so that children
115cannot take their eyes off their devices that is the goal social media doesn't serve any purpose those businesses that are in it are in it for one reason and one reason only they're public companies and they are in it to make money and how do they make money by keeping our children's eyes right here when my two of my oldest sons in 2011 and 12 when they went to middle school they were the first cohort that went to middle school with these things and we were wondering what is this what what what is this constant and it wasn't because they were getting emails and texts it was because For the First Time The platforms uh social media platforms Facebook Instagram followed by others uh had digital apps and they became usable on uh cell phones
116um social media is proliferated since then in the 10 or 12 years since then and in the districts that we've spoken with the impact of social media in terms of its impact upon Youth and students sleep deprivation attentional issues discipline issues Tick-Tock challenge issues we have spoken with many districts where the tick tock challenge issues are actually creating safety issues where children seen or students seeing the tick tock challenge actually laying hands on teachers actually laying hands on other students and the disruption is very significant many districts have had to and this varies by state in terms of the the district's ability to uh fund additional counseling or mental health services but the data is very clear social media impacts our young people's mental health the data is fairly impressive on anxiety and depression body
117self-image self-harm suicide attempts and actual successful suicide attempts the the data is really startling um and so that's why we're here to date the litigation there are several hundred districts that have filed uh cases so far this litigation because the tech companies are all based in California it won't be happening here they will have to go to California to pursue the case as all the districts are but but we believe in in this case it is a we feel pretty strongly that it's a that it's a Just Cause And we saw when like-minded lawyers come together on behalf of like-minded clients good things can really happen um you know in the jewel case uh this District's share of that Jewel of the jewel part of the settlement will be about 288 290 000 and we
118don't have an exact number yet on the Altria portion the accounting and distribution methodology isn't completed on that part but it's a meaningful a meaningful recovery for a district of this size and the recovery methodology is based upon number of districts number of students a number of different uh kind of objective demographic criteria based upon districts so I probably spoken and and talked too much and I I want to make sure that you have the ability or have the ability to ask me any any questions uh at all about this oh one thing that I should note um you may say how does this how did this lawyer get here in front of us and how does that happen just so you know that the ethical rules that apply to lawyers uh especially as it
119pertains to a lawyer or Law Firm like mine where we bring lawsuits on behalf of entities and individuals when they've been harmed or injured the ethical rules allow us to reach out to entities that have lawyers and so in Jewel that started back with David Cunningham when he was still with the district and then as it related to this matter with outside outside council at the Stevens brand firm so lawyers can contact lawyers about things like this and through that led to a conversation with Dr engelbrook and Dr Lewis and the invitation that to appear before you this evening okay before we open it up for questions I will note that we do have one public comment on this too so if you all can help me remember to honor that before we vote that
120would be helpful but questions Carol um not so many questions but I want to thank you for this and bring this to our attention because um I'm actually a substance abuse counselor and this is not yet in the DSM-5 but I would like to see this disorder in the next DSM I think I I think it's heading that way I hope they were the internet gave me disorder so thank you um briefly to inform the board about um the similarities between how our engagement with you for a matter like this would be similar different from our engagement or in the jewel litigation for example that was a contingency fee yes and I'm sorry that I didn't and would there be um implications in terms of your investigation um and how that would proceed that the
121board should be aware of those are really good questions and I and I should have covered that so uh my Law Firm those that we're working with they are pursuing this case like Jewel on a contingent fee basis so that means that uh you or the district USD 497 uh would not be obligated to you know have any or be exposed to any out-of-pocket loss in the event that the litigation was not successful our law firms a group of law firms would be advancing all of the expenses related to pursuing the litigation in the jewel case we reviewed close to 50 million documents and took about 110 depositions of the jewel management and Altria management and we anticipate in this case the platform of this case will be larger um you know when you think
122about the prospect of suing meta that's Facebook and Instagram and suing Google that's YouTube and suing Tick Tock which we're not quite sure what that is yet but we're gonna we're gonna find out and snoozing suing Snapchat to significant undertaking so we anticipate that we'll be reviewing hundreds of millions of documents and 10 and and hundreds of depositions in this case um but we're committed to doing on contingent fee basis the contract that we would propose to USD which I've given copies to Dr Engelbrecht uh is a contract that's almost identical to the jewel contract a contingent fee percentage would be a one-third contingent fee percentage uh after the deduction of any expenses that were attributable directly to USD 497. the recovery for USD 497 in Jewel was really based upon two things one your
123decision to pursue the case to the filing of the case and then three um I think it would be fair to say that the district time in Jewel was related to the filling out of a fairly detailed uh questionnaire which got to a lot of objective information student size how many campuses different things about the district and there were there were only about 10 or a dozen districts that filed the Kate that filed the case in Jewel that were subjected to actual document production and putting up their employees for deposition now can I sit here and guarantee that there would never be any any impact upon the district in terms of employee time or something like that no I'd be fibbing too if I said that I could guarantee that but the likelihood that any
124given District would be subjected to direct Discovery depositions of Administrators teachers and so on would be the odds would be greatly against that for any individual District we anticipate as with Jewel that there'll be a handful probably six to eight Bellwether districts that will be chosen um around the country that will likely be larger districts that will be representative of the different types of state law from different states different state law has a little bit different view when you go state to state about what can a district recover what is the threshold of proof that you need in one of these cases that's based upon public nuisance meaning an unsafe product is causing an unsafe condition that that is being exposed that the Public's being exposed to so um so in summary to answer your
125question contingent fee contract very similar very similar to Jewel no out-of-pocket Financial Risk to the district thank you great hearing no additional questions there is a recommendation from Dr Lewis um public comment oh see I need thank you all I knew I needed to say it I'm sorry Jody it's time for public comment hello again Jody Meyer um you know as someone who's a practicing attorney I certainly understand the contingency fee agreement proposal there would never be a situation where I think someone like you just heard would come in here and suggest that you had to be paid fees up front but I think it's fair that we characterize what this is which is a sales pitch there was a July 23rd Wall Street Journal article which discussed how plaintiff's attorneys are pitching this to
126school boards throughout the country to file lawsuits against the social media companies um I'm glad to hear what the percentage is on the recovery if it's there however I wish we would have heard more about the type of litigation that it is this is not similar to The Jewel litigation because this litigation involves section 230 law passed by Congress in 1996 which has to do with holding internet companies liable because they're generally not liable for third-party content so this is going to be I think significantly different than that litigation I think the the risks of winning it are not great I think there are motions that are presently pending in this litigation to dismiss it by the tech companies um and so I just I I it's not it's not similar at all and I
127think at the end of the day I'm not really sure what damage our district has done by this some of these issues that we're dealing with mental health issues behavior issues in schools are issues that school districts have had for a long time I would argue that closing our schools for a year and a half actually did more damage than the social media apps that we're talking about in this litigation and I would also suggest that you know we have a policy where students basically are you know have their phones non-stop at the high school level at least in class all the time using the stuff and I think it's somewhat disingenuous to go into litigation about this when we can't even stop it from happening in our schools as it is um so I
128I you know if the court if the board wants to go ahead and adopt this because they look at this as free money in the future that's fine but when somebody comes here student groups or whatever and ask to be able to fundraise or get money for certain groups I you know I want the core I want the board to think about how they allow that to happen when we're getting involved in something like this where the success is low and quite frankly I question whether there actually is a legal basis for moving forward the lawsuit thank you thanks for like in court so I'm happy to stand up and respond sorry about my meeting um we uh we'll wait let's see if there's any board questions are there board questions that's something uh this
129is Carol not so many questions but um an observation I'm a behavioral health specialist and I'm a mental health professional but there is budding research on the the harms of social media and I would you know I would like and again I would repeat it but I would like to see this you know maybe this board will have a we will have a impact on the American Psychiatric association perhaps they will you know put this in the next DSM for disorder because it is it is um it is harmful there was an article in yesterday's Journal World about the suicides are the highest we've ever seen and you were talking about Mental Health on our students our people but I you know I have to just there are times when I just have to force
130myself to unplug and you know what there are days when I will I will just unplug and it's it does me a world of good and so thank you uh other questions or or comments before we consider emotion oh thank you um Elise uh made a necessary update so if you could refresh before you read give me just a moment then to get it pulled up it is in board docs a recommendation and then I do have a printed version that is just exactly what is in the agenda I believe if I read this and it's not right yeah I will refresh again to stop it all right I moved the Board of Education to enter into an agreement for Legal Services with goes and Honnold LLC Beasley Allen Crow Wagstaff and cartmel LLP to
131investigate an if appropriate initiate litigation and false suit against any necessary priorities to recover damages suffered by the district as a result of social media companies engaging in designing and promoting products to attract and addict children and to seek all appropriate relief this is Carol I second bam no Jones yes buyers yes Kimball yes could do Blackwood yes Gordon Ross Yes Kiel no motion passes five two okay so we'll now move on to item 5.1 which is the budget report and approval with Cindy Frick Executive Director of Finance hi Cindy good evening Cindy Frick Executive Director of Finance let me locate this here should be the only one left right okay tonight we are going to talk about the District budget for the purpose of um going to publication with our maximum fund expenditures and
132mail levies as well as the publication to exceed the revenue neutral rate the next board meeting will be a review of the final needs assessment and then on September 11th we'll have hearings for both the budget hearing and exceeding the revenue neutral rate so actually approving the budget will be on September 11th after those hearings I wanted to speak to some terminology that we often use full-time equivalency refers to the total FTE of students accumulated to result in that one full-time student would be the FTE for state aid purposes that could be to halftime students but that is the terminology we use so if we're looking at head count those are the number of students actually in the district full-time equivalency is really a state aid calculation the base Aid is a base aid for
133student Excellence that is a ksde term and it refers to the amount that we receive for every full-time equivalency student Revenue neutral rate is the mill Levy at which tax revenue would be the same as the prior year and we'll look at that one here in a little bit as well when we look at sources of revenue for the district almost 50 percent of our Revenue comes from state and federal aid another 45 percent is from tax revenue and the remaining balance is a combination of things like student fees donations interest income and the sale of property and equipment this is an example of the a general fund legal Max budget calculation and so we're not going to go through all of these details but I wanted to include it in case anyone was trying
134to follow along we essentially have enrollment um the FTE for K-12 enrollment is taken off the higher of the previous two years and most of these other counts are going to come from September 20th counts so the preschool aged at risk is the three and four year old at risk program that is based on September 20th of 2023 our literal count on that day you know as changes as needed for weekends Etc and then the weightings you will see next with the different factors included in legislation to come up with that calculation the weightings are as of September 20th and then the virtual program is calculated yet differently again but the counts for the students are taken on September 20th so if our estim estimations here were to become reality the general fund legal maximum
135for the year would be the 87.4 million and this is what we would be looking to publish as maximums for the 23-24 school year the local option budget is our second operating fund there are a couple tweaks to the calculation for this but essentially we're taking the maximum of 33 percent of the general fund would be the lob calculation for the legal Max now we adjust this calculation three times throughout the fiscal year so when we're coming to the board with budget updates it's because we have a little bit more information or more solid information than we did the last time and so the first update on that is based on the September 20th counts and so we go through that count day and then technology gathers all of that data and submits it to
136the state for enrollment weightings and virtual count by early October for a state report and that lets the state know the number of of counts that we actually believe that we have then in typically in the spring ksde will come out to audit these numbers and they typically spend about two weeks here and they will look at not only all of our our accounts and our weightings but they will look at things like our free and reduced lunch application did we in fact you know did everything calculate correctly did we in fact have support for all of the free lunch students that we are claiming they look at some of our financial reports that we've remitted over the last year and so they do a pretty thorough job on all of the enrollment counts and
137some other Financial items and at this point after we get the results back from ksde that's when we have a really good idea of what our budget is going to be the last step in this is Department of Education will finalize special education Aid in June before our June 30th fiscal year end and so as I was thinking about this I was thinking why what sense does it make to the normal person why we are getting our finals our final legal Max budget in June before we're wrapping up the year in June 30th and so essentially you know our budgets our expenditure budgets are set well before we enter into a fiscal year right we have the Personnel hired we have utilities paid by the end of the year supplies and all of that so
138essentially what this cycle does is then by June it's telling us how much the district is going to fund the district so when they come up with our final counts they are saying our state aid that we're paying you is going to add up to this much money between tax revenue and state aid this is how much we're giving you and so we keep talking about the budget but really it is those maximums that does not typically impact our expenditures by then but does have repercussion for future years and and the ending balances so for example if the general fund came in you know a million dollars higher than we had estimated for expenditure purposes that would let us know that our cash balances will be increasing at the end of that fiscal year and
139that will give us some additional leeway going forward into you know for example raises or expenditure budgets Etc this chart is really looking back to 2003-2004 in terms of our base state aid amounts again that this year it will be five thousand eighty eight dollars but starting in 0304 we had a base state aid amount of 3 863 dollars and also I did hear was reflect the base Aid amounts that were paid to districts in Kansas and the orange bar or the orange line is if we had applied the annual inflation for the Midwest region to those base Aid payments what they hypothetically would have been and so as we know after 0809 we hit the huge you know those down years for about 10 years where it was just really hard to make do
140right so inflationary items impact the district just like they much like they do a household budget in terms of utilities and repair and maintenance on any your home or the district facilities let alone if we're trying to provide wage increase in wages for folks um and so what I'm trying to to show here is that while the district has done a lot of work to you know go through the budget reductions put us in a better place financially that is all paying off in terms of now we'll be able to look at an increase in state aid and actually you know use that to to you know obtain some of our goals but also that we're not in a position that we would like to be in right um I believe the the orange indicator
141here would put us at 6 100 over sixty one hundred dollars so it's been a lot of work to get to that um Financial place where we kind of are at a break even Point um and so between some of the budget reductions that were done last year and the increase of about five percent in state aid going into 23.24 we were able to increase some salaries and work towards that goal for competitive raises for 24.25 KSD is estimating that we'll have another increase of approximately 5.9 percent which will help us hopefully continue towards some of those salaries and those other goals that the board has has discussed we also receive federal revenue in the form of title Esser funds a portion of our special education and the majority of our food service meal reimbursement
142in terms of taxes our assessed valuation has increased quite a bit going into this year again we're looking at 150 million dollar increase and that will do a couple things for us like like we talked about a little bit earlier in the meeting with the city essentially on those funds where the cost increase on an annual basis the increase in assessed valuation will help us maintain more of an even Mill Levy than we would otherwise have to or if the expenditures are fixed then the mill Levy can go down in years that the assessed valuation increases now to think about expenditures I wanted to look at all of our funds everything that happened last year and this reap this graph is actually showing expenditures by function and some of these are just going to be
143ksde budget words so forgive me this is the world that we kind of live in over here but if we think of it like departments okay so instructional as a department yes it has salaries and benefits it also has things like devices and supplies so if every grouping on here were a department we have Debt Service which we don't think a lot about but it's a pretty significant amount of money Capital Improvements are not only they're part of the items in capital outlay but they're only the ones in in the category that are significant improvements to the building so things like HVAC roofs asphalt and concrete some of those items Food Service transportation of course you know is all about the students operations and maintenance is covers the entire district and includes both our custodial
144folks and maintenance it includes all of the the repairs of any type that are within that I'm going to try not to use our coding but within the operations and maintenance department um admin and support I'll have a little bit better breakdown of that next but also instructional support is support for the things like um staff training curriculum development some of our library functions are in there and that is and also some instructional technology so there are several things that go into instructional support there's also student support which is a little bit different that will be social workers guidance nursing psychology some of the special ed services or therapies such as Speech Pathology or Audiology and so a lot of times when districts talk about the amount of instructional cost that they have I'll often
145see them grouping the instruction instructional support and student support together when they talk about those because they're so closely linked Cindy I have a quick question yeah could you remind us or me yeah it's all included in debt services so and that is just the principal and interest payments on our go bonds and so not our leases not our a little bit more minimal debt payments the leases are out of capital outlay so Debt Service is only principal and interest on bonds okay thank you and this slide is breaking it down a little bit differently so of everything we spent in 2223 what type of expenditure was it and so regardless of what department it was in how much did we spend for salaries and benefits and you can tell about two-thirds approximately of our
146total District cost are for salaries and benefits we talk about that as Employer cost because it really ranges everything from payroll taxes to the district's portion of 403 b um and health insurance dental vision um and so it's it's more than just benefits it's really the um employers cost on work comp and unemployment and all of those items and so this brings us back to um some of that breakdown I do want to define a few of theirs because they they look like they all blend together other purchase Services um is really things like Transportation property and liability insurance and staff travel purchase property service is when we cannot do the service within our own Staffing and so if that is hiring out repair and maintenance um operating facilities or maintaining facilities and purchase Professional
147Services is are things like Consultants or the attorneys auditing Services things like that and so and that's why you hear us talk about raises and Personnel so much as well because it is such a huge part of our budget yes there are other items that we always look at for Budget reductions and at the same time salaries and employer costs are just the bulk of what what we spend budgetarily okay and so this one shows the breakdown it's just looking at salaries and employer cost and then goes into the breakdown of those salaries by the different objects here and so not all of the items have a heading so I'm going to point those out but at the very top of the chart there's like a red or burgundy little sliver there that is our
148trade wages and benefits and so those are the um the salaries that are paid out of capital outlay for things like if we have Staffing for electrician HVAC construction folks those are trade wages then we've got some activity wages food service operations in Maine Nets is our maintenance folks and custodians so then I'm trying to follow along the colors here Central Services is green so Central Services is basically all things on the business side as compared to the academic side Central Services includes HR so making payroll hiring exiting benefits that type of thing the finance group pays for everything outside of payroll does a lot of the state and federal reporting all of that then there's the print shop Communications the warehouse some of the technology is in Central Services and then the next category
149which is that brighter blue color is building Administration so that is everyone um at the building level that is Administration or support thereof and so your principals assistant principals the bookkeepers secretaries administrative assistants are all included there the little white sliver is what we call District administration um and so that includes the superintendent the clerk board professional development like if you go to a conference or something and that is where the legal and auditing fees are as well and then we get back to instructional support and student support and so I just wanted to break them down this is where we actually code things and where some of the state reporting tends to summarize a little bit almost two months so we don't really know what is involved in those so since we're talking about
150the budget I just wanted to break those out a little bit that sort of little white Slither that you can barely see is District administration so that is 2300 pardon my terms but so that's you and your office and the board legal and auditing um Central Services is often called is often lumped together as Administration in the budget document it's actually 2500 so if anybody's trying to follow along um that's actually the business functions that that are like the ordering the furniture and doing bids and things like that um and then of course the school administration so in terms of our funds we have general fund and lob are considered our operations funds and we can do anything except the significant Capital Improvement projects from general fund so essentially what we tend to do is
151unless the expenditure relates to a special program which we'll look at here in a little bit it will the cost will go to general fund or lob an example would be transportation services unless that transportation is specifically about a special education students then it would be charged to sped otherwise the cost will go to general fund or lob and there's no big Rhyme or Reason it's just a District's preference and how they budget between the two of General fundanello be the other significant part of these two funds is the transfer to other funds because most all of our Revenue comes into general fund and LOB and then if we are going to pay for say the bilingual Services whose expenditures are over in the bilingual fund we don't have any Revenue to offset that outside
152of what comes into the general fund in LOB so that is where we make transfers to the funds who need the money to keep those funds straightforward now this is a list of some of our special Revenue funds the most common ones and so for example in at-risk K-12 we will charge to that fund any at risk or the percentage of at-risk teachers salaries that is determined through the ksde method there or bilingual would be all bilingual services for those students obtaining services uh the ones with asterisks are the ones that we assess a mill Levy in one of the special Revenue funds that we talk about a lot is special education and so that is instruction and support services for all of our students being served on an IEP uh the blue section is
153the amount of state and federal aid that we receive for special education and the Orange is making up the difference to get to our total expenditures for that fund for the year so for last year we paid about 8.8 million out of general fund or lob to support special education services now we will we did talk about having a separate presentation on special ed because in terms of Maintenance of effort and everything it gets pretty complicated so that will be a conversation within itself but we just kind of wanted to look at we do have maintenance of effort requirements which essentially say you're going to spend a similar amount of money as you did last year out of your District support the orange portion and so we are looking at having to watch that pretty
154closely now so we thought this would be a good time in the near future to bring someone in to talk about that potentially from the state level um Cindy before you move on to the next slide can I ask you to clarify one thing sure um so when we talk about special ed funding and we say the state has said the state statute says that the that they are supposed to cover up to 92 percent of excess cost right um is it correct to say that if that was happening I would look at that chart and the blue would be all but eight percent of our total expenditures um the blue would be significantly higher I think the thing that we want to talk about as a group is that the 8.8 million might still
155be about 8.8 million because it's comparing this year's expenditures to Prior years and this is something I've just been working through this year because I always worked with a co-op okay and so um this is very enlightening and but that's why we wanted to bring someone in but yes the blue section would be higher in and Kevin and I going through this with elt I'm afraid the orange would have to still be pretty significant I think I might need some additional explanation of that another time thank you yep sounds good and so um Capital outlay the main thing I wanted to point out here is that state aid is available in capital outlay we just do not um qualify for it because it's based on the assess valuation per pupil compared to other districts in
156the state Bond and interests this is where you'll see our principal and interest payments of about 14 million and this fund as well would qualify and historically we have qualified in the past for some state aid in both capital outlay and bond and interest but they are based on that assessed valuation per pupil and anymore we just don't qualify for it I often get questions about the principle and interest what Bond issues that we're paying on and some remaining balance amounts so I just wanted to include that here we are scheduled to make roughly the same amount of payments for the next several years of nearly that 14 million dollar mark and our outstanding debt we pay down every year but we are at the 157.82 million as of the end of June 23. now
157this is the budget document that we will be publishing in the paper on this first page it just goes through our first funds and talks about not only what have we actually spent the last the prior to fiscal years but in the green is what we project that we may need to spend for 23.24 and the maximum Mill Levy that we may need to assess in those funds so if I just work on down the list here general fund is 20 mils by Statute so the board cannot change anything there are supplemental general fund or the local option budget is you'll see the 27.9 million is the maximum budgeted now that fund cannot be amended and so typically when you need to spend more in a certain fund towards Spring April May we would bring
158to the board an amendment that says you know we thought it was going to be this now expenditures are higher will you approve that and we go through a process with the state to approve it but lob cannot be amended and so what ends up happening in that fund is if our revenues exceed expenditures then our cash balance increases at the end of the year which will decrease our Mill Levy rate and the mill Levy between the cash balance and the mill Levy those are trying to come back to a stable place every year the opposite is true if we spend more than we bring in if we spend more than our balance goes down and our Mill Levy goes up so we have a lower ending balance in as of June 30 of 23
159then we did the prior year so the mill Levy is going up a little bit um for special education we have a minimal amount that we assess in that fund and it may continue to drop down we have about the last couple years about 480 thousand dollars of expenditures so not a huge fund for us but does have some really good programs Capital outlay eight Mills is the most we can assess by law what the interesting point is that in last year you'll notice it was only 7.347 and we assessed eight just like normal so what happened there was between the time that the county gave us our assessed valuations and when we submitted our budget to provide them our our Mill levies back the assessed valuation had increased so much that it took our
160mil levies down from 8 to 7.3 I've never seen that in all of my years so I just kind of wanted to point that out I also want to note for when we get to the bottom of this form that we really did intend to assess more Mills than we ended up assessing so we'll look at that in a second on the second page you'll see our cost of living fund now we did talk about this Fund in terms of we might have to increase our our Mill Levy to be able to utilize um the new state calculation that lets us use more money in this fund but we are using the maximum the two and a half million dollars that is what we're requesting and for the same reasons um that Mill Levy is
161still decreasing Bond and interest is the fund that we really just need the same amount of money each year unless we start talking about different directions with Bond and interest so we could actually go down to 9.016 in that fund and so as we have presented here we are looking at a maximum Mill Levy of 52.229 if that's something that the board is okay with then we'll ask for approval here in a minute to publish at these amounts that doesn't mean we need to proceed with them on September 11th it is just the maximum so we could technically the board could choose to decrease some Mill levies at that time but we could not increase above this amount and that's just that's just the maximum rate that is the maximum so it'd be the maximum
162for each individual fund yep I did include the mill Levy history going back a few years just for just for reference this is where I kind of wanted to point out we had been close to that 53 Mills for a few years and last year we tried to assess 51.776 but because of the change in capital outlay it went down significantly more than we intended and so now we're back up a little over the 52 Mills this is just the home property tax calculation if anyone wanted to look at that later or at home and this form which would also be published along with the code 99 is essentially reporting especially to the taxpayer to say our general fund taxes that we brought in last year were x amount at whatever Mill Levy so 27.4
163million for general fund at 20 Mills so hypothetically if we could decrease the general fund which we can't since it's set in statute we would only need to assess a mill Levy of 17.957 instead it shows that we're assessing the 20 mil still so it is going through that for general fund capital outlay and then a total of the other Mill Levy funds so any questions we are to the end here so anything you have questions on okay Cindy I think you addressed this but I want I just want to go back to it to make sure I understand it correctly sure um so on this slide where it showed um 2020 223 and then 2324 proposed um um for for the mill Levy and the okay fun so yes uh yeah this will work
164this will work so um because I have the other number so okay in 22 23 we had actual expenditures in our lob of about 25 and a half million yes our Mill Levy was 12.329 we're estimating that our taxes to be levied for 23 23 24 is 22.7 million but the Mel Levy goes up in that fund that is because of the issue that you highlighted about ending fund balance yes correct that's right so we collected it so is in essence is it that we collected more tax money because of evaluation than we were authorized to spend and so there's a balance there yes and there is a balance there because what we do is we try to budget as high in general fund as we can because that's State dollars that we hope that
165we are getting right and so then lob is 30 essentially 33 of that but if we budget too high in general fund it wouldn't be very feasible right and so the lob can hit a point where we've received more Revenue in and we have hit our limit for expenditures the other option would be to always try to spend everything that we every dime we have in that fund which would bring the fund balance to zero and that wouldn't work either because then since we can't amend the budget if we needed to spend more on a given year we can't because we can't amend so we would lose expenditures in the year that we did that so local option budget does live in this a little bit of an in-between world compared to everything else but
166our fund balance did go down from a little over 2 million to about one and a half million at June 30. is that tied somewhat in part to declining enrollment I mean um On Any Given fiscal year it will make adjustments um but yeah it's kind of its own Beast so it's a little bit hard we tried to talk about better ways to to talk through that but it's a little bit hard to Define okay I yeah thank you other questions it was very thorough very helpful I know I'll use it all year great so I appreciate it sure um this is a meeting that I go back to and watch the video over again so I really appreciate how much attention you give to it and it's particularly helpful in an election year for
167the community and candidates who have to talk about this to have an opportunity to see a bit more detail around what you know what goes into our budget so I I really appreciate your time and it will help us be prepared for the budget hearing which will be September 11th and on that date for the community you know that would be when we would take action okay yes okay okay are you ready for emotion on the budget yes okay I moved the Board of Education approved the maximum Mill levies and budget authorities to be published in the notice of hearing 23 24 2023-24 budget and the notice to exceed the revenue neutral rates for the 2023-24 school year hearings are set for Monday September 11 2023 at 6 PM for the hearing to exceed the
168revenue neutral rate and 605 PM for the budget hearing second Jones yes buyers yes Kimball yes could do Blackwood yes Gordon Ross Yes heal yes van yes motion passes 7-0 thank you so we now are going to recess to Executive session which is item 6.1 is there a motion I move the Board of Education recess to Executive session to discuss matters which would be deemed privileged in the attorney-client relationship under coma with Dr Anthony Lewis and Brad finkeldine invited to be present and with the board to return to open session in this room at um nine no I'm not doing that math right uh 10 pm 25 minutes correct okay yes board to return to open session in this room at 10 pm with no action to follow second buyers yes Kimball yes could do
169Blackwood yes Gordon Ross Yes Hill yes band Yes Jones past 7-0 executive session to discuss matters which would be deemed privileged and the attorney-client relationship under coma with Dr Anthony Lewis and Brad finkeldei invited to be present with the board to return to open session in this room at uh 12 minutes after 10 with no action to follow ERS yeah Kimball yes could you Blackwood thank you Gordon Ross Yes and Hill yes van okay adjourn motion do adjourn all those in favor anyone opposed all right