001Good afternoon and welcome to the special committee of the whole board meeting for Tuesday, May 27th, 2025. And we will be focusing on the budget. We will be having the second reading of the budget. So I call this meeting to order and I turn it over to clerk Mike Cassell for roll call. Member Banks here. Chair Derek Eer here. Member Laughler Kemp here. Member Loal here. I am here. Member Sidowski is excused. Member Williams here. Superintendent Maggus present. Assistant Superintendent Bonds here. Deputy clerk Simone Zunich present. Executive director of HR and operations severance present. Uh Shannon Brown. Thank you, Clerk Masella. And now we'll move on to our agenda. We have one um item on our agenda. We'll be looking at the budget today. And this is the second reading of the fiscal year 26
002proposed budget. And I'll turn it over to Executive Director Zunich. And I'll turn it over to Executive Director Zunich. Thank you. Um we will be casting this tonight. I'm just waiting for Shannon. It's also available in board book and your folders. And while we are waiting for that, um, just anyway, good evening and thanks for giving me this opportunity to present the second reading of the FY26 budget. Um, essentially the numbers have not changed from the first reading. Um but at this time I gave you some categorical aid breakdowns. I've given you um we've pie charted the information out of um our frontline analytics and then I've also given you a budget breakdown by fund. So we'll take a deeper look at all of that. And I'll just start with my general overview. Uh I
003just want to remind everyone that the general fund includes fund one. It includes transportation fund three and fund five operating capital. And then within the general and operating capital funds, certain revenues will have re uh reserve requirements. So that means they're restricted. We can only spend that money on those programs. Uh we have additional funds including uh food service fund two, community service is fund four and that houses everything that's head start, preschool, community ed, that's all fund four. Our construction fund is fund six. I do not have anything in there. Um we still do have money available in our fund six bond from this building but we are using the remaining funds for our addition for transportation our solar and I think we will have some smaller minor projects. So that money is um
004tagged. I'll say the word tagged. And um debt service fund is fund seven. That's how we pay our debt. And fund trust fund 8. Uh this school district has a small trust fund where that money is set aside. The number essentially doesn't change much. We don't use it for people. It's just kind of a little savings account if we have an insurance increase um if we need to pay some extra bills. So it's just a little savings account for insurance. And then of course our internal service fund is our dental. Uh the process for general fund revenue budgeting will include projecting and analyzing current federal, state and local revenues along with forecasting legisl legislative or local district changes to revenues. Now, we all know that the education portion of the budget has still not been
005determined. Uh, from what I read this morning, and I haven't read the news all day. So, unless things have changed, I understand the governor has to set a special session. Really the only thing that we are looking for is if our comped our compensatory which is based on our free and reduced applications if that will hold to this the amount we're getting this year or to the new amount for next year. Um I called MDE and they said use the newer amount uh because that is their revenue projections are giving us the new amount. So I do have that in here but uh I increased the amount but I also increase the expenses because it has to uh match. Okay. Um so just some general overview here. Uh review of budget provisions made for FY26.
006Of course we're always striving for fiscal stability and sustainability for future years. We will continue to prioritize our fund balance growth to meet the district policy of 8% of the general fund. Uh if you'll remember at our last audit, our statutory operating debt percentage is at 10.71. So it'd be great if we can keep that in the double digits. Uh this will be supported by district-wide operational budget realignments and reductions. If you'll remember, this is just for your information. When we did when I presented the levy, um the overall levy for next year will be going down 1.9 million and that's due to LTFM adjustments. And we some years it's going to go up and some years it will come down. And even if it goes down the 1.9, after I talked to MD several
007times, they assured me that those numbers will we will see that money back in two years again. Just for the public. Just for the public. Uh when you're using an acronym like LTFM, could you long Yes. Thank you. Thanks for the reminder. Uh long-term facility maintenance. Those are the dollars that are set aside specifically for uh repairing our buildings, our older buildings. So, our state aid increase uh is 2.74% and that overall is roughly uh $1.9 million increase. The basic formula amount per ADM for next year is $7,481. It was 72.81 in FY25. Our American Indian Education Aid was 305 last year. It's $354,500. I can see I need a comma there. Our literacy, Could you just tell me that American Indian Aid again for FY2025? Sorry. Uh was I believe 305,000. Thank you. I
008have it on my laptop. I can get you an exact number. Our literacy incentive aid is 395100. And I want to remind everyone that this year we got ReadAct curriculum money and teacher comp training money to almost the tune of $750,000 between the two. That was one time only. And um I did attend a um breakout session uh by MDE and the lit literacy incentive aid is going to change its name again. Might be called the literacy read act incentive aid. They don't even know yet but that's coming. Do we know anything about legislator legislation in that area with letters training? No. Okay. Um, all I do know is that grades 4 through 12 that need to receive it is unfunded right now. Going forward, uh, is this the time you would you could just
009again um explain the literacy incentive aid besides the read again more for the public. Thank you. So uh the lit literacy incentive aid is money and it is a restricted fund and it is money that we use for we can use for curriculum. We can code um an English FTE there which is generally what happens with this extra aid. Um we can offset our the general fund by coding it there and it helps um our students with reading. That's That's the most simplest way to explain it. It's all tied also like with the readac curriculum. We had to buy books so they gave us money for that. And then the teacher com comp training is when all of our teachers attended um the literacy the read act training and we were compensated but it was
010one time only. So just for this year we will not receive that money for next year. Question please. I like questions as I go. So that's good. So, are we able to then to provide tutoring from this fund for students? Um, perhaps. And we could probably also provide it with our comped. Yes. Mhm. And that would be a programming decision. Yes. So, do buildings I'm sorry. Do do buildings have who directs that funds? your department tle directs the literacy aid fund incentive aid to where you know and your experts know it's best needed or so generally no generally it comes from uh the business office what we do at year end we would take um an English teacher or any funds that were used there and we would apply the funds there ah okay so
011um but of course the assistant superintendent can come to me and say listen I don't want to use it that way cuz uh during our audit process that is just normally how you handle all these funds. You go through and you determine what FTE who's working in what area and then you apply the aid there. So it stays within the pro appropriate department. So rest assured it always stays with the appropriate department. We don't use it to pay for math or anything else. Um just a followup and um so are are reading interventionalists paid with um not necessarily. Um they can most likely they're probably paid out of the general fund. Okay. Okay. And and then just lastly, do you want to call on us when we Okay. I just wanted to clarify that. So
012wasn't a a freeforall. I was feeling that way. Um, assistant Superintendent Bond, since it's a cow meeting, do you want to Sure. Okay. And I'll be here for backup if any. Okay. No problem. Okay. Do you want me to continue? um our title funding. I received uh information from our title coordinator um principal Sheldon and right now we should know by June 9th but as of today when I printed this last week the overall state funding is potentially going down 5.4% but that doesn't mean 709 will go down that much. Last year we went down 1.2 1.9% and the year the year before that we went down 5.9. So, it's not unusual. And we receive roughly uh a little over roughly 2.1 million in title aid. So, and that department does a very good job
013of making sure they they they tie out those funds on a regular basis. Um I just wanted to add some extra money. We are potentially getting the MTSS grant. We it we could get up to 200,000. We do not have the official letter yet. Um AD says state funding. There's no funding amount yet for FY26. Last year was just under 600,000 and it's actually run through our the MDE um formula and we get reimbursed for roughly 55% of our expenditures, but of course that's part of our audit process. So that doesn't happen until the fall for the previous year. Uh prep paraprofessional training. Um I'm really glad to see that they are setting aside money from the state to help us uh train our paraprofessionals and our hourly worker employment at 558,000. This is the
014number that's on our revenue projection model, but quite honestly, I don't know that we're going to get to that number. Um I think every district when they they did a pretty high estimation of what we think the number was going to be. Right now ours has come in um about twothirds of what we thought it would be. And that's just part of the it's part of the I our payments are called ideas payments. We get them twice a year and they just make um adjustments throughout the year. If we didn't need all that money then they'll go in and and take the money out. So, member Banks, thank you. Thank you. I have a quick question. Can we go back to the title funding? Sure. Part. So, you said there's like 2.1 million in aid
015for that. U how is that distributed across the district? So, we have a title department. It's it's run by principal Sheldon and he follows um very strict guidelines. So when you do your application at MDE, it tells you exactly how much you can spend in each department. So there's like 5% for administration. Um families in transition, unhoused. So they there's specific tabs and we have to hit that mark and then what whatever is left over then we go with our reading and math. and a lot of our interventionists could be paid there too, but there's only x amount of funds. Member Lo and then member Leramp. So, a couple of questions. The hourly worker unemployment is what we um are now doing per our state legislative platform two years ago. Thank you for asking that.
016Yes. So, that is just strictly for June, July, and August for our hourly workers. Okay. that and then adsis what what is that? So that is a grant um that is run through the special education department and that gives us additional assistance to um hit our core programming with uh special education students and it's the alternative delivery of specialized instructional services. So say it again. alternative delivery of specialized instructional services source assets. It's meant to support students with interventions before they enter into special education. So, we do hire uh several of our math and reading interventionists using these dollars. So to be clear, we have not only um title resources, access resources, general ed resources as well as combat resources are all used to provide um FTE or full-time equivalents uh in the form of
017reading and math interventionist. Member Lamp. Um, this wasn't my question, but I'll follow up with the Addis uh, state funding. So, are we maybe you said this? Are we reimbursed twice a year? Is that the one you said we were reimbursed twice a year or the reimbursement? Um, we get paid from through our general fund twice a month. Oh, twice. So, our general form, our general ed aid comes twice a month on the 15th and the last day of the month. The access, the reimbursement, I'm not sure how they'll have that set up. Um, either they'll ask us for a quarterly or semianual reimbursement. So we would have to send in all the invoices or the payroll to support our request or it will be done at the end of the year uh as part
018of our audit process starting in September. Um we will start sending what we call EUARS files to the department of education. So that is our all of our budget codes and all the monies that were sent spent in every single budget code gets sent into a file and we do that every two to three weeks and that's part of our audit process. So the auditors and we do a bunch of work, journal entries and whatnot and we balance out our title and literacy incentive aid and then we do a new file. We send it to because we enter the information into Skyward and then we upload it to the Department of Ed. The nice part is we get a one-page review that says no these code budget codes don't align properly. they don't align with
019the chapter chapter 10 grid. So then and that can happen. We have tens of thousands of budget codes and if one of the sequences the threedigit sequence uh is off it won't allow it to go through. So and and just the last thing with the um this fund um how have we had this fund for a long time this funding ADS? Yeah. Um, I believe we're on year three with our current staff. I guess with our current staff, but we've had access since I've been here, so at least five years. I think it's been here previous to me as well. Okay. And and then my my original question was actually just with the title funding again, more for the public. Just could you review the schools that are our title schools in the district? And
020then just for board members, I do that's one of the committees I'm on this year is the federal grants and um we meet there's community members on it. There's school staff on it. Um yeah, thank you. Yes. So there's Lincoln Park, Meyers, Wilkins, Piedmont, LOL, and I think that's it. Stow. Stow. Sorry. Stove. And Laura Mac. Yes. Thank you. You're welcome. Member Michael. Um, just a quick question on the paraprofessional. That's revenue coming in. Is that just a one-time boost or is that something I'll be on? This is our second year we've received this money. It's legislative change. Okay. So, we should continue going forward. Yes. To my knowledge that will be ongoing. Okay. Um, and then just to clarify, so the hourly worker unemployment, we estimated that our costs will be that or we're
021estimating that our benefit from the state will be that once all we estimated that our cost is going to be that for 3 months. Okay. But we found last year that it was less. It was um we estimated 338,000 and we spent 270. So this number will change. I I don't know that we'll hit that number, but it last year was basically the first year because in FY23 we only had um July and August and then last year we had June and now this year when we do our audit, it'll be July, August, and June because July and August fall in the new fiscal year. Great. And then it's my understanding looking at news reports and reports from our legislators that this is the unemployment insurance is fully funded for this summer. It is potentially
022into next summer as well. It is and in fact that's on they they would like to make it up to 100 million it looks like. Um but which would be ongoing then because if we're all using a little bit less than they thought that maybe could possibly fund us for another two to four years. Great. Thank you. Thank you, member Lo. So when you say that that um we have we know that we it will be below 558 but the state reimbures. So in actuality it won't cost us that at all. This this 558 is when I do the revenue projection model. They're saying, "We're setting aside this amount of money for Duth Public Schools to reimburse you for your hourly unemployment for June, July, and August." But with all of our aid, if we
023come in less when our actual expenditures than when we send our EUARS files and the audits done and they said, "Oh, you guys only spent 46,000. We're going to give you an adjustment." Yeah. And that's how that But that we'll get that money back right now because Yes, that is correct. Okay. Yes, we will we will get back everything we spend, right? Yes. Got it. But you know, I can't make up the numbers. If people chose not to file for unemployment, then you know, we have to give them the numbers that are true. Right. Member Laura Kemp and then Chair Der. Just a followup to that one and and and again I know this is new so um what's the kind of cash flow in terms of getting reimbursed back for it? I mean is
024there that's a good question. So last year they actually gave us the money in October all of it and then just recently so it's May in March they did some adjustments. So they did take some money back from us for the prior year and when they send that when they take those adjustments they clearly will put on their FY24 uh prior year adjustment and so we account for that differently for the auditors as well and and I'm going to add one more thing. So then in December when our MARS coordinator sends in our final, we finally get our last um ADMs, our counts, enrollment counts for the prior year, then by the end of December, then that's when they'll make an adjustment to us. If we got 102 kids more, then they make the adjustment
025and give us more aid. But it's always accounted in the proper year in the audit. Um, just a question related to the hourly worker unemployment. In order for our hourly workers to apply for unemployment, if we have positions open within the district, like can you just talk a little bit about how that works? And just for the So we So yes, if if we offer positions and the um the staff choose not to take it, I think that will definitely impact. Okay. um their chance for unemployment. Got it. Okay. Do you know anything different, Teresa? Or Yes, but our our summer work is not equivalent to the regular school year work. So, it could impact based on the findings that um worker that the unemployment looks at as far as incomes. However, it wouldn't necessarily
026discount them from getting any type of um summer because they are different. So, it it really is a determination made by the state. We provide information about positions that we have available and what that looks like for each application that comes in and then the um the employee would put in the information from their perspective as well and then the state makes the decision. Yeah. And I I guess my question is around that there are parameters surrounding how people can how people can apply for summer unemployment. This isn't just there are rules and regulations surrounding how all of this works. That that was really what I was making checking on. Okay. Thank you. And just to be clear, yes, that the determination is not by made by the school district. It is made by the
027unemployment office. Okay. I'll go on to the next page. This is uh really an informational page for you. Um FY26 pupil counts. Um I'm using an estimation of 8,999. It's an increase of 31 adjusted enrollment over FY25 which was 8,68. Um food nutrition, uh there will be free breakfast and lunch for all students who will continue in FY26. the application for educational benefits, which is also called the free and reduced meal form, are right now being mostly directly certified. Um, applications are still required. I did confirm that with uh Sheila Oak, our our food nutrition coordinator. This is another conversation that they're having whether they want to go back to paper forms, which they think will be hundreds of millions of dollars to go back to using paper forms instead of using the direct certification
028process. Um, as Sheila Oak has pointed out, it has been quite beneficial for the districts uh because they're getting true and accurate and current information. I think the families like it too. Um, other local revenues are estimated to prior year funding amounts. So, um, I've taken some of the last year numbers and I've kind of done some analysis and that's how I estimated our local revenues. Uh local revenue includes property tax levy, miscellaneous tax revenues, county aortionment, tuition fees, admissions, medical assistance, interest earnings, rent, gifts, and bequests. Uh state revenue of course includes payment by the Minnesota Department of Education and other state agencies. And federal revenue includes aids awarded through state agencies or directly from the federal sources. Restricted revenues uh require a reserved fund balance if funding is not all spent in the
029allocated fiscal year. Most restricted revenues are intended to be spent in full in the allocated fiscal year. restricted revenue uh reserved revenues come from state and local sources aid and levy. So um you know the business office has to apply the restricted revenue first. We have to use that money first before general fund money but we do have small fund balances in in at least half a dozen which is is okay. um if they've not been able to spend down and there's a h 100,000 left over, we keep it in that fund in that balance sheet account and we roll it over to next year. So, I always like to reassure everyone that we if they don't spend that budget, we don't give it to somebody else. It has to stay in that restricted fund.
030First, I think I told you guys this story twice already, but the first year I was a business manager, I didn't do that and I got written up for it by the So, it's important to spend your restricted funds. Um, undesated revenues come from federal, state, and local sources, the largest of which is the basic formula allowance, the general education aid. Undesated revenues may have individual calculations but do not have a required reserved fund balance. So that's what you'll see. That's your general fund. That is your unassigned fund balance. That's also in your assigned fund balance. It's all general fund money. And federal sources are often reimbursements and have allowable carryover provisions to subsequent fiscal years. Use of federal funds has limitations and every year our auditors will pick two to three um programs that
031they audit. They're called single audits and they do a very deep dive into the spending. Okay. Go ahead. Neighbor left camp. Uh and and when you're um talking about the federal funds, that's including anything that falls under Head Start. That's Head Start, special education, Indian education, title. Uh even food service has some federal funding. I just because of Head Start uh how complicated that is. I just wanted to clarify it fell under that too. Okay. Thank you. Uh this is a timeline I presented last time. Uh nothing's really changed. Um today we're at the committee of the whole the budget second reading including categorical aid breakdown and basic formula aid. June 9th we have our HR business service meeting. But on June 13th I'll do a third reading. Um we'll see if anything changes in
032the next two weeks and um if it does I'll make sure that's what I will point out to you. And on June 17th is the regular board meeting and I will be asking for a budget adoption. And of course uh just to let everyone know we have had some smaller group meetings um that are that have been very I think very beneficial. Projected enrollment for FY26 um analysis was completed in March of 25 excuse me. And due to 24 final counts of 8,263, we're using an ADM count of 8,999. I'm so sorry. And um so as you can see, we're doing we're having we use a very conservative for budgeting. Um like in 25 we this year we're using 8,68, but of course we revised that and we'll see where that lands. We won't know
033though till December and then at that time they will adjust our aid. Sorry about that. Member Larle Kemp and then member Banks. I know I asked this question um at our uh previous committee of the whole but do does this number include um our estimates based on kindergarten u the kindergarten uh meetups. Yeah. Yes. Meet and greets I think. Yes. Correct. Quick question regarding the timeline. So, uh, once we approve the budget, would there be a provision? If we need to revise the budget moving forward, would there be that opportunity? Well, um, yes. Um, I just the budget has to be approved by June 30th. So, um, if I will present it again at the committee of the whole and then we can have another great conversation if you wanted anything to be changed and
034then I would present it again at the um the regular board meeting, but I would think it would have already gone through HR business services on the consent agenda and then we would have to just make some kind of adjustment. Member Mel, in your professional world, is there any concern that um there might be differences that have not yet been decided at our state level or um things coming down from the federal level that will affect our 2026 budget? The only thing I'm waiting for a determination on right now is our compensatory. Um and as far as the federal funding, it is the end of May. I would think we would know by now, but I have received no official documentation on any adjustment to federal other than title. It is going to go down
035um overall 5.4% for the state. I don't know how that will impact us. Again, that's June 9th. So, I would not doubt that the first couple weeks of June um we would get some maybe some interesting information, but right now I have nothing on the federal side. Do we typically have that information if there is any major changes by now from the federal? Yes. Okay. And then um follow up. If we do receive substantial changes from the federal, does that then obviously mean you're going to be working a lot of overtime to inform us? Then we'll have to bring it to the table, the team, and say first I'd have to know how much is being adjusted and then we'll have to look at it. So yes. Thank you. Thank you. Superintendent Maggus and member
036Laughler. Sure. No, just in response, I would say that that uh the the times are kind of unprepedented as far as what the impact of the federal funds will be. Uh so we have to keep our eyes uh wide open for any possible major sea changes and and we will be responsive, but we will also keep the board and the public very well informed as far as any impacts as well. Yeah, I was going to ask the same question as member Michael just about um typically uh uh what information do we get and when do we get it from the federal level that we're not getting right now? Right. And then again um is there a dollar amount total from the federal level? It's between 10 and million. Um it's roughly 3 million for Head
037Start. It's like $2.9 million. Indian education is 176,000. Special education is um several million dollars. So it all adds up. And just to give us a historic kind of perspective be because we are in unprecedented times right now like when do we generally have that information because we are required to pass the budget at the end of June. So in the past I know from being on the board we've gotten it a lot earlier. Oh yes. Um usually by the beginning of May we have our award letters and we know how to plan for the following year. And and this is also the importance and significance of the fund balance of having a healthy fund balance to sustain programming decisions uh at least temporarily because in my 33 years of experience it's rare that reductions
038are made during the school year once it starts um if there are reductions in funds. And so that's why districts really have a significant uh or substantial uh fund balance to maintain themselves in case of these kind of things. You would like to add anything to that? Um no. Our fund too, our food service and community ed both have um a good fund balance. So if we needed to fall back on either one um because Head Start does come back come out of fund four um but because we cannot generally use fund one to use for fund four we cannot co-mingle funds so we have to be very careful there. If food service gets um le has less federal funding uh because we do we get a lot some food from them then right now
039we do are sitting on a decent fund balance for them. But this is the importance to um Anony's point that it's important to just slowly build up those funds because you never know back in 2014 instead of getting n 90% of our aid during the school year and then the other 10% comes in the fall once they get their la fin we get our final counts. That's when they give us our last plus or minus aid. It was at 70%. we only got 70% and so that affected a lot of cash flow for a lot of people. So having that fund balance is key. Member L. Yeah. And just to follow up, uh then are are are school districts getting any direction from MDE because of this federal impact? And then also um or federal
040unknowns and then have can you speak towards any cash flow concerns already because of the unknowns at the federal level? Thank you. Uh right now we have we've received several memo uh memos from Commissioner Jet that we they're watching it as closely as we are. They have a page set up uh at MDE so you can go in and track how the federal spending or conversation is going. Um so that's really all we've gotten. That's why I'm not I'm really hoping um it's just a gut feeling right now that they won't make any impact this current year, but perhaps the following year they'll give us some time to plan, but I could be completely wrong there and they could change it. And as far as our cash flow, uh thank you for asking that. So,
041um, our finance manager, Sheila, works very closely with me and we work with our financial advisors and every month she we send the information, our revenue and expenditures uh to our finance advisors and they send us a monthly cash flow. Um, we've they will go out 18 months. I've even asked for a five-year. So, I'm I I really watch that cash flow very much and Sheila knows that's very key uh for me too under my radar. So, she'll come to me every once in a while and say, "We've got payroll coming out and some really big bills and our ideas payments from MDE doesn't hit for four more days." So, then we have to kind of what we call move money around. we have money in um investments and we use those funds to offset
042if we need a three-day cash flow, but overall the district is um we do a we do a good job of watching our cash flow. So, and we have everything that we we think we're going to spend for the next 18 months in a cash flow spreadsheet. Superintendent Maggus. Um, but I and I would say I think that highlights why we're trying to um make sure that we bring forward a budget that is um um based on preparedness, I guess I should say, because we don't there there are financially uncertain times. And so we want to make sure that we're as prepared as we can be if things get worse with uh federal federal funding or other things. That's that's part of the reason why we were trying to stick to our budget targets. Member
043Laughler Camp, you know, this is more just I guess a comment. I mean, I I appreciate you going into more depth about all the checks and balances that we have at many levels. Uh, you know, sometimes I think people say we have this inefficiencies out there and there are so many checks and balances. So, I appreciate as you're walking us through this that you're highlighting that as well. Thank you. Thank you. Chair Derek Eder. And I would also just um for the public, if you go to our website and you look on the upper right hand side, there's a tab that says budget. And that will really that also allows people to look in look at where we're at for this fiscal year. And then as we step through processes, that's also on there. but
044it is um information that we want our public to take a take time to look at. Um and there is also a submit a question little clicky thing on there that the public can also ask a question. Thank you. Yes. Okay. Okay. I'll move on. Um these are just some of our general fund categorical aids. We have there are up to 40 to 50. So I highlight the the ones that um are the most important ones to us right now. Um of course our undesated um general ed education fund is at 64 million5 and I have federal programs because this is just general fund at 6.8 million. Uh last year it was 6.05. I didn't write that down but it's close. I didn't want to go too high here. Uh special education is at 25
045million9. Transportation is 3 million9 and I have to re transportation is costs us a lot more than that like double um but that's the kind of aid we get for transportation. uh telecom access that is um through technology and we we get about $140,000. Uh we just get some aid from the state to help with um our Wi-Fi and whatnot. And American Indian Education Aid is 3545. Medical assistance. Um, I had 1.7 million last year and I bumped it up to 50,000. This year, our special education department does a great job of making sure they fill out the information, the forms, and get these submitted so we can get reimbursed for dollars. And of course, the literacy literacy incentive aid I had on the first page of 3951 um are restricted reserved. So staff development
046and just so the public remembers we are given 2% of our general ed aid. We don't make up that number. We don't decide how much we get. It is set aside but it's part of our general education aid. So that went up slightly from last year to 1.3 million. Our operating capital went up from last year. our basic skills and competed. Here's our 9.7 million that this year we received 8.8 million and that's the conversation I'm waiting for from uh the governor's office. Mank and just for clarification in the American Indian line item. Yes. I heard uh you mentioned 170,000 earlier. So, if we don't get to 170,000, uh what would that look like for uh that program? Well, that would have to be a programming decision. So, we either use the 354 to offset
047the the staff or program direction that we were using to pay with the 173, but I believe we have two and a half staff coded to the federal side. So, a programming decision would have to be made if it comes out of the general fund. So, could I um re request or ask if we have um the amount uh for comped and basic skills? Could we use some of those funds to accommodate that? We could, but again, that would have to come from programming. It would have to come from programming. Okay. Okay, thank you for asking those questions. Uh, gifted and talented went up slightly, 114,7 learning and development is 1.8 million. Um, the ALC at 5751 173. Um, I was asked a great question today because last year it was 1.9 million. I will
048adjust that before we meet again. Right now, that's just the comped portion of that 9.7. Um, I'm I think we're going to have some better numbers in two weeks and I'll be able to calculate a our state aid. So, that number could will probably double. Uh long-term facility maintenance is down 700,000 from prior year, but as we all know, um LTFM adjustments happen every year. Achievement and integration now that went down uh $500,000 um to 1.1 million. Again, I'll keep checking that. and safe schools. Uh we do get state aid uh for safe schools spending at 326,000. So this is just probably 23 of our categorical aids. There's a lot of other little ones, but uh I'd like to highlight the um the big programs here. Member Banks and then member Laura Kemp. Thank you.
049Can we go to achievement integration? So, I I was concerned about that uh number because I knew how much it was the last time. Um can you talk a little bit about um if that doesn't go up, are we going to lose integration specialist in the district? [Music] It's like all of the um other other things that um executive director Sunnich has um indicated. uh when the resources have um if they decrease, we will have to make some programmatic decisions on what things to prioritize and what things to um you know keep and and things to reduce. So at this point in time, I won't I can't say that it won't be impacted. I'm I'm just saying that we would have to make some decisions based on the amount of resources that we receive to
050support the ongoing programming. So it depends. Oh, it depends. So, I'm I'm very concerned about that low number. Um I'm also very concerned about uh our kids that need that the most in the district and how we how would we as a district um deal with that? find the necessary funds to make sure at least we have the standard or the basic that we have now uh so that our kids uh can get those resources at the current level and and that's what I'm very concerned about. Thank you. And I'd also like to add this is a terrific area too where we can use compad to offset. Okay. I'm not sure what's next. Member Lafer Camp then member. So, thank you. Um so, so that was going to be a followup to uh member Banks's
051question is is there other funds that could be used? And then secondly, um how much of this again is state money versus federal money? This is all state. Okay, that's what I thought. Correct. Um and um um we won't know we won't and in two weeks. So right now the way MD has their revenue projection model set up it's for what they know today. Um if there will be changes in a special session then they might alter some information. So I'll I'll keep double checking it. Okay. And then my my question I wanted to ask um just back to the safe schools um that's uh the state funding uh for safe schools. That is correct. And can you just uh clarify broadly what kinds of things that covers? You've gone over it before with us,
052but I think again for the public, we can use that for SRO officers. We can use it for counselors. Those are the two main ones. Thank you. Thank you, Chair Lo. Member Lo, just to to react to member Banks's um questions as well. Makes me confused. So, these are dollars coming in state or federal, but mostly state correct revenue. I get it. But we've determined already um through all of this our what our budget is for this year and we don't see reductions in some of these areas right now. Correct. That is correct. We are moving forward for next year with the current staffing levels in those programs. I just wanted to clarify that because our question sometimes makes it sound like, yep, we're going to we're not getting as much. So there must that
053must be where reduction reductions are when we've already determined where we're trimming. We're just telling we're just sharing the budget with what we know the state's giving us for these. And then we have other dollars that we use because we are currently, you know, committed to what we have already determined are realignments and reductions in our in our district. That is correct. And I was about to u make that clarification as well because uh we have committed resources for uh American Indian ed programming achievement integration. Those um staffing levels for this coming school year have been determined. So there are no reductions. However, because of the resources that we are receiving uh will receive, there will be some tough decisions to make the pre the next year. I believe it was um um member Lo,
054you already went u member banks. So I just need a clarification as it relates to safe schools. I know that we have um I believe a contract coming up for consideration with the SRO's. Correct. Um and uh so is that coming up like soon? Yes. I want to say in the next week or two. I haven't looked at last next year's or excuse me, next week's calendar, but June 10th maybe. Okay. 9th. It's coming up next week. And so where does that fit in the safe schools part? So, well, all I can tell you is that's all we get from for state aid. Okay. And the contract for FY25, I believe, was roughly 475,000. And that's my concern. Member Williams. Um just I guess follow up on that safe schools based on U member Lafeler
055Kemp's question. Is that only for people then? Is it only for FTE or is there like it would only be for FTE? Generally, we use it for FTE on most of these restricted funds. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, member Michaelels. Uh just to clarify, I've pulled up the state statute that covers the safe schools and it can be used for a number of different items like up to 10 has listed here that includes what we're using it for at this time, but there's also some other um programmatic um things that can be it can be used for as well. So, but obviously it barely covers the things that we're intending it to go towards and so anything else would be difficult to defend. Correct. Thank you. Okay, I'll go on to the next page if
056there aren't any more questions. So, here's the budget. Um, Shannon, are you able to move that to the left just a smidge so people can see that this is all of the but maybe you might not be able to but everyone has the paperwork. I just was maybe for our audience here. Um, there you go. Perfect. Thank you. So, I'll start overall the all the budgets all put together all the plus and minuses. Uh the district is to the good of 1 million1. See it's the bottom right hand column. Uh the general fund uh we're I mean to me that's a balanced budget. 248,000. It's balanced. Food service we're to the good 24,000. Community ed. Um I was really conservative with our expenditures there. um that number could go up, but right now I'm showing
057to the good of 462,000. Of course, construction I have at zero. Our debt service, um we are to the good of 462,000. Our trust fund, I bumped that up and bumped up our expenditures, but we're to the good there of 49,000. our dental um our expenditures came in higher last this current year I after my review so I I increased the expenditures um and so we're now going to be under by 65,000 and our student activities that's just our little fundraiser account that um we still keep it we I still report those separately to you um that can can go up or down. Um so overall we have um our proposed revenues of 183 million 9 uh and our expenditures are 1827. So overall all budget all co funds put together we're to the good
058of a million one. Now remember none of those funds can co-mingle. So I can't use fund 20 to pay an off offset in the general fund if we're over. So, okay. And now to our great spreadsheet or pie charts. Yes. So, um this is the Okay. So, these are all the funds that I just showed you. These are all the funds put together. Um there's historical data here. um we at the end of the year uh will load our actuals from FY25 into our forecasting. So these um you know when I present next year you'll have actuals. It's just a different way of looking at everything. Um to the left there we have the budgeted revenues which match matches the previous slide. The expenditures match the previous slide. We received we're going to be receiving
059548 in revenues from local sources 113 million7 from state. We are going to be spending this is remember all funds put together 85 million2 in salaries benefits are 436. So if you look at that number it's half our benefits is you know it's for every district not just us. It's a big part of our expenditures. Um, I have 13 million in there for purchase services. I I kind of bumped up purchase services and supplies because I'm anticipating increased cost in services. Things are going to cost more money I think next year. But we are really uh watching the last four months uh with our um contracts that have been coming through. They need to be tied to a particular program or then I really start talking to um the person that submitted the contract. So
060um so it's just not coming out of the general fund is what I'm trying to say. Member Lamp, can can you just uh clarify uh uh because we've been talking a lot about state and federal sources, but the revenues from local sources, just clarify what that includes. So, that's our property tax money. Um that is any fees we charge for. Uh let me go back to my so I'm not just so local revenues includes property tax levy uh miscellaneous tax revenues our county aortionment tuition fees admissions medical assistance interest earnings rent gifts and bequests. So we get wonderful donations they're in there too. Okay. We have a very uh generous um city that makes wonderful donations to the school. And on this page too at the bottom, you know, it's I'm getting plugged up. It
061says historical revenues and expenses and fund ballots. So you see that green line. What a question. Uh clarification question. When you said we live in a wonderful city that gives many donations to the school, you mean the community gives donations to the school, not not the city of Duth, right? The community. Sorry. Sorry. I was just Thank you. I know that's what you meant. No, I'm just kidding. Sorry. Um the community. Thank you. Yes. Not the city of Duth. That's right. So, let's go to our historical revenue expenses and fund balance. So you see that green line when we when we go to the I have a page for just the general fund. You're going to see it drops below but that green line is that very nice assigned fund balance that we're we have
062on the books. So that's why that's showing elevated kind of went down but when I go to the next page you'll see um we used 5 million of it for FY24. We approved another five for this year and you'll see it drop. Okay. So, go to the next page. So, you'll see just for clarification, we still have a fund balance. We haven't spent it down. That was just That is correct. Yes. Okay. Just want to make sure. Still have a fund balance. Yes. Uh upper left you'll see it's very What? Member Lamp. Oh, sorry. I um would would you just clarify why having that fund balance is so important? It's what we call a rainy day fund. Um we put we put money aside for um severances, retirements, curriculum operations. There's some money for technology.
063Uh we put our land sale money into the assigned fund balance and those funds are basically our savings account. Okay. All right. So now in the upper left you'll see it says fund 01 general fund. So this is just our general fund and uh I'll start with the bottom part there. Do you see that green line under historical revenues, expenses, and fund balances? So in the general fund last year in the audit, it's the first thing you see when you look at our um EUAR's audited EUARS compar compliance table. We overspent expenses over revenues by close to 5 million. So we used 5 million. It was board approved from the assigned fund balance and we used it to offset. We anticipate that happening in 25. So, I wanted to show you this that yes, we
064have an assigned fund balance, but we also for the general fund, we're using some of that money to help balance our budget. Now, I'll go back to the top. Um, yes. So all those numbers match that one spreadsheet uh that shows all the fund bal all the funds 140 million in project budgeted revenues 1398 in expenses uh revenues from local sources is 254. State sources for just the general fund is 1083. Expenses for salaries is 795 and expenses for benefits is 389. And those pie charts um are lovely. Proposed budget expenses by object code uh that I think it says 56.2 and plus the 27 it comes to almost the 85. So we spend close to 85% of our budget on FTE. And then I also uh if you want to turn the page please
065uh then we I did one for food service for you so you can look at that. Food service right now is holding its own and we'll see. Right now, I believe we will be getting free breakfast and lunch through FY27. We'll see what happens in FY28, but a lot can change in the next year or two. And then if you turn the page, I uh provided the same um look for you for community service fund fund four. There's good historical data there. Okay, no questions. And then go ahead. Okay. And then um now we start with this is called budget summaries. So I'm giving you another way to look at this. Um I like these reports as well. But if you go to the more towards the bottom Shannon um here is a good breakdown
066of u so these are all funds property tax uh than our 2025 budget and our 2026 projected budget. is um that because of ESR funds and ESR positions that we had at the time. Thank you. We were able to offset some of the gened fund by the ESR spending. FY26 expense budget insight that is generated through frontline analytics and it says expense for FY26 is budgeted at 182 million7 which is a difference of 2.9 million or 1.66% from last fiscal year. Salaries and benefits are budgeted to change by 845,000 or 66% to 1284. Purchase services are budgeted to change by 644,000 to uh 13 million and supplies and equipment is budgeted to change by 654,000 to 8 million8. So, I thought that was kind of a nice conversation just to say um where where we
067are picking up our differences. I didn't do it on the revenue report, but just on the expense side. So, unless you want me to go through every fund, this is uh the documentation that I have for every single fund. The next one, I'll do the next one which is the um the general fund. And again, um this is the revenue page. And it breaks it down nicely from 25 to 26 and the percentage change. You can see all that below. And then if we go to the next page, Shannon, um the expense because we're still in the general fund. If you'd go to the bottom so we can read the conversation there. The FY26 expense expense budget insight. So expense for 26 is budgeted at 139 million8 which is a difference of 2.9 million or
0682.18% from last fiscal year. Salaries and benefits are budgeted to change by 797,000 or 68% and purchase services are budgeted to change by 749,000 to 112 and supplies and equipments change by 612,000 to 5 million6. But what I want to point out on this page here is if you'll see the salaries and wages for FY24 were 94 million. Benefits were 36 million and you can see we dropped those down this year because there was no Esser and they're really it's flat now. This is what I would call flat and because we did make our budget reductions, but please remember that some contracts were settled. So, we have to build in lane changes and contract settlements. And uh I think I'll stop there unless you have all the rest of all the other pages are I
069have fund two food service revenue and expenses. I have all the funds broken down just like this. I only did pie charts for all of the funds, general fund, food service, and community ed. Um, debt service and trust and, um, internal fund. There really are no expenses there. So, are there any other questions? Member Michael. Oh, yep. Um I think my brain is working slowly right now but we have been spending a lot of time talking about um budget realignment and reductions and can you explain where I see those because the majority of those are in salaries and um wages. Where do I see those reflected in this budget? So it would be in salaries and wages. Had had we had those FTE the number would be much greater than uh it would be bumped
070up to a much higher number. Right? So if we had um how do I explain that to you? If we have 50 FTE that are no longer there, those numbers did come off of there. There, but because of late changes and salary increases or for contracts that have already been settled, uh we have TRA that went up to 9.75 from 8.75. So that made a significant difference. we had an added another additional 6% for health insurance on top of this one. So, uh, this year. So, all those percentage increases have been taken into effect. So, when we pay when I get paid, the district pays my Medicare and social security half of it and I pay the other half. So, all of that information is built in there. Um, we have I have an assumption
071um tab that I can use and um I put, you know, I put all those assumptions in there. Now, I wanted to mention about TRA that did get passed. So, let's talk about that a little bit. I did some very rough math. It just happened. So, I'd have to go in, but if we have even a dozen people that take advantage of this, you know, wonderful new legislation that passed, um, it could roughly be 1.7 million that would cost us today. That wasn't that would have maybe come out next year the in in two years. So, if they go now, it's 60 instead of 62. That could be a really high number, but I did some very rough math here. Member Lo, did you have a followup though, sir? Okay. So, just going off of
072member Mike Cell's um comment. Don't we see that reflected on this page right here under salaries and wages? So, in 2024 it was 943 and now it's 75 795. So that's where that that's where you'd see that reduction. Yes. Right. Am I right? So instead of those those are the staff and the realignment and the reductions that we have done for this coming year. That is correct. With our lane changes and um contract settlement percentages that have happened. If they weren't in there, if that hadn't happened, um I'm just guessing it could have been another I think when I did my salary estimator, it was 3.1 million just in salaries and benefits. So there would have been an additional 3.1 million in that number. Member Michael, just to clarify, is it more proper to be
073comparing um the column from 2025 to 2026 than 2024 to 2026 because 2024 includes our ESR funded physicians. Correct. So in reality, if we're comparing between 2025 and 2026, it's a much smaller amount difference that changes only because if we if I didn't have those reductions in there, it would have been more and the expenses would have been an additional 3.1 million. I have a wonderful salary estimator and um it calculates all your salary and all the benefits and I went through and did those to get to balance this food. So just to go back to that conversation which in a way is a a a good relief in the fact that you know we have been able to cut our budget by 7.2 two or you know or 5.6 this year and it hasn't
074necessarily you know just devastated our teaching ranks or our pair of professionals or our other staff is what I'm seeing from 25 to 26 which is a nice thing. It means that we've cut, realigned, we've saved places. So I see it as, you know, a a strong indicator that we've made significant cuts, but it hasn't been, you know, sometimes people think when we're in this place of needing to reduce by 7 million that somehow it's it's going to just, you know, really impact staffing, teachers, paras, um, support staff, you know, and and it has, but it's not as as large as I Well, right. Yes, correct. Um, yeah. So, I I took the reductions we had um and I put them through a sal this estimator I have we I reduced our general fund uh
075when I was doing all my assumptions. So e even if so say we did make those reductions that all came to 3.1 million our budget our expenses would be an additional $3.1 million. So instead of me saying we're to the good of $248,000, it would be an in the $3 million range minus. I just pulled up uh this this spreadsheet because I think this this shows a lot as far as where where were we and where have we been. So, if we look at um April of 2020, which was right after I hired, compared to now, or actually, it's probably better to look at that far right column, which is where we'll be in the in September. That's after all the budget reductions take place. Uh so, we had 200 roughly 300 pair professionals. We'll
076have over 300. Uh we had, you know, you look at the food service, that's gone down some. look at the various positions but basically I think when you look at that teacher uh category of 729 student or 729 uh teachers or in the April of the following year 723 we're still we still have u more than 70 teachers that than we did when when I started and so I'm not trying to to I'm just trying to point that out we have gone through reduction but we're still in a better place than we have been in in many respects it's hard. It hurts. It's not something that we enjoy doing by any means and we've had to make some really tough decisions on belt tightening, but we still have uh 70 more teacher members and more
077paras. Uh there there are a couple more uh administrators like for example, we made uh a manager position into a director position with with Terresa Severance's work. Um but that was partly because we were finding a need for greater focus on human resources. So if you look at that that final column uh I think you'll see that there are there are impacts but we've tried to mitigate those impacts with other other uh efficiency seeking and belt tightening chair Derek Eer and I would also again correlation isn't causation but I would also um note at this point that we have seen graduation rates increases. We did see a dip following CO but that is expected um just because of the situations that our children had to navigate through CO but we have we have seen increases
078in our graduation rate. So, we are increasing our teachers because they're at the front lines in the classrooms with the kids. And so, when we are increasing our staffing levels, we are seeing, and again, correlation isn't causation, but I'm going to say it's a pretty strong correlation. And as a scientist, I'm pretty comfortable with saying that it's a causation, um, increasing those ranks of teachers and pair professionals. We do see that play out in our graduation rates. And I would think about again celebrating what we saw in our graduation rates last year, acknowledging that we have work to do, but we are using staffing to the benefit of our students by getting them across the stage and graduating them. Thank you. And and I would agree uh of course with that. I would also say
079that some of the other additions that we put in place, you know, we we um it's easy to to always look at the central office staff and say that there should be reduction there and we have made a reduction of 11% as opposed to the 8% that we're looking at for sites. Uh but some of the resources that we put in like having a separate director of elementary and a second director of secondary, we've been able to revise our our um schedules prek12 during that time. We've been able to make adoptions of new uh literacy curriculum. We've been able to um adopt new English language arts curriculum that hadn't been adopted in over 30 years. So, there are a lot of changes that we've been able to make in in trying to catch up and
080trying to to really bring our system up to speed. Uh and I think that those will continue to pay off over time, too. So, there is, you know, some sometimes there is allocation made in those areas as well. and and I think it's justified given the results that we're beginning to see. Member Lo, your light is still on. Yeah. So, can we go to page five and look at that dollar change um column at the very end? And so my my question is about the you know the 1,183 639 plus that we have after everything. Does that then tend to then go into our um that kind of rainy day fund that kind of savings account that goes that would make our 8% go up to 10% or where where is that money or or
081is it Yeah. Yep. So this that 1 million1 is all the funds put together. So if there were any remember that so if if food service had I I estimate 24,000 if it's 34,000 that money will go into their fund balance. So yeah there's a separate fund balance um with MDE for each one of those accounts. So, a follow-up question is where are we at when when when we have now this budget presented to us, where are we at with that s that 8% savings that we that we have mandated or made a resolution that we stay at 8% or higher? So, last year we're only as good as our last audit, our final. So, last June, which and then presented to you in December, we're at 10.71%. Um we went down from 14.78 to
08210.7 because we yeah we the five. So um we'll know at the end of this year and I can estimate all I want but really things can change if we have um an unusual expense or we have uh payroll that goes up or down and it can it can sway. So, we still have um our certified staff is paid all summer, but we do those calculations at the end of June and we run all of those payrolls. So, then we can start working on our audit. We're going to start working on our audit July one already. They'll be here in August and uh it just doesn't end. No, it's a it's a circle, but we will start that process. Thanks. Yeah, you're welcome. Seeing no additional questions at this point in time. Any uh closing
083comments? Um Executive Director Zunich? No. Thank you. Um I will be so we will we will put a placeholder on the June 9th HR business services. I'll do a final reading to you um in on June 13th or 12th and um if there are no changes I'll let you know um at the committee of the whole but if there are changes and anything is affected I'll certainly point that out to you and then but we'll do a placeholder though at HR business services so then it can be presented at the schoolboard meeting for final adoption. member Michael. Um, thank you. Um, I reiterate something someone over here said like all the checks and balances that go into this. You know, when you hear comments made in the public about how um, you know, it's hard
084to trust the district or you know, how are they spending their money? There's so many ways where we're being kept track of and um, you carry that burden. Um, so thank you and your staff uh for for doing such a good job with that. Um, I I appreciate the balanced budget coming forward. I would just like to reiterate um I would love to continue to have further discussions to see how we can keep u music lessons in the middle school going forward and if there's any way that we're able to um to to look into that further. something that um I'm deeply committed to just hearing from my constituents and knowing some of the um other background on that subject as well. Thanks again. Thank you. Member Low vote. Just give me a moment to
085think about what it was I was going to say. I've lost it. Member Williams. Um, I would echo what um, member Mikeel said. If there is a way we can um, look at our budget and figure out how to save the the music lessons at um, the middle school, I I would like to do that. I feel strongly about that. Member Lra Camp. Yeah. Thank you. Uh I I want to just add that, you know, I I know from all of the many committee of the whole meetings we had have had where we've had presentations on our variety of academic programs, our our reading, our math, our MTSS, all all these different programs that we really are investing in um academic achievements uh for our kids and we're really prioritizing our funds. You know, that's
086that's very clear and I I encourage the public to really go back to our other committee of the whole meetings where we have all these presentations on what these numbers mean in terms of real programs, real services directly to our our our students and our our staff. So, just want to um encourage the public to do that. I do um and I've brought this up uh a number of meetings and I'm will continue to bring it up. I really would like us uh also to continue to look at how we can keep the music lessons in middle school. Um again I think uh music is an academic program and uh it's u uh it I really want us to continue to look at that in the next few weeks. Chair Derek Gater and then member
087banks. Um I excuse me. I appreciate and I um support and and understand thinking about the changes that we have to make for the middle school music model. We started this process back in April and we've had quite a bit of time to walk through this process. I would also think about what we asked our administrators in the district to do which was to come up with a budget that was balanced and responsible. um we did not task them or they did not task us with going through a menu of options where we were going to pick or not pick different things to be reduced and different things to not be reduced to come up with better language. So um I also have passionate feelings about the check and connect program and how that is
088drastically changing next year going from 15 counselors to eight. We also have reductions in special education. This process is not easy. But what we have done as a board is asked our administrators to come up with the budget and that's what they have done. If there are changes that we want to make, I think that is not on the administration. I think that is on us as a school board to try to figure those changes out. So I would just ask all of us as we move forward through the next couple of weeks to think about how we want to how we want to go forward with this budgeting process. We asked our administration to do a task. They completed the task. I think that if we want changes I think that is something as
089a school board that we would have to figure out collectively. Our options moving forward are supporting the budget, not supporting the budget or amending the budget. So, I think we need to keep those things in mind as we move forward. And I don't think it is as easy to ask at this point to try to preserve different um places within the budget where we've had to reduce and reallocate. So, as we move forward through this process, I would just ask us all to think about that. Um and of course, thank the administration for the work that they have done. Member Banks, I was going to say something else or something differently. than what was just spoken. So I I just want to say I concur with our chair. uh we gave uh administration uh the
090charge to present a balanced budget and that's what they've done and um I I think we're obligated as a board to uh move forward uh because we did give them the charge and uh if we need to make revisions or whatever that may be uh we need to get through this process first but again we gave gave the the administration the charge to present to us a balanced budget and that's what they've done. Member Lo. So I'm going to, you know, support what Chair Eer and what member Banks just said and then I shared this last meeting we were at too that I feel like we've we've allowed them to do the budget to the best of their ability with their stakeholders in their district. And I really just have a a really strong feeling
091that um our educators on all levels of where we've made reductions and realignments are going to do a good job of doing their job the way that now their job is going to go forward. If that's a five in lessons, that's a 0.5 in lessons and that teacher and a half are going to work together in those schools to do lessons and to provide. I sometimes feel like when we talk about bringing things back, whether it's the media specialist or the check and connect is somehow, you know, those programs are never going to effectively serve our kids. And I think we all know that there's going to be some some angst in going forward in a a somewhat different model. But I also have great faith that these educators have worked in programs and they
092know how best to use their time to the best effectiveness of our kids. It is tough to reduce. We've said that since last summer and so now here we are at a time that is in the last, you know, few weeks. And so I just want to um continue to lift up our administrators at all levels that have made decisions about how best to balance our budget and and also lift up our educators, both teachers and pair professionals and others check and connect mentors. They'll they'll serve kids the way they have always done. So I commend the the process that we're doing. It is a process. It has been a really clear process and so I appreciate that. Everything from the budget online to the questions and answers or the frequently asked questions to the
093meetings you've had with um with your staff um in buildings. So, thank you. See no additional um lights on. Um this ends our cow meeting.