001welcome to the meeting of the lonary school board to be held on Tuesday January 9th 2024 at 700 p.m. at the lonary high school 295 Mammoth Road Londoner New Hampshire in the cafe the meeting will also be broadcast on local cable access Channel 8 as well as District YouTube could we please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge Al to the United States of America thank you uh we have uh four retirements tonight and um we'll start with uh Robin Gallup please in 2002 Robin Gallup became working at Matthew Thorton school as an instructional assistant she helped many children as they adjusted to school during their early years in 2012 Robin moved to working in the main office where she shares her positive energy and sense of humor as she navigates getting substitute teachers
002and making sure the building is covered each day she manages teacher supply ordering student absences and daily announcements all will make making sure the office runs smoothly additionally she organizes a school Sunshine fund acknowledging staff celebrations as well as supporting staff members as they recover from illness and mourn losses during Co Robin brought many smiles to our staff by integrating more jokes memes and Daily Facts into the daily announcements which she has continued as we got back to normaly she brings smiles to all of our faces every day Robin has been a gift to Matthew thoron she is kind generous dedicated proactive and a problem solver she will me missed deeply but we are so happy to wish her well as she gets to spend more time with her husband Gary at the lake and
003help her daughter Lydia plan her wedding congratulations Robin thank you Amanda uh Elanor Peele please y Elanor Peele U who's a special ed assistant at the high school Miss Peele was here from 2002 until 2006 as a special ed assistant at the high school she returned in 2015 and spent the last 8 years supporting our special ed students Ellie has played such an important role in the flex program over the past few years she's a math expert and has a way of supporting all students when they are struggling she truly cares about students and will go above and beyond to help them be successful she has a way with working with individual students that allows them to grow and become more confident in their math abilities as a colleague she is such a kind and
004thoughtful person she will go out of her way to help her colleagues and always has a smile and words of encouragement Ellie will be very missed by staff and students alike B made the decision to retire at the end of the first semester and we wish her the best in retirement thank you Tim and uh Susan wrote please Mrs Susan R retired from the linary middle school as she closes out her 24-year career as a physical education teacher Mrs row has been an instrumental member of the PE department and leave behind the legacy of accomplishment one of her many notable characteristics is her passion for the health and well-being of young adolescents she is a wellness advocate and encourages her students to include exercise in their developing lifestyle as a student centered educator Sue has
005the natural ability to connect and build positive relationships with students which was essential to her success as a Middle School PE teacher and Coach as she departs LMS we want to thank her for all she has done to enrich the student experience at the middle school Su took an active role in developing new units to the PE curriculum mentoring student teachers and those entering the field a longtime chaperon for the Washington DC and floting lab trips in addition to being a wellness day and spirit assembly day organizer each year her involvement in school activities has always been a big part of her career at LMS in closing Sue leaves a legacy of achievement in coaching women's volleyball and basketball on behalf of The Londoner School Community we wish Mrs suro the best in her retirement
006and time to enjoy her family and five grandchildren thank you Kevin and Kate follow please miss Kate Wallace will retire after 24 years of service as a math teacher whose experience includes grade 67 in pre-algebra Kate began her teaching career in 1989 and coached cross country for 5 years winning two state championships until in 1996 when her sons were born she decided to stay home to be with them upon her return to LMS as a seventh grade math and pre-algebra teacher she has served in this position for the past 13 years throughout her tenure Kate has been an integral part of the dth department and has developed several new initiatives she is well known for her strong belief in mathematics its application and instructional best practices for middle level education she advocates for middle school
007and has always taken an active role in her team's leadership and how to best support students as Kate departs at the classroom her impact as a lifelong middle level educator will be remembered as a dedicated and compassionate teacher on behalf of the lary school Community we wish Miss Kate Wallace the best in her retirement as Kate leaves the classroom she looks forward to spending time with her family and two grown sons thank you Sarah all right okay upcoming meetings January 11th 2024 budget hearing right here in the cafe at 700 p.m. January 16th 2024 will be a bond hearing right here in the cafe at 700 p.m. and then on January 30th 2024 uh will be a regular school board meeting right here in the the cafe at 700 p.m. could I have a motion
008to approve uh the consent agenda polias so moved motion by Sarah second second by Amanda all in favor I I no oppose thank you uh announcements presentations 4.1 filing period for candidates first day is Wednesday January 24th 2024 the last day is Friday February 2nd 2024 positions open one Schoolboard member three-year term and also another position of one School Board member for another three-year term to make arrangements to file please contact Carrie Stanley the school district clerk at 603 9369 Carrie will be at the district office on Friday February 2nd 2024 from 3: to 5:00 p.m. for the purpose of final fi filing and 4.2 gonna hold on the band will come back with better weather okay yeah we'll move uh a recap on the uh London the ban London trip to the next board
009meeting hopefully and 4.3 we will bring uh Bashan and clue clay up for a review of our school district audit please welcome thank you good evening everyone I'm Matthew Murray from Bashan cuk I'm audit manager for uh the elementary school district engagement and I'm going to go over the audited financial statements for fiscal year 2023 so um most important thing to the board to the public is the the district's opinion on its financial statements and the district received an unmodified opinion which is referred to as a clean opinion on its financial statements for all reporting units for the year ended June 30th 2023 um as far as the the board and the public are concerned is every year through the budgetary process um the the district starts to prepare and project out for the next
010fiscal year and with that um in one of the schedules this a schedule schedule one in the notes of the fin or the required supplementary information of the financial statements um we'll actually see the results of the district's operations for the year and one of the things to make note of is that the district's Revenue budgeting was in line with the actual amounts and was roughly within $340,000 of excess revenues and some of that can come from things such as the state of New Hampshire providing you with one number while the budgetary uh process is being undertaken in the uh September October period and then ultimately those numbers can change after year uh after that and toe end one of the things that's changed um the last couple of years has been the adequacy number
011that they give you is not necessarily the ultimate amount that you end up with um so for londondary school district for this past year um the district had a favorable uh Revenue budget variance of roughly $340,000 which was about .4% and that's on projecting revenues for about $84.6 million obviously everyone's concerned with expenditures and how the district performs and utilizes with that um so the district's total expenditures and other financing sources which are essentially your transfers out to your capital reserve funds any transfers to any other funds common thing in there is transfers to the Food Service fund for any deficit that's run by the actual program itself and those were $553,000 less than the approved amount for the general fund and that represents a able variance of about 64% on a budget of $85.
012million and the overall result of that is the district's fund balance ending up being Higher by 89 uh $893,000 than what it originally had budgeted for um as far as the district's year-end budgetary fund balance um under state law the district is allowed to because it was passed by the voters the district is allowed to retain a portion of its fund balance um and the actual components of the district's fund balance year end were nonspendable amounts for prepaid items uh for 20 roughly $29,000 amounts that were committed to the next year's expenditures those are amounts that you know the the voters vote at the the March meeting to to come from the Surplus fund balance to fund those warrant articles of the next year that was about $43,000 um the School District board voted to
013retain fund balance off about a million $375,000 and that gets into where I said the the voters allowed the school district to retain that fund balance um you no longer under previously under state law you had to petition um the Department of Education to be able to expend that amount you no longer have to be able to petition to them it can be made at a board meeting motion to be able to spend that amount and it's actually good because there are certain items such as unanticipated special education cost which can cause you to have a potential overdraft of your Appropriations and the fact that the voters have allowed you to retain the fund balance kind of gives you that level of protection and it's it's much easier to utilize your fund balance than it
014is to go back to the voters and say we ran a deficit and now we're requiring a deficit appropriation for that amount and the remaining amount is was about $235,000 which went back to the taxpayers or to the tax rate setting process it's not common this confusion everywhere is that it's an actual check that's cut back to the town it's not it's if you needed to raise a million dollar in taxes and you had $235,000 that you went gave back to reduce the tax rate It ultimately ends up with you raising only $765,000 in tax revenue for the next fiscal year um as far as the district's government W wide financial statement so if you happen to have the financial statements in front of you there are there are varying sets of um opinion units
015you have the governmental activities opinion units which is that is more along the lines of a uh presentation similar to a business you'll see all the districts at long-term assets c um refer to Capital assets and things along the line of your outstand debt obligations um and then all the pension and opep related items so the district ended the year with roughly a $29.8 million deficit net position and that was actually an increase in the deficit of $750,000 from the prior year that deficit as i' said multiple times before it's caused by two gasby standards which require you to report the the district proportionate share of the New Hampshire Retirement Systems unfunded pension and oped liabilities um and those without those reported within the district's financial statements um your the district would would actually have
016a overall net position of $ 35.9 million and an unrestricted deficit of about 2.1 million and what what's important to know is that that deficit is caused by um certain things such as compensated absence liability so individuals who have worked for the district for a long time who have um is part of the overall contract negotiations they're entitled to certain pieces uh certain payouts on their unused benefits and a lot of times that comes with knowing who's going to retire within the next year and the district appropriately budgets for those it's not it's not an amount that you like if everybody retired at one given point in time yes the district would have to pay that out but that that's never the case that anywhere you're always getting a constant cycle in that so the
017fact that it's only a $2.1 million deficit that's that that's good and and kind of comparing year-over-year taking into account removing the gby statement 68 and 75 liabilities um if you look this year you had like I said about a $2.1 million deficit uh in the prior year there was about $600,000 deficit the year before that it was 244,000 and in 2020 it was about 1.6 million so the district's stayed relatively consistent within a certain amount and it also depends like the two of those years 21 and 22 are the reason it be where the deficit was sold little is going to be because of surpluses related to covid I your 2021 budget was already established and the district had a tremendous amount of savings because of the covid the remote learning um additional funding
018that the the state got that it passed through to the district um uh I think they at the SP srf funds is one of them you know it was um close to a million2 million3 I believe off the top of my head so this basically additional funding where you had budgeted for certain expenditures but then the state said nope here's this onetime funding and you I believe they gave it to you in October and you had until the end of December to spend it so it was um a lot of maneuvering of okay what can we spend it on what can't we spend it on and it ultimately resulted in savings for the district at the end of 2023 the district had about $3.1 million in outstanding debt and that's uh related to four individual
019bonds and all of those are anticipated to be paid in full as of 2029 um and underneath state law the district is allowed to issue that up to 7% of the equalized valuation assessment that's determined by the New Hampshire Department of Revenue Administration and it would never pass with the voters but you would be able to issue up to 4885 million of additional debt um it's important to keep in mind as you progress towards new projects things like that um as I had said earlier with um gasby statement 68 the district reporting its unfunded share or it it share of the state of New Hampshire's unfund Retirement Systems unfunded liability um the way that the New Hampshire retirement system calculates that is they take everybody's contributions into the retirement system for the year and they
020take your share in comparison to everybody else and then with the calculation of the unfunded liability it's determined by actuaries um at the end of fiscal year 2023 the district share of that unfunded liability was about $70.3 million which is about 1.22% um to get into it uh I guess relatively quickly a higher overview of it is that liability is based off of the June 30 2022 valuation and it's the way that the standard is written by gby it allows for municipalities to to report it for a whole period behind um the New Hampshire retirement system doesn't actually release the 2023 numbers until I believe it's early March of this year so with that you wouldn't want to hold up your financial statements until March of this coming year so the way the standard is
021written is it allows you to do it based off of the prior valuation um and it's the same thing with with opv and I'll get into that um so gby statement 75 it was a revision to gby statement 45 which gasby statement 45 required the district to solely have the SLE employer opep so um quick overview of that is everybody pays a pooled rate you don't have age adjusted premiums and because of that they you know the people who are older are paying a lower rate than what they would if they were on the open market the people who were younger PID a higher rate so they use that to project out what the district's liability would be for all those individuals and then there's a cuto off period too I believe it's B um
022age 65 once you kick on to Medicare that's when the valuation kind of drops you off um but under 75 what it picked what it didn't what 45 didn't include was the New Hampshire Retirement Systems unfunded liability so 75 mod ified how the single employer opep liability was calculated and determined but it also required the district to pick up the unfunded portion of the Retirement Systems and the almost similar to the pension liability the district's uh OPB liability with the retirement system is about 1.23% versus 1.22 uh how that is different from the the pension is there are different contribution rates um into the retirement system it everything is it's a total rate but then they split it into what is a medical subsidy rate which is part of the oped plan and then they
023have the the pension rate which is goes of the pension plan and police fire teachers General employees all contribute to that and the district share of what goes into the retirement system for employees versus teachers two different rates and then when you figure in what goes in for police and fire um they contribute higher amounts in for police and fire so that's why you'll have some level of of varying differences and those two total liability uh the total liabilities between a single employer opep and the cost sharing multiple employer opab was about $10 million at the end of the year for the district oh every year the district has U expended in excess of 755 uh $750,000 and when a dist when a governmental entity expends in excess of $750,000 it it triggers a single
024audit it's a it's a um Grant it's basically like a grant compliance audit and a financial statement audit um in the current year the district expended roughly $3.1 million in federal funds which was a significant decrease from the prior year and a lot of that relates to the covid funding starting to fall off uh significant portion of that is I'm sure everybody knows that the um the national school lunch program where all students are no longer free um because of that dropping off that put in a pretty substantial decrease in the overall amount of the district's Federal Awards um and because the district expended in excess of the 750 we did a compliance audit um and as part of the audit we tested compliance with the district's Federal award programs as well as its internal
025controls over both financial reporting and compliance with the individual program itself or the programs itself uh from the program that we had selected as a major program in the current year uh we did not find any as far as question costs um or internal control deficiencies and because of that the district received an unmodified opinion on its Federal compliance audit for the major program for the year on an annual basis we do a communication with those charge with governance the school board um it's it's required part of the actual audit itself so it's a letter to you describing the overall audit process itself um any new standards that are coming in into effect for the year uh gives you kind of a higher overview of everything that we've done for the year if there were
026any material adjusting journal entries those will get communicated to you within that letter itself um and the results of the current year were there were no material audit adjustments that needed to be made there were no uncorrected misstatements that needed to be uh proposed of as part of the audit and um if we had any difficulties involving those that we um you know management of the entity we would communicate those to you in that letter and we're pleased to announce that there there wer no such [Music] instances um so other if we had any other findings or Communications they would be okay sorry want to go back yeah you want to go back one Sor okay so there were no other items that required communication to the board um and we always say that if
027we don't have anything that we can kind of comment on it speaks very highly of District's management personnel and the finance um office within your District continues to operate at an extremely high level um as part of the audit process we're involved with you know the communications of everyone involved within the the business office from a business administrator down to the individuals who are responsible for processing payroll accounts payable dealing with the oversight of Student Activity funds um the actual Grant activities um and one of the things that your business business administrator does on an annual basis is tries to reach out every year before we come out for the audit and try to get an understanding of are there any new things that are applicable for the audit that we need to be aware
028of that we can get to you for the purposes of the audit um you know for instance this year one of the things that came into play for the district was uh gby had a new standard gby statement Number 96 in a subscription based Information Technology arrangement ments and that deals with the district paying to use another person's software um and it kind of more or less concentrates on what are your non-cancellable periods uh as part of that we went through evaluated everything within the finance office and there were no items that were material that would require um inclusion within the financial statements a lot of the software stuff is just kind of a you know you have the the one-year agreement and you've got the right to cancel that software at any time um
029So within the district's business office structure um there's great segregations of Duties the fact that you have that level of of oversight um you know one of the things that I always say I think it's great within the actual s's office is you have two people who process payroll that on every other payroll run switch which um section of the alphabet that they're doing so you're you have that level of not one person continually doing the same payroll for everyone every single payroll run um and then I can't thank Janelle Janelle Janette Janette Janette enough for the work that she puts in with the federal grants um you know we come come in for the audit and it's here's every single grant that I have that's open and we had activity on during the year
030and there's you know the monthly reports filed within there the the detail of the expenditures behind it are there so when we come in and you know we're auditing the federal grants it's it's basically kind of put together extremely nicely for us um and I can say that as far as the audits that I conduct I think it's the the most well-managed as far as the federal grants go I truly believe that um and then as far as how the district handles the oversight with the Student Activity funds it's something that um when we have communic communications to the board as far as things that do go wrong in school districts a lot of the times it's related to the Student Activity funds you know the the level of effort that's put in where they're
031periodically going going through evaluating the activities that's in Student Activity funds you know are your deposits being done in a timely manner is there support for all of your expenditures that are going out um that is done so frequently within the business office to make sure that they are doing the things that they're supposed to do um that it it does make it easier on our part because we don't have to worry about the level of you know an expenditure went out there's no backup to to support it it's just a a handwritten note of you know we're requesting this for payment to this field Tri There's an actual receipt to to back up to support it um you know and your SAU office does a fantastic job at making sure that the um the
032principes and the secretaries at the at the individual schools maintain all that document mentation and file it away for them so um during field workor all members of the staff that we interacted with in the business office are extremely Pleasant to deal with and we do ask for a lot of information and it's always a whatever you need we'll take the time we'll get it to you what while you're here you're what's important to us um and then throughout the completion process of the audit uh management being Lisa and Cheryl been extremely responsive to any Communications that we have and it has been great because everything has been if I ask a question to Lisa or to Cheryl I get a response you know if if I'm asking it later in the afternoon I'll still
033get a response by the end of that day um and that actually makes for a significantly more efficient audit then if I if we ask for something and then it drags on for a week two weeks before we get any response on it it allows us to go through complete the job um just quicker and it's more efficient for us so very appreciative of that and on behalf of uh Vashon C cing company we like to thank you for continuing uh to serve as your independent auditor great thank you any uh questions from board good any questions no looks like our staff did a really good job and uh everything's uh in a good spot so we appreciate your uh due diligence I know I met with you back in the fall and uh answered
034some questions for you and uh looked like you had a pretty large team in there yep and that and we appreciate your service thank you very much thank you have a great night too Bob Bob um could I just add that the um full Financial audit is on our website if anybody wants to go take a look and have some easy reading um it's under the business office um uh under Department's business office and um it's filed in there and if you can't find it just reach out to me and I will be happy to email it to anybody that um would like to read it um I'd also like to thank the business office staff um they do a tremendous job as the auditor pointed out um we have Ann McAdam and Ry Adam
035uh n Haney that takes care of payroll um they keep everything right up to date for the Auditors um Janette Evans takes care of our federal audit grants Food Service um and the Student Activity um does a tremendous job getting all them all the paperwork um Cheryl Rich this year um handled a lot of the paperwork um for her first time getting ready for the Auditors I um worked with her so she should be all up to speed on getting everything they need for next year as well um we also have Terry Foley who took over accounts payable from Genie zapa um again takes care of the accounts payable the payments um the purchasing the purchase orders the encumbrances um and does a great job there um we have the HR department which is always
036helpful at the audit any contracts or Personnel um records that they need um Sindy McMahon um is always helpful um Melissa Thompson and Donna stall over there um really it's a team effort to get this I know in the summer a lot of people think that um school's out and we're on break and at the business office we're not on break we are um kneed deep in the audit and it's a team effort to get them all the paperwork they need and we really have a fantastic team um putting it all together to make it go smoothly so I want to thank all of them and I also want to thank Lisa Muse who um may not be personally involved in the financial audit but she does everything else um to support the entire department
037and um just keeps us all running smoothly so I want to thank all of them and Lisa to you and the staff on behalf of the board thank you so much um I've been heavily involved here now for 78 years and every year the audit seems to be done in a timely fashion and comes back uh impeccable so that's um you know not a lot of school districts you know come in this this way and this fashion so I I commend you for what you and your staff done year after year so thank you all right we're going to move on to 4.4 uh Facebook live Moose Hill project events so just uh let the school board know and we'll get this out to the public uh within a couple days but um a couple
038weeks ago we had our first Facebook live event on Moose Hill the Moose Hill building project it was actually very successful um Scott spr was able to host it for us and we had kind of a series of questions to lay out that the major points of the project and what we're doing is kind of digging into some of the more specific areas so Sandra uh Mack principal Sandra Mack is going to pull together a team of her staff where anyone can ask questions of them to be better understand the overcrowding issue and then be on January 25th at 6 p.m. then we'll push it out on our on our on our Facebook account so people can watch it afterwards as well it's meant to be a short event where we we basically speak for
039about 10 minutes where we have you know 15 20 minutes of questions if they do come up and we'll have a a venue again for the public to ask questions then on January 31st of next week uh we're going to invite our Architects uh the potential construction manager um if the school board approves them tonight along with the Trent group to to give the public the same taste but then talk about the building some more really understand how the building would be constructed if it does pass so we have a couple more events coming up and it's a really good way to just understand the project and ask questions and we'll do our best to answer all of them before and at the same time perf anyone have any questions good um I just got
040want to head on a couple quick things I know we get a lot to do tonight but I just wanted to uh recognize last night was um adult education graduation over at the gymnasium uh for 24 graduates uh Crystal rich and her staff did a phenomenal job um just such a great event to attend every year so thank you to her and all her staff and teachers for that and um we also had a freshman student Megan Plaza put on a Suitcase program this weekend here at the high school um I'd like to bring her in at a future meeting sure and that to to hear about her how she started this 501c3 and that but from what I see on in a 3-hour period colle over 800 pieces of uh luggage and that so
041uh I'd like to just uh compliment you know and and thank her for for doing this for a young freshman student to step up and and to create this is U pretty phenomenal so um thank you uh Megan for what you did all right I will open public comment if somebody here wants to speak we're going to have public Comon open during the budget so if it's something on the budget you're welcome to wait but if you have something that's other than budget I'll open public comment to anyone that's needs to speak just your name and address please uh good evening uh my name is Ted cus I live at uh 57 Griffin Road uh London da here um Mr chairman um thank you to superintendent black and principal uh benam I hope I'm pronouncing
042that right it professional Brandon for their timely response and support but uh a pretty serious topic uh my student is not the only one stepping on internet landmines can't be YouTube in particular is designed to direct young viewers to destructive ends Instagram Snapchat Twitter etc etc all have the same goal dopamine and or sexual addiction at as young and impressionable an age as possible the school board handed portable concealed able computers computers to what are essentially internet babies if I had a big red doomsday button which could launch a nuclear war would you leave it in the crib with a toddler these kids have mixed company on buses extracurricular activities and elsewhere and they can pick up an unknown word or phrase and start surging that's how the slippery slope Works how do you stop
043a war once the nukes are in the air the school is responsible for the outcome since they both provided and forced the unsupervised use of these devices in their present unsafe state it may be that the school is liable for transmission of lewd images to children and it must urgently take reasonable and customary actions to prevent such use failure to do so may be considered gross negligence or with knowledge malice at this stage of adolescence the internet should be severely restricted to a white list of websites for specific purposes blanket access requires 100% supervision cell phones so-called smartphones are an enormous risk to Young neural networks young brains being wired for the next 100 years the district uh Mr chairman should restrict private electronic devices to special needs assessment on a case-by casee basis I'm
044asking for a districtwide ban on student use of cell phones and other private information access devices during the school day the children sixth grade and up are viewing what you would refer to as hardcore pornography they are discussing very lwd and not age appropriate topics amongst themselves imagine knowing what you now know about these topics but learning it all at once and without context or guidance in the sixth grade given that students of the sixth grade and higher are expected to perform their homework without supervision it is all the more important to provide a safe learning environment that includes the tools that the students disposal I doubt we would intentionally leave a toddler with the nuclear launch button but that's precisely what leaving a student loan with an unresected internet access is like put it
045this way if you were not getting a steady stream of I can't get it to do this or that complaints then the machines are too open parents have their own computer's devices if it really matters for some bit of research or whatever assignment a parent can carefully supervise that activity on a non-district device or a study hall machine can be open for particular use uh thank you to Mr Brandon for letting me know there are some controls in place I suppose um we could be discussing discussing how strict to make those controls I know managing such things is a serious profession requires a lot of skill and a big thanks to Brandon for doing it he has been very helpful in my opinion the computers must be so restrictive that the machines are all but
046bricks I think they should be limited to specific academic purposes only I think we must try to protect the neural pathway development for a few more years if at all possible I suggest creating a curated list of sites that are allowable potentially from each teacher or subject matter I propose that these are not supposed to be wide access machines they are basically a word processor for typing submitting reviewing assignments which they're quite useful for specifically the students are using YouTube using Google search YouTube is an unsafe environment YouTube next up is also heavily polluted and tends towards smut if allowed to free roll as the vulturas on the internet are attempting to make new addicted clients so they manipulate the search the suggestion engine this is my area of expertise I know a lot about
047this since I've been build the internet they're using Amazon probably with Search terms offered by their peers Amazon is an unsafe environment these are sixth seventh eighth graders there's no reason for them to be searching for various topics and furthermore if various topics are returned by the search engine these need to be stopped livefree lead ban student devices lock down the district devices I sympathize with the teachers and the workload efficiency Google Classroom offers right it's it's wonderful but safety must be Paramount thank you very much thank you appreciate [Music] it I'll take care I'll take care of Attorney D franccesco one ches Court um last uh meeting I talked a little bit about uh the conquer school district and how they appropriated $300 million I'm sorry I talked to about the Manchester School District
048who appropriating $300 million with no voter input that's how they do it there this week the C School District appropriated 1.76 million don't hold me to that could be 1.67 but whatever it was a lot of money um for a capital project for I think it was a middle school um no voter input that's how they do it there goes to show you how there are different forms of governance in the state of New Hampshire from SAU to SAU from town to City to Village to whatever that's how it is we're kind of lucky that we have a little bit of control here we're also a little bit unlucky but I just want to let everybody know there are different ways to crack an egg especially in New Hampshire it's not all the same the
049taxpayers don't always get to vote on capital projects in londondary you do while I was reading that article it came to mind that you all as a school board unless I missed it and I very well could have if I missed it might be good to remind me and others but I do not believe that you as five sitting board members ever made a statement or a vote on whether you support full day kindergarten or not if you did I apologize I missed it but I'm kind of plugged in if I missed it and you did take a vote I wish you would reiterate that so that people know if you didn't take it I encourage you to do that because as I said at the last meeting we basically have a space needs project
050at Moose Hill that's disguised as a curriculum item at scho Schoolboard members part of your job is to listen to the district office and absorb and understand and make a decision on whether you agree with that or not so what you have before you really is twofold on this Moose Hill thing one as a school board are you in favor of a of a new curriculum product or not that will be the same as if we were doing new math that will be the same if we were bring in cursive back that would be the same if regardless of what the curriculum item was that voters don't usually get to vote on right because the central office and the school board do that so I would urge you to take a vote formal informal little
051py big py doesn't really matter but you have yet to make a statement and I think you need to you're going to make a statement if you vote to put the warrant on the on the ballot or not but that chest says yes I'm in favor of letting the taxpayers decide if they want this or not but part of the success or failure of that bond is going to be whether you're in favor of full kindergarten or not to start with aside from the building project two different things I can't stress it enough it's so obvious to me and yet it seems to be hidden and it seems to be a little bit convoluted Mr chair is can I talk about warrants the warrants or is that later on or yeah we're going to it'll
052be open when we go through it okay thank you so I won't I won't do that uh now we'll come back to that but um thank you thank you all right hi Beth Morocco for westw Drive um I you know have said this before and I'll say it every time until um we come to that vote in March um but I am standing here um representing the voices of a lot of people that are watching at home or that are connecting with me on the side um asking where things going with this um I have my ear to the public I'm listening to what different factions of people are saying what they're thinking about um regarding the Moose Hill project um I would like to urge people to really really really remember the research that
053has been done um we have a lot of information and we have a lot of children that are existing now and that are coming soon and we owe them the education that we offer all of our children um in the upper grades um I really really want to urge the board and the budget committee to stand uniformly against this project I get nervous when I hear people in the in the town just a small amount of people um contining to put forward information that is not correct and I really hope that does not swing anyone's vote we have very clear facts we have lots of slides we have lots of um feedback from the community we need a full-time school for these children that are in kindergarten and for the children who are three four
054and five that need those extra services from my leite program we know that those kids absolutely need that burden um in that length of day and I'm really really begging people to stand uniformly and support because when voters come to that ballot in March they're going to wonder what does it mean if all of the board are standing behind this they're going to say h that says something to me cuz I know that out of these five people they don't all agree on a lot of things but if those people can stand behind this building that says a lot for our community um and no you know we don't expect you to all agree about everything all the time you're all five different people but if you can stand behind this project and the children
055that it represents our community will benefit so much from that the same for the budget committee you don't all have to have the same fundamental beliefs about this this and this that's okay we're all separate people but our community desperately needs this project to move forward now the timeline is so long to make this happen these kids need it now they needed it 20 years ago um please just collectively give that vote for yes so that when our voters come to the ballot it's already so hard to get voters to the ballot like we don't have enough people in this community stepping up to to cast that vote please put your positive vote behind us um so that we can get those kids what they deserve thank you thank you B I'll close regular public
056comment like I said we'll let uh the public speak on uh Warren articles and the budget as we move through here um and we're going to move into the budget Workshop I'm just before we start with the budget Dan Kevin just has something he needs to read regarding the budget so I'm going to open up to to Mr Gray U FL yours Kevin thank you yes uh I received a letter from uh one of um the staff at sou school as well as a well as Community member uh that she asked if I could re the record in was last second so I'm going to redo in here and open discussion around it um dear lary School Board my name is laori gri and I am reaching out to you in my dual capacity as
057a dedicated math interventionist at South School and a concerned parent with our esteem School Community with three years of experience in this position I am writing to express my deep commitment to the positive impact of the math interventionist position has on our students academic progress and overall well-being as you discuss the budget planning for the upcoming Academic Year I have been made a the math intervention his positions including my own will not be added to the budget I understand Financial complexities in informed such decisions but I'm compelled to advocate for the retention of this indispensable role originally funded through a Federal grant to address the challenges posed by Co related disruptions my role is evolved Beyond its initial scope currently I collaborate closely with a title one teacher providing support to students across various grades
058through small group sessions and pushing into first grade classrooms during math times my day consists of 7 30-minute blocks where I'm directly working with students the need for the position extends Beyond pandemic related catchup I offer crucial social emotional support and personalized instruction to struggling students with math concepts at sou School our current Staffing includes three full-time reading Specialists who also cater the ex same student population for math support however if the position is eliminated next year the available support for math will be reduced to only one and a half part-time teachers in contrast to the three full-time teachers dedicated to reading this discrepancy in staff levels raises concerns about providing comprehensive math support to our students without this position the remaining Math teachers will face the challenge of addressing the needs of a larger
059group of students forcing them to prioritize assistance based on urgency this situation may result in some students receiving this the necessary support While others in the same group who also require assistance may go without highlighting inequality in educational opportunities I know that as an educate as Educators or advocates for this education system myself we all want the students to receive the education they deserve and not keep not keeping the ma interventionist position May compromise his principle in alignment with the district's vision mission and shared beliefs the role of math interventionist contributes seamlessly to the commitment in providing personalized academic social emotional and physical learning opportunities for all students the small group setting allows me to address not only academic challenges but also nurture confidence and engagement in a manner that may be challenging in larger
060classrooms recognizing the financial constraints B by a district it's crucial to highlight that the position incurs a minimal Financial impact never exceeding $20,000 per year the benefits however extend far beyond the financial aspect signific significantly contributing to the success of our students in the overall effectiveness of our math education program with over 20 years of dedication to the field of Education I firmly believe that my exper my experience background and passion making an invaluable asset to the liary school district particularly a sou school by retaining the math interventionist positions we not only support the individualize needs of our students but also uphold the district's commitment to providing a dynamic foundation for Quality education and contined student growth I appreciate your time and considerations sincerely Laura gri did you get that Dan no I got the
061email I I didn't have a chance to respond to her then that's all you're going to no they emailed me too I just didn't get a chance to follow up with them okay Kev did you want to add anything to that uh I just basically it's uh you know I got that she makes a very reason you know um passionate argument and a lot of it makes sense to me so I just curious as to open conversation to see what the thoughts were around you know what I guess the first question would be what would the budgetary impact like what what are the numbers around that do we happen to know that off the top of our heads or or have access to it or is that completely out of I know it's last second
062yeah so these are in the the the federal Esser grants um so we've had them for the last couple years um we we could do very rough uh back of the napkin calculation um but we had we we used we we had these at all the schools so it's not just South School um so I think it would be larger two each school yeah two two in each school so I think a couple years ago we had two to each School this year now we have one so we've scaled it back as we we run out of funds um I I think if I remember correctly and maybe Lisa can correct me we paid them $30 an hour for 6 hours a day for the school year teacher would have got 40 I believe hours
063oh it's 3 hours that's all and it's $40 an hour so was there always two two part time okay I'm going to phone in a friend I have two of them back there cuz it this evolved the last couple years this was fun hours so you know a quick 20,000 it' be more well see these were un benefited you know so have tax we we created a whole new position that's not even part of a collective bargaining group so that's the other weird thing here um um I don't think the language is in there for the teacher contract no I think when we when we added these positions in we knew they would be temporary it was s are funded and it was to close the education Gap was what the grant was for so
064I I think when we added them we knew it would be temporary it be closer to $30,000 a position but that's without benefits time three time four cuz we used to have we actually I think when we first started we probably had two of them at each school um so it was it was significant investment three years ago and we've scaled it back over time to what we could afford yeah cuz this is what we started with the yeser funds right mhm so we we would probably be above default um if you put them back in well it mean for kids who are receiving Services through that part-time position now in terms of like hypothetically we don't have it and then do those kids who are kind of On The Fringe just don't get services
065or how does that work there's a lot of things going on as Mr P and I can kind of explain um where I think we're heading in terms of model is there are interventionist positions they can handle literacy they can handle math they can do lots of things where we've been for a while is there's always been an infrastructure for reading we never really had an infrastructure for math so this kind of this was well to some extent we do just not as much we we've never done it so I think where the model is is we're trying to you know have the right people to catch the kids in all their needs and that's both General Ed and regular Ed um you know so I am not concerned that needs will not be met
066which is why I didn't make it in the budget and then the other thing you guys got to consider is you got a staff member asking you to put money in the budget at the last second process you got you got to think about both those things so one more clarifying question so and we have RTI for all of the kids right we a lot we have a lot of work to do there um but some of that's process and some of that's people so just so I understand this would be kids who don't necessarily make it to RTI or it could be R it could be ventive it could be tier two yep okay so it's a little bit of both awesome thank you I just wanted to understand what we were talking about
067so I I'll make that last one again I'd be hesitant to accept Hail Mary efforts in the budget process but you can do whatever you want you because you you all have to bring a number to the public hearing I I guess just hold on one minute Patrick what I'm concerned here is I would have liked some good discussion on this to what we're going to get out of this for this cost factor I I guess ahead of time I wish we had some more time here before we move it to the to the public hearing with with staff and yeah and that too to to make sure this is cu I don't know what your plan is basically in these areas and what we're going to do to replace what we've had yeah um
068well go go back to what Lisa said a lot of what the eser funding was meant to be was temporary yeah um I think longer term where we want to be is we we want to have um a team of interventionist that can kind of meet all the needs yeah I have reading needs I have writing needs I have math needs and what does that look like and how can we be flexible that is going to take a lot of work the first thing we're trying to put in motion is having a new literacy program next year we have a math program then it's what do you do for the kids who are following between the cracks and we we have you know we have a good amount of staff right now um to do
069that it's just how do how do we work together together on it it's been a little siloed for a while in terms of literacy and math and I think we're trying to figure out what happens in between oh all right let me uh Patrick you had something I was just going to mention the summer math academy that that program is still continuing for now uh and you're addressing needs in that way as well yes yeah it's another way we we get the extra time and I think that that was you know that's the what the remainder of the estra funds would are planning to be used for this summer this summer would probably be the last the end of the exer funds so in the next budget cycle if that's program that um is deemed
070to be um needed that would have to go through the budget cycle and get added into the um operating budget that seems like that's been a really good program the last few years in my opinion yeah MH and you know and and I think the hardest thing with any budget is you always have a lot of priorities um you know I'm about to jump into a slide and you know there there's a lot there's always a lot of competing priorities and and what what do you what do you put the efforts behind and you can't say yes to everyone and you can't say no to everyone but you got to find that balance yeah how many people uh I know you've said it before I apologize declin summer math academy that are offer it I
071don't know sorry yeah yeah yeah J J might out not to open a can of worms but so but just keep in mind Esra funds are done this September right so we can't use it past this September yeah so next school year we can't use them anymore okay never mind for various reasons and again I'm working off the top of my head from that figure we presented from the summer but I want to say it reached up to a couple of hundred people that were unable to attend for various reasons yeah I I was just going to say I'd rather see the kids get the help in the moment rather than potentially need the help get flagged and have a summer vacation and not go but that's why we did both yeah uh but you
072know the yeah Esser ends in September so we just can't continue in the next school year Mak thank you sorry just thinking out loud and I just want to reiterate I I think the the kids are getting the help in the m in the needed um I just I think like you said the S funds these were kind of extra help how can we catch these kids up but knowing that it wasn't sustainable without keeping our budget High um continuing but I think we all knew that that was temporary but I think if the kids were not if our students were not getting the what they needed in the moment I think you guys would understand that that's a priority and we need to find a way to put that back in so I'm confident
073that I think we're looking and doing what we can for the students who need those gaps and and how we can move forward with the staff that we have and this is um for next school year so um I I take a lot of um what she said um but at any case the school board here if the superintendent and staff came to us and said we need to ramp this up we have done it before and we need to bring somebody in now um and that and and find the funding in the budget that we would we could make that move correct yes um yeah sorry I was doing some math to to better so I think what we've spent this year our closest estimation is about $160,000 on on this we had seven
074seven of these math interventionists at 4 hours per day so basically 28 total hours of services per day somewhere in the district you know the three elementary schools in the Middle School okay okay did you want to add to that no I I do like the the idea Bob I did like what you said there just a second ago Bob about if if we find ourselves looking around saying oh God we we overshock this we do need that we have that lever to pull yeah mhm it's hard like like the superintendent said coming in the 11th hour and not having this at the beginning to kind of walk through um but I like the idea that if we see this and you know uh the principal itself cell School comes to the superintendent to the
075school board says we really need to hire somebody to to handle this we'll find the funds we you know we can do we can react that way as well um where it's so late in the game right now so I just yeah I agree with that okay with that so if you can explain that abut to her if you would appreciate that okay good yeah no I I didn't I didn't get a chance to respond to the email uh that I got yesterday too I was going to basically say like we're kind of late in the budget process but you could come you could come to the public hearing and argue your case you know so it's still on the table and if the school board really wants to do it we could figure it
076out it's just I I don't know I don't want to sacrifice any other cuts to make it happen that's that's what make me worried yep you know no it's and it's just hitting us for the first time tonight too so I think I think we're covered where we can react if we need to as a school board if you come to us and Personnel in one building says we need somebody we can pull that trigger at that point so um but I appreciate the info on both sides so thank you Kevin and the only reason was it wasn't clear is was sitting in the federal funds you know that you know it wasn't part of the operating budget well we knew this was going to come a point in time y um when we were
077going to run out of all these funds for math academy and for for these additional staff so now we've got to work into and I know you're making a lot of changes curriculum wise in other ways in each building so um and that so I appreciate the info all right we'll move on to uh discussion of the proposed fy2 so this is just you know kind of a quick process of where we're at um so what happens tonight is we discuss um all the warrants and the school board is just voting to move these things to either a public hearing on on Thursday or the bond hearing on Tuesday and they have to be separate legally um you know so we we'll do all that tonight um and and ask any questions and and you
078know the general ideas you need a number uh and you need a draft of the warrant to go which we have right here um and we we'll go through it one by one and then at the public hearing uh we present all these things to the public as a chance for public comments uh at that point in time the school work could decide to change their operating budget number again or any of the warrant numbers again but then you actually officially vote on Thursday to move things to the deliberative session then the deliberative sessions it's whole whole separate thing where the whole Collective body comes together to decide on each warrant article and if there's any changes and then and then we get to the voters on March 12th and we will also vote how
079we support that as well and and who who's going to present yes on Thursday on Thursday y okay um we'll start you've got uh 6.1 we've got the budget so do you want to uh have we'll discuss the budget first to be to adopt it to the school board this is when we would accept it after we go through yep and um and then we'll go through the warrants after that that's okay with you guys y okay so try to make it I try to make it very simple um so the operating budget right now is $88 million 29,41 um that's about $154,000 below default and if you just remind ourselves of the biggest moving pieces um you know this was a 2.69% increase from last year's voter approved budget um you know a lot
080of the the increases were from Collective bargain agreements um the infrastructure Bond um there are some increases for student services in our transportation contract but then we did make some Investments um you know there is a $200,000 investment for new literacy program there is a $30,000 investment uh for more Career and Technical education tuition um electronic textbooks for the advanced placement classes at the high school and for a field study um similar what we went through the buildings uh and within this yes I we did not put the math interventionists into this and obviously those are those are tough choices um one of the ways we we controlled some of the growth was really looking at our staffing um and we were down about 100 Kids since last year so we did react to lower
081enrollments um but at the same time we're still able to provide you know the strong academic program and all the co-curricular um invest programs we have as well but within this process there will be four less staff at the high school uh two left staff at the middle school and one at the elementary school uh none of those are projected to be a reduction in forc right now um there's also reduction in a third shift custodian and an IT hybrid position um there's we don't project the Riff in the custodian group but we do project a reduction in force for the hybrid um but that was a total of $621,000 in in savings and that definitely muted some of the growth but also explains the differential between the operating budget and the default budget so
082that's the big pieces um and then you know what you're what you all are doing tonight is telling us what number you're comfortable with and that's what we move to the public hearing all right I'll start the process I'll do a quick review with the board then I'll go to the budget committee then anybody in the in the crowd so anyone have a question on the operating budget at this time good budget [Music] committee all good all good Community all right back to the board with no questions um I'll ask for a motion to move article 3 general fund operating budget to the public hearing so moved motion by Sarah second second by Tim all those in favor 5 Z thank you Bob could we also just give the uh dollar value on the default
083budget as well that would be moving forward do you want me to do both numbers um yes please all right so um we'll back up a little bit and the operating budget um would be 88,2 59,00 411 or the default budget for 88 m413 544 thank you is that good yes okay all right Article 4 this um is uh for the bargaining agreement I'll I'll ask if there's any questions on from the board on this seeing none budget committee I'm just curious about the tax impact is that cumulative or is does it actually go down every year it's it's always going to depend on valuation um you know so if you look at you know basically the way this contract works is the potential biggest investment we make is in that first year um and
084then it goes down in the next in the second and third year so we were just estimating the tax impact based on the valuation we know now that could always change right it's it it's not cumulative it's it's that value based on the tax assessment for the current year which will change it's just an estimate yeah wait a minute can I make CL can I ask a clarification question there so the the 798 458 increase is that's the first year of their contract yes there's an an additional $59,000 increase in the following year of their contract yes right so so yes there is an additional cost of 500 in the second year an additional cost of 380 in the third year to answer your question right yes thank you yeah so it's really in the
085third year you're looking at a 26 Cent impact from today yes so I think that would be more accurate more accurate representation for the voters to show the total impact year-over-year not just the increasing impact we've always just shown the one-year tax impact and I and I think in the I'm sorry I think in the text of the article Ryan it says uh such Su representing the additional cost items attribut attributable to the increase in salaries and benefits over those paid um so I think that what you're seeing there is the the increase in salary over those years I think that's reasonably clear yeah yeah and the other way to think about it too is we actually have no idea who's going to be the staff in 26 27 this is all an estimate um
086if everyone stays in place and com back it be that that's exactly what it will cost but you have this EB and flow where usually more Senior People retire younger people come in and and it and we and it's the savings are there you know so that it's always just an estimate too how do you handle raises is there like a is there a percentage for raises is it capped yep um I I don't have the in this contract the first year raises were a125 per power you that was so long ago that was a long time ago sorry and then and then there was there were smaller raises in the second and third year um but you know these are all hourly staff so second year was a $150 and then the third year
087was the CPI plus 25 a quarter I believe and CPI um with a minimum of 2 and a half and a maximum of four thank you guys good just to the sorry one more question sure if this article doesn't pass what's the the impact so the there's Article Five which allows the school board and the bargain unit to get back together again there potentially come up with another agreement that's may be lesser in value that we then bring to the voters again to the community thank you Mr chair Tony D Francesco one treasure Court just to further to clarify the superintendent's point that this is a guess not only is it a guess on the number of personnel that you have in place at a given time that are exactly the same level of seniority
0883 years later you have to also have to understand that the guesstimate on how much the estimated tax impact is is a guesstimate on what the assessed value of the town is going to be so if the assessment of the town goes up let's say and I happen to be a member of the planning board but but all of these projects that are in the queue right now once those hit the valuation of the town the valuation of the Town how much the town is worth is going to go up when the value of the Town goes up then how many cents it cost will go down for these for for for these contracts okay but understand this is just a snapshot in time and a double guesstimate right so in some respects people have
089gotten up here in previous years saying it's all it's all whoy anyway CU you don't know how how much is really going to be so yeah thank you bring it back to the board Ryan if I'm understanding your concern is it that looking at it the way that the language is uh set up here it might appear to the voter that the costs are actually dropping year-over-year as opposed to that just being an increase from the prior year right yeah and I I see what you're saying I don't know how reasonably that would you could do something alternatively um so if you have it approximately $800,000 as the estimated cost in year one in comparison to today year 2 on there would be up 1.3 million but if you put that on there that could
090also be misconstrued by the government or by by the town not accurate at all yeah so I understand your concern I just don't I think I think more people looking at the tax rate impact than actually reading the warrant article yeah so I think people are going to look at the tax rate impact and say okay this has cost me 12 cents in year one but it's actually going to go down maybe it's a good investment as opposed to if they see the year-over-year or this every Year's individual impact it might sway them one way or another y all right um anyone else what I'd like to um just talk about a little bit is we put additional funds in our fund balance I know Lis is doesn't like talking about this but I was
091wondering what you thought of is taking 250,000 out of that 1.35 to offset this year's 12 cents and knock that down by 250 and leave 1.1 million in our undesignated fund balance we talked about it early on that we may need to use some of it for offsetting a warrant article of some sort I think this warrant will be supported I I I think that they are working this year without a contract right right um I am com I mean I'm confident I I can't say 100% sure but I do think that this group um deserves this I think the community believes they deserve it I think it will be supported I would hate to tap into reserves that we have for emergency funding is how I look at that not as um supporting our
092regular operating budget I look at that as more emergency things that we can't plan for we're planning for this I think we worked really hard to get this contract where it is and I do believe that the community will support it um so I would hate to tap into savings our savings that we've we've put away so that that's my opinion Bob but yeah and and I'm wondering of all these other things that we've talked about earlier tonight too I had this on my radar at the beginning of the budget season to offset some if we needed to this was the main one to make sure we got it through um for our staff um but now with uh the potential that we may need something else you know in in the school school year
093uh having those additional funds available uh would be key too I mean I know 1.3 million sounds like a lot of money and it is but we are a $90 million organization and that is a small amount of dollars to have in reserves for the size organization we have it's not enough in my opinion we work every year to put a little bit more which is great um but to think that that's just a pool of money to tap into for regular operating um it wouldn't be something I would recommend okay anyone else else want to chime in on that good I will take that under consideration thank you so much there's no other comments or action on it I will uh look for a motion um to move article four lary support staff bargaining
094agreement fiscal year 2024 2025 of of a tax impact of 12 cents FY 2025 26 9,134 at 8 cents tax impact in FY 2026 2027 379,000 247 with a 6 Cent impact and I'll look for a motion to move that to the public hearing please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Kevin all those in favor I 5 Z thank you um Article 5 is no impact this is authorization for a special meeting on cost items shall the Lund District if article four is defeated authorize the governing body to call one special meeting at its option to address article four cost items only um everybody good okay I'll look for a motion to move Article Five uh to the public hearing please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Amanda all those in
095favor 5 Z article six school lunch program and federal fund projects um shall the voters of lary school district vote to accept and receive federal grants and other such funds to support the school school launch program and federal projects further to raise and appropriate such funds in the special Revenue fund as follows school lunch program 2, 41,000 and federal projects 1,631 th000 for the total appropriation of 3,672 th000 such funds to be self-supporting through local state and federal revenue Source Tax impact zero any discussion um do we know uh what the strings are if we accept federal and state money for this what are the strings what are they what are the stipulations yep um we I think we approved them in June remember that long list yeah so mostly it comes down to um
096a lot of things we just saw from the audit a lot of uh you know compliance ways and how you spend your money um it allows us to accept federal grants um mostly um the Ida Grant which supports a lot of our special education programs um the strings are there are some guidelines that you need to follow to accept that program but I don't think it's anything outside of um what we would find acceptable to educate those students um Title One and title two we get some money there as well um it also allows us to accept money for the free and reduced food program so if we were to vote no on that we would have students in town that would not be able to get lunch and breakfast um at free and reduced
097prices um so I think it's really important to the Community to the students here in London Derry to have those programs and there's no tax impact um it comes from um the federal government uh to support our students understood I would just like to know the guidelines that they put in place for IED I would love to know that yeah we we can get the what was it called again you remember what the name of that long document was called remember we the general assurances General assurances we can actually a copy of the general assurances it's long and it just goes through all the different things you need to follow I would love that thank you y m good all good here all right I'll look for a motion to move article 6 to the
098public hearing please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Tim all those in favor uh 5 Z article 7 um special article buildings and grounds capital reserve um shall the voters of London School District vote and rate to raise and appropriate the sum of 220,000 to be placed in districtwide buildings and grounds capital reserve fund established in March 2021 School District meeting for the purpose of maintenance construction Renovations improvements and related Professional Services to all buildings grounds fields substructures and infrastructure to the overall property of lary school district the fund shall provide the funding source for all equipment structures Professional Services machinery and materials necessary to sustain efficiency safety of the school district buildings grounds and infrastructure and subsurface that me that meet the needs of the school district tax impact 2 cents uh
099any questions from the board budget committee good I just want to say I like what we did to this war article I think it's really a good financial plan the way you guys made changes to this great thank you community nothing okay bring it back to the board and I'll look for a motion to move article 7 to the public hearing please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Kevin all those in favor I I 5 Z thank you article8 District technology Network infrastructure capital reserve fund shall the voters of lary school district vote to raise and appropriate the sum of 125,000 to be placed in the school district technology Network infrastructure capital reserve fund established in March 2019 School District meeting to provide funds for equipment and services for the school district Network
100infrastructure such as but not limited to routers wiring switches access points wireless network improvements or any other equipment software or service that is necessary for the maintenance Improvement performance or management of the district's Network tax impact 2 cents any questions on article 8 from the board no budget committee no Community seeing none bring it back and look for a motion to move article 8 to the public hearing please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Amanda all those in favor I by Z and article nine special article equipment capital reserve fund shall the voters of lard School District vote to raise an appropriate up to the sum of $120,000 to be placed in the school district equipment capital reserve fund established in 2013 for the purpose of funding the acquisition of minor ongoing equipment
101and tools such as but not limited to classroom Furniture technology Furniture Building Maintenance equipment and tools used in the school district with a sum to come from the June 30th 2024 fund balance available for transfer on july1 2024 and no amount to be raised by additional taxation tax impact um would be zero any questions any questions from the budget committee Community all right I'll look for a motion on article 9 to be moved to the public hearing please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Tim all those in favor right 5 Z thank you and article 10 is just a petitioned Warren article yep so it automatically goes to the public hearing yep um we can talk about it more on Thursday y the school board can vote on it but we don't touch
102it as it goes to deliberative session correct yep so that'll be presented Thursday um that was presented by a um citizens petition yesterday you talk about tonight you can talk about it tonight it's fine yeah can you explain it a little bit it's a it's a petition worn article so it didn't come from us um the best I can explain is how it's written there um they're it's looking for a a need to to create two budgets uh one that's Administration and one that's everything else I think but it's it's you know it's from a position it's from a citizen I would think on Thursday that that citizen would be here to explain yeah what what what it means um we can just present what the language was that was presented and it does move
103forward by law um and then it can be discussed at the public hearing and and and voted on yeah okay it good Tony I know Tim Tim ra Tim raising his hand read it for should probably read it for context for people watching it's going to the public hearing without a Tony you going to speak about it you're going to speak about it now yeah so I think prior to him speaking you want me to read it into the uh record sure sure Artic article 10 is a petition Warr article shall the residents of Londoner New Hampshire vote for division of the school district 12's operating budget to be divided into two parts operating a budget a for the school administration unit SAU covering all salaries and benefits of all the office staff as well
104as all principles and vice principles in all operational expenses of the SAU 12 operating budget b for all other school related expenses this aims to clearly diff differentiate administrative costs from direct student education expenses okay thank thank you for the opportunity Tony D Francisco one Chester Court um so legally I don't know how this works but it seems to me just based on that confusion right there where did this come from I thought these types of things said citizen petition War article as a header I thought that's how I had seen it in the past and the reason for that is to stop that kind of confusion to where did this come from did the school board decide to do this did an administrative staff decide to do this where where did this come from
105who who petitioned this and so I think that somehow legally when you talk to the attorney maybe I'll check I'll or maybe you know already well I'll check on that it's a it's a really good point Tony um we did look at the last one that we had which was a few years back if you all remember on the face uh coverings and that one read this way right Cheryl we looked at it um and it said petition but I do agree if I could add the word citizens and that would make sense so I'll check with um legal counsel on that cuz I I think would be a a good addition sure thank you um and then um I'll talk about it again on Thursday as well but the way this is worded um
106it certainly shows a profound lack of understanding of how public education Works um um I would encourage the school board to go 05 on this as a no to intimate that that a principal and a vice principal is not part of the direct student education again just shows a profound lack of understanding of how public education works because they do they educate students on a daily basis I think this is a mistake I'll talk more about it on Thursday but mostly I wanted to talk about the header to have time to talk to the attorney first um and then we are going to talk about two as well bless you it's coming thank you it's coming thank you T all right so that'll get moved oh sure hi Beth Morocco for Wester Drive I wanted
107to back up what Tony said um as an educator myself it is ludicrous to suggest that we can divide a budget between um who's providing that staff for their the support for their administrative staff and for the teachers and you just can't separate a budget um so that citizen um clearly is is looking to create a situation where you just can't you can't divide um it's a it's unified building it's a unified goal of supporting these children educating them um under the best circumstances in in our budget and our and our tax dollars are designed all with that one bow in mind um we aren dividing one group of needs against another um we're not hitting students against administrators we're collectively working to support these students to to um get the best education they can
108um in the way that we are here to serve them so thank you thank you B I have a I I have a question sort of related to that too so if we have warn article 3 which is the general operating budget if warn article 10 passes does that mean article three becomes article three and four no okay what we already know right now is you know article 10 is kind of it doesn't work with New Hampshire state law and it doesn't work with our Charter so it's advisory only so you know I mean so let's say London really wants it we could just do a better job of showing the costs in the future sure you know but we it it's non-binding it's non-binding you know it's it's advisory you know okay yeah cuz
109here I am thinking that maybe the operating budget for teachers and students gets passed but the administrative budget doesn't get passed and we have no principles and vice principles unless they want to work on volunteer y like it' be a problem y yes good point yep thank you Tony Tony D Francisco one chure but even if it was binding it would be a implementation would be a year yeah away if it were binding if it were binding it would be a year away so you wouldn't have to change anything on the current with the current budget problem for future school boards does there need to be language in article 10 to say that it is advisory only and non-binding so if if you remember a couple deliberative sessions ago the last time we had a
110petition article someone did get up that was part of the the the voting body and make sure that there was language to make clear we add an amendment to that to that one article that that can happen at the deliberative session a citizen can come up and add that language to the article so it would go to the ballot with that language on it but that would need to be done at deliberator session okay sounds good all right we can't change the language we have to submit it as submitted by the citizen okay and also you know one can make a pretty solid argument that we're already detailing out all of the different different aspects of the budget in this process that that separating it yeah yes it's one more in article but we already
111have it all detailed out you guys already do so there y yes so one more question sorry sure um so does that mean any uh citizen petition will be just advisory no necessarily necessarily they could be B difference yeah if if they was in compliance with state law or the district's Charter thanks yeah but it would definitely help to have if citizen proposed that at the deliberative session and that was and that language was put in agreed I can't comment on that yeah that yeah I mean it can happen but it we know it's advisory only so it is what it is we we can't change it all right so we are good we have basically accepted the the budget and the warrants as a school board and moved it to public hearing yep um
112and that so I think we're all set um we've moved Moose Hill to the the bond hearing on the 16th did we do that you would take a vote too you yeah we're going to do that um you have we'll have a discussion on it as well you want to do a slide or I have a very high level very very high level for tonight um I invited the kindergarten committee I invited the Moose Hill building committee um so with the the potential construction manager if you guys are okay with that later the meeting will be there the architect will be there trending group will be there so all the groups that have been involved in this process um for a long time will be there for you to answer questions and obviously the Public's
113welcome to come too you know so we're we we'll go into a lot more detail y so all I put together for tonight just a reminder of you know what what this project is is uh $ 34.2 million part of it to address overcrowding part of it to make room for full day kindergarten um if if we were to go forward with a 20-year Bond and a 4.2 2.5% interest rate we know that there's an $850,000 approximate payment in the first year um we did we did the update that Tim asked for as you can kind of see in the warrant last time so you can kind of see the breakdown of the estimated costs um in years two and three as well and and we put down the tax impact um I think we've
114discussed this at length um but we can rehash it all over again um uh next Tuesday night when we go into the bond Heering and kind of see if there's any other final decisions or questions the school has uh for that night okay so I'll read it again just to have it mov to the bond hearing article two special article Moose Hill addition and Renovations shall the lary school district raise and appropriate the sum of 34,200 th000 for the design and construction of additions and renovations to Moose Hill school for current overcrowding and to accommodate F day kindergarten program and to authorize the issuance of 34,200 of bonds or notes under in in compliance with Municipal Finance act RS a33 one um to authorize the school board to apply for obtain and accept federal state
115or other Aid if any which may be available for said project and to comply with all laws applicable to said project to authorize the school board to issue negotiate sell and deliver said bonds and notes and to determine the rate of interest thereon and the maurity of other terms thereof and to raise and appropriate the additional sum of 850,000 for the first Year's payment thereon and to authorize the school board to take any other action necessary or to pass any other vote relevant there to this would require a 35th ballot vote required FY 22425 estimated cost 850,000 of a tax impact of 13 cents FY 2025 2026 estimated cost 2,695 1869 of a tax impact of 43 and FY 2,544 231 with a tax impact of 40 um and that's going to be this is
116estimated on a 20-year Bond at about 4 and a quarter interest rate on a assessment um so that's that I'll open it up for any discussion anyone on the board one quick thing sure so this list of estimated tax impacts and estimated costs this differs from article four in that our payment the first year is the $850,000 that is not also paid again in the second year on on top of the additional 2.7 million these are not cumulative to use Ryan ster from earlier so if you go back to Tony's Point um we know these to be realer costs because it's an amortization table that we're pulling it from absolutely these are what these are what the payments are yeah corre we're not adding 13 cents this year and another 43 next year correct that's
117not how it works and then you know the problem you always wrote into with the collective bargain agreements if everyone comes back again this is the estimated cost for all those people again these are as estimates say it again these are all asteris as estimates yep I agree right so they're both estimates they are exactly exactly y right but Brian brings up a pretty good point now that I see both that when we look at article two it reads one way and then it's presented the same way in article 4 but the but the fact of the matter is it should be different like that the article two stuff is not tacked on to one another year to year uh whereas the article four stuff is I just feel like we should find some way
118to clarify that it's easy to see those two things and read them the same way meaning meaning if I look at at this right and I read it wrong then I'm then we're saying that we're adding 13 cents this year and we're adding another 41 cents the following year for 54 cents total over those two years you follow that's reading this particular article two but that's not how it is it's 850,000 for the first year that's interest only in that year only I'm right there with you I get it we pay we pay only the 850 that 13 cents goes away after the first year because we've already made that payment then we get a new impact of 41 cents a second year I agree that's that's how it works 100% but then when you
119look at Article 4 it's 12 cents the first year and another 8 cents the second year in addition to the 12 and I understand these are all estimates my point is I don't want people more importantly than misreading Article 4 I don't want people to misread Article 2 and think that it's 13 cents now and another 43 and another 40 on top of one another over those years you follow what I'm saying y so we either need to clarify Article 4 on what those numbers mean or we need to clarify article two on what those numbers mean because they read exactly the same way well I think the difference is Article 4 I I understand Ryan's point about um it being cumulative because you have those same costs that are going to be those costs
120depending on who you have in those positions and then some this is completely different these are additional cost and and they they stand alone they they're they're two different articles and they aren't they aren't we can't compare them because these costs are additional for that that one year only there is is nothing to cumulate it to unlike the Personnel cost that you have those costs in the first year in the second year you have those cost and then some more which was Ryan's point Y but this is not the same as that at all I agree they're not the same but the presentation those three lines of text are the same and I'm and so you're I I think it's hard for the voter to read those three lines on article in those three lines
121on article four and see that they're different from one another it's the additional tax impact for that year could we it would be out of a question to add like the header of the column estimated tax impact per year on the mill one and then estimated tax impact cumulative under the it's not cumulative though oh no for the for the support staff one but it's not it's not cumul that's the tax impact for that one year that's the additional tax impact for that one year Okay add can we add additional at the end of it additional tax if the board wants it to say additional I I mean I do get that point now that they're compared and contrasted like I was on board now that I've seen how they read I'm trying to made
122tax impact for that year yeah for the we spell out the year and that's the tax impact for that one year cor right um I can add any language if if the board wants that do that sense to the rest of the board though I don't want to look like it's more confusing I don't want to add to the fire we've been doing this for a long time and it's never I've never really had that question seen that question asked that's that's what's kind of getting me here because it's it's telling you the fiscal year the cost for that year and the tax impact for that year it's it's you know then the next year is 43 then it's 40 cents same thing with uh to to your point Patrick on on Article 4 it's
12312 12 cents then it's 8 cents on f25 26 and 6 cents on 26 27 yeah but that's for that year for that year I get it's for that year that's how much it increases for that year that's what we're saying that's how we're displaying it that's the increase for that year correct we just want that language in the ballot for the people we get we get what you're saying we do what language would you like added what is there a word you want added or I think additional I think that's fantastic estimated sure estimated additional cost I don't know I mean I'm not the lawyer I don't know what the wording should be you know I think that's always the thing to keep in mind too it's like as simple as we tried to
124make this all this stuff is Guided by state law and what a lawyer thinks we have to do that's why it gets so complicated you know um but we have to be clear the additional tax impact is just for the second and third year right it's for that one year only so we display it for that year the estimated tax impact for that year is displayed we get it we get it we're just talking about voters here just make it easier on the voters can we explore if there's something we can do to Article 4 to make that language clearer so it's not to be confused with Article 2 and I'm not trying to create a whole big thing here I'm not at all I was I was in the same boat as Kevin I
125saw article four earlier I'm like yeah that totally makes sense then I looked at this and I was like wait a minute that's the opposite of how we just explained Article 4 so that's my only concern anyway maybe talk to the lawyer see if there's something we can do to four to make it clear without messing ourselves up if the board agrees sorry so so you're looking for additional estimated tax impact is that what you'd like to change it to additional estim on last column that would that's fine with me I think it makes sense okay okay run that by and see again my concern is more about them seeing Article 2 and thinking of it the wrong way cuz that's going to affect how somebody might vote for Article 2 if they think it's
12613 cents now and 56 cents and then and then 96 cents because those are adding up then that's going to affect us you know I don't want them to read that wrong so so in that vein of thinking and again the the the the language for the bond is always a lot harder you have to go to bond Council right yeah and I think I hate to be keep continue talking about those two articles like they're the same cuz they're not Personnel cost I understand your point that they the second year it's the first year plus the second year makes sense the bond is a totally separate and not even similar to that story so I I hate to be comparing them because they aren't the same at all but voters think that way yeah
127I agree with you they're not the same I just think they're presented those three lines are almost word for word the same they are word for word the same yeah I think I think what confusing too we've actually never done a bond like this before okay normally just that 3 34.2 million usually say the first line T that put the next two years so this is throwing a little yeah into this right we've never put years two and three on a bond but some I don't there was a member that requested that last week and so we looked into it and so we added it in I did I think the the re the main reason that I felt it was absolutely necessary for Article 2 to have it is because of the disparity obviously
128from only to then including principal and interest in year two even just having a year two on there agreed cover what my concern was I think we're in agreement and and that's why we put it on um but you know to that point too is is it is really estimated because that would be how we issue bonds and if that project were to pass and if it's a three-year project we might not decide to issue the $34 million right away um we could issue a part of that so I mean not to complicate that discussion but it's estimated I think the a word additional in article 4 would um clarify the issue I I'll check it with legal tomorrow and see if he's got any problem with us adding if you think that helps the
129understanding of it I'll make sure legally it's okay and and timing wise does that mess us up if we end up changing that and then and then the board has to revote on that does that matter be Thursday at the public hearing yeah you're always allowed to adjust after the public hearing yeah cool yeah thanks all right we good just Bob one more question on article two this is obviously the buildout does the public get a say or a line of sight into what the additional overhead cost is going to be for the F day kindergarten yep um not here that that's why but if you go to our main Ino infographic everything that they need to know is there we have a whole bunch of other ones which we'll recycle next week too so
130full transparency yeah the additional impact is not 40 cents a year it's 40% plus the additional overhead correct yep but that's a couple fiscal years away that's that's the hardest part about this too is just knowing I don't know what we're doing in three budget years but if the voters say yes then there would be an impact there as well and but we estimated that um on that infog graphic and we we'll bring that back next Tuesday too you just don't see it here you wouldn't see here you wouldn't see here it's three years away yeah I I don't know that we can project that far out Ryan the impact's going to be so could be way off you know it's but but we do speak about that that impact because we recognize that there
131would be a Personnel impact with more but it wouldn't impact this budget it'll be 3 years down the road so the information will be out there in information packets but it would not be on the article because we wouldn't be asking to raise an appropriate those funds in this budget it would be 3 four years away this article passes you're not going to have an article 3 years from now asking to for the additional overhead to fund full day kindergarten that would just be part of the budget correct it would be part of the default it won't it'll be part of the operating part of the operating not be in default yeah be the additional necessary Personnel that they would have to add okay yeah which is laid out in in the packets as Dan
132referenced for that additional cost it's on there but I think all this is going to be gone over next week dig into it is there a reason why we couldn't just do a warrant article for this year that just said all day kindergarten yes or no rather than just doing the whole kit Kaboodle all at once and get this huge loan um and that's just one question and I have another follow up question we we'll bring back both committees and they'll be here next week they can answer that and you know it was a long 5year journey to get to this point in time um and the the best way to to answer that question is we got a lot of positive feedback from the community over the last 5 years which has led to
133this point in time okay um last question um so you say fiveyear Journey right and all of that cannot be free you just talked about Architects and stuff we're already paying for this and I get that there has to be estimates and stuff that's super responsible to do but we didn't even say yes to this so where is this money coming coming from and what account sure um the master plan was 2020 yeah started in 20 through Co yep so the school board back in 2020 um allowed for a master planning process which is how we got the Architects um so over the last three fiscal years I I think the the bulk of those funds were in 2020 and 2021 they were um and then basically somewhere within the district office cost you would
134find the cost for the valley uh brening or The Architects or the Trident group um we have to get them for you I don't I don't have them on top of my head right now it's in the a contracted service line in the um School Board function yeah we hired Trident group in 2019 or the school board that I wasn't on at that time to be our owner project management group which kind of walks process through and then went through a process with hiring the architect firm to do the master plan and they've continued on on service plan with the district which is in budgeted through the the superintendent's budget um and then we approved some funds back early on for this to be priced out with two CMS in an estimating firm to get
135to this point so that's how we've gotten to where we are okay which is entirely normal in in any process um we don't have a group of Architects sitting in our district office you know you have to go out and hire the the experts yeah all set okay everybody good Tony did you have something again before I read this and vote thank you Tony De Francisco wi cheser so um while we're making things really confusing um I thought I'd add to that um I get really inspired a lot of times at 3: in the morning um thinking about things and we have a situation here where you know my feeling on this we basically have a space needs problem and the taxpayers and the voters are going to vote on a curriculum item which I
136don't think is right however let's let's go a step further and let's say after voting day we get 58% instead of 60 60 or 61 60 60 so we get 58 instead of 60 this special article the way it's written says to accommodate a full day kindergarten program as I understand it in New Hampshire legally no means no for a fiscal year yep yep during that fiscal year we only got 58% instead of 60 during that entire fiscal year you can't do anything with k kindergarten well you can't build a building for kindergarten that's what this this is a capital cost and so correct and so if the feds and the state comes in and says by some miracle hey London Derry we've been talking to Mr Slater your Schoolboard chair and we know you
137need this really badly and so we're going to give you 80% of the cost to build your kindergart can't do it cuz the voters said no perhaps to wait a year yep and is the is the is the state and the FED going to wait a year are they going to hold that money for a year or not I'm just I know it's I know it's a balloon but I'm just saying if the word kindergarten was not on here MH and all of a sudden money became available you could accept it and that's the problem having a having a dual meaning uh article if I'm not sure that's that's that's right though like even if it didn't say F to kindergarten if the funds if the project got turned down we're still under no means
138no we can't expand that building regardless of the purpose of it with funds from the federal government or wherever from the state because we'd still be stucking to no means now agreed we ask our to to I think the no means no is you can't find the funds in your operating budget to fund that so if you have an article for a truck and that fails no me no really says you then can't find your money in the operating budget or somewhere else to buy said truck because the voters said no in in this scenario um I'm processing I'll be up at 3:00 in this morning think about it as well um so so my my purpose was Lisa and and both boards is it needed to be asked and answered because it came to
139me and I I want to throw it against the wall yep and and just a double triple check so that there's no door that's closed to us because of one word that happened to be in in an article that's all it's a really good point and we we can talk about it would your would your update be space needs and just cross out for current overcrowding commodate current overcrowding and space needs yeah over crowding or at additional 10 classrooms no that's too specific never mind you would never want to be that specific in the Warren article because if God forbid there was a something construction wise and that needed to change you wouldn't be able to so so I mean so so let's be clear the naysayers are going to be saying oh you're trying
140to you're hiding things you're trying to push it through certainly there's been there's been more than enough uh publicity about kindergarten in and itself and I'm going to throw the dart again you all need to make a vote you're in favor of kindergarten aside from a building project from a curriculum basis are you in favor of kindergarten or not as a school board as a curriculum item outside of a capital project because it's really two separate things thank you thank you if we leave it too vag I think it is going to be really deceiving try that again I couldn't hear you oh sorry um if we leave it too vague I think it will be deceiving for the voters just to get it ped yeah these These are always the conundrum we get caught
141in every time you year in the warrant you know it is yeah but that that's why I mean I I I feel confident though with our website we're going to put out a video all these Facebook live stuff I mean the the information's out there I mean we are working over time to make sure everyone knows why we're doing what we're doing so it's so it is clear well I get it but not everyone has kids in school they're not going to actually go to the website I think it should be on the ballot itself I just want to reiterate what you said we've been at craft fairs we've been had Flyers at school events we've been in public we've been online we've invited people it's been almost two years now of of trying to
142push information out and I'm all for informed decisions that's why as committees we all really prided ourselves on doing that um and people have volunteered a ton of time doing it so at the end of the day we want to get the voters as much information as possible but just to allude that we have not made every attempt to do that is is not fair at all so just put it on the ballot that's it we want to do our due diligence to make sure people are informed but people also have a responsibility to be informed and access the information that we're putting out there I don't think that's fair that's your opinion all right so you'll look at some wording yep check with the uh attorney can on that let's make sure of the
143no means no and if there's a better way of wording this for for Thursday that absolutely cuz I I I do fear the no means no I know you're thinking it's different but I'm concerned with that too no agree we'll we'll check in yeah so we'll check on that and let's look at the uh if we can put a little less confusion and maybe the addition additional estimated tax impact on that sure sure so everybody good good all right I'll look for a motion to move article two to the bond hearing please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Kevin all those in favor 5 Z all right all right takes care of that portion and 7.3 construction manager nomination I me need to I'll jump in very quickly um so the Trident group
144L an RFP process um uh a committee was formed with the administration Mr Slater and uh Mrs whan from the kindergarten buale building committee uh we met you know four great companies that potentially would want to um complete the moil project it was voted on and approved by the voters um they they all brought a lot of talents to it um but the committee was unanimous in in choosing Eckman um for a lot of different reasons and Bob you wanted to add on top of that sure um yeah the process was very similar and that's the reason um we have Trident Gro as our OPM that um the few past school boards have um you know put put hired them to stay on as our OPN it's worked out well so our Educators can educate
145because they're not up to the current terms and how to negotiate and make sure contracts and uh Mark laid this out on a uh we were there for 6 and 1 half hours in one day interviewed four companies they all came in gave presentations over an hour um all their qualifications after they left we caucused for 15 20 minutes next group come in went through them uh the committee then voted on who they felt best now these presentations brought their superintendents brought their project manager um ownership uh so there was four to five individuals for each group um and they were all invited by the Trident group um knowing they're their background in um handling these these projects and at the end of the day the committee uh he went around and ranked each committee
146you know was it a one two three and would ask each individual six of us and tallied the number and all came up with number one was emman um number two I believe was Bon of page and stone and number three was Harvey and then uh North Branch um was fourth uh so all reputable companies then he opens up all the fees we had no idea what they were charging per project you know their um architect fees their uh overhead expenses fees and then we get to see that and compare it knowing that we picked them and so behold pekman was one of the lower numbers on the fees per project um and then they were a little bit higher on on their internal fees but not a a big percentage that made a a
147huge difference but it was a win-win for the district there was a company we felt could represent us well um on this project if it moves forward and um you know everybody had a good feeling about them in their presentation so that it's it's kind of a foolproof where you're not worried about dollars when you're picking your team you want the best suited team especially around a school and operation because this is going to be done in phases school's going to be in session they laid out their plans how they would handle that as well you know as as rough as possible um and then we decided and then the fee structure came in and we were all comfortable with that and um came up with thatman to bring back here to the to the
148board so that it's a it's a pretty good process um before we move on I I noticed when we got the packet and um and that that the um it reads uh on there after the qualifications based rankings the financial M Matrix was presented and reviewed Ean construction had the lowest CM fee markup as well as the second lowest fee structure overall a variance of less than 3% emman service services in support of our pre-bond efforts will be $11,000 um I'd like to support emman but I don't want any cost I I think a $34 million Bond $1,000 to do some work possibly to help us get there I I just I don't think it's fair to the taxpayers this isn't a something we've approved or the taxpayers haven't approved um it's all it's it's
149their due diligence as a as a construction manager they want the project to pass because it's $34 million possibly of work so I think they can come help us I don't I think the th000 is not necessary so that's where I stand at this point as one board member um you know I would I would just go back to them and say yeah we'd like to you know have you come on board but you know for for $0 at this time and um hopefully they would help because it's just it happens all the time in our business we have companies call us up we give presentations we go out and we do some engineering we spend a couple thousand dollars to show them why we're the better company to get there um if they want
150this job you know um to move forward in March I'm I'm sure sure whenever asked they are going to do their due diligence to help the school district and I don't know what the $1,000 is it's it's it's just not good it's not fair to charge our taxpayers any money at this point we've budgeted stuff for Architects and that to this point that are in in the superintendent's budget and um I think it's good to have them on board and have them ready to go and have them participate when they can um you know and then hopefully their reward is you know they get to do the project but at this point I don't want to I wouldn't support the $1,000 as a board member that's all I would agree with you on that not
151approved yet I think but we're interested and they want to work together on on not charging us yeah yeah kind of be fine was this discuss at the interviews at all no with I think I miss that detail I'm not sure all the stuff so if I don't remember so that's why when I read this I was like could have been my mistake that's all yeah yeah no problem you guys good I agree you agree yeah okay second second by Amanda all those in favor hi Hi 5 Z thank you all right let's see we got a policy here um first reading to resend policy dab fund balance policy yes so um when we were reviewing our policies and and we all agree that our policies need some updating I did notice that there are
152two fun balance policies um one the more current one was to allow us um to retain fund balance I don't know the date but um that was a few years ago that one is the legitimate one and should remain uh the D is a da bom Dia Dia that's one we're resending it should have been resented when that um other one was written okay um and in looking at it um we decided it was a good time to make our policy letters Dia djb whatever in in uniformity with the uh Schoolboard association's recommended policies so I thought since we're resending the old one um take the new one and put it with the correct letters so you'll see one resend um and then really it's just renaming um the policy to put it in uniform
153with um the Schoolboard policies it's just one small step um to getting our policies where we need them to be but the policy Remains the Same it's just a rename I see you it's just so it's going to be fund policy instead of fund balance policy is the only change on the description Dia fund balance I mean fund policy not fund balance should say fund does it not say fund balance it says it on both it says it on the two we resending but the new one doesn't it says fund policy we'll fix that it should say fund balance policy okay great all right so I'll look for a motion for the to accept the uh first reading uh to resend policy daab please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Tim all those
154in favor I I and then first reading to resend policy dfaa fund balance policy look for a motion to for the first reading on this one as well so moved motion by Sarah second second by Kevin all those in favor I 5 Z and then the first reading to adopt policy DIA fund balance policy um were there any changes to this current policy it's just changing the letters correcta okay I look for a motion uh to uh adopt the first reading to adopt policy Dia so moved motion by Sarah second second by Amanda all those in favor I I 5 Z thank you uh 7.7 uh proposed calendar so we looked at it uh you know last time um one minor change in the wording on the side we just clarified on November 14th that
155the middle school and high school have their parent conferences at night as well other than that you know we we've gotten um all all the uh input from from the unions and staff internally uh this is pretty much how we've approached the calendars in the last couple years we think it's ready for school board approval we're definitely a lot earlier um than normal so we have time to talk about it um but we don't have another school board meeting till January 30th so figuring if you guys liked it we could approve it but if we want to discuss it some more we certainly [Music] could so I'm just going to share what we talked about Bob is that yeah yeah that's fine okay so um we had some feedback um that we thought was really
156good feedback um about the possibility of um some inservice time for elementary Ed teachers and there was a lot of um great points made so we wanted to bring that up and discuss it a little bit tonight but in and looking at the calendar for next year it looks like if we consider a change like that and added just a buffer day for teachers to do some um second half of the Year planning um the students wouldn't come back till the Friday and that would just bring them back to school for one day that week um so I think if we approved this calendar we would probably have time to decide on the potential of that and talk about it more for a subsequent year because it sounds like for next year probably wouldn't make
157sense anyway to have the kids come back one day on a Friday right um so I think obviously um I wanted to share the points made and discuss that but looking at the logistical pieces of the calendar I think we could probably come back to it um and still and still look at this calendar yeah and to to H off what you said Amanda I I think it needs more internal work too with with staff to look at it what what um the information we got from this individual asking about this and why the reasons so I think it I think it needs to go through internally okay for you guys to look at it and then you know the board can discuss it with you if it makes sense moving forward I thought it
158was some good input um but I I'm not sure logistically how it works you know with with these extra days and how it would be set up if it if if it works yeah and I know look at the um vacation time for next December and January it's a longer vacation anyways I would hate to keep kids out of school for an even an extra day for the inservice days because it's already a long extra vacation yeah we want we don't want to get the students out of the flow too much so yeah I agree I think when we look at like time for mentoring that's great time for taxes administrators that's an awesome Point um training time all of planning all of those things is is great but to your logistically it probably didn't
159make sense to start it this upcoming year anyway so I depends in the year yeah year yeah definitely but um points points taken and considered and to to be continued I think yeah I agree this was a hard calendar because if you look at where the holidays fall do you bring everyone on one day for December 23rd you know and and it would be the same problem on the other end you know like those are the hard things um because normally there's a balance but this year there's a big swing to a much longer break just the way the holidays felt yeah and we had a really short one this year did you make you make it up make it from an educator to an educator you know you could um look at that though
160the 23rd would work for that yeah you know for the teachers to come in and then the kids would be off absolutely you know what I'm saying so that is something that could happen we don't have enough days in our contract I was just going to say so the other that's why I said internally I think you guys need to look at what what's being proposed as well and see time with with the with the days school days as well so and I know I can speak for you Bob when we didn't want to like throw a wrench in it but like to have have the good feedback come through and and not acknowledge it um didn't feel right either so yeah it it needs a lot more time and talk soend send us the
161proposal yeah yeah it's just a pipe dream right now okay yep Bob can I comment on that I know it's not budget related years ago my district did that where the 23rd was a Monday and staff had to come in for a training nobody got anything out of that training cuz none of the staff wanted everyone was suking yes so it's not a it's not a great day for teachers not doing them any favor yeah are turned off by them yeah we wouldn't we wouldn't be on uh the nice list for Christmas would be all right any other questions on the calendar from board M no so you want a approval on this stand vote it works for us if you guys ready you double triple checked with everybody we don't want to we we
162have we've done our due diligence Y no we we've done our due diligence we feel good about it so it's ready to go yeah I think people are waiting on this to plan trips and stuff so yeah we're about two to three months earlier than normal yeah great with seeing no other questions I'll look for a motion to accept the proposed 2425 lary School District calendar so Move Motion by Sarah second second by Tim those in favor I 5 Z thank you and that wraps up regular meeting for a sign off any anything else Kevin Tim I'm good Sarah anything Mana Dan Jay thank you nothing all right thank you budget committee appreciate all your your help this year and uh we'll see you on Thursday yes see you Thursday we'll and next Tuesday um
163but thanks for all your input and that is very valuable I did have one other question uh for Lisa I guess the petitioned article number 10 do we vote on that or do we not vote on that budget committee does not vote on that it's not monetary okay cool great yeah thanks all right seeing I'll uh look for a motion to go into non-public session requested under RSA 91a colon 3 section 2C please so moved motion by Sarah second second by Kevin uh ask for roll call vote starting with Kevin I Kevin r i Tim Porter I Bob Slater I Sarah lman I Amanda butcher thank you everyone