School Committee: February 28, 2025

Transcript captured from YouTube auto-captioning. No speaker labels; proper names and dollar figures occasionally misheard. Click any timecode to jump to that moment in the source video.

0:24 all right so um just for anybody zooming in I am not calling us to order we are still waiting on one member but out of respect for everyone’s time we are going to start the meeting we have cleared this with both our legal councel and the Secretary of State in previous times um we can proceed with the meeting we just don’t call the order we take no votes which we wouldn’t be taking and listed on the agenda anyway this is just an update um and if when we have Quorum we will call to order at that time bencom is going to call to order okay I call the finom uh School leis on subcommittee to order okay perfect um the first thing we have is public comment um if Kate if you would like to make public

1:13 comment no okay um next we will go to the closeout fy4 fy4 everybody um yeah I’m not in the meeting so I have the sheets up but I don’t know M second Alison’s here so

1:37 I okay I will call us to order might probably going to share screens and stuff at 9:06 um so I I don’t know so this wasn’t my physical year but I will happy to no yeah we just want to talk through it so my my records show that we returned approximately 382,000 sit on 382 379 is my rough number we had uh bug of 44,4 44 mil 947 274 uh at the end of the year we had incumbrances of

2:14 55,57 and uh actual expenditures of 44 m509

2:20 320 uh so that means that we returned 382 379 but you know those are those are my figures I think you know I don’t know match up it’s pretty close like you know within $100,000 on a $50 million budget so um and yeah you weren’t here um I don’t think this is surprising to the fincom I think we kind of were expecting a little bit of um over budget on the salaries and wages due to some volatility in positions being filled and open and vacant throughout the year um I think as I as I look at the numbers and the analytics here I see the wages that were budgeted versus actual the budgeted were $2 million higher and we’ve talked about this in previous meetings um don’t just confirm what I’m saying because I’m

3:07 not positive it’s more of a question but it feels like in the past we’ve had a little bit over budget on the salaries and wages but we’re way under budget on on the on District tuition and though although they don’t show up as encumbered a lot of that those were prepayments that technically weren’t encumbered at 6:30 because that’s where the you know the net like 3400 Grand of returned cash back to the town we overspent on the expenses by like 1.5 million and that’s driven by the the outof district tuition which to me means that the geography or where it is in the budget was just off right we probably should have had more budgeted for outof district tuition and maybe a little bit less for the for the salaries and what I

3:54 could say is that I’m asking though yeah I think part part what we’ve uncovered is that um there was some out of District tuition students Etc that were not accounted for properly that’s where the discrepancy came from um I think we’ve rectified that at this point I it doesn’t help for the f24 but um there was some when we walked in the door and there was some uh finding where students were actually um placed in the budget in reality um was took some time for us to figure out I’m sure that’s where most of that discrepancy is yeah I and I guess like from my perspective assuming this is true all that I’m saying um had you not had a little cushion on the salaries and wages you would have been

4:40 in a lot of trouble with those outo District so one thing I would like to look at um a as we look ahead to our future planning and this is something we all have spoken about many many times is getting a title handle on the trends of the out of District of every year what we’re budgeting but what we’re actualizing because starting in 2020 was the first year we did prepayments um and that year it was just prepayments it was I think it was like between two and 300,000 and each year we because in the past we just completely turned it right back to free cash and then we had started the process of the prepayments um utilizing some of that to to free up our our to try to calm some of the volatility that was happening

5:27 each year and it has helped but I think what it it does a little bit is when we look at this where we’re Under and Over in certain areas I’d like to see its true Trend capturing that those prepayments as well in this fiscal year this is what we owned and this is what we approved a town meeting for a budget because every year the number of what we own and what we’re approved for has has we’ve been approved for less than what we ultimately wind up owning which is a trend I think every district has been seeing everywhere but if we can look at that Trend and see the growth rate and if it’s regular growth rate that might help us fiscally like project a little bit closer at one point we we were trying to

6:13 add a buffer in each year um but we need to base that on data right and I think that’s a good point in in you know knowing I mean working special for a long time and this you know there’s that volatility that you can’t you can’t plan for everything but you can plan the trend is is certainly there’s been upward trend of about of District kiddos here and in Marblehead Head District kiddos here and in Marblehead on the fact I think we’re over $5 million with the district tuition which is insane for the amount of kids that we have in this in this District so um but it is what it is and you can’t really change that overnight but um I think the trend is is important I think the prepayment is is that’s a matter of course for most districts when it’s good to do that when you have the money to do that so you don’t get because then you pre pay it and then all of a sudden you get three kids that move into Marblehead from somewhere else that you weren’t

6:59 planing it for it helps offset that without having to go back to to say oh now now we need another million dollars so um I think that’s that’s a matter of course I think I think Mike is already already done a nice job of saying this is where the money is this is what we think we’re going to be able to prepay and this is you know what we’re gonna have to ask for in the budget to to equalize that out a little bit I think um just more ACC yeah I mean guessing I don’t want to jump ahead yet to the the budget for the current year those three comparisons but I loved what you did with the circuit breaker offset it makes it very clear to people I would love to see that moving forward doing that other other things too like let’s show the town what the real cost of the school is and then say hey we have this revolving fund to offset these expenses but look

7:46 what’s left for the general fund because people don’t under fully understand that it’s actually a lot more than a $50 million budget I did that throughout the budget for 26 not that we’re on 26 yet right but um I did have a circuit breaker for our largest Grant which is the idea 240 Grant I also did it there so so we can see how much money we’re actually spending but I offset with the Grant on every line You’ll see an offset if it was offset by the grant so I just think it’s more transparent that way if we build budgets like that I mean it’s probably easier for you to rec well when I came here I in essence I had I felt from my from my comfort level I rebuilt the fy2 budget using their data yeah um and special education out of District tuition was one of the ones I just couldn’t tie out ex there was no way because I didn’t know how much was plan

8:32 for circuit breaker um I’m sure if I dug deep enough I I could have found it yeah but as said I think there was the way we do our budgets here um because of town meeting and everything and we’ve presented our budget as of February 14th state lest anybody who moves in before April 1 we own for next year so there’s a twomon gap between when our budget is developed and when somebody can move in that could change our budget over that that two if they move in after April 1st if it’s a private day the previous District owns them for the whole next year oh good so if they move in prior to April 1 the state feels that we have enough time to adjust our budgets in order to to cover those students but after a if it’s a

9:17 collaborative I think we still own them either way correct yeah but if it’s a private school or res landmark that’s one of the reasons I have in years past not wanted us to vote our budget until after April 1st right you don’t know who’s going to move in you you kind of have on your always wanted to wait to do that I understand the reason why we want to do it now because we are ready our budget is fully baked and we’re ready to go and for some people it may seem we’re like we’re just sitting on it for a month but I’ve always liked to vote it after that April 1 so that we just know we there’s no volatility that we could have so in in the in the past I can understand why that was important because we did not have a stabilization fund we did not have uh circuit breaker

10:03 at a full year so right now I we’re holding a full year circuit breaker so unless half the state moves in the Mel head without a district kids we’re probably okay yeah knocking on wood over here that’s why that’s why the circuit breaker is helpful because for things like that so so you don’t have to wait till the end of April to do it you have that a little bit of buffer plus we also we also look to um go for Extraordinary relief through through circuit breaker which is monies that we can get now it’s instead of in the rear um so we’re working on that work with Lis Mar to see where that stands so we we might actually get some funding through circuit breaker extraordinary relief that will help this year which will help with some of the um the twitching prepays and things like that so it’s just it’s just a shuffling the money but and we’ll share that if and when we get

10:50 that extraordinary relief is uh a circuit breaker program but if you spend 25% more than what your claim was on the previous year so just say our claim was $2 million yeah if we spend 2.5 or more we can file in the same year that we spent Circ break is always a reimbursement this is one that’s a it’s a full it’s a it’s an INE program so if our tuition were 2 million claimed and we spent 2.5 or more we can file we’re on the hook for the first 25% above the two million but anything above that I believe they reimburse you at 75% the same as you would normally get on a circuit breaker so on the Delta not the totality in the Delta over so it’s I mean it’s not tons of money but a $5 million tuition well

11:36 for for stuff you haven’t for for costs you haven’t planned on it’s a huge yes so one thing one question I have is we know that there was a lot of out of districts that either came in or over in the last there seems to be some cloudiness about special education out placements in the 23 24 school year um so we have you have accounted for everything you and Lisa Marie we now have a clear picture yeah I would say actually Lisa Marie and Victoria okay put together a full roster of every student uh who is out of District what their tuition is what their transportation cost is what the projected increase is from the state for next year on those tuitions uh and and

12:21 they put you know we’ve got the list of kids not that we ever share that information but we’ve got the list of kids by their placement what their tuition is what any additional Services they may receive whether they have it one to one or they’re getting additional Services just so you know that plan that sheet you’re talking about is something that always existed um Bill McCall oh not always Bill McCall du came in and it hadn’t existed which just and of what 2019 happened um but Bill Mall have made that tracking sheet and we reviewed it at our each fincom meeting um and then we switched to an Administration and that sheat went away and it looks like it came back last we assumed the tracking was happening in house when we stopped

13:08 getting present by the wayside with somebody and but back on it’s back on no that’s why I’m saying thank you because it was a tool we were using and it was a helpful tool so when when at some point in the near future Lisa Marie will come to school commun Mee and got to do a State of the State on her department and part of that conversation will be here’s where we are with out of District stuff and that’s helpful information we have to make sure we’re not and find yeah and I actually found one of my old sheets so I put I thought I put it in my B I put it aside to show you guys and how we were doing it so that student privacy was protected but we had transparency and numbers too um so I’m happy to share that I think the other part of this is um my former two districts um both of them from a business office standpoint it was very difficult to make sure that

13:53 I was aware of what was going on in special education so in both of those districts we implemented um when it when it comes up or an agreement comes up business manager signs off on it they don’t they don’t approve it they we have no authorization to approve or deny but we sign off on it so that we’re aware that we’re there a financial obligation being made in that wew so I think that’s something that we should have a Administration will have a conversation have yeah for next year that when somebody goes toore that up bu John could you also last night because I I don’t know if Alec and P were online last night but mentioned that you’re doing a review with the um student services on you know looking at services that and students that are out placements now that could potentially be

14:40 brought into the district which would have a you know big Financial impact could you maybe just kind of walk through it so um really really extensive specializ education background for me before I came into superintendency rules um so I have that background Lis Marie obviously has that background and since we both come on board like the minut and we both walked into this dist we try to uncover what was happening in special ed um I think there’s programming that used to be in place it was a lot more solid than it is now for a lot of reasons that we don’t need to go into but um basically what we’re looking to do is Shore up the programs that are currently in District the language based programs the therapeutic programs um Ava programs which service kids that have you know

15:25 higher level of needs um so that once we can get those programs really more solidly um evolved into something that we’re more comfortable with in terms of and then we start looking at how do we bring kids back in from out of distri so a lot of the kids are in Landmark um school um are different for language based programming um and we feel very confident that um we can uh reinvigorate our language based programs to a point where it’s not necessary to send them out of different we’re bring it back in right the philosop the philosophy is my philosophy is always let’s let’s educate our students with their like HP to the extent that’s humanly possible right so I don’t feel like I’ve had several conversations with parents who have kids out of district and I said

16:11 listen I want to bring your child back in the district today but I don’t feel comfortable doing that until I’m comfortable that the program is going to meet their needs so I’d rather eat the tuition so to speak and make sure the child’s getting what they need before we bring back in set them up for failure so so it’s it’s a process right so everyone wants it done now including Mar I have to keep saying we’re exle we got um but I’m very confident with in with going into next school year we’re going to be in a much better place and we are now and by the end of next year would be a really really good place to start bringing some of those KS back in District would you be willing to make a of an upfront investment in order to make that happen or do you anticipate being able to use the resources that already in place um I think the resources already in place is is where I’m going to start I think Lee asked a

16:56 similar question last night um the resources that we have in place the first the always the first way is to see who do we have in District already for teachers for instructional assistance some therapists and stuff how do we utilize the people differently and more effectively and more efficiently to make sure those programs are and then see where the gaps are and then if we have to pull in different Staffing how do we make that happen without adding staff we look at how do we do that to rri we look at say if we need another a make it up speech and language therapist how do we kind of is there another area that we don’t necessarily need anymore we can shift that resource so that’s how I’ve always operated and it’s I know in the financial world that’s that’s a little great for you guys but it works and it’s been

17:44 proven to work so um it just takes a little patience um to get there but um it’s hard because it’s not it’s not uh it’s not easily quantifiable all the time and so we kind of really know how your kids they look like the levels of their services need and stuff like that that’s also that’s already being worked on and I’ll and I’ll add and say that in the last in the not even full year in the time since Lisa M has been here she has done some frontloading of investment she’s taken um we had budgeted some Landmark Consultants to come in and kind of do an audit um she had dug a little bit deeper in in determined that there was a more productive way to use them to train our staff and to to close those gaps and she’s been actively doing that

18:30 all year so versus so they they’ve come in they’re witnessing they’re doing an audit they’re working with our staff it’s a model of you know observation paired with trainings um so she you know I’ll just leave it at I I know at a very personal intimate level she’s she’s she is doing a lot of work and um keeping kids so this is going back to what you said I think doing the trending is clearly the right thing cuz you got to have you have to get the data first and then that tells you where to go sounds like you’ve already kind of jumped ahead I was going to suggest is there retroactive data from starting at 20 or something where should we have

19:15 should be finding it is a little difficult but yeah but it also might not be necessary based on if you can have if you feel you have enough data currently to do a forward projection it but anyway so that’s that’s up to you guys but how are you going to quantify that because I think it’s a great suggestion but the Department’s got to take that on as a it’s not as I don’t think it’s as hard as we think it is because we know we’re prepaying every year th those numbers are are yeah but you’re prepaying in order to accomplish so what we need to go back and do is like for an example of FY 24 when we look at our report of what we spend in fy2 24 on um out of districts we need to add to that number

20:00 we praid at the end of FY 23 so take that figure add it to fy4 and compare that to the number approved at town meeting it’s really a very simple yeah it’s timec consuming but it’s not a complicated thing and then and and we’ll see the percentage Delta that year and then we’ll do it for the year prior and see the percentage Delta um yeah and you know me going you know going back year or so is helpful and moving forward is where where we’re looking at you know going back two three four years is I mean isn’t I mean it might be help to a certain degree but I look at like where we where how we moving forward so if I have making up if I have 50 kids out of District now and next year we’re we’re able to bring three or four back next year and following year we could bring three or four back that’s good Trend out of The Have and those three or four equal couple hundred thousand

20:47 dollars you know so you start seeing that $5 million again I’m gonna say it out loud no in public $5 million inition District tuition for district decide way out out aot and the growth rates so in 2018 I remember being in a meeting in January of 2019 and this was before I was on the committee I was just you know someone who attended every meeting um and hearing that at that point we had 27 students out of district and it was at that point 2.8 million I say for 27 students at the right now where I think at the last set of numbers I saw at least was like 47 and roughly 5 million that growth rate is is unsustainable not

21:32 for here’s the reason for that so OSD operational services division sets the rates um it’s outside of desie so they set the R so a couple years ago they jumped 14% And then on top of that was like 4 point something and this year so but the number students growth rate yeah no no the students growth rate doubled it’s both things right so what I can say is that you know um again I just talk about my previous life I had a I worked in a district had about 400 less students than we have here in Marblehead and when I came into District we had like 60 kids out of district and I create we created programs we did this it took us several years but when I left special directorship and moved into um assistant superintendent we’re down

22:18 to seven kids out of the district so from you know and and that’s it takes time but that was like I you know I was even when I left Swansea I think we’re at like a million five in AO District tuition for for a very similar sized District to where we’re at $5 million out in so and there’s a lot of reasons for that and that we won’t get into there’s a lot of reasons why we’re at Sor would it would it take I’m sorry would it take less time if you sought to hire from out of District as opposed to develop an IND District um teacher currently um it depends and it might be that there aren’t resources available out so so what how I would answer that is we always look to IND District sure folks first and if there’s not that skill set certainly we look and say okay

23:05 we need to pull in this specific specialty area person um but I always try to do an offset for that so like hey this person retired do we really need to fill that position can we use that position for this position instead those are conversations but the outside student services has been the most volatile and very high cost for years and and I’ve mentioned several times in the past that yeah

23:33 that 5 million would be way down great to hear that you’ve done it before too like I’m really happy to hear that and and I’m not going to hold you to this number but when you say it is at a line and it should be lower in your head what is a reasonable range honestly I think I think what we what what Sarah was just talking about in terms of number of students out in in tuition that’s probably more in range with what it should and could be because what happens 20 to 30 30 because you know you know our our espe numbers are higher than the state average again for for several reasons that we won’t get into today but I also think there’s a lot of extra kids out of district for reasons that aren’t I’m gonna choose my words wisely for reasons that aren’t necessarily based on team meeting decisions around kids needs

24:19 so is there a review so is there going to be internal review of that kind of of that situation because yeah it’s it’s um yes it’s happening it’s I have a little bit of a um non-financial question and and I’m very happy with everything you’re saying because I think you’re taking a closer look maybe than ever has been looked at before at least reported back to us which is great I’m not not saying that people weren’t doing in the past as well because I know it’s tough thing um but just not not understanding that process at all let’s say you’re in you know the the first 25 kids no matter what you do are probably going to be out there’s going to be certain kids in every District that have to the challenge then is like 25 through 50 what is that

25:06 process like very quickly I don’t want to spent the entire meeting on special education but is it meeting with the parents and convincing them that our inhouse expertise can keep their student or is who makes that determin so yeah so it it’s it’s all based on team meeting decision and discussion and that’s why I said at the beginning I’m not 100% comfortable in a lot of our programming to say yes we could do it better than S L Mark right so that’s why a lot of these kids end up on dis because I think some of our program kind of dissipate a little bit right so it’s kind of like let’s rebuild the Snowman and when it looks really great let’s let’s bring the kids back and then it builds the town’s case supports legally being allowed to keep them in is it like legal decis yeah so so yeah it’s definitely

25:51 legal uh it’s those decisions are made in the team meeting so like just say for instance this was a team meeting decision we decided as a team that this child needs to be out of district for whatever reason right and I’m the superintendent and I don’t agree with it I can’t come in and say no he’s not going on District the team decided the team makes a decision and then it happens okay what I I guess what I was alluding to is that I think a lot of times in this in this town parents have pre I’m just gonna say that beat parents have pressured people in meetings with lawyers to say I’m just GNA get a lawyer we’re GNA make this happen and then it so that’s not a reason to sendic out of District but that’s why a lot of our kids have sent so the piece and it’s a little bit of inside baseball I’ll just take two minutes because I I know we all know this but I don’t know if they all

26:38 know this so it’s a I don’t want to say it’s a game of chicken but when you’re always get more out of districts in an fluid Community because those parents can pay the the $5,000 for a private neuros pych they can pay for the attorneys and they get more data and then they get more power behind them and what happens is the districts want to settle before you get to what’s called a hearing because if you settle then and this is what we had a strong history of in the past people coming with legal counsel and consultants and this and that um and with f tight little files that are saying why we’re going to go out and you can push it to a hearing with the state and then the state determines the problem is if you lose at the hearing you own all their legal fees all their consultant fees so what

27:24 happens is a lot of times the district will say we’ll come up with an agreement and you own that and that’s helpful context I think I’m hearing you can control what you can control and you’re very hyperfocused on over the next this year next year the year after takes time yes controlling what you can control which is building up being able to educate kids that need additional resources as best as you can and hopefully that will you know I wish I had the magic W we’ll get we will get there because we have we have the right I I feel that we have the right people in place as long as people stay here it’s gonna it’s just gonna take time and I applaud the approach they’re taking of building the program because I try

28:09 very hard never to mix my parenting and this but what I will say is as a parent and of a child in that demographic no parent wants their child to go out of District you want your kid to go to school with your other kids if well that’s what I was wondering if they really I mean I guess there’s outliers but if they’ll they’re working on building the program that’s what’s going to get people to come back a parent who’s doing a 45 to 50 minute commute to Landmark every day and their kid doesn’t go to school with the kids they play soccer with yeah they can’t play sport they’re able to if they build the program we’ll we’ll I’d say 90% will willingly come back it won’t be a legal battle because it’s what’s best for the kid so I applaud this approach it’s relational trust that needs to be built I think because I

28:55 think a lot of the parents have been burned and I think a lot of the staff feel like they supported and again I’m not pointing fingers or anything you know but that’s really how we got to where we are um and I’m all about how there’s a lot of good good work being done in this yeah I one I started to asking it didn’t get answered so circuit breaker so since we had a lot of this they weren’t accounted for are we confident we were maximizing our circuit breaker for the last several years and if we weren’t can we refile and get that money back so no you can’t refile there’s a deadline you don’t miss the dead don’t make the deadline you don’t get it and quite honestly they’ll come in and audit you if they find an edit error in your favor too bad if they find an error in the state’s favor they’ll

29:42 take the money back yes so so that the plan is to file the claim accurately to begin with okay um the claim in recent years has been done of the business office which should have never been done but it was done in the business office and I I can tell you if if I was asked to do the claim I wouldn’t know half the kids I wouldn’t know their situation I wouldn’t know their what what condition they’re in what you know I’m going to look at dollars only and I’m not going to catch some of the other stuff that you can complain like the one the one to ones and the you know there’s so many things I’m very intricate so somebody that’s very dialed into the actual programs needs to to yeah to do the calculation I’ve done ccer breaker a million times or by themselves yeah I’ve done the circuit breaker claim a million

30:27 times in my previous role and it’s it’s a daunting task it’s it’s really taking a basically taking a child’s IP a service delivery grid taking a minutes and and then fitting it into like the system that they have and they and the minutes equate to a certain dollar amount but you have to put them in properly and you have to put them in like you have to look at summer program you have to look at indust program you have to look at consultation it’s it’s really dogging things so to your point Sarah I would Hazard to guess that it hasn’t been done properly I’d be I’d be shocked if it was um I I have to work with Mar to make sure that like her comfortability with doing doing the um is where it needs to be I haven’t done it in several years but um it’s very um

31:13 it in several years but um it’s very involved task to do but it’s worth doing because the circuit breaker basically they set a threshold so the tuitions I think it’s like 50 I’m going to use 55,000 so 50, $55,000 you pay for that that tuition if the tuition is $75,000 the threshold is 55 so that when you do the circle breaker claim they will reimburse you for 75% of the the Delta over the 55 so you’re not getting 75 of the $75,000 you’re getting 75 $25,000 so it’s it’s a reimbursement of a partial but it helps off we can and the outplacement I think are the easier calculation you those it’s your tuition it is what it is but in house we can get

32:00 re verse with them if Little Johnny has a onetoone and a speech therapist and this therapist and that therapist anything any C and then he gets five hours a week of reading supports and five hours a week of PT all these all these Services you can take our employees and or the rates and things like that so that’s what’s very time consuming and as we bring more inhouse that’s going to get more cumbersome so I just want to put out there if at some point you need to tell us Lisa Marine needs an additional person so that we’re accounting for every minute and getting reimbursed for everything we possibly can will we start bringing those kids in that is something I absolutely would support yeah I mean it’s been my experience that and you’re absolutely

32:45 right um it’s been my experience that those IND District kiddos that reach the threshold to the point where we can do some sort of claim it are very minimal because it literally if they have a oneone nurse but if they have a oneone nurse they usually meet thing a nurse made to say costs $770,000 so they me it but if it’s I have 30 minutes of speech 30 minutes OT P it seems like a lot and does always reach the threshold but um we what I’ve always done in the past is look at any of those um kids that have extra supports and say do we think they’re going to meet meet the threshold and then we run through those kids and actually run them through the program to see if they and sometime I think most of our lb kits would hit the thresh and I think you know in realistically when you get to that then the question becomes if

33:31 they if they’re that needy and they have that many needs and they’re in District it’s like H should be be in District so you know so there’s a cuspy thing right but um you know if you think like if they require one to one aid for whatever reason then that’s usually a hell thing but here’re a little bit different are nursing or something like that they they will usually rise the level of me that profal so get a part of this is the very first piece of this is making sure that when we have a team meeting everything that’s discussed gets on the grid because if it’s not on the student IEP grid you cannot claim it even though even though you’re providing the service you may be giving the kid you know he may be going down and visiting the the adjustment counselor or or the bcba every day but if it’s not in that

34:17 kid’s grid you cannot claim it yeah and I think that might be the next place as far from a financial standpoint because I can tell I think you need to do that before you start looking for these kids that might be reaching the threshold because you need it on their and we know the kids who who might be reaching the threshold but it might not be on their grid already yeah and it also justifies the positions the yeah all well I mean we have a team cheer at every so I mean yeah I feel I mean I feel comfortable that again I feel comfortable where we are now how we’re moving forward I mean we a we have another team chair coming on that that we’re looking at and I think once we get the full complement of Staff in that area that’s really managing each building’s IEP meetings um in a way that’s helpful and in in more

35:04 in tune with what they actually need um a lot of this stuff’s going to kind of start participating a little bit and we’re gonna parents are going to trust us a little bit more they’re not going to be coming in for bear and bringing Advocates and lawyers all the time um it just it’s just it’s just part of that relational trust I think um once that’s in place a little bit more firmly because we have some of that in a lot of places where we’re still kind of struggling in other places because just there some of the and we don’t have place properly yet um the last thing on the budget to actual because I know we’ve can I just I resent the file call an F the formula was wrong the number I gave earlier today verbally was accurate but I couldn’t tie it out and that’s why I stressed there for a second I it was

35:51 taking the actual minus it was taking the actual minus the budget instead of budget minus the actual I don’t know if it was my formula if it was already in the spreadsheet I’ll take it was my formula yeah and uh and it’s now been 41,000 that no I’m sorry no it was more than that I think it was uh oh it doesn’t matter it was it was about 41,46 million isend yeah yeah it’s still not percentage but but now you have the accurate I just looked at the accur accurate total the numbers were all right it was the total oh are we covered for FY 24 close up uh no so the last thing I just wanted to mention this all Blends into our next conversation so we’ve covered half of our special education actually FAL 26

36:38 yeah this the best place to start is is the actual right um so I said there was the $2 billion kind of over budget on the salaries and then you know the net of the the 1.5 on the expense side overspending or not over spending but just spending more than the budget um I would say half of that was special education the other half was it and I know that at a previous meeting like as you built this year’s budget we’ll get to a second so I think I have an answer for that I have a a theory Capital expenses right so I have a theory I believe at the end of fiscal 23 we returned a million dollars to the to I know the fact because we bought a phone system that didn’t ared by June 30th yes so that had to be paid out of our 24 budget that is probably why

37:23 probably why inces at the end of 23 that were effectively I don’t want to say denied like it was oh they were denied love they were but I think that when at least from her perspective she didn’t feel comfortable with something that was going on legally so yeah end it 23 she just arrived so I guess I’m all in context to where we’re going next like I believe that over was because of that but I think you’re looking very closely at the balance of wages the outer districts the technology those are three kind of bigger categories within your budget and I I will also say when we get to May yeah and we’re looking at our bottom line budget you know what’s remaining we

38:08 project our salaries out we we’ve got everything encumbered um sometimes we look to things that didn’t get in the budget that we that should have been we make the purchase in May yeah it’s a bottom line budget so I’m not saying that we we do anything unethical or illegal we get the permission from the school committee we say we’ like to transfer yeah 500,000 from salaries to it because we these SMS going to enhance education we need and there’s a check in balance with this with the school committee but there is a difference we’ve talked about it many times between the school department and other departments in town There’s No fincom approval of that they’re a bottom line budget that’s the legal rule in Massachusetts we all on the same so that I just want to give the full picture so

38:54 those technology things they were asked to be spent at of Bara and in an initial meeting but in the meeting it said pull them out of our or no they were in a budget they were in capital they said no pull them out we’ll put it in arpa so then we were going to do that so then we did all the purchase orders and everything else and then everything goes upstairs it gets spent sent back down and it was a no and after it was a yes in a public meeting I can send you all the videos um so then it got sent back downstairs because the something was all Alicia there was something with when arrived in versus the purchase order so then we owned it already and we had to bind it in our current year budget so it wasn’t originally allocated in our

39:42 budget that was the same year that um but that would that would happened in 23 but we actually paid for it 24 yeah know I’m more concerned about like is that a recurring thing where you need to up your it capital lines or or whatever lines were we’ve had this conversation you and I not in group format but uh I believe there are two things missing from our budget one is a curriculum refresh line where we put a set amount in the budget it’s a onetime add to the budget which which we did this year for 26 we put we we put 200,000 we say we put 200,000 it was actually hund and something additional because we reallocated other lines to help fund that but we have 200,000 now in for curriculum now some some years that might have to pop up a little bit and down a little bit depending on if you’re buying math because ma math comes with

40:29 with usually workbooks and and other things that manipulatives that you may need um so the first thing I always thought that we needed was a curriculum line something that we’re that the past history here in many districts do that is you get to May and you say okay I’ve got little extra money I’m GNA buy the curriculum instead of budgeting for it you wait for the end of the year and spend your I built our budget very tight yes but that means it will be very little left over at the end of the year to do these purchases we need to get them in the budget the other thing I believe we need to do is uh it’s going to take three infusions into the budgets over three fiscal years just use a number of $150,000 in year in just say it’s FY 27’s budget for it purchases you take

41:15 that $150,000 you go out and Lease $400,000 worth of equit that 150 has to stay in there because you need to make lease payments the second year you add another 150 so now line is $300,000 you go least another $400,000 worth of equipment and you have to keep that money in there the third year you add yet another 150,000 to the bottom line of that line so now you’re at 450,000 but they’re all three-year leases now the money’s in there every year you can renew a lease without adding additional money three years of investment how we got to find this money so we just haven’t done that we haven’t and and I think that’s a discussion that we’re going to have to have for the FY we didn’t do it 26 and then it’s 150 per year on an on for three years no years out because your first lease is paid off

42:01 after 3 years you’ve not that money already in the budget you just Ideal World then your Capital the budget for year four is 150 no the budget for year four is 450 but it’s level from the year before there’s no additional influx I see and then you just leave it at 450 hopefully bump up to 4 470 and you just recur leases of the equipment and then that that takes away the the question mark of oh no we need to spend 400 we need to so Brown is now four years old we need to replace all the devices in there how do we do that oh we have to go an it we have to go a town capital and yeah it just takes the town conversation it it releases the town of having that burden and then if you know in the third year it’s it’s not you know

42:48 that expend is not as great as we anticipate was going to be then we then we look how where we reallocate that that goes these are all great back to and I wish I wish we could do very something very similar with but we can’t you know um then know it’s difficult to it’s the same thing we’re saying to the town as a whole including the schools is when we’re for we just went through that very big forecasting exercise in the fall like let’s try to forecast obviously you need cushion right you’re not going to you don’t want to over forecast Revenue that you’d be in some trouble there um you don’t want to um under forecast or for spes but we we should be trying to get as close as

43:35 we can with a reasonable buffer Reserve whatever you want to call it not planning for oh let’s let’s forecast zero for that and then have it come in at three million like I don’t like planned it should be more transparen and it sounds like a mechanism like you just described that’s just an example is way better transparency then exactly what well and and I love Mike’s thought on that because um that’s not how was again my experience hasn’t been that way it’s more like hey we had a mild winter we had some extra extra funds because we didn’t spend all the money and that’s how we’re going to buy the technology that’s how and a lot most well maybe not most a lot of districts do it that way because you don’t want to be the one saying hey I’m gonna I’m gonna bump up my budget by 150 this year 150 next year um because most towns don’t want to be

44:21 planned for like that it sounds like that which is good it’s the same thing as you said before when you do that it doesn’t necessarily have to be brand new 150 it could come from another lineup piece of it right because stepen has a line already so maybe maybe we’re looking at maybe that 150 is 100 because we know we could take 50 out of his line to reduce it but that’s only one time the next year we’re gonna have to get back to the 150 but one of the three years we might be able to not ask for whatever the number is we have we we have a lot of work to do with this we need to come up with a fiveyear refresh cycle and Stephen may already have that I’m sure he does yes at least it’s up here I don’t know whether it’s on paper and it’s been you know distributed but if Stephen has that plan we can actually plan out what a fiveyear looks like because we’re not replacing

45:08 the same devices every three years year one for an example could be all teacher laptops devices whatever year two might be all student devices year three might be all infrastructure so switches um gear um W wireless access points everything year four might be smartboards and year five might be you know

45:31 back to teacher right so it might be a four might be a five year you know depending on how we spread it out um when I was in in Wayfield we did all elementary K to four devices one year 5 to 8 the next year 9 to 12 the third year teacher devices the fourth year infrastructure the fifth year and then went back around but we always had a little bit in there because student devices they just they don’t you’re talking about many will last five years many last months years more laptop no so you gotta it’s so student devices are typically Chromebooks um and the biggest part about Chromebooks is replacing the keys when the kids BL them off there’s no

46:18 there’s no real intelligence other than the screen and the keyboard and smashing the thing there’s no hard and not total expert on this but there’s really no no hard hard drive everything’s off the cloud so there’s it’s a pretty dumb machine um so kids close the pencil and it crack the screen they say oh take the Y and put it over here and they pop it off and then they can’t get it back in happens all the time ID deal with so in Wayfield we were a lovo dealers Lenovo house I believe for our our Chromebooks and we got Lenovo training and we were able to purchase directly from Lenovo for new key screens and our kids would come in in the summer 15 bucks an hour and they would repair the high school kids would

47:05 repair the devices and get it back out and sometimes it was Frankenstein I take the screen off of this one and the keyboard off of this one because this keyboard’s junk and the screen’s junk but at least we’re frankensteining went together I’m not saying we’re gonna do that here I problem I’m all about all the way okay there were three you said that you were going to do curriculum it you said there were three refres there two but it was a three-year on the it one the it year I mean at some point I think my own personal opinion I really haven’t discussed this thing I’m still shocked that Marblehead is one of probably 10 communities in the state that still charges for y that Alex like please don’t get her going on

47:51 going on going on this it’s a thing you want true Equity it’s a thing start kids in kindergarten we’re not going to talk about that today today R all right I think we can and I’m not educational person I’m going looks like I’ve lived to this for four years 2 we kind of yeah we’ve set the stage very well that’s why I like to start with the actual um to discuss the proposed budget for 26 actually before we get to the budget just on a brief for 25 so can you just really high level how we’re looking and maybe what your plan is to in prepaying like what will be left to

48:38 prepay so um again just seven months in now I can’t say that anymore no it’s eight months until tomorrow eight months and um again as I said before I rebuilt the budget our soft rght system does not encumber salaries and and be and because 80% of our budget is salaries I had to manually encumber the salaries I put up at the time I did it nine POS purchase orders one for each month with what I took everybody’s salary divided it by the number of payroll summer 26 summer 22 some some 52 I I open up all these purchase orders and at the end of every month I closed the PO and I run our report and I look to see what we’re trending I did it in December I ran it again in January and the January Trend

49:24 was spot on today is the last day of the month at some point today I will run that report again and hoping that we still have a a somewhere in the $2.8 to $3 million um I use the word Surplus and everybody hates that work destroy not a surplus but unexpended balance if we can continue to Trend that my my thought is that the trend should come down2 to $300,000 a month get to the end of the year if we can do that and I feel like right now the numbers are trending that way that we should be able to do the same prepay on special education tuitions at the end of this year but I I somewhere between 800 and a million um what what I said in school

50:12 committee in December was that I need three months to make sure my data is accurate finding in the right way one month one month is lucky two month is good three month is and that kind of jives because one of my questions was you know if you look at the actual salaries from 24 versus what was budgeted for 25 it was a fairly large jump it was like 6.7% it wasn’t budget to budget when we built it last year but the actual payment much lower in order to actually pay that full budget I mean you guys would have had to hire a lot of people really quick I think right some of the vaping positions and whatnot well I think you know we were off negotiation right I think so so there was I wasn’t here but I believe that the budget was built with the anticipation that we may

50:58 need some some funds settle negotiations yeah and I don’t know what that number was I wasn’t part of that discussion yeah but I did you know there was a half a million dollars in this year’s current budget for Lane changes right I truly don’t believe we need a half a million there I cut it down to 200,000 for next year those are people who they get their steps they can earn their Lanes right people have to earn their Lanes they have to go and take courses um I put 200,000 in there I’m hoping that’s you know in the past I think we carried about 100,000 and that’s yeah I was assuming the negotiation yeah I mean it wasn’t very very good

51:40 if again we’re not we’re not necessarily surprised by that based on the trends of the salaries where we’ve been seeing them come in our expectation is with the new contract maybe not this year we’ll get to it in a minute that that gap of this Surplus could come down pretty quick when we get to years two and three right in terms of budget to actual like so the budget to actual difference there if you have a new contract in place that’s putting pressure on that line even if you’re not adding positions deleting positions it’s going to close that Gap so when I built this year’s budget I took the roster the existing positions vac can build whatever it was I moved everybody up their stpp and call oh that they don’t get a call unless they tell

52:25 us I moved everybody that is exactly what’s in the budget now the fluctu the fluctuations are one of probably three things one position goes unfill yeah for some period of time it could be a month it could be three months it could be six months yes that’s going to cause us to have a slight you Surplus in our budget the one that the the second one is that um people are going to retire and we’re going to hire at a lower rate yeah but in my budget I’ve got $182,000 I believe in there as a uh it’s at the very end of the budget uh it’s $182,000 that is for retirements what I call retirement savings it’s a negative in the budget 182 it’s a negative in the budget so I what I assumed was we would have yeah 10 retirements 10

53:12 retirements at 18,000 or 18 retirements of 10,000 how many do you know of at this point I think we have three or four but you you I think it’s conservative no I think it’s conservative because I think we’re going to save more than 18,000 on a retirement they’re going to retire at 103 and we’re going to rehire hopefully at 75 right you know somewhere 75 to 8 yeah somewhere in the middle of the that’s the third piece is that when we rehire not just retirements but we ask our principles when you rehire you need to be cognizant of the number if you have somebody who’s retiring we’ve already captured that savings you cannot recapture you can’t say oh somebody retired at 103 I’m GNA hire somebody at 103 right because I need that two that 218 back um the other thing you know we

53:57 asked them to do is plan on a number we give them a number 70 75 80 somewhere in that range to rehire if you need that $103,000 person maybe you you’re and I don’t want to I’m just giving an example maybe the the grade three team is got some inexperienced teachers or in their first few years and you need somebody to come and bring that team together somebody with 15 years of experience go ahead and hire that person we’re not telling you not to hire that person but on your second grade team that’s got a lot of experience and you got a vcy how somebody that’s that’s recently entered into I graduated recently entered into education and we know they’re going to come in at maybe 65 so you’re going to blend the two together to where we need to be it’s strategic yeah and you look

54:43 at there’s certain areas where you can’t like so specific special teacher you’re not going to get at $60,000 hire Ma you know math physics yeah World Language there there’s some definitely um positions that are higher sought after harder to get so yeah I mean we’ve talked about this at depth first time Molly and I met you over the summer there’s there’s we hear it around town that the the school is funding a bunch of vacant positions and buffering up I just want to have you all be able to explain your story for your budget and if you have a million dollar Surplus on a on a on 80% of your budget which is $50 million your total budget off by 2% that’s a that’s a

55:30 pretty healthy you know estimate for these things it’s just getting ahead and I say the same thing to Alicia the time is when when I feel pressure from people saying I’m doing something that I’m not I get ahead of it and say this is the real story as to as to what we’re doing in this budget it sounds like you all are doing that so at the beginning of this year yeah we had some difficulty filling some positions right I think John looked on school spring this week and we have one position open it’s not in a school or two I have an echar position that’s it and the rest are coaching positions and there’s really not many vacant right now HR yeah manager and there’s coaching athletic coaching positions and the postings for the summer positions that um extend school year so when we get to fincom

56:16 hearing and we get to Warrant hearing and people ask about these things as fincom we can say we reviewed a budget and there’s legitimately whatever you know a very small amount to vacant positions in I think I’ve hired close to 100 people so I can tell you fromr perspec I think the landscape of education has changed also and I know it doesn’t matter what the you know public or whatever is saying but I like to kill the narrative UPF front so that when we’re at these meetings it goes away do you know what I mean the landscape of education has changed it you used to when you started the school year you finished the school year you didn’t leave midy year you didn’t you know districts districts didn’t recruit people mid year they didn’t hire

57:02 people but the landscape has changed you didn’t retire midy year you started on September one you were finishing on June 15 June 30th or whatever people now retire on their birthday people you know when they hit that that magic number of 80% that’s it I’m out which is idiotic because I’ve had this conversation with people like directly I’m like like finish out the school year you’re not going to get any more money you’re not going to get any less money like that those couple weeks months whatever aren’t going to matter h beans so do what’s right for the kids and you’ve been educated for 35 years now you’re like are you going to leave in sep you know October um but I think you know Mike’s right like we’ve had a bunch of people that just yeah I’m done I’m out of here I’ll leave they don’t like they don’t give notice they just up and I mean it’s crazy I think it’s just the

57:48 the society we live in now and I hate even saying that but it’s like the the kid the kids haven’t been taught like hey when you when you’re going to change jobs you to find job we see in accting we get you know staff accountants leave in January that was like forbidden back then you’re not gonna leave before like right you never get a job anywhere when we did this and I think it was in August or September and there were correct me if I’m wrong over 30 or so vacancies so I just want to compliment this Administration and all the principles you guys have done a wonderful job Staffing the schools cuz that was a big yeah because I mean I was at that during the strike like that’s unheard of did you like five or six people in the middle of

58:40 stri they thought they were got support now so the the budget for fiscal 25 had at the start of the school year had unfilled positions those are now filled correct so there’s already there’s funding budgeted but there will be a little bit of surplus X months times however many so what I’m saying is that this Surplus that’s existed for now it’s come down a little bit but like two to three years the combination of filling positions and signing a new contract We’re not gonna have that anymore probably which means you’re not gonna be able to rely on it for pre payments unless people well you again attrition is always like like

59:25 saying you hire people at the different levels but um yeah this year I think if I had a crystal ball it’ll be some turn back to the town I think because of the reason we saw I mean when you have we not h i mean I’m hiring I just hired like two people this last lastek and the contract that was signed the new contract was not back um and quite frankly we had budgeted for something for it so and the first AB the cost it’s going to get challenging is what I’m saying just always cautious that this is going to wind up in a mass email to people so I just want to clarify the reason we didn’t do retro was we absorbed a tremendous amount of costs in

1:00:11 strike fees and additional legal fees that would have never weren budgeted because the an that wasn’t budgeted we didn’t do that to hurt Zach we Rec we that was a business decision to offset the cost of those negotiations and strike the town didn’t it’s also it’s also we could AFF we could afford the the contract that we’re signing so but the other piece that I don’t want lost in the shuffle is the first day of the strike we slid the PD day there so all striking staff went unpaid that day there’s a good chunk of change there that they didn’t get paid so then that’s that’s going to flush out so I guess

1:00:56 where I’m going with it is and and I sat in this room around this time last year and said when I did that full p&l I we don’t want to call it pnl joking about that but get profit the statement I made last year to Michelle who was sitting right there was this looks like a financially healthy organization to me because if you look at that summary you were having surpluses in the general fund you were building reserves in the revolving fund it feels like for this year I think we’re still fairly healthy financially but if we’re closing surpluses and we’re filling all these positions and our contracts are ramping up I don’t want to leave this meeting thinking that we don’t have challenges ahead is that fair we have significant challenges ahead and no I think that’s a very fair point and I think you know Mike and

1:01:42 I agree with his his strategy is we we’re gonna we’re gonna develop an in operate budget that’s as close to the bone as we can without like you know killing ourselves um but I don’t like operating with like oh we’re just going to put this in the budget just in case and fluffy stuff a lot I don’t and I don’t think we have a very similar philosophy in that so I think it’s different than what it has been in the past potentially so yes um three 3% on next year on The FY 27 contractual obligations three and a half% on the FY 28 contractual obligations we’re gonna have much different this is this is a great conversation this is I did the budget hearing last night I think it went really well I think we had some good positive feedback next year’s going to be very next year especially following

1:02:28 it would be very different conversations so I don’t want to yeah and that’s what I’ve been saying on the town side as well because we see the structural challenges of the entire townwide budget yeah just because certain good things happen which are great for the town when when you get some sort of windfall does it mean that those don’t still exist and and everything I’ve reviewed suggest that they do on both the town and the school set I think we talk about the 3% three and a half% two-thirds of our staff are at the top step so next just 3% it’s pretty much 3% plus onethird of our staff will get a step yeah the year after that is three and a half% and another step and we added the step so all 100% of our staff will be getting a step increase in 20 so it’ll actually be four or

1:03:13 five yeah yeah no I that’s what I’m saying because I think we’re okay right now but with you said it would take two years three years two to three years when we first met and and I think that we’re just at the start of that right in in everybody myself included Mike included at school committee the student services want to be where we want to be now but we have to be patient we have to I keep saying take small bites the Apple because if we don’t we’re gonna there’s going to be missteps and we’re gonna better we’re going to screw it up and then we’re not going to be where we want to be so it’s it’s very difficult I mean Lisa Marie is doing a phenomenal job she wants everything in place now like yesterday and I have to keep like let’s she’s doing so much

1:03:59 foundational work really yeah and it’s going to be very important but it’s like she wants it to be done now because that’s the that’s the kind of person she is and it’s great but we have to like make sure and when we talk about years two and three three and three and a half percent plus the additional steps that was very very intentional when we were bargaining to give ourselves and give the town some Runway to let our administrators have time to really get in and look at what our staffing is what is necessary what are these PR programs so that when we it is time to bring an override forward it’s a fully baked one so when we when we structured our negotiations it was purposeful to give them the time give them the runway so that when we go to the electorate they they have they have all the information and it’s not just this is what we need

1:04:45 this year but we’ll have those projections surpris it’s it’s that’s why we’re trying to make the communication a bit more um I think the two words robust and then transparent but two words that need to be made I we’re trying to be very robust about the the communication and the and transparent about where we are stuff and you know transparency doesn’t always equal like I want to know exactly what the staff is making and where they are and what they’re moving to because that has to be an operational decision that we need to make but the overarching like this is what it cost to run Brown School this what it cost to run Glover school that’s what it cost those that’s the higher level thing I think that people need to make sure that they’re understanding like we’re budgeting the way we need to we’re being

1:05:31 able to move resources around based upon student needs and resource needs and um I I think the school commit has been very supportive of that I know it feels it probably feels a little different than it has in the past I think the school has been supportive of okay let’s let’s move towards this um and I think we’re in a good trajectory so I I appreciate all this collaboration I’ve said that every single chance I’ve got public sector this collaboration communication H and the win is we were able I mean we can’t overstate this enough we were able to keep our services the same we not laying folks off kids are getting what they need and the taxpayers aren’t realizing an increase in about two and a half this year that’s a

1:06:18 win we did it within the confines of what was available to us yeah I I don’t want to be Circ I don’t want to be lost on the fact next year we look different yeah’s not forget I asked Mike this three weeks ago the schools last year when we were sitting in this same I just said this right we were sitting in this they were allocated at this time last year they were getting $750,000 more than the previous year’s budget at the 11th Hour there was there was 250 found for a million I think the increase in the budget this year is 2. y if I was telling you right now that you or thater was telling you because it’s not me thater was telling you that you only had a million dollars of available revenues that new available revenues to be

1:07:03 allocated to the schools we’d be having a much different conversation the projections the projection showed we we’re gonna need an override right listen I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth more money came in in revenues than we expected or I don’t think we can anticipate having two. next year no I get that loudly and clearly and I think we should make sure that we bang that g loudly and clearly because Joe Q public is gonna say well that’s great they the town and the schools work together they came believe it’s awesome and they should i i people should be jumping up and down in my opinion but I think the more we can say like this is where we’re likely going to be next year and this is where we need to work together but they expected revenues coming into the schools I I know for again state of the town did that but

1:07:50 it will be a fully plan because I think the reason the last two overrides failed were there wasn’t enough information um about what happens after this year the Strategic plan wasn’t there and John’s working really hard to develop that strategic plan because when you look at a prop two and a half it’s we hear it all the time it’s an every time raise so people want to know how is this going to meet your needs several years out what are your projections what are you doing and when we tell them which is what happened in the past well maybe back in a couple years you can’t we need to be able to say we’ve done our due diligence fin Staffing wise educational wise and we know what this District barring any major you

1:08:36 know in out of districts coming in or Co unexpected things we know what we are doing strategically and we have not had an Administration who was willing to to do the Strategic plan to a level that we’re doing right now so that’s great the last

1:08:54 thing I’m still here sorry my water heater broke so um that’s why I’m not there uh the additional transparency and the increased transparency into your point Alec getting out in front of things and getting the information out there that for the questions that we know people are going to ask before they even ask them is just helping to Garner more support and Garner more trust from the community which it was obviously as we know lacking so this Administration has has really you know you know seek to improve hugely and it’s amazing thank you Alon and I guess on that point the last point I’ll make on salaries is so we filled most of the vacant positions so we’re signing off in

1:09:41 a budget Mike’s looked very closely at this and it’s really good I guess where are you at in terms of is this the appropriate roster for the town of marel because we get that question all the time is what do our analytics look like on desie and this and that and and desie can be misleading as we’ve all talked about before and and certain 20,000 uh you know population towns maybe not the same as another one and whatnot but again telling your own story The these are our staffing per student ratios and this is why ahead of time how do you feel about where it is now and where do you think that may be in the next few years projected en so I think well there’s a narrative about this that the enrollment is

1:10:26 decreasing it’s it’s it does this it’s it’s G to continue this so I had someone someone call me day and said oh I heard that we were we were 600 kids down and we’re talking about doing the the 30b housing or whatever and you know so does that mean we take you know 600 kids back into the schools I’m like that’s that’s a bizarre narrative to have but um so anyway the Staffing the answer the simple answer is yes I think the Staffing that we have in place is appropriate for for the needs we currently have identified um I think that as we move forward in doing all things I talked about earlier with especially in the special education realm I think there’s some efficiencies that will come out of that and I know it s it sounds counterintuitive and I think this is the hard dialogue to have and people for for people to understand is

1:11:11 that you know we’re saying we need more robust and more um you know especially that program that’s a little bit more resource um Rich to be able to bring the kids back in in my estimation it doesn’t mean that we have to hire a bunch more people it just means we need to reallocate staff that we have so that we can create that programming um and in that process I actually honestly feel that there there’ll be some staff reductions just um um through some of the the reallocation of how we do the programming so for instance would be you know if we have you know in a school that serves say three grade levels and we have currently and I’m making this up so don’t quote me we have three classrooms that service this specific

1:11:56 population of kids and it’s uh you know xrade and we look at we say listen I know it’s three separate grades but the students needs very similar to one another so instead of having xrade all separate we can maybe have xrade xrade in this classroom and X grade next grade in this classroom and consolidate that the two instead of three or four classrooms and provide the proper resources and what that does is when you look at it instead of having say nine staff maybe you have six staff but you’re actually service the kids better because then you have you can create small groupings of um uh instructional groupings you can pair kids to have more similar needs than you can I think there’s been a thought process in Marblehead and maybe other districts where you know we separate the

1:12:42 kids out so that we have a teacher and three kids in a classroom of spe you know significant special ed and that’s a better thing I don’t subscribe to that I think I I was a special education teacher with significant social emotional um disabilities and I would take 10 kids of very high need over having two or three in a classroom and the reason being is because then you can separate kids into like um abilities small grouping and you can educate them and engage them much better than you can if there’s only three kids in the classroom and I know that’s a mindset change that’s a that’s a cultural shift because I think right now we do have several classrooms that are structured that way so yes this the the Staffing is appropriate for our current programming

1:13:29 yeah as we as we migrate the Staffing the current Staffing will not be appropriate for our migration yes as those as the contracts ramp up and as you continue it it’s you’re navigating the Staffing regardless of what you’re paying them and then you’re navigating the challenge of the budget that’s available yes and you’re going to have to do it all together and make it work and you do think there will be some efficiencies as as the um as the contracts escalate maybe there are some efficiencies found to be able to you know have pay less people they have well they have to because because the thing that I don’t want to look at a to look I don’t want to look at a situation where because what we’ve

1:14:15 obligated in salaries that we have to say we have to cut 45 staff this year right to be to or get a $2 million override to do St I think the I think personally and then maybe I said I think there needs to be combination right so if if we know that the to just say the town says well you know you’re not going to two $2.3 million anymore you’re GNA get we could project you’re GNA get a million right and I know that our increase is going to be two and a half million so that I know maybe there’s a Delta of a million where I have to find some savings right so does that mean a million dollars worth of Staff savings or does that mean $500 worth of St savings and maybe some money in an override but you know this year and then next year we combine it together um those are the conversations I don’t have answers to yet and I know that’s very

1:15:01 frustrating for people but I think those are the things we that those are the conversations we’re having I think Lee blander asked last night that same similar question and when did you start playing this I said she might ask so um so I said you know I think I basically said like you know as soon as the town votes this in town meeting the next day we start we start having those discussions about how we start ramping up for for next budget so I think that answers your question but yeah no it does when we first met um Molly and I said we you know it’s been you know Sarah’s been through the whole thing as well there’s been a lot of uh leadership of the schools has turned over a lot right and there’s been a lot of volatility on Town and school side quite frankly sometimes it’s good to have a fresh look at things and the first thing we said was we just want it to be done

1:15:46 right we want this budget built so that we’re not seeing surpluses in one spot and whatnot and it’s going to take time um and right sizing the the roster and signing a new contract which when we met wasn’t in place there’s been a lot of challenges so far but I think yeah the messages that moving forward there’s there’s a lot of more work to do and in you know I don’t have all the answers I certainly don’t and I think but I think that again these kind of conversations the internal conversation you have the support from the school committee um in all these conversations is huge and without like without all those pieces in place this would be an exercise of futility and I can guarantee you like as superintendent if like we weren’t having these collaborative conversations and or the school committee wasn’t being supportive or our

1:16:33 team wasn’t cohesive like what why why would I say Marblehead head like that like would I say Marblehead like that like that’s that’s there’s so many competing demands I love the fact I came in and all these things have kind of come together and I see it as a positive thing I see there’s a lot of really good growth happening in town um I think our administrative teams just really come together we have some we have a lot of really good St happen schools and I think um we have to tap into those resources we have to make sure that they’re you know that they’re being supported in a way so they’re they’re um you know uh educating students the way they need to and and again you know there’s some trust issues they’ve had five I think I’m the fifth superintendent four years that’s that’s craziness right for for people um you know principles I mean we’ve had right

1:17:19 now like only three of our principles have been here more than a year you know that’s that’s crazy and assistant principles I mean all you know 80 no 60% of our administrative teams new because of July one that’s a Hu that’s you get like like a principal an assist maybe an assistant superintendent maybe a business manager everyone I walked in July one 14 people in this building seven of them were new seven out of 14 half half the people in this building were new Walking July one we’re all at each other what are we all doing here like what’s happening you know um we did we met in an office yeah but but we’ve come together I I think it’s it’s been great so um you know a lot of people say why you why you’re in marel that’s crazy you’re driving there nuts crazy stuff going on I’m there’s so much positive

1:18:06 here I’m not saying that because I’m you know want my contract to roll over I’m saying it because like are you gonna give them spoiler John is so happy here he wants to move he’s a twoyear interim wants to be more permanent but that speaks to the good work that’s that’s happening here yeah and I think you know again and that’s I’m not saying all because I want I’m saying because I I truly feel that if I didn’t iation I can’t imagine the 2hour Comm appealing enough to falsify what you’re saying it’s not it’s not appealing but it’s not as I mean I think about it and like oh my God you drive two hours it’s it’s not as bad the drive itself isn’t as bad as you think it’s the

1:18:52 issue is like my time away from my wife has been a little bit stressful so I’m taking a vacation week and I’m going I’m not bringing my phone and I have to because otherwise I won’t be able to say Marblehead head for other so you know I Marblehead for other so you know I think I think that’s important because I want you know I’m very transparent very open and honest probably wear things more sleep than I should but um I think you know there’s a lot of good stuff happen I I like the community I’ve been supported by the

1:19:21 community so then I guess the last kind of thing we’ve we’ve covered it in depth in the past um you built the salaries as good as close as you can right on the on the out of District tuition we’ve talked about at length it’s gone up significantly even with that new circuit breaker offset mechanism way to present it which is great we talked about um this is what you truthfully feel we need so that is uh that is our current roster yeah um adding in we anybody who’s aging out at age 22 you age out of the program out of any obligation to the school district um we’ve to my understanding removed those students but we did put five placeholders in there at collaborative rates so collaboratives is the least

1:20:08 least expensive uh type of a of District tuition it’s a public school model um it’s not a private school it’s not a residential obviously uh so we have five placeholders in the budget for collaborative now that money’s in there it may end up being three private it may end up being something some other configuration what’s the cost of a collaborative so what is it 375 divid 5 is what I think we put in there so it’s total 375,000 no it’s annual tuition it’s probably in the 60s 70s um give give or take private schools 65

1:20:54 yeah I didn’t look at that a while yeah would be like 80 and depends on the services every every

1:21:03 little do is that like a common practice to put placeholder for that a number based on the number of kids you there’s two ways you you do it one of two ways either you put a placeholder in or you don’t remove the kids who are aging out right right and and if you really want to be safe you do both you leave the kids who are AG sometimes I just get curious did you say 22 like age on their 22nd birthday they are they are sorry to be naive but what are they doing between 18 and 22 so it’s so it’s 18 and 22 catchment it’s not all kids on not all kids that have special needs require that level but there are the kids that have significant needs we are obligated Massachusetts till 22 and normally this good question the topic

1:21:49 normally between 182 it’s transition activities it’s like how do we make sure that you’re understand how to do life skills not noted y they might do like a um for instance when we used to have that 18 to 22 year old program over at ath one room was set up as a bank one room was set up as a grocery store um and one room was set up like a home so you would teach them maybe how you would work at a grocery store life skills no I didn’t know if it had something to do with like college or something so right now unfortunately that’s one of the things we have to look at when we look at evth and all these different build buildings we have is that program got displaced with the brown um they used to have a dedicated space right now I believe they’re at vets but it’s it’s a

1:22:35 very small small number but there’s still students that deserve to kind of not be shot so so again this this speaks to a of programming so if you don’t have solid 18 to 20 year old program within your District where you’re where you’re creating life skills situations to kids have because you you’re obligated to educate them if you don’t have your own programming somewhere so some of those currently are out of District some of those age more than likely yes I I have look B kids but yes um because yeah you’re obligated to pay and if you don’t have transitional activities or life skills activities in your District that meets those kids needs they end up on the district which is a higher cost speak and is that’s a state requirement or federal or both

1:23:21 Massachusetts is age 22 rhod island is age 21 so it’s it’s a state um different states and the funding for the support of that is nonexistent you circuit breaker and everything else and they’re on your roster you get the Chapter 70 money but yeah we get so little Chapter 70 M it’s just as if gradu instead of graduating when they normally would they they would they would leave our system at 22 yeah with like a c certificate certificate of completion or you know attendance or something like that typically um y so yeah you brought up State versus Federal I’ll just do my one minute lurb on this we’re not I just want to acknowledge openly in a public meeting we’re not sticking our heads in the sand that

1:24:06 grant money could potentially have some volatility my list um but but the bottom line is if a grant like the ibea grant were to just disappear the Federal grant which I think we rely on for about 800,000 something’s got to give somewhere that’s not just going to be a Marblehead hit problem that is going to be an entire syst problem everywhere and when you look at it like Massachusetts it’s the state’s gonna have so yes we are we have I these guys have had calls for me they’ve given me information back um it’s definitely something that I am hyperfocused on and and everyone’s aware of but again it’s so

1:24:52 volatile so so my answer to like oh what are we going to do the Federal so my general answer to that question I’m not doing anything differently than we’re doing right now until or unless our Department of Education here in Massachusetts and and the folks that run the legal system here in Massachusetts tell me anything different so all the stuff that’s going on in the federal level like oh you have to take away Dei stuff you have to do this or you lose all by today right it’s it to me it’s noise and to me it’s noise until our state people says th sh correct wise we’re going to drive ourselves nuts it’s chicken little stuff we’re running around the heads cut off um if I get a call from the commissioner of Education says Hey listen your Ida money just

1:25:38 disappeared yes then then we have all the conversations and but until then like we want to be as proactive as possible but I don’t want to be reactive to some of the nonsense that’s happening federally and um and that’s not a political thing that’s not a liberal that’s rightwing thing just it’s just how I am I I don’t I don’t I try not to be reactive and over um you know overzealous about things that until I know they’re in in a situation so desie is our governing body for Education Department of Education and secondary secondary education Massachusetts until they tell me otherwise operating as a and that’s fair but I think it needs to be you know certainly needs to be set out loud potential yeah set out loud and be

1:26:25 a potential for the eventuality I’m not saying you should do anything about can I also ask the number for um for fiscal 25 and 26 projected budget is the same number for for the federal grants right you have the estimate is still the yeah so yeah we won’t know the award until uh August I believe yeah comes kind of late okay when have have the full amount of funds been allocated for fiscal 25 do we have in so on the budget in the in the bank so to speak no they’re not in the budget though M because if the funds are coming from a grant that

1:27:11 doesn’t show up in our budget because this is just the general fund I think but I think what he’s asking is we’re paying someone with that money yeah exactly so we when we when we get awarded I’m sorry when we get notified of an award for a grant we only look at the entitlement Awards which are Title 1 2 3 4 in idea in early childhood this six GRS but four aump into one and two lump under another we are required to apply for that money and we tell them how we’re going to spend it we’re going to spend on Staffing we’re going to spend it on programs we’re going to spend it on supplies Contract Services we tell we have to fill out an application and we tell them how we’re going to spend the money just like our regular budget if we say we’re going to send it on salaries but we can’t fild that position for 3 months there’s a likelihood that we’re going to have three months of salary r

1:27:57 in the budget in that Grant all of our federal grants are actually 21mon grants they run okay so they’ve got some they give you some time the re the the legal side of it is that you’re supposed to spend 85% of it I believe in the first year and you can Tide call it Tiding they can Tide 15% to the next year um I don’t know how strict they are on that I’ll just leave it at that okay I I believe I believe that yeah you you have to ask permission at the end of the year and say he I want to tie this into the next year I don’t believe we tapped our 85% in FY 24 so the state always says always spend last year’s money before you start spending this year’s money so if we carried money forward it’s likelihood we

1:28:43 will carry money forward again next year yeah we looked pretty closely last year at obviously revolving which we’ll touch on in a minute but um the grants as well the the grants didn’t seem to have as much I guess you call it Tiding or carryover um historically but it sounds like maybe there is some it’s built I think it’s built un listen to the plan you know you remind you so the announcement doesn’t come until August you have to apply for it and as soon as you apply technically you can start spending that day reality you’re supposed to wait for it to be approved and sometimes you can take revisions going back and forth yeah so it’s usually two months before into the school year before and if you’re had a position in there you can’t start paying that ition legally until the grant is approved so you’ve got two

1:29:30 months of on the Lea to start with and there’s a little bit of a cat and mouse game with that that’s where you use your 15% from the year before to cover the first two months because your that gr is already approved so you can use that money amend your grants this Christ goes through a lot with amending grants and filing draw um and the other part of is we don’t get the money up front it’s a reimbursement so every month at the end of the month Krist has to send a report to or want log into the state’s website and itemize everything we spent by category and then they will send the reimbursement okay have you had any reimbursements to no we put in for 200 just about $200,000 we did we did a big draw down on the day that they said they might affect federal grants but they didn’t affect Federal entitlement grants entitlement to your point entitlement

1:30:15 grants are different than a lot of the other funding so like all of the six grants you mentioned their entitlement as is like nutrition things like that but the federal grants are a year behind on the funding yeah so what we’re getting for fiscal 25 was approved in fiscal 24 from the federals from the federal state but the number is the 947 992 you because you that’s what you applied for for fiscal we no it’s an entitlement Grant so we don’t apply for it they give it to us but we we have to submit an application but our numberers already set it it’s it’s ton it’s a guarantee yeah in previous administrations it’s been a guarantee you were going to get this money when they tell you this the money you’re G to get right we’re Administration and I’m not get into Poli we don’t get it until

1:31:01 we spend it we were expl desie explained to us that the money for fiscal 25 was appropriated in fiscal 24 I believe that there’s things happening in Washington DC so that that could just be a we don’t care when it was appropriated hold the money back anyways right um but right now they’re not touching the education grants in in any way I think there’s there’s other targets they have um but to your point point they won’t be looking at those GRS you know in I think the bigger issue is the passrs that happen at the state level and that’s not just a school issue all right um so I’d like to have one more of these before our budget hearing which won’t be until I think

1:31:49 331 so I think our kind of like third overall topic and we can think about other things to to talk about as well as is um you know that revolving fund roll forward and just kind of since we started that last year and I thought it was very helpful to just follow up on that and and kind of compare you know I’m thinking about two screens like your current year general fund budget and that and what’s in those balances and how those two things interact it’s really the story and I know when when we met last I think you have a really good roll forward of that I think maybe the email you sent over earlier this week might had the wrong attachment um for the revolving stuffen no I’m just kidding h no never retentional uh I didn’t do anything with revolving so maybe was there was there a revolving tab in there somewhere oh no

1:32:34 there was a third attachment but it was just that file that I had kind of summarized last year okay you just sent back so I didn’t know if you had like mine vers yours and you

1:32:49 the it was outdated da um but you’ve got a projection for revolving funds and in Grant is that is that in something that I don’t have this is in the budget book budget okay so we can look at it there okay I just would like to have a conversation about it like I didn’t get a budget book call then ask for one you want one can I you have to

1:33:19 can on your I was not going to make any minders that were going to sit there going to waste the money

1:33:27 use the one online okay because it’s an Adobe Acrobat you can click on the table of confence it’ll take you right to the area want go some people like me like paper I like paper but that’s a cost that’s where we can cut

1:33:50 budgets I like having the budget that I can yeah PA you agreed that we I thought we did a really good job and the schools did a really good job last year of actually like better under it’s just half of This Is Us understanding how this big puzzle works so we can articulate the taxpayers what’s going on right so with revolving accounts and it’s got all the actual balances though so yeah so yeah I’m still waiting for the town to but it doesn’t eventually like see so because it’s a revolving account at the end of the year they need to close the books and they need to move that money into the next revolving year time has not necessarily done that yet I I think it’s a it’s a backlog from

1:34:36 multiple departments but I think it it may start it’s not it’s not at least just direct problem but other other departments are affecting her being able to roll those numbers forward so I I did my own spreadsheets with my own manual rolling I think I have a good idea where we ended last year um where were this year but until they actually roll the numbers I would feel more comfortable making sure that my numbers reflect what they’re actually going to roll yeah I mean this is this is the the raw data that were on my underlying tabs so I could I could refresh it yeah he has them it’s just it sounds like I will say little B I felt that the kindergarten tuition line was not hit

1:35:22 this year curring year the way it was the way it should have been so I have allocated more money in FY 26’s budget to hit that house I took I took half of every employee who has kindergarten kindergarten teacher or kindergarten instructional assistant I took half of every one of theirs and moved it into the revolving account okay so I’m hitting that harder but I I I’m not doing I made sure not to do it to the effect that we’re gonna have a problem in three years that we’re going to spend it down too fast just again I think we’ve we’ve met for a while now I think at our next meeting we’d love to look at your best girl forward of that um and just as a preview we learned a ton about circuit breaker last year I don’t think there’s

1:36:08 too much more to talk about there so that’s good that’s a big one that has a carrying balance um school lunch was one that we spent a lot of time on last year and we actually moved some after our conversations from school lunch back so we we took the director’s salary we put the director salary there but just school lunch is 100% funded right now we’re aware no we got it we can talk about it next time yeah kindergarten preschool was one you just mentioned we can talk about and then there’s special education tuition and foreign tuition where the other the other ones are all like I mean we’ll see the new schedule but 13,000 bucks small foreign the foreign tuition one actually was sizable at the end last year but it was supposed

1:36:54 to be spent down if you recall what did you call it the for forign tuitional I think we might have made up that name so but it’s I use the titles that are in the DAT I think it’s better to call foreign tuition versus education because right now it’s Educators but it doesn’t mean that we’re going to stay with that company if we I mean yeah it’s like saying we need an elevator maintenance line yeah should we just put Embry in the budget you know or or what big elevator company but whatever leaving it as generic it allows you to the extent these have balances and to the extent any of them are growing for whatever reason will be helpful as you enter next year’s budget and think about how do we balance better without

1:37:41 presumably 2.4 million increase in the general right and we have to balance that that’s all we’re asking is we’re looking at the full picture and we’re doing the right we have to balance that with making sure that decimating those Revol point where like now we’re we can’t to egg we just want to know that the process is happening and we trust that it is Sim the grant funding right so like you know I’ve had these conversations in previous life where like oh well you get you get $750,000 from from Ida so we’re going to reduce your local budget by that no because you know the local budget local budget and that’s like a like you know you you know supplementing the budget from those gr of things so like we have to look at those things and you know I think again Joe Q public says well you have this

1:38:27 money over here then it should be reduced over here like no it’s in addition to so that we don’t have to raise a local budget by this month so I think those conversations have to happen um in a more open but but last year was the first year we actually had deep conversations and I think I think they help I think they helped both sides right us understand and then even like the school committee got a better understanding of it right is that fair um it wasn’t my lack of understanding we weren’t in agreement on spending down some of them um it worked out okay um and it was a way to get through another fiscal year um but she I don’t think we need reserves in school lunch of like a million dollar that but that one’s protected you can’t you can’t spend that on anything but school lunch can you confirm that there’s no costs in our

1:39:13 general fund budget at all I could probably charge off a little bit of custodial Services that’s all we’re asking that’s that’s those have to be spread to every entitlement Grant in the same percentages the same way if you do it for one this is revolving no it doesn’t know the we have to’s a percent no absolutely just the concept like we shouldn’t be carrying reserves just to carry reserves we should be making it work as like electric all that no absolutely the circuit breaker one makes perfect sense to me but if you’re if you’re maximizing the usage of that then yes I agree yes and school lunch is a little bit different anal because of free lunch can only spend it for lunch so but those are things we say hey if

1:39:59 you if you need to buy a stove a refrigerator resurface the lunchroom change the tables all that all comes you it saves because you don’t need to get Ser product so we talked about it came a lot so like yeah know I love this probably pretty good right exactly so um In fairness what we we did talk about this in our budget Workshop that because that’s a a very unique one that you can only kind of spend it down in house not just in in the district but in the the I want to say callary buts in the Food Services Department um one thing we talked about is with the food service director at the budget Workshop um was that next year he will start using more

1:40:46 um scratch cooking versus he had been relying on pre-made that you kind of warm up because it’s a lower price point because we have some more money we’re going to give our students Bud based on what you’re getting that’s also training of staff to to be able to do I wasn’t calling just using it as anle no and that’s and that’s a good way to look at it Al and I think and it’s good to have the conversation because people might say well there’s a million dollars slide that over to salaries like why why you you can balance a budget that way but you can’t so it have in the conversation that money can only be year mark for this and we’ll do better at year mark St that’s and and this is something we’re doing with every Department across the town obviously schools are not unique having revolving

1:41:31 funds and it’s something that bencom really has been Health waste last year they had a budget request and there was the money available we said what about that revolving fund and we talked through it and Andrew said well I need it for this and and they figured out a solution between him and Alicia so right and I think you know again I said it earlier I’ll say it again you know I think Mike and I have very similar and prist have very similar philosophies around you know we’re not not going to create budgets that have all sorts of Fu just in case like you know we want to make sure that we’re utilizing them obligations properly um and knowing that there’s always some things that can kind of you know in educate it’s different like right so like Police Department I have X amount of officers I have X amount is to trend for the overtime so I I can have a pretty good idea what I’m spending right education is vastly

1:42:17 different than that for a lot of the reasons we already talked about but like we still need to be able to say to you and to the public this is what we need need to run the district and this is our trends for why we need that money and exactly here’s like if there’s money that goes back to town it’s because of this like again like if there go back to the town thiss year the first the dialogue and the the narrative in the town going be like why didn’t you give a teach more money because you had money to turn back we have money to turn back because potentially because we had Jes went on fil and that increases the money that may be S spend so and then and then even better that I take away from today is just because they were unfilled that doesn’t mean they were vacant the whole year and that doesn’t mean they’re vacant right

1:43:02 now and it also means they weren’t vac because you don’t need them so that that’s so there three parts of that conversation and that was asked specifically for the school committee around I think people hear I think we got to be careful when people say that I think they hear unfilled and they think that means it’s unfilled right now and it might have just been unfilled for two months but that could have been a big amount of savings if you do that 10 times right 10 different people for two months you know we’re we’re in a situation where there’s a there’s a um a deficit in Educators out there so so unfilled position like I and I had this conversation with the Union I just want to share this so the union says oh we’ve never had a situation where we had all these other positions I said but there’s a shortage of teachers in the United States it’s not a Marblehead there’s a shortage of teachers there’s a shortage

1:43:48 of Administrators shortage of superintendent and so when you have open positions years ago you can swing it can’t hit 10 elementary teachers you can’t do that anym you might hit four instead of 10 and then you look at special or physics or World Language that number becomes exponentially less so yes um this open position to stay open longer and yes we still need them and how did you feel them we feel that we had to Cobble things together like for instance at the high school we were out of languages we had to have people that were teaching outside their outside of their um area of expertise so that we can continue run you know Spanish or Latin class or something until we could fulfill a position so those that’s a narrative that it’s very difficult to quantify for the numbers people but

1:44:34 that’s the reality of the situation so again the more conversations we have the better okay so yeah well Molly if you want to coordinate a meeting um I think we’re on Monday let’s see here for the actual hearing with our full committee to vote the budget is Monday the 31st what does that look like do we give a present so you guys yeah you the select board departments and then probably one or two others that are left at that that’s the last budget hearing approval night but it’ll be at probably basement of Mary allei and then will our full thcom will be sitting in like a u and you guys will come up do like a full budget presentation kind of like what you did last night not yeah maybe not even it’s in depth it might even be like just you

1:45:22 know um ex similar to what we talked about today like we can go budget actual not not for two hours right last night was 10 minutes we are liaison right so so Molly Pat and I are introducing you all we we prefer that you guys present it but we’re there to say hey like we’ve gone over these numbers and hey like remember what we talked about last time that’s right so that you can say it to the full committee where’re liais on so basically down dirty numbers and this is the point of this meeting is to avoid two hours with the full thing we’ll be typing up notes we call them I’ll be giving them notes that cover the highlights of what we’ve covered in all these meetings John did great job Chris

1:46:09 exactly first the bolded first stamp that have it at the high I’m sure we could work if they wanted to have it at the high school in the library instead of no fine down here we have just anything it is we have we have what I’m just giving you the heads up is anything that has to do with the the schools and finance we’ve been seeing a larger increase in crowds so we love that nobody comes to our

1:46:35 meeting spcom publicly posted meeting not a school committee right you’re the guest yeah sometime um if Allison and I both are are gonna be there I’ll definitely be there but if Alison is gonna be there too we will post as a ume to cover yeah so since you guys are new of

1:47:03 those last because they’re the biggest board has like 13 or 14 that roll up into it they don’t have their own like board or they have SEL do we present the select board here no so then after that third budget hearing night the first Monday in April I think it’s the 7th we do the warrant hearing but we’ve already done all these Le on meetings all these groups that we’re not on most of them they’re doing their thing right now we’ve done three budget hearings so we’ve discussed all the pie with the full fincom and voted on it so when we get to I don’t know what article it is this year it’s around 30 usually the balanced budget we give an overall presentation of it but generally like the school will not come up unless somebody asks a question to be there for the roof no yeah there’ll be

1:47:52 other so um for the warrant hearing that’s to get I’m hosting that yeah he’s the MC I am it’s it’s a long meeting that’s a good question we want to have in we have our next meeting to discuss the other one article oh yeah I need to sit down debt exclusion does that something that the three of us that we would meet with them I mean we can discuss fa subcommittee yeah also me we’re happy to um so just let me know so I book the right people it’s just if we or if you want to you can just present that to the full fincom for the first time too so it’s just which one which one that exclusion okay and then what about the warrant hearings what what

1:48:37 from our end do you need for that the warrant the April 7th well that’s what I’m saying is because we’ve done all of these meetings and then we’ve done a hearing we voted on your budget I will when we get to the talk about budget first the balanced budget I don’t expect that you need to come up unless somebody asks a question that I can’t answer and Mike’s in the audience I have to say Mike can you help meting

1:49:02 or historically there’s the warrant hearing they don’t have anything to ask us unless we have a separate warrant article sponsored by the schools we happen to this year for the roof so that’s otherwise if there’s not a separate warrant article sponsored by the schools nothing happens at the warrant hearing really not not a lot happens on their part feil we have the the roof for the 8.6 million and we have we talked about a feasibility study yesterday at our hearing is that a different article no that we don’t we wouldn’t present that night and that it’s part of our Capital request that thater I don’t think the night we’re approving or voting on your budget I should say um that we need to talk about

1:49:49 a capital warrant article if we want to have if you want us to meet with your facilities ahead of the warrant hearing so that like it’s a Lea on leaz on to that if you think that would help because the more I’m educated and Molly and Pat are educated the better we can help you provide context during the warrant here because the LA sometimes the citizens positions for example if we’re not briefed on them it can get like a little bit like tense oh wait so the one that says that all the administrators have to live in town that I don’t know that you know I don’t know if there’s a financial implication to the town of that so we anything but let’s put it this way there were articles last

1:50:36 I I’m just saying we have to payed in Bost and

1:50:42 they the whole thing for us is are there financial implications of this article and that’s the thing that drives me the craziest about this fincom Ro is like the debate whether there are if if we’re debating whether there are financial implications I’m just going to say okay there’s not enough financial implications for me to really at this point move on talk a town meeting right but obviously warrant articles where there’s like Capital requests for Millions we need to vote on as well and vote our recommendations and and sometimes the art the articles are usually pretty obvious whether or not there’s financial implications or not there have been times when it’s like proponent of the article has felt not are there financial implications of the leaf blower band that’s been on there

1:51:27 for seven years right and I’m like well it would cost the town more because they use leaf blowers to clean the cemetery I’m like enough I I can’t talk about this anymore I got in trouble for saying that last so just big picture that think about the budget the three budget hearings the full fincom hearings that we have get us to the answer for one balanced budget the for the balanced budget article that’s just all one article the warrant hearing is all the articles that come up we revote article 30 balanced budget that Bas and I itemize every list as our recommendation right and then at town meeting Jack the

1:52:14 moderator will will list the school’s total bottomline number the health and waste bottom line number everyone everyone and and people can put holds on them if they want to talk about them it’s another fun no I know no it’s why it’s always been my my experience is like that warrant article is like the whole entire town budget is in that one article and if someone challenges it then the moderator will open up and line by line that’s the way it works that town meting yeah yeah at the art at the warrant article hearing it’s whether or not Alec will ask does anyone have any questions public comment for public comment an article it’s it’s like a 4our plus

1:52:59 meeting I’ll try to make it faster push us people have meetings at 11: yeah all done yeah I’m gonna join us at um 1058 Molly yep oh nice