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Westmoreland School Board Meeting - Budget Work Session for Saturday, January 2, 2021

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Westmoreland School Board Meeting - Budget Work Session Date, Time: for Saturday, January 2, 2021 – 9:00AM. Meeting Location: The Westmoreland School Board members attended the meeting remotely. Transcription available upon request.

Show Transcript

appreciate everybody joining us on our our annual budget Workshop like to start off by just introducing and and or having Christine and Susan introduce yourselves so let's take a minute or two just introduce yourself and go from there I'm going to go for a few years now technically the chairman we had one person moved out of town so they have been replaced by Bill Chase I know that he is trying to sign on and we have a new full-time member Christine I don't know how to pronounce your last name honey but she she comes with some some work experience on this end too so we're pretty happy to have her on 4th I got a new Christian muted thank you for the tip Christina Del Mar McKenna technically super long and obnoxious but I don't have a lot of experience with budget this dies when smaller budgets like there been a couple boards but I'm green and I'm excited what's the address of formality to run through right Rob so we have to announce where we're at we are where we're at and that we're okay to be recorded do we have to go through that exercise because you called it to order I pressed record so if there's an objection I'll stop it Dean why don't we start with you that's adding freon to my home in Westmoreland and I'm okay to be recorded awesome thank you Stephanie hi Stephanie Kelly I'm at home in Westmoreland and I'm okay to be recorded thank you Maddie hi Madeline cast them at my home here in Westmoreland and I'm okay to be recorded super thank you Kevin hi Kevin Powell my home in Westland gar and I'm okay to be record fantastic also joining on today's meeting that are the principal in Westmoreland School Mark Hayward our business manager for Westmoreland Scott Lazaro assistant superintendent Brian Campbell keeping us honest with the with the minutes this morning is Deb Nelson and myself Rob mullahey and width at the meeting call your sir very good so I hope this meeting is short and simple I think we've got this ironed out and done pretty well over the last number of years and Scott has continued to know on with what we've done in the past with our financial support from SAU so Scott if you don't mind pulling up the I think the first thing we should go through is just a budget Overview at the high level. Last year this year I'm just showing where I believe that's a genda item number one and just for formality say Christine and in Susan we do an emergency meeting with emergency meeting call an emergency meeting when we do remote meetings as a formality this number is available if if public does join we we can address the public input as as those questions come up is there a printed you know online did you send the link as to what we will be reviewing this morning am I missing it Skagen off if it's possible to send out if I thought agenda so I just I thought it was there but I'm not seeing it now if there's something specific need to get out of there once was a couple of files said that Scott can send out normally have the big three ring binder in person and I have several of them printed out here and I'll bring one home with me when I leave the meeting and catch up with you appreciate it so you are doing Scott screen and it says please is that your on your screen yeah that's Scott and I'm sitting can move Windows around because I got the big red message Scott are you on mute Rob's you know what that weird messages in my screen. How do I get rid of it yeah can you click and drag it doesn't look like you can all right so I guess I just start with a the budget overview and Dean had suggested if the what I find is the easiest is if the Board review who's the budget analysis report which is the munis back up that way cuz what you're seeing here and I'll say this for anyone new to this process is this overview she breaks everything down in the major category so you have 1100 which is regular instruction that covers everything for regular instructions whether it's salary supplies benefits retirement replacement equipment Print Media Group everything under regular instruction so this is not designed to be a detail deep-dive it's designed to give you as Dean said this is what it was last year this is what it is this year this is the change in dollar the change in percentage and I make a little note off the side what the big difference is between those two years it's helpful if you go through the very detailed explanation while I'm going over the highway and then you can ask for specific questions be like okay it looks good but why are we up 20% and print media and then you know Mark and jump in with wild this year were trying a new program for reading and we had to purchase a whole new set up box in online software and if we can really get into that deep dive if you have any questions so we'll starting its regular instruction and I don't know how to get that stupid thing off my screen that's really frustrating see if I can move around so we can stroll all right so there's a 1% decrease over $19,000 of the major drivers in this account are benefit elections decrease so that is employees changing a benefit plants may be going through family bandana to partnership for 2-person down when one person does it cost to make a large difference in the opposite direction and increases we have been gmr groza guaranteed Max rate which is the insurance company telling us that the insurance benefits while not predicted completely for next year big guarantee it will not be over 6.1 increase cell for budgeting purposes we budget for the Max rated sometimes it comes in at that sometimes it comes unless they've given us 4.6% as increase the budget this year to actually came in at .84 so we actually work to the good on that this year New Hampshire retirement system is showing an 18.09% entry status. Can you do me a favor on your screen to scroll over so she calms ab&c there we go thank you okay so that is a large increase it's something completely outside of our control much like the health insurance rates it's up by the states there has been some shortfalls projected in there in past years so they're continuing to increase that every couple years to try to make up for those projected short calls that's all based on actual reason formulas and generally it doesn't move every year so that we're seeing an increase this year does not mean that we're going to see one next year it could be stable couple years it could change that's right now you can say to that we're budgeting for a high will tuition if you're looking at there at the backup it pretty much remained flat there's a slight decrease in the print media are the print media, most of the accounts in this line have pretty much stayed the same Mark hasn't increased any of the lines that he has control over like supplies or print media the major changes are all and things we are outside of our control benefit elections New Hampshire retirement system intuition although tuition stayed the same so far does anybody have any questions on the radio read side of it just for clarification for folks that are new Here regular instruction is our bassist there's a fixed cost to what Mark in and what we do at Westmoreland School so there's not there's not a lot we can change those that are there here we did you didn't negotiate the teacher contract last year for a four year deal this year the first year that right Scott so we have three more years that's pretty stable through the benefits is budgeted for the max gross however what's our historic this was a reminder what's are his performance for that typically it's less than Earth Air Max Wright last year like call Dad us so we usually I guess what I'm trying to say there is usually are gmr's pretty conservative typically well it did really depends on their predictions usage and cost I believe in Rob you can correct me but I believe in years prior to me being here they've seen 20% increases in that yeah that's correct. Dean you might recall this as I can on we were seeing guaranteed maximum rates in the high double-digit 12 High Teens I should say not high double digits but I jeans and I think once we even touched on 20% but came in significantly lower than that so you know the 6% sounds bad but we've definitely seen worse gmr's guaranteed maximum rates and at least the last five years or the five years that I've been doing this marketing you would have for folks that are new here for this line oh no that's pretty straightforward all right then just a just a kind of good will go into before Scott gets into the high school tuition the way we get charged or high school tuitions is a rate that determine the whistle go through in a minute but ER how many kids we send and are attending 9 10 11 12 that's how much times that rate we pay for high school attendees so just so folks are aware of how that works okay all right so I see no changes there the next line is the 1200 special instruction in much like regular instruction discounts everything falls under that from teachers to support staff to tutors health insurance mileage supplies print media in-state and out-of-state tuition so basically there's categories for tuition within special at where is it regular at we just paid tuition to Keene high school there are students in this is all based on their IEPs that either placed in mainstream I guess it's a special individual needs require there are some students whose needs beyond the capability of Keene high school so for those students they get placed in what we call out-of-district placements in those can be either day programs or they go just like they would the King High School but with more help involved or cases the students in for residential placements were they actually live there so looking through the changes in the especially and support staff salaries slight decrease in the health insurance and that's got to be a benefit election not much change in the FICA retirement of a c we went down a little bit there was salaries in the regular support staff so we're looking at retirement went down a little bit there $300 decrease in the supply line the tuition in state for before I believe that $6,000 is preschool tuition and then there's a significant decrease showing in the special at Keene High School tuition and that's really dry that major decrease in the overall budget year that is so things that can change will change in we are constantly updating that that's something that I will be going through again Springs that we had before myntra nobody new has moved into the district or nobody's moved out of the district so that we can make this as accurate as possible when we presented to the public again A lot can happen between March and September but we do our best to Mom Wisconsin a sky I'm in white Scott everybody else is here and it but it's it's we trust that your you know wherever you're at and everything is good will just go listening to your voice and show your show your screen but turning video off it might help okay is that better Dean yeah yeah we do something this is something I learn with my Consolidated consultant here recently so our lines are designed to bring data in so what everybody's dealing with with all these no remote learning and zoom call this when you send that out you you start absorbing your line speed self anyway this fiber supposably last month so it's not here yet so the major so that the tuition rate at King High School is the major decrease in the overall budget to smell the largest decrease in the overall budget in that could change then we're going to continue to monitor that anyone have any questions for the special education line I'll jump I'll say that usually each year if you look at the tuition lime have 325 students are sold each class that are what identified this year if we have no special ed students in 8th grade so that's a zero they are so that really is the main driver behind that decrease over like you said that we could someone to move in move out of most part I think that will still be a big a big drop that's great call outside the primary reason because special ed is typically about twice our rate of 30,000 proximately so I was going to ask. Did we get that other item that we had last year cleared up where I'm not sure exactly the specifics here but we had somebody that had changed the needed blind skating we provided in and then we end up picking up a little bit more on that and but I thought we ended up finishing the year that we weren't going to get hit with that extra cost this year for some other weather was a federalist for the Contra War the other support was coming from can you help me out with that moving forward you're going to see that we had this year in the $12,000 over budget and that is, Bill. well they didn't send us last year for those Services moving forward I've worked with on Timber and Brian Campbell and we work through the doctor Maddie for the head of special ed in basically because we're not the only people do service other students from other districts that are going to be moving up through the system in Keene high school they have decided to make that position part of the overall body and provide that service moving forward so we will not be paying for that is a thank you Scott Scott when will you be paying a portion because it will be everybody will have a portion added to their special ed yes it goes into the overall budget is a part of the overall budget increase we all pay our whatever our portion of that is all right with that would be negligible wouldn't it would not just be a small amount what's a large amount spread across a bunch of schools which turns out to be smaller than what we're paying last year I don't think so all right so moving along there's not a lot of changing bilingual that's pretty to purchase service now that's pretty much level-funded co-curricular we didn't really make any changes there that what you're seeing there is the retirement system increase esy again we just level-funded that and are some of the New Hampshire retirement system costs rolled into that as well, just so I'm not skipping over anything be bilingual services are purchased from Chesterfield's we share that cost with the Chesterfield School District esy services are for Mark you can jump into fell off our for IEP services at required during the summer require additional services that during the summer that's where this as bad as budgeted for it's not summer school is in a camp type of thing it's mats for Ife driven Services curricular activities that's all are sports teams this is something that this year and last year were the last year we had considerable savings and a projecting the same this year due to the fact that Sports and other activities have been greatly hindered by the virus pandemic moving forward. We are hopeful that we will again be able to provide those services to students at the same level that we were before so it continued to keep that budget was so that when we have the opportunity we can give those kids back to sports oh so we're looking at guidance now the major increase there is really the ham retirement system and obviously something the contracted salary that's a big driver is really into the retirement on that line help you singing increase there because that position is they 60% position which is benefits eligible for a prorated amount of the benefit so there is some additional cost added in there so so just to clarify that we made a decision of the board last year with all this covid-19 to increase that position correct mark yeah just for this year was increased to 80% then going back to 60% next year so we're going to that's why the benefits increase there is what it is so we had we had not budgeted for benefits the year prior and then we increase the position 80% which added in the full benefits, but that comes in a 68 according to the policy for the district that is a much smaller contribution on the the board's part individual may choose to have those benefits but we're going to budget that they're going to continue them at the reduced rate so are we sure we're going to reduce that from I need a 60 this year we going to get this continues are we going to leave that support in place I'm hopeful that with the vaccine and everything but by September we could be back to you know fairly normal need for the nurse and hoping yeah that's right I forget that this is not this is budget for starting next after summer so you're right so you're you're thinking we'll probably a good idea. Basically were budgeting the benefit but we're not budgeting the extra 20% Then the benefits are budgeting for those because the person is you taking those benefits now percent the amount that the board contributes is much smaller so putting in that amount what's up brother that's why I'm trying to make sure we're we're thinking about it and conservatively estimating so that we know getting caught in September with 80% full benefits and it says negative hit good I'm good alright so the next line item is Psychological Services we are projecting an increase in that so we get we budgeted for a little bit more of those purchase Services let her know if Market generally say too much about that or what I thought that was just an increased cost based on the benefit of eating the retirement of the New Hampshire time of weird I think we're keeping that at 10% with my understanding that could be that guy I went up to so I texted you know what Mark I'm looking at this it's not under the purchase service we have that separately that is important we actually buying a salary right that's what it is. We are actually going to the second rule were talking about so when we have some of these rules where are neighboring school districts have a need or somebody else in the district has in the air but we don't have a need for 100% then we share those services with our other school districts and that's why we pay a portion I don't think Mark do we have any that were sponsoring per se and Contracting out but we're the beneficiary of this correct. We purchase from Chesterfield I go tell and Spike and then they carry and their budget full amount of everything and then we pay them exactly right so speech that was a decrease in that position they start to decrease speed in the population again. one of those things like a lot of speech Physical Therapy occupational therapy Services required by a student's individual IEP plan and as that students plan changes or students move in or move out of the district our need for these Services goes up and down year and it appears this year that the speech portion will go down without a position that we increase in like 30 to 40% last year and it will be around 2:30 but we need the Budget Inn went dissipated increase needs will benefit we had increased from 40 to 60 but by the time we issued contracts in March we realized we weren't going to have that need this year people being homeschooled the remote stuff we did not need to 60% and looking at the numbers next year we should be able to maintain 40% again yeah are you paying on 40 or 60 this year we're paying for it was originally budgeted for 60 but we never paid 60% so physical therapy and occupational therapy we currently have 30-4900 budgeted for purchase Services Rocky patients and nothing budgeted for physical therapy is there is currently no need for that that's a percentage as well correct work graphics all right staff support services that was level-funded and if you want to directional in curriculum development I can see you can I just ask you to connect do I type it I want my little unclear no just asking can we go back to 2140 as far as the psychological needs with covet and the kid coming back to school what happens if there are children that are psychologically affected by all of this and we need more services and what we're allowing for you know those shared services are psychologists really what he's he doesn't provide Counseling Services is more for evaluations and guidance counselors 100% so she really does a lot of the counseling services and she does a pretty good job of covering you know all the needs of the student population so I don't anticipate that need I guess it's possible if we did need to increase that percentage we can look that I think there is some wiggle room to sit with us in Chesterfield but usually it's innocent because the evaluation to fluctuate each year and last year we didn't have a ton so he actually didn't have extra time to have to provide counseling services this year we've been really busy with evaluation so there hasn't been that extra built-in but he could go back to that big available next year to have him kind of supplement the guidance counselor but when you're talkin about evaluations you're talking about special add evaluation when students are referred he goes through the battery of tests to see if the student qualifies as not for regular education exactly so Madia he just texted something is moving cuz I was thinking about we just increased our guidance last year it was the year before there before Eddie's Susan one of the things we did you know not obviously 4C hope you froze Dean we buy any but no more turn my video off the better you increase sound to 100% a couple years back yeah so obviously we can see Corbin coming but it was absolutely the timing was perfect for us to be able to support all the stuff that was going on his past year and she she Mark she definitely puts in more than her 40 hours a week kind of a person you know we just don't know how it's going to affect people let alone children and an adult so I'm not sure where but we know specifically we were on I would say I'm not going to brag bragging about this but Brian and and Scott and and obviously Rob and Enmark in the whole team we took their the proactive steps to get the kids back in school I mean I hear people from work getting other states that they never made it back so they bet the remote for the whole this whole situation and so we've been we were back for day is a week old time with with the kids of proportion of the Year and that way we we made decisions along the way knowing that kids were starting up nose kids that were specifically starting up in grades that we thought that the the personal contact was most more important I eat kindergarten first grade the point make sure we tried to prioritize and obviously thinking about Coban safety but we knew the importance of getting the kids back in school and I think we the team did an awesome job and and in a we were beneficiaries of a v proactive good discipline I would say on the safety and the protocols and and all that sort of thing so I was going to save the who brought to the end but there's a who refer but I've heard too deep going to make me cry being you know but I really get your comments and in your acknowledgement I certainly been a very bumpy road and everybody's really just picked it up and we're looking forward to getting the kids back in school as soon as we can crazy times all right so moving along to Media Services good size jump there and most of that is the 18% increase to the New Hampshire retirement system the school board you're seeing an increase in that line of $1,800 and that really is almost entirely made up of a biennial Gatsby on it so we have our normal audit done every year but every other year we have to do an additional guest be on it and that cost about $1,800 increase this year next year you'll see there's a decrease Pretty Simple vs Au formula that is up $4,000 this year now this is based on a formula that uses property valuations in the population of Westmoreland school at the complex part about understand this formula is that your portion of that cost could change even if your property valuation and student population state entirely the same that percentage is still going to change because it's relation to the other districts within the essay you so someone out if everything stayed the same for you and everyone else is population went down your portion would go up if everything stayed the same for you and other people's pop play shed went up your fortune would go down and this is one of the rare numbers that you actually do see go up and down sometimes it is a decrease yeah so so how does that how does it what does it mean for a S8 so at the end of the day when I look at the overall number for the SAU budget versus how much were getting increase we're pretty close to being flat or equal it whereas some districts saw as a significant change in this number correct more than you who had an increase but that the change for them was more significant I need to share that with folks are on a call so that we vacation from other districts in in this number I think it's important for us. There's a law lot behind the formula we attend the meetings in the decisions of the SIU Budget Inn and so I feel really good about where we're at with Dean I can share the breakdown for the seven districts if you want I've got it pulled up Stephen want to do it real quick I just so people are educated that be great sure I always like to I always like to think about how we're doing with with the rest of the district whether it's performance of the school and in Mark and the team and all that going on scores and grades and in y'all from us from an academic standpoint I always like to make sure people are aware that you brighten Lee happy because our kids are usually at the top of the the numbers from the performance side and inform up from of attacks side it's always good that people understand we're doing pretty good to we're not dealing with some of the things that other District I was right now are you able to see this got it yep so this is Chester Chesterfield right and you know you'll see the 20 21 and then the 21 21 22 when the change that was made from one year to the next for their school district on the bottom we we really talked about what drove those changes we have other sheets that go into greater detail but I thought this one might really helpful just to share with you so like in Chesterfield there increase went up a total of 8.38 to the overall SAU budget now what that reflects in their Chesterfield School District budget different than 8.38% because it's a portion of their entire budget Harrisville only went up 3.8% Keen actually only went up 2.16 Marlboro went down just a hair Marlo went up 13 and a half percent Nelson went up three and a half percent basically and westmoreland's was 2.35% and that's to the SAU budget that's not to your individual School District budget so that doesn't say that that's not saying that the sou portion in the Westmoreland School District budget will go up by 2.35% that's the share of the overall SAU budget with the other six towns or the other six districts if that you know helps explain that and you'll see the reason for that is because of the property wealth compared when up a little bit from 5.37 to 5.48 + actually you're Roman numbers went down just a hair so overall you went up from 4.38 to 4.39 in the total conversation of the SAU budget I confused you more than it helped you know but that that that supports my statement about being flat things right and we barely try to spell it out so it's very transparent or not we want to make sure we're fair and transparent about it so the stuff thanks Rob yep anytime I Scott back to our regularly scheduled program play the principal phone postage Supply software new equipment that total line is showing slight increase at this point in space on the New Hampshire retirement system I need to make to know that at this point I do teaching staff is covered under the CBA which is a collective bargaining agreement which we signed last year which covers increases for those staff that does not cover the principle that needs to be discussed in. public for that portion of this budget so just letting the board know that ahead of time there's no increase in their budget for the principal at this time so right now that's flat the building line is up slightly about $16,000 and that's because we added back in the employee into the the mixtape headband out of the long term disability which we had talked about earlier in the fall we had discussed so that individuals back in the budget now so you're saying that increase cuz it had been taken out and this is also we had discussed for the last several years putting money into trying to put money aside in the capital reserve to do the parking lot we had discussed at a previous meeting that this you were going to ask to have that done through any if we could through the any unreserved fund balance left at the end of the year we're going to put that on a warrant NASA taxpayers if they agreed to that that would allow us to do it much sooner and without a real tax Impact versus them just putting away money every year using that getting it done this summer along with the basketball court so I talk to why didn't talk to him but Stewart was able to email me the latest estimate for that to do the the full parking lot job estimated at $85,000 and to resurface the basketball courts would have a usable that would be $25,000 alright so we talked about that that would be part of our budget for next year that would only be a warrant that gets approved to you little by is Surplus from this year's that is correct so just trying to step back I can just bring everybody up here so right now we've got just shy of 80 grain or capital reserve we've been doing is building up our capital reserve with surplus funds from the previous years we had them the parking lot that was something on our list to do we decided not to do it last year obviously Covetous as hit we are very uncertain on how that was going to impact us at this point we feel is going to be favorable for some of the same beans and cost that we've had and will be against the Scots point we want to do is put forth a war with this bone budget to say we want to use to call 125 so we have a contingency in there where the parking lots and bath work repaving that would happen this summer so that's kind of the summary of what Scotch is said any questions or conversation around that no Heidi nothing cluding the side vents the sidewalk that was a question was sorry the side vents help me out what that means Maddie what do you mean by the side vent you're muted sorry guys I was watching a bit I remember from the last meeting that Stewart had mentioned I have written down the the warrant article the first word article we talked about which way is that amount for the parking lot and the side vents maybe Mark next Lane what the side vents are but it was part of what Stewart have mentioned yeah I don't know Cypress maybe the basketball court was the other thing when the sidewalk I think was something we had talked about before but then decided it had been done really well last summer and would need to be addressed that it was Mo I just I was just a parking on the basketball courts was where we left off my understanding in the back of the building that need to be adjusted venting I think he's our way of thinking about what we said we were going to look at is the drainage on the front with a spy and what I mean so you got that kind of put that to the side so we're not going to deal with that remember said the sidewalk was done for whatever five grand as last year it's in good shape based on the feedback from Mark and the team we're not going to spend the money to rip that backup just in and do it again and we're going to leave it just do the parking lot you could do basketball courts and then if we have to redo the sidewalk in five years for five grand that's not a big deal for us to pick that up on a maintenance line best summarizes our conversation my understanding of the side vents but it was not the sidewalks but that it had something to do with drainage but I'm not sure I don't know the technical name but he said side vent so I don't know if it's something different that we're talking about Mark and I were looking at the sidewalk in and what we were looking at was there is a a a black top section that comes down play in the middle of your looking to the right of the the main entrance to the right there's a sidewalk against the building then it stops there's some rocks which is the drainage and I and what I was saying is from at from a handicap accessibility standpoint it made more sense to take that sidewalk down and connect that little section we could do that to minimize the you know the speed ramp that we have going down to meet sidewalk and you know Stuart brought up the idea that there's a lot of of it's not vented Rangeline which is a pipe that takes that water and gets it out of there that was a lot that was a I thought the majority of the conversation I'm not sure from a side Vents and point but it was a drainage that makes sense now that sounds right are you good I'm good thank you all right that brings this  to transportation we actually have a slight decrease in special education Transportation next year and we renegotiated our contract is the previous regular Transportation contract has expired the contract and we are seeing a 6% increase in our transportation costs over last year which is a met and a slight decrease in the special ed Transportation which brakes is not within a hundred and $8 of last year's overall budget and actual flight sale I'll just jump any one of the only places I actually made any increases in the budget with this one place was field trips and transportation so I didn't really affect the overall line but we had 3500 it was a Christian 4500 because we weren't able to go on field trips obviously last spring which is what are used to go on a field trips hopefully we may be able to this year maybe not a definite for next year they'll be kind of a backlog of like the State House field trip for grades 4 and 5 in Museum grades 2 and 3 with some of those things we do by annually that will be kind of want to make sure I could get those opportunities and it might be we might end up having three boxes instead of 2 or 2:31 so make sure we can those kids out just want to throw that in there cuz it wasn't many changes and that was one all right 30 questions for Mark on that all right next line is staff services in this is money that we budget for things like your new employee physicals fingerprinting the background checks all that stuff when we hire new employees or certain people that want to volunteer still need to go through a portion of this obviously to make sure it was safe that's level funded are pollen, what is the second largest decrease in we have been making an $80,000 principal payments on our bond along with 5,000 last year in interest that has now been paid in full we are now $85,000 less than the budget so so Scott can you just let people know what that boy on was for what was taken out can you speak that that was before I was here I don't know what that was for I have to go back and look at me the last resort that was that was substantial like that was write that whole reenergy HVAC you know that was a big one cuz I was in the hundreds of thousands of dollars remember we we had to contribute a portion to get the rebates and the refunds from the it was a whole energy upgrade with the orderly system the h v a c Mart good point with the insulation and some of the light fixtures more energy efficient so I think that started in 2014 maybe the year before I got here as well call good and then I think we're in as we started our covid-19 and helped us get back in the building sooner as I was true statement yeah yeah definitely all right all right so the final account is transfers we have we set aside budget for $110,000 transfer to Food Services every year to fund that program and we also a $90,000 Federal transfer so this is an interesting one that sometimes difficult to understand so I'm going to try to explain this the school district operates on a $0 budget which means we get an amount approved by taxpayers every year we cannot spend a dime more than a taxpayers approve and if we have any funds left at the end of the year we can meet you do a ask for a warn article to use some of those funds for other projects like we're planning on doing this year and any remaining funds and or all of it goes back to the taxpayer so we ended with a $0 budget at the end of the year what this post is one problem because as we found out with the covid-19 pandemic there occasions where the federal government and state government offer additional funds to help offset cost this year we got a considerable amount of money through the cares Act to help us either a repay or refund lines that we over expended do specifically The Cove in preparations cleanings PPE additional wise gear indoor to purchase additional stuff we may need you were there was laptops for remote learning cleaning machines to sanitize because let's be honest we didn't sanitize our building suite are just really wasn't necessary so if we did not have that $90,000 placeholder in there because that's what it really is we don't know we have no way of knowing if it how many grams next year but by putting that placeholder in there it allowed us to accept which I think we got what nearly 50,000 or 60,000 between the two this year so far yeah sounds about right we wouldn't have been able to accept those funds because we would have taken in more money than the taxpayers had approved so by holding the putting this $90,000 is a place folder it allows us to accept up to 9 $2,000 in federal and state grant money if it becomes available in his to the advantage of the district to accept it so the other interesting part 2 this is it look at we're looking at our expense sheet right so people like call that increases our taxes by $90,000 while we also put that on our Revenue sheet as a revenue that's going to come in for $90,000 so close to the red and a liability offset each other so they have zero tax impact so it does not raise our taxes it does not increase the text right one but it does allow us in times like this unprecedented times when federal state money is available to accept that money to use to help offset the copy on a global pandemic in the car anybody have any questions for that that I explained it somewhat clearly I have a question so is that like typical grants where you have to have the money before you can accept the grant is that what this is this is the overall budget we wouldn't be able to accept anything if it wasn't we didn't have a weather in the budget know some of the grants that we do have our reimbursement rates for we have send the money first and then we get paid back afterwards one of these caves France they actually sent us the money first and then we had to spend it following their rules and then provide them with proof on how we spell if they disagree with how we spend it we going to pay it back so I had to do this team in the town budget from the sense but if you want to do a grant for some fire equipment as an example we have to have it budgeted and then if he get the grant great but an interview by it and we don't spend the time to do the same thing but this is the one lineup we carry just General stuff that might come up that Mark Mark and a team do a great job of they are f****** found this grant you know we're going to go out and do this and that or where we get this portion of this teacher salary covered or whatever else we can advantage of everything we can throughout the year write thank you so with all that being said we are looking at a 250 $3,440 decrease from last year's budget or 6.2% decrease and again the major drivers you're looking at a decrease in Special Ed case intuition which we will continue to monitor right up to the last minute a decrease in the need for purchase speech services or percentage of speech services and we have finished paying back in the pond overall I think we have a budget that that the town could definitely appreciate we spoken up doing a warn article for $125,000 from the unreserved fund balance at the end of the year if there should be one other Ward articles that we may want to put four days do we want to put anything into has to put anything into the I believe we had this discussion and I don't remember the number off the top of my head I have a note somewhere but not with me as I'm at my office today for the special education tuition fund Sanibel Trust just Expendable Trust Siri call work yeah we've been typically stay in 25 Grand right now that balance is a 230000 so for those folks that are new Expendables Frost is a kind of a name surance for us that if if we get some folks that come into the district we spell need or were situation as way beyond our budget cover that cost to get us through a budget season year-on-year did I summarize that correctly yeah I think it's important to know that I explained earlier in the conversation that there couldn't there's different types of out-of-district placements those can be residential placements that can be upwards of $300,000 a year for one child so with that in mind you know when you're looking at $230,000 and thinking that's a large song that's less than one placement at one of the most specialized facilities yeah so so your question is what do we want to continue a warrant article so this would be so we got the one on 111 article be just for the budget II warn article before the parking lot basketball court Paving to use surplus funds in the third war nanako would be surplus funds Beyond warn Article II would also then put 25 Grand into Expendable Trust question that is the question infer my perspective with you I say yes we should move forward with that or anybody else's objection the question is does he do we want to use more to build up or Expendables Trust cuz I think there's a limit to we can't have a million-dollar sitting in this count either right I have to look into that what if there is a limit I'm wondering if we could consider the $50,000 amount 25 we're going down 6.2% overall so you can you can consider any and that amount can also be amended on the floor during the actual district meeting I think it's it's very appropriate to allow the voters to weigh in on that 25 is what has been relatively consistent with what we've been doing we have seen a couple districts in RSA you get hit really really hard with unanticipated move-ins that were very expensive over the last three years there have been two different districts that have been hit really really hard and what help them out tremendously was having that that trust fund built out so Dean said absolutely spot-on accurate it's an insurance policy really is what it is and any day now it really did help to other districts in this essay you when that time did actually come before most that shouldn't say most but there are some districts that do say look we want to get it to this level whatever that level is I know that Keen has been trying to get to that million dollar Mark Dean but that because they also have a lot more students and more buildings so you know setting a goal and saying look this is what what we're aiming for in this is white and we're going to say we're going to stop putting money into it I don't think that's a bad idea it lets everybody know what the goal is but you can put whatever amount you want Maddie well can you give us an idea of what tuition rates would be you know average for one of those out-of-district placements it really depends on where the placement is and what's available at the time that a placement needs to be met to be perfectly honest with you we've seen them as low as you did with Transportation included because you have to transport phone to there is well we've seen it as low as say a 20000 to as high as 270000 if you get to in a year you just like oh my goodness I feel like when we discussed this might have been last year or the year before there was the number that we had looked at was 300,000 does that ring a bell yeah I'm not sure if I'm happy. I think Sweetheart would make sense for us by I don't feel I don't feel we need to try to bank a bunch of money here because I bears at the end of the day also would like to see some of the benefit of us paying off a car loan and some of the other things that are going on so I guess my question is because we're asking to get this basketball black parking up and down without asking for additional funds from the Surplus from last year if Scott does the reconciliation on this High School tuition thing they brought up earlier right now we feel we're in very good shape with her Surplus from last year but I'd like to reconcile three decide on 25 or 50 we can do that then frankly it doesn't matter I guess right is really matter I suppose because of the basketball court and parking lot is first and we had say 200,000 and surplus that would come out first that would leave us with 75 so that was a bad example so let's say we had a 30000 Surplus we had a hundred 25 for the basketball court we use 210 of it that would leave us with 20/20 would then going Expendables R Us whether it was 25 or 50 correct yes and we can add an additional monitor only asking for Surplus and we can word itself that its let's say up to $25,000 Surplus remaining actors Article 2 is fully funded I see you got you know we can play with the wording on that as well so you can you can either go with $25,000 afterward Article 2 was funded or up to 25,000 so in one instance if you didn't have more at least $25,000 if we just go back to taxpayers or in the other case if it was last you just whatever it was went into the worst day of the trust so you can play with the wording on there yes I think either way that doesn't impact this budget number it's budget wearing today correct so the tuition stuff yes impacts the budget were in today and how much Surplus there would be at the end of this year to be used for these Warren articles yep all right so expendable now can I don't know that I caught that number 230000 now you folks continually do such a great job with the school budget just speaking as a resident to non-resident just now I'd hate to see you get caught short on the Expendable trust funding if a child were to move into town and it was needed to you no send an out-of-district place so to have a another put the proper money is in there I think is important to I know you've been building it all these years. Yeah we and we want to continue that Susan the biggest really is and I don't think the question we could put it on but work overseas I'm worried about right now is and I'm not worried I guess we're wearing very favorable spot and there's some variability that's happening what we got hit with was this year came out of our budget correct Around Bar spend I'm sorry not the budget out of the spend is that correct and they chose to homeschool that we did not incur that tuition cost this year which is why we were predicting such a large Surplus and why now that I got to recalculate that it may not be as large currently predicting a massive Surplus because of that now that number goes outside so that said once we get that ironed out and figured out let's just hypothetically say we got two hundred grand left 12054 parking lot basketball court we could go up to 50 Expendable trust at the 280 and we still have a surplus then we pay back to the tax oldest correct. Taxpayers Scott oh yeah mute now he's not on mute so anyway we got some work to do with finalizing where we're at I guess would be my summary and then I think we as a school board we got to decide whether the basketball courts parking lot is more important than the Expendable trust what you get warn Article 2 versus 1 free and we may want to say 25 warn Article 2 basketball court and maybe part of that one article could could say after the basketball court parking lot done if there's any extra we can put in Expendables set another 25 as another one of her article I don't know if that makes sense Rob yeah I think so a lot of different ways we can carve that up but I think I think that that makes a lot of sense what week we can figure that out when Scott gives us the snow and we got snow we got another four months or so five months of I must read Mark 6 months something like that whatever no snow smell okay so we don't have we don't have to worry about that anymore so that's good news we're really dumb why are not out of the question Maddie 50 or 25 up to that number then we could take up to that number if there's a surplus yeah but I think you're 300,000 I agree it is kind of a number that makes sense for for me and Lester how everybody else feels I'm fine with that. I'm fine with that I think it's a good idea if you can get more in the now I need it rather get caught short and then struggles and try to find it yeah I think 300 is a really good goal I think that's an appropriate number so Maddie and Susan you guys both Dallas both good set up Maddie it's a good idea I so we lost Scott I think I think his program was concluded for the most part Rob yes yep and he just got back on but I agree thank you is pretty well through programming unless there were other questions or any area that you wanted to dive deeper into I'm back road yeah we can meet me see you meet senior don't worry we got lots of assignments for you while you stepped out who's awesome at my battery died on my laptop oh yeah yeah all right so that said if there's no other questions that we would we would we have to move 233 make a movement to approve with the exception of the non-public element on the principal salary which we got talk about a second we can approve with that guy correct rob you can you can so I can make a motion to approve the budget for school year 2122 as presented with the only open item to firm up our non-public item what is principle line item budget so when will yard when we are in a virtual meeting when you do all votes by roll call okay so we're going to move to roll call voting you are going to be there you want me to call you the iru yes please rub all right so the motion is to approve the budget as presented with the one pin guarding that principle lime diffuser locate my eye if not say nay and we'll start with a chair D Maddie Stephanie and Kevin I alright you have a unanimous decision for a zero improve the budget well done all right good stuff so any free boat launch ever done. No more discussion correct right right before we close the non or before we close the public session again I just want to you know this year has been crazy. From R6 our broadly public meeting we had in the Middle School auditorium to do all the others had to do this year again Rob and I know we had this conversation with with you and yes AAU team again your support and obviously great job and getting our kids an education that was top-level through all this compared to other schools not only in New Hampshire but across the country as I said and I I I I work with people all over the country and you know their kids didn't even make it back to school at all this year well done a nice job and it's very much appreciated the effort absolutely that's impressive also add thinking to expand field trip funding goes to show the length and the depth that you think of our kids Mark and we really appreciate it yeah hundred percent b99 hopefully spread some positivity if you would humor me for about 2 minutes you are meeting are you well no I just want to see what I want to share with everyone is you know we've been tracking this data from the from the onset you know when regard to Cogan and so what I wanted to show are with you and show you is this is this is a trend line for all seven of the districts in SAU 29 with daily new cases from November 1st to December 31st and you I see that the new cases on a day-to-day basis has been trending upward right and that that looks like it's never going to end and it gets really worrisome for a lot of us because it's just continual uphill battle but what I did was I broke it out in the beginning and end of month so this is the beginning of the month of November you know November 1st to the 15th and it's a very steep trendline which is very concerning, but we saw that coming and here's the second half of November not quite a steep but certainly still uphill and then we get into December you see that trend line start to Flat now and here's where the positivity comes in here's the second half of the cell wow yeah yeah I think when you look at it and its totality it it's frustrating but when you break it down into digestible chunks so you know there is definitely a lot of Hope moving forward so that's a really positive sign and I just wanted to share that with you you know as we start off 2021 you know reinvigorated ready we are seeing things move in a much better Direction currently that's not to say we won't get a couple spikes from you know New Year and holiday Gatherings and what not but certain seeing things move in a better Direction yeah so the other thing I would say to folks that especially Susan Christine you know we as a district the star it has been pushed out to January 15th Rob versus January 4th correct do the 15th then back to school on the 19th so I can deal with when is it considered a holiday surges correct correct cuz there's a lot of money certainty there we want to clean up that uncertainty and be very confident of principles were meeting the beginning of last week or the week that we just finished anyway I think we're all in a good place right now with I thought process and getting kids back on site ready to learn all right well I appreciate that additional data you know I think one of the things that with your reports and seeing all that data come out every time you send out an update definitely positioned all of us I know how to deal with you know some questions and feedback books that are pretty analytical and it's nice to be able to I analytically it's so you know I think we've made good calls you've made good calls and it's all right with that make a motion to adjourn our public session of today's Workshop if I make it making a motion to go into non-public not to adjourn yet copy that make a motion to go into non public so I appreciate call the public input today Atkins High now talk about you mark so all right we're good seeing you guys could seeing everybody thank you very much Happy New Year so can we get a second on that motion on 2nd and we'll do a quick roll call Susan I'm going to kick you out of the meeting man. You beat me to it Dean yes thank you Maddie yes Stephanie yes Kevin yes okay are you go to make a motion to come out of non-public 1049 and adjourn our Workshop session for twenty one second. Let's do a real quick I'm all in favor Dean Maddie hi Stephanie I and Kevin going to stop recording

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Westmoreland School Board Meeting - Budget Work Session for Saturday, January 2, 2021

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