This program is brought to you by Cable Franchise Vs and generous donations from viewers like you Some virus was to affect a student or staff person in our district So we're actively partnering with the town on that and more soon. It's an evolving situation for sure And one of the things that we're continuing to stress is this is one of the worst flu seasons That Massachusetts has ever had and that is affecting our schools pretty significantly both of the staff and the student and the same types of things that one would do to prevent the flu in terms of hand-washing for 20 seconds with soap Avoiding some physical contact hard to do with young kids, but we do the best we can Making sure our cleaning protocols are up to date and we updated them last year and based on guidance received from DPH for Continuing to update those those are the best things that we can do in terms of a preventative approach And that's the way we're we're sort of approaching this that we're gonna do everything we can in terms of prevention But also develop a plan for an unfortunate scenario if it was to occur locally So I think by the time in the next regional meeting, which is next Tuesday I'll be able to be either me or Miss Consolino be able to be much more clear On our approach and plan but as the situation evolves and the town for instance got information this afternoon from the state We want to make sure that we have a concise clear plan Before we share anything with the general public, but the preventative approach is already in place Think the other update I'd like to make very briefly is that mr. Demling talked about mr. Nakajima one of the things with his departure was that in my illness I Last week because it's been going on a while I Thought about that it'd be nice to have him as chair of the region and Mr Donas as chair of the Amherst elementary schools be able to chance to have a chance to reflect on their 10 years and so I was feeling better on Friday before I backslip get more information that you need to know But we were able to tape window into harps episode where for half an hour They you know reflect on their three and a half years of experience and a stage a little more On the Amherst and regional school committee So that'll be up tomorrow And I think it's a really good reflection for people who are interested in what is it like to be a school Member what are some of the benefits and what are some of the challenges? I think they really captured the experience very clearly of what does it mean to be a chair? What does it mean to be a committee member and what are the rewarding parts of that position those positions? so Be on the lookout for that one, but I think it'll be something that you know for seeing your former colleagues I think it came out really well and thank you to Amherst media for covering that on short notice Thank you so Before we move on to the agenda, I do want to Talk about rearranging some of the order of the of tonight's agenda to accommodate dr. Morris calling in So we will proceed with a the budget hearing And then but before going on to the second quarter budget update like to go into the school choice hearing and Then from there move up item J dual language Lottery To write after school choice hearing and then from there continue on to the second quarter budget update Is that yes, mr. Denley? I think the only Possible complication there is if somebody was planning to come to the the school choice hearing It's on the agenda for 715 and so if they got here at 7 or 710 and they found it was already over that might feel Less than I yield so I mean I'm fine with with starting it and then I Don't know maybe so I guess there's two options one We could do the non-hearing items and then once it's 715 do the school choice hearing Maybe that's simplest or we could do the school choice hearing and then if someone comes later and says hey Oh, I'm here at 715. I'd like to provide my input. We could allow that You know whichever what do you think? Yeah? I so Yes Could I suggest maybe an alternative? Because I think mr. Demling spot-on. I wonder if we did the budget hearing and then the dual language lottery And then the school choice hearing we might find ourselves at 715 anyways. I was thinking along the same line So yes, okay, does that sound good to better? Miss Spitzer you had another I Was gonna make the same suggestion, okay? Okay, so we will go budget hearing then do a language lottery and then school choice hearing and Then also leave open the possibility that if it is before 715 and members of the community come in at 715 wanting to speak to the school choice hearing we will Reopen that comment period, okay, okay So Mr. Slider, all right, so I'm going to take a moment here to Open up my slide deck This is still dated the 26th of February because I didn't change it for the shift from last week to this week In general however the this series of slides is not wildly different than what you've seen previously When we get to the sort of ads and cuts section Dr. Morris will join us and in more detail as far as what those those things Are looking like at this point in our in our process and So we're at the budget hearing some some basic budget highlights our proposed budget is twenty four million five hundred and six thousand three hundred and forty two dollars This includes some additions of two hundred eight thousand three hundred forty one dollars some some adjustments of negative three hundred eighty three thousand dollars and there are no reductions in this in this budget, so the adjustments are financially good as far as reducing our Rx our expenditure, but but they're not necessarily causing any reductions in it in what we're trying to offer to the students And so we're we're maintaining the things we've been doing You know high-quality dedicated staff and in community and school programs and our class sizes, etc And then we're able to make Some investments in some new things and some continuing programs that we have like the dual language program Which we'll talk about a little bit later There's some infrastructure planning we're doing around New buildings some professional development for para educators and the like And so you can see that from the slide and most of those things were we're covered in our previous Meetings The budget timeline which really has changed the third one the public hearing and presentation of detailed additions and reductions Which is for tonight, which is now March 2nd instead of February 26th But otherwise we're we're well on our way through the budget process and and when you meet again on on St. Patrick's Day the 17th of March you'll actually Be be asked to take a vote on on that on the budget But tonight we'll hear from from you all and others about about this budget But the other things that are on this slide tell us about the the dictates of of the town charter And so the manager will need to to receive the budget from you all by the 1st of April He's got to get it to the council for the 1st of May and then they will take action after that Again just just for the public at large the budget process. We start in early Early in the fiscal year really at the end of the first quarter start in October to December. We start having conversations about What things are looking like for the new year what kinds of programming and the like we'd like to do And we need to do and and start to think about what those things cost and how things need to be adjusted When we get into December and January we we get Some initial guidance on what the financial revenues look like from the state We we make some predictions on that we get some feedback from the town as far as how that shapes and influences our budget And then we continue to have those meetings with directors Principles and and look to see if what they wanted to do when there was no constraint in October to December and Now that we have some sort of sense of things how those fit together And then we keep going and in that way and in a process until we come to to tonight's meeting where we Present a budget in a more detailed way to you all and then and then have a little time between now and your next meeting when When you'll actually vote to to propose a budget to the to the council So the expense budget This is the simple by version of things and and so our salaries and our substitutes Somewhat significant increase in substitutes Primarily driven by changes in in the minimum wage And so that's about a 5% increase on on that number from fiscal 20 to 21 Overall, you'll see a 2.8% increase. That's the percentage of the bottom of the next to last column and that was within guidance of What was asked of us from the from the town as far as what they they knew of of Revenue estimates for the coming year and and so we we kept within that You know the overall change in level services is 3.45 percent But we had some reductions by virtue of the 154 659 which you see there Which is that combination of of adjustments to the budget and we'll get into those in more detail in a moment and then Some some additions to some some programming and some and some things Which will detail them in a few moments, but an overall You know that helps to reduce the the overall impact of the changes to provide level services Just to talk about the expense budget a little bit the salaries all but the food service budget is Still in the in the collective bargaining agreement. They're they're in effect for another year So 2% Kolo across the board and then steps for for folks that are not at the top Are in the two to six percent range for those those folks With the minimum wage changing and and and again next year will go up this year went up 25 cents in January It goes up 75 cents next January So that will have an impact on things and so we've tried to capture that in in some of our budgeting for the substitutes And you'll see in our expense account special education Contracted services significantly higher. We had some influx and when we talk second quarter report We'll we'll talk about that a little bit about change in some of the demographics of our student population And that's driving a bit of a need there in contracted services But another thing to keep in mind is health insurance, which had a very very modest 1.89% still contributes about 20% of the increase in expense accounts as a whole So it's a it's a huge driver of of of our budget And so I wanted to point that out to you all as we move ahead And so now we'll move to the next slide, which is the additions and reductions And I'll I'll ask dr. Morris to to speak to the particulars of this slide Thank you. The only thing I want to add before I talk additions and reductions is that This budget fits within the fin finance committee guidance that they gave to us in the fall So that might be under, you know, just assumed but I just wanted to be explicit about So in terms of budget adjustments You'll see special education tuition occasionally there's a student with special needs from a neighboring town Who would benefit from one of our specialized programs? And if there's space and the fit is right We have on occasion accepted students into one of our specialized programs Particularly if they're going to be with us in our regional district. Anyway, it's it's an everyone's best interest Get students the services they need and so we charge tuition for that. It's not through the Purely through goodwill and so that's an adjustment to the positive tuition payment that we anticipate to be $50,000 Sabbatical so as you may remember last year we had a sabbatical that was accepted you voted to accept one There were no requests this year. So that is a positive to the budget that there's no sabbaticals this year um We You have put in now 150 thousand dollars into a special ed stabilization fund So we feel like that's sufficient. So it's reducing Last year we had that as a budget number $50,000 contribution. We're reducing that because we feel like that's a sufficient number We feel like particularly when we get to UMass strategic partnership agreement I can talk a little more about it, but even but some of the variants that we've had we feel confident that we could prepay some retirement incentives out of this year's budget which will help next year's budget and The school committee shifts school committee stipend payments to the town. So this eliminates The payments that school committee members receive stipends. They receive As per the charter from the school budget to the town budget, which everyone including our legal counsel feels like is a lot cleaner than the current current model and UMass strategic partnership agreements. So UMass has agreed Starting in this fiscal year and the two fiscal years after to give $185,000 to the district And the way we roughly split that out is a hundred seventy two The Amherstel elementary district and $15,000 to the region based on the kind of average historic average percentage of kids In taxes and housing who attend our elementary district versus our secondary district As north village is now going through some pretty significant changes, you know, the current numbers aren't particularly helpful, but we went backwards and we feel like that's a fair assessment And benefit and it's I don't want to minimize the point that this has been a discussion For many many years the committee has been heavily involved the last two or three years with the Donahue Institute report And this is making a significant difference in our budget You can see that it's roughly three teacher salaries that are being paid for So when we talk about budget additions, we wouldn't be having that conversation If we didn't have the funds coming in from the UMass strategic partnership agreement And thank you to the town as well for assisting in that discussion And the last one on adjustments is we're looking at preschool and preschool to make a Sort of lengthy story short Excuse me is Sort of analogous to some of the academy in many ways And much like some of the academy we feel like the preschool requires an administrator not a kind of teacher level Coordinator to support the staff and students in that. So it's not a huge price difference You know price point on there That's it depends on the person's salary when they get hired and a whole variety of other things But it's providing more administrative and frankly mental health support from the preschool staff So those are the Adjustments and why don't I pause before I talk about additions? See if there are questions So I just had a quick question Maybe it's not so quick, but on the UMass strategic partnership agreement I find this notation a little bit confusing because it makes it look like we're reducing our spending By this amount as opposed because if I read that correctly or am I just misreading As opposed to it's an increase in Revenue So I'll let I'll let dr. Slaughter answer that one sure So it's showing us a negative number because it reduces the expenses And so we're talking about expenses generally when we're looking at these additions and reductions and so To just be consistent with that it is additional income But income in this type of format does show up as a negative number. So for instance, these are good as far as Uh From the standpoint of of cost So it's lowering our cost or our appropriated amount of money. Okay. Thank you Any other questions on this? Okay Okay, um, so for additions we have a modest addition So after we got the positive news in december about getting it back in the msba process I went to all three of the schools and we talked about how to engage teachers in particular teachers and para educators In the process and one of the ideas that came from the group that came to these meetings was Or one of the concepts was, you know, being on the building committee is incredible amount of time energy And some of that work sort of having lived through it before has a lot to do with education and some of it, you know, frankly doesn't And so the idea was if there was a group of, you know, roughly 10 staff members who were stipended to meet, you know Once a month perhaps slightly more often if things are heating up in a certain way where we want educators voices involved They could then inform and offer feedback to the msba The school building committee as well as serve as a communication tool Back to the staff and I think one of the things as we enter this msba process that I think everyone agrees is we want to really hone in on the best communication strategy and I appreciate staff are coming up with this idea because I think it has high I think has a high potential to Keep staff engaged and hearing from each other as opposed to always from administration I think has a real real positive benefit And there was broad, you know strong interest and if we set something up like this Uh in participating in it. Um, so that's the idea of that one So the next one sixth grade to the middle school exploration is a rather small amount of money But it's uh for some staff members who don't typically work in the summer To spend some time working in the summer to fine tune A model around what sixth grades in the middle school could look like um the next one down is uh, really around the opportunity gap or educational debt And this is having a middle school Math teacher come down and work with groups who are underrepresented in honors and ap and flex math courses in our middle school and high school And work with fifth and particularly with sixth graders to get them on track so that when they get to seventh grade They opt into flex and are successful in flex one of the things the more as we've looked at this whole sixth grade In the middle school question that's come up is waiting till kids get to the middle school to do some of the intervention Is really too late and having someone who knows what the flex curriculum is and can be both Help with the math and fill in any gaps kids may have That would prevent them from being successful, but also having some, uh, motivational, uh, support We feel like is really important and you know, we're not pleased with the demographics. They're not representative of our general population particularly in mathematics and this is, um, trying to do something A bit different. Um, and our elementary principals on board will take some complicated scheduling but we feel like that we have that worked out and Her educator training. So this is uh, supporting para educators who often work with students with disabilities To make sure they have the skills they need We do have what's called safety care training But one of the things we recognize is that we need to provide additional training for para educators particularly in the specialized programs of buildings blocks aims in the ilc As well as the preschool, uh, who work with students who have more significant disabilities Contingency control accounts. This is a sort of a delicate one to talk about But we sometimes have situations when we get to march where we're unclear whether a student can Remain in the district and successfully access the curriculum or we'll need to go to an added district placement And so this is setting a contingency because we aren't sure if we Will need to use that Uh You uh, you went out, uh, you Cycled out a little bit after explaining the contingency control accounts Oh, I'm sorry Uh, so I think what I was just trying to say is that we try to really only miss this little vision fund In the real emergency if we can maintain it through our operating budget and not create a struck Uh, by using the stable which we try to do that Yeah Do a bonus of our staff and we are encouraging them as a nice model that We um, you keep going out Dr. Morris, I don't know if something's changed in where you're situated, but you you keep going in and out Is this any clearer? Yes Okay, sorry about that um, so, um I think you lost you at staff wellness Yeah, sorry about that. So for staff wellness just that, um, we'd like to form a committee with the teacher association Around this topic. We know, uh, a well staff Is going to be at their best and and staff where wellness is not the priority As all sorts of negative consequences for our students Um special ed clerical so right now wildwood has a part-time special ed clerical person Whereas the other two schools have full time and that's based on caseloads, but uh, what we realized is that We're paying a lot of overtime for the wildwood clerical person because the numbers have went up and We used to have a full time special ed clerical at all three schools and we're recognizing that we really need to That was a budget cut a couple years ago and we need to Kind of get back to that model. Um, so we can support our students and families with special ed needs Um facility sustainability support. This is working with the town to Contract out some analysis of how we can become more green over time and again We feel like this these funds should pay for themselves that We should be able to make sustainability improvements over time With an expert in the area working with our facilities team The second the last one is, uh, again, we've had a positive financial year And as we look forward and the UMass piece and the health insurance are two, you know, huge variables Um this spring we're doing English language arts review of our curriculum and This based on kind of achievement data as well as feedback from staff And what we found out with the math is that once you do a review Then you have to implement changes and it's worked really well to have a teacher leader in that position And we're hoping that that person also can support us with looking at the sixth grade study And some of that work as well So we're looking at this as a one-year position that we can fade As we head to next year in the same way we did with the mathematics because that's been a very effective implementation methodology And the last one is three para educators and that's just done student needs, which Mr. Slaughter will Talk a little bit about when he does second quarter budget And I think that's all I have to share And open any questions people might have Mr. Demley Yeah, so I see some of the public has arrived. So are we do you want I'm just asking the chair Do you want the committee to ask questions now and then at the end we'll open up for public Questions, how do you want to that that was my Plan if that works Yeah Clarifying questions right right So yeah, so just a brief clarifying on the the one-year position la review and sixth grade study So with with both of those tasks in that one-year position Can you just talk a little bit more as this is primarily for la Review and and you're hoping that that they can assist with the sixth grade study or is it a 5050 Split you just talk about like what the fte expectations are for that position. Sure. Yeah, I wouldn't say it's 5050 I think the la will be the larger task. We're not necessarily looking at early literacy and phonics We did that work for the last couple years. It's much more looking at middle to upper grades So the scope is not the same as as it was with mathematics. And so I do think there's There's scalability To go down from what was required for grades six through twelve and and you know lots of different buildings So I would say like probably two-thirds the la review and one-third sixth grade study Thank you. Yep Any other questions from the committee? Miss Bitton I just wanted to clarify with the the stipends Those are exclusively for school staff that wouldn't be going to other members of the msba Committees that will be formed throughout the process. Yeah, no, it's it's yeah No, I'm sorry if I wasn't clear about that and maybe when my phone was going in and out No, this is exclusively for teachers para educators and clerical staff to be you know engage and have their Thoughts taken into account as well as for them to be able to communicate it back with their colleagues And I just have one other clarifying question on the Support for increased participation and flex and honors from underrepresented groups. Is that Specifically with regard to math participation or in general It is specifically to math. Yeah, I'm sorry. That should have been more clear actually in the text Yeah, um, you know, I'm sorry about that. That's okay. Um, so I think we have one more slide before We'll we'll go through the one more slide before we open up for the hearing portion Right, so this slide is is just talking about some of the other funds that support our budgets that Help us to do the work that we do. Um, we we have a quick grant summary here I'm not sure I've captured absolutely everything under Amherst education foundation that's Grant applications were due recently and so I'm not sure if we've captured all of the fiscal 20 Or not there, but you see the other grants that support the work that we do Generally speaking most of these are Augmentative to what we do not entirely but but a lot of them are And so they're in addition to what our our and and require us to have it be supplementary to what we do Not extensively or exclusively but many many of them are And then under the revolving funds those are ones where we where we have You know a dedicated purpose funds is what they are they allow the state allows us to have those kinds of dedicated purpose funds That help us to mitigate extremes in our budgets is is one way to think of it But it also helps us to sort of build balances for good and bad years like in food service We're trying to build a balance there so we can hold and sustain our program in a way we'd like But under things like school choice. There's years. We need more support from that and other years We don't need as much support from that Likewise with circuit breaker special education. Those are again trying to help build in some capacity to to Deal with contingencies that come up and and and arise in in our budget um, and so, you know those those accounts are we're trying to Maintain the balance in a fairly steady way So it's it's you know in a sense rainy day funds in some circumstances not exclusively but but in others It's for regular supportive programming school choice. We use some of that money every year But we don't want to take too much so that we don't have it when we need it in a more extreme circumstance We've got a fortunate budget year this year where we've got a fairly positive Outcome so we'll be touching those as lightly as we can Is the idea? And so that's that's really the last thing I want to share with you in that regard and then We'll take questions as you may wish to to see if the public had comment or questions as well Mr. Demo Dr. Slaughter, where would you put charter school tuition out expenses? Um current and projected how that affects the budget. I mean, I understand the accounting for that gets complicated with the town, but How does that has that fit into this overview picture? So what happens is that for the For the town and for the elementary budget in particular what happens is those Assessments both positive and negative are all accounted for sort of before it ever gets to us And so when the town comes to us and says we think you can have a 2.8 percent increase It factors in the expectations on the charter tuition's out and any revenues in Relative to that and so those are kind of taken into account before it gets to us. So it's kind of a bit This presentation and generally our budget is a bit blind to that Whereas on the regional side as you know, it's it's a little more straightforward because it's it's literally the number we can Can you know identify for ourselves? But on the on the town side it's blended in with a lot of other Pluses and minuses that have nothing to do with schools. So it's it's it's a part and parcel of the cherry sheet And so it doesn't really show up here Mr. Deming So if if maybe at our next meeting dr. Morris and dr. Slaughter if we get like a more detailed presentation of how that has changed from last year Because I know how the accounting has been done with the town and with the schools has changed a little bit over time in terms of Accounting for that first and then having that impact the The allocation that the schools get or or not and and with the with the change in the charter reimbursement law And with with how volatile it can be year to year I just think it would be helpful for the overall budget picture to understand how that's working in context Absolutely There's no other questions from the committee then we'll move on to the public comment hearing portion of the sorry the public comment portion of the hearing and just to Describe our process for this is we have some members of the community who are here. Thank you for coming Each individual similar to our public comment period will have three minutes to To prepare to present their input feedback or questions And we'll go through every every every comment at that point and then at the conclusion of the public comment The superintendent and mr. Slaughter will have an opportunity to respond To those questions and and provide clarification there And if there's any sort of clarifying questions from the committee then we can circle back on that as well So with that if you have Comments that you'd like to Please identify yourself when you Hi, uh, Tony Cunningham And uh, I sent through a bunch of questions I had ahead of time just to give advance notice since I had a lot and I don't think I'm going to fit them in three minutes So I don't know how you want me to do it Do you want me to just read through the list of questions and then see how many I can read in three minutes and Then they're addressed or how should this be approached? That I would do that. Yep. Okay all right So I looked at the desi data on Per pupil spending and amherst is spending about $5,000 more per pupil than our neighboring districts And I was wondering what why is that and what is amherst getting for the additional $5,000 per pupil? On page five of the budget it has special education and regular education Spending and they're very similar. There's only a percentage point between them But I understand that special ed services much fewer students So I was just wondering an explanation for that similarly the expense accounts are almost well, they're not the same but there's 268,000 in special ed expense accounts 376 and regular But again, they serve a significantly different number of students. So just an explanation of that And central administration expense accounts seem to be six times the school administration expense accounts Just wondering why that is and what those funds are spent on And I'm sorry. I missed the beginning of the meeting So some of these things may have been addressed and the broad it wasn't broadcasting on amherst media So I wasn't able to watch the first half hour There's this consent special education contingency control accounts 49,451 I was wondering what that is. I know in the January meeting The superintendent said it was to do with Students coming into the district after the beginning of the year and needing special ed services But I thought that's what the stabilization fund was for so just curious what that additional figure is for The on page 68 of the budget under central administration school committee, there's a 16,000 Charge or amount for other unclassified expense. Just wondering what that is On page 80 the amherst elementary school bus routes or have gone up 50,000 dollars in two years Just wondering why that could be or at least the proposed budget is 50,000 more than the actual was two years ago Transportation maintenance staffs gone up by 30,000 dollars wondering why that is um On page 84 contingency expense accounts totaling 217,000 Two years ago. They were $1,000. So I'm just wondering why there's now $100,000 for payroll adjustments 66,000 for grant changes and so on Um, I think mr. Demling just addressed my question about where in the budget you would see how much is going out for charter school Funding because I wasn't able to figure that out other than looking at the number of students and then multiplying it by the per pupil cost And just what's the net? School choice similarly. What's the net of school choice? It looks like there's 24 students going out and 88 coming in or Some numbers it looks like a hundred coming in So what's the net on that to the district? Um I didn't see any funding for early childhood access per the recommendations from christin haze In the study that she did a few weeks ago I was wondering why that's not in there and what the plan is for that And then in the quarter two budget it showed district-wide Special education and support significantly over budget and it explains why that is and How it's going to be covered out of the umass funds and a few other things And i'm just curious why the special education stabilization fund is not being applied first since I thought that was what its purpose was for Um unanticipated costs and then should I address capital now or no? is that separate We don't actually have a capital hearing. Um, okay, it would that would be general public comment Which I missed right the So we haven't we haven't actually I had that presentation yet Is there a hearing on that coming up or there is not a hearing but there is um A public comment at our next meeting. Okay, because I know it's in the packet for tonight. So that's why I was curious Um, yeah, so I think that's about it. I had a couple of the questions about the Editions and I think dr. Morris addressed it just when I walked in the door there the the ELA review and sixth grade study position He was explaining why that's needed. I was just curious about that and the middle school Sixth grade to the middle school exploration. I noticed the amount dropped from 7 000 in january to 3 000 today Um, which I think is a good thing But I'm wondering why we should be spending that money at all and how much did the Work over the last 10 months cost. How much did we pay? Juan Rodriguez and where we paying district staff to participate in the grade span advisory board I don't know and if we were how much was it and where do we see that in the budget. I couldn't find that And then the lastly I'll just say the stipends for the msba steering group I just was curious why educators should be paid to do that. It seems like it should be a voluntary role that I'm just wondering if other districts pay their teachers to participate in a steering group and if that was done for the wildwood project Um, and how would you select who would get that? How would those teachers be selected? Um to receive this stipend And I think I'll leave it there. Thank you Thank you. Sorry that was a lot So I'd be before you start timing me Um, I wasn't aware in our last meeting that there was a limitation during hearings for people to speak For the public. So Is that like policy? Yes Okay, because that wasn't explained at the last meeting. So anyway, so I want to thank the parent parents, right? Yeah, for some of those things that you brought up because I think one of the things that I just want I'm not going to get into too many details about the I didn't come in with that kind of information Um, can you please identify? Oh, yes, absolutely. I'm Caridad Martinez And I am a member of the school committee equity task force And so my concerns are around Um Not being able to fully understand the budget. So I this is I sit at the last meeting I think that the school committee and the administration need to work on being able to present a budget Right and how schools suspend their monies in a way that's comprehensive understandable to the general public I don't think that that's I think that this is language and thing, you know and Language that is used that is only understandable to certain people And other people just you know, we got to try to figure it out or come here in three minutes and Ask questions that are not going to be answered in three minutes. So I think what I'd like to say is more of a statement. So We all know that public education is funded mostly through property taxation, which we already know causes inequality and access To resources and outcome and this district benefits due to property taxation more than others And one of the things that I'm concerned is With what seems according to much more detailed information that's recently Being made available to the public through other means that isn't the school committee That for me that there's an unequal and unfair allocation and distribution of wealth in the ARPS system An example that I'll give you is there seems to be a very wide discrepancy between Paraprofessional salaries and teacher salaries though para para educators work just as hard As many teachers and most of them are presently people of color While teachers with the higher salaries higher salaries are mostly white So I think that's something that we should look at It seems that more money is spent on salaries and direct services to adults meaning teachers and administrative staff and other staff Then money directly allocated to students Is this true? I'm going by information that has been presented to the public by other means right and by Some of the understanding that I I try to Have by reading these documents Um Is this true is so how are you going to change that because in fact that shouldn't it shouldn't be that way Should it it also seems that certain individuals have more than one title and are being paid extra salaries for these jobs Once again this information is coming from other information that's been made public I think this needs to be looked at to see if these people are being overpaid Can these jobs be consolidated? Are these people being evaluated? Is this practice even legal? Another issue is that it appears that salaries are being increased without people being evaluated. Is this legal? Is it right? Is it true? Our teachers administrators and other staff being evaluated according to policy Which means consistently and whenever a pay raise of being is being considered people should be evaluated Is that happening? Do we do we know if that's happening? Or these um salary raises just happening and People aren't being evaluated I think it's the responsibility of the school committee in the administration to rethink the allocation and distribution And to review these concerns that the community is bringing out I also think that this school committee should be reviewing in detail how money is spent in detail Um, you should all be thinking of creating a way. I already said this You know to create a way in which the budget is clear and understandable to the general public I would like to be able to know exactly what a line item means If it's not obvious and how the money is being exactly spent If not maybe in the moment, we won't know until the end of the year They may be like a general fund and then at the end of the year we'll know exactly how it was spent But at least we have an idea What exactly do these things mean? So when you say a contingency plan, well, what does that really mean? Right in detail. What does that mean? Um, and I think that if you're going to be cutting anything you should be cutting trips food and legally supported Uh, and unsupported salary increases meaning if the people are not being evaluated, nobody should be getting a raise That's ridiculous. And if that's happening, that's not correct, right? This should be a proper evaluation Uh, um policy and that should be um, you know, practiced as it should be and so the other um, A thing that I want to say is um Uh about What I saw up here, which unfortunately we don't have any hard copies in this meeting, so I um, but In the area that said reductions and um We can go back to that just really quickly if somebody can get me back to that page with reductions and thank you There we go Additions and reductions So someone pointed out that it looked like the UMass strategic partnership agreement looked like it was money that was being reduced But in fact, it's something else. I wasn't clear on that So when I look at this and I see something in parentheses according to the legend, it means reductions I mean, so it's it's not clear to me You know, if it's are you is this a reduction in the budget, you know, what does that really mean? Because I didn't really understand what you said And um, so that makes it, you know, uncomprehensible. So and so then I would go back and then I'll wrap it up to So in fact special education Um tuition so we have it in parentheses. Is that a reduction? Right, so I'm not clear You know, does that mean that you're cutting from the budget this amount of money in relation to um special education, right in relation to um The stabilization fund contribution special ed and I'm confused and I'm a little concerned with cutting anything from special ed Unless of course it's money that's not being spent the way it's supposed to be Because I actually from my experience is advocating for children who are on IEPs in this district Many parents who do not know About the various resources that are available to children Their children do not have access to those resources Usually it's parents that are very well informed Who have legal representation whose children get the resources That they require To show academic progress right to have academic progress. So Um, I'm concerned that if a parent comes in says I'd like a I think a paraprofessional would be a good fit for my child And that the special education person says we don't have the money for that Well, yeah, you don't have the money for that if you're cutting Is that what that means, right? So thank you Thank you. So, um Uh, dr. Morris or mr. Slaughter, would you Do you have any follow-on comments or clarifications? I'll defer to dr. Morris Just starting I'll defer to dr. Morris Sure, uh, so in terms of per people costs, um There's two primary factors of Comparisons to other neighboring districts one is how many adults we have working with kids and the second is What the salaries scale are And I think that's what one of the members of the public said is true that you know, we have Our negotiated salaries are higher than some neighboring communities Across all different all the different units We also have more staff than many other schools We're very fortunate and the community demands us to have for instance full-time librarians and library para educators In all three of pretty moderately sized elementary schools all of our elementary schools have One school counselor one school adjustment counselor and one school psychologist, which is very atypical But we believe in mental health and we believe in supporting kids that way So, um, I do think, you know, there's legitimacy to the concern about the per people cost piece But, you know, my experience is what what the community demands is is a little different in Amherst than what it is in some neighboring communities um I think in terms of special ed versus regular ed I think while the number of students is lower for sure in special education the needs are such that Often the funding that's required is significantly higher When you're talking about students who have kind of adapted devices for communication things like that That can be quite costly, but they need them to access their curriculum In terms of central administration expense versus school administration expense, that's generally because You know, mr Sheehan's lines and some other lines when it comes to curricular items are bought centrally across all the schools So, you know, everyday math materials things like that are bought centrally to be more organized in that regard I think a number of the other ones I addressed earlier. I think In terms of why we don't use Contingency the contingency count, that's really our last resort and we want to if we can't cover Our costs with appropriated funds, then we will go there, but we try not to go there unless we absolutely need to And then this year because of some positive variances that we had that we discussed We feel like we don't need to go down that road in terms of the bus routes dug probably could talk a little more about it than me, but we went out to bid and The bids that we received a low bid is quite a bit higher than The bid of the contract that expired. I don't know if you have more that you could share on that one dug Yeah, I'll share a couple of things. So so the increase from, you know, last year to this year was considerably Higher than than nothing we had projected I think mr. Mangana before he left had had a pretty decent estimate of what he thought the increase would be which was On the order of about 10% or so And of course then that sets us on a trajectory to have higher costs over the ensuing couple of years Our contract is is such that once we set this base price in the first year the subsequent years are based on a Essentially a cost of living it's not really cost of living It's a cpi index a computer consumer price index change Which typically over the last few years has been in the 2% range or less sometimes And so that that moderates the cost the the estimates in the In the out years as it were in in what you saw were We're probably at about a 3% increase which is decidedly larger than what will likely happen with regard to the busing But the the big change was from last year This year's pretty significant increase in in in bus prices and busing costs for for the district In terms of early childhood access miss haze is doing that follow-up work looking at facilities and other items and Until that work is complete it's You know that budget line wasn't cut So if there was additional work that we needed from her for someone else that we have that money in the budget for next year And what she has expressed to us is there are grants That can support the expansion of early childhood access And it may be the case that we use the money that is remaining in next year's budget around that to support Someone supporting us to write a grant for that excess next year But it's it's not something that we're going to be ready for implementing in the next fiscal year I think I also want to clarify that there's no cuts to special education in this budget in fact there's addition of para educators As well as training for special education para educators In the budget, so I just want to make sure that that is clear I think that's probably all I have to say at this point Or Doug or if the committee has other comments, I'd like to make I have a couple things I'll add to that just a little bit partly to orient people to the sort of additions and reductions So so when we're putting the budget together we're talking almost exclusively about the expenses And since we're describing those expenses as increasing costs, so it costs 50,000 or 60,000 dollars for a teacher, etc, etc Anytime we reduce those costs we represent those of negative numbers And so what we're showing on this slide with the ads as additions and reductions is Things that are reductions in the budget adjustment area are typically adjustments that are favorably impacting the the expenses that we're incurring and so You know in some cases they're they're cost avoidances so like the prepaid retirement incentives for example We budget a 50,000 dollar amount each year This year because we are able to To prepay those and knowing the some of that depends upon how many what our staff are and how many are retiring And the whole host of other factors there So for the coming year we are not needing to budget that 50,000 dollars So that reduces a burden in our in our expense line. So several of those fall into that kind of category And so it does it is a little bit of an inverse logic when you see a negative number being a positive effect But it's it's what is happening there And so to to one specifically on the stabilization fund contribution. So The idea was is that we were going to try to build our stabilization Our our special education stabilization fund to a certain point We don't want to build it too big because then we're not able to use it to provide service to kids And so what we want to do is be able to build that up so that in the most extreme case when when we are In need during a any given year that might have that kind of an unexpected expense. We can tap into that We've built it to a place. We think we're fairly comfortable with and that's also part of Why when we're looking at our second quarter budget report, we're trying not to use that money So it's sustained that balance. So it's those two pieces go kind of hand-to-hand a little bit there But I do the one other thing I would say just a general comment, you know is is that You know, we are looking to uh, you know, we're in a people business and so The services that we provide to the kids are done by people and that's a fairly expensive thing if you look at Any government in enterprise? It's it's a lot of individuals doing a lot of work for folks and the stuff They use is often not terribly expensive relative to the people what they cost what their benefits cost Uh and those and those obligations to their future like their retirement Etc. So, you know, people are fairly expensive And I would would also say that budgeting is it is complex. It is difficult We are trying and and want to hear feedback about how to present it better Um, I'm certainly relying on what my predecessors have done in regard to that. I think it is a very very difficult and complex You know area that we we work in when we do the budget there are lots of little pieces to this that we're trying to Identify the cost. There's a point where you you get to so find a level of detail It becomes uninformative But at the same time there are some of the reasons things are where they are is because we're required to report on them in certain ways Um, and so that's some of what what goes into like per pupil expenditure accounts and reports to the state regarding that So some of what's in our budget is driven by what the state expects us to report to them Some things are for our own education as far as how are we spending our money? What are we spending it on? But certainly we're welcoming any comments people have about specifics on how how we we present that to the public at large But it is it is a complex, uh, you know, entity. I mean we're talking, you know 24 million dollars worth of spending. There's a there's a lot of of pieces to that I for one will just add a comment on that that it is it is complex and I think We on the school committee benefited from that additional meeting that we had where we We really dug into and asking all of these like nitty gritty questions about the definition and and how Definitions and and categorizations and that was earlier this year. Um, so they're definitely um, I think we can definitely keep working on that to make it more accessible for Not just future committee members, but also for the for the community to be able to really understand What we're what we're spending our money on if I had one other thing about that So so some of the titles that are on like if you look at the line by line Some of the titles that are on those are driven by what's called our chart of accounts, which is basically The list of all the lines where we track money And uh and try to account for things and some of them are pretty straightforward like office supplies Well, that sounds like paper and pens and pencils and it is But I I do know that you know, there are some that have a certain Legacy aspect to them and so the intention and purpose of them may have changed a little bit over time And we we are due for reviewing and and going through those and trying to refine those names a little bit That's a that's a pretty big project And so we've it's been discussed in sort of my office even before I got there About going through that process and trying to sort of bring some consistency And and normality to to all of that But it is an ongoing process and absolutely there there are some terms that are very much Terms of art so if you're in the business you kind of know what they mean But if you're not they have no meaning whatsoever, it's you know Um So I I do appreciate that and take that as a as a valid criticism And we'll we'll work on trying to to to make that language a little more accessible to everybody So any closing comments miss spitzer I think dr. Morris and dr. Slaughter did a great job summarizing some of the responses, but there was one thing where I don't think we responded to and I'd be happy to Respond or maybe open it up for um A response from dr. Slaughter or dr. Morris, but this question of The salary increases that our staff are getting and whether or not they're being evaluated and my understanding is that the salary increases are Largely negotiated and I think that's worth highlighting for the public that we do have contracts that have Any more cost of living increases that are negotiated on a regular basis and so that um I don't know the evaluation piece, but I'd open it up to say that we probably are regularly evaluating the staff But that the union negotiations that we engage in set into place Salary increases that we must honor and I think it's a good thing that we do Yeah, I don't have anything to ask that So the only thing I would say around the evaluation process is that um And dr. Morris was you know instrumental in it as assistant superintendent implementing it the state came through and and Normalized that across all districts within the state of massachusetts around certainly the what's considered the professional staff the teaching administrators And and professional staff We also by virtue of contract have you know evaluations do for our our paraprofessionals each year as well And so everyone's getting evaluated every year in a various And those those evaluations differ depending on the type of work they do for us But they are being evaluated and and and for the purposes of primarily it's it's to enhance and Ingrow the workers ability capability and and understanding what they do and how to do it better Mr. Denley Yeah, I just wouldn't want this to close without just making the very general point that you know staff do cost a lot And we have a high budget and we have a high Uh cost per pupil because our community makes the choice is willing and is able to invest in our schools And as a result we have excellent public schools Um, you know, I've had the unfortunate of living in a city in the state That does not value public schools as well where There were class sizes in the mid to upper 30s in the lower elementary grades one teacher no aids No extra curriculars you had to pay for your buses and it's a much different educational experience And I for one i'm very Uh grateful to live in a community that gives us this much support I think dr. Slider dr. Morris do an excellent job of presenting Uh a transparent budget And uh, I am i'm proud to be on a school committee that invests in Our primary resource uh of teachers in order to support our children Um as as we go about this this uh exercise of public education Yeah, um, there was just a detail of a question that I don't think I heard Um outline I was just wondering if you if we had a number about the uh cost per pupil for Spets or special ed students I was just waiting for dr. Morris to maybe weigh in but um, so you know the You know, it depends upon the needs of students to some extent, um, you know You look at any district within the state and their their cost per special education student versus their cost for regular education students Going to be different and it's going to be much higher um And so that's that's not surprising and and one of the reasons is generally the the kinds of supports that those kids need Or more adults in their in in their educational program. And so when you have more adults involved, they all Need to be paid and and compensated and so that really Starts to hike, uh, you know the the cost per people That's a sort of short story on that and that's part of why you know You have a very disparate number of students relative to a fairly equal amount of cost That's a that's the I mean, it's not all of it, obviously But that's the sort of quick answer that sort of fills in most of why those are so similar in the overall budget structure Yeah, I think the only the only thing I'll add to dr. Slaughter's statement is that um, Because we don't send a lot of students relative to other districts, um out of district Uh, that's a different budget line in in our in our budget as well as other districts budgets So what you'll likely find is our special ed costs are higher because we maintain in-house services for a greater number of students, but our How much we're spending for out of district students is lower than many other districts? So, you know to a certain extent, it's how the state reports how how the state Shapes what we report to it which dr. Slaughter knows better than me. Um, but it's um You know, it's a little bit of a shell game as to where the costs are represented What that number actually means Okay um with that, um, we are unless there's More common. Um, so we're closing the the fy 21 budget hearing Uh So for those those who were not here we are Rearranged we've rearranged some of our agenda given um that dr. Morris is remote So we're moving on to what's on your agenda printed agendas item j dual language lottery Dr. Slaughter, would you be able to pull up go back to the agenda for? I don't think that there's a handout in our packet for this is there. Oh, there there is. Um Let me see if I can probably near the end. I'm guessing right It is page 50. Oh, sorry. I'm it might be Yeah, that's the budget. Sorry. I'm looking at the it's page 140 Page 140. Thank you. There we go. That's what I would have guessed There we go. Okay. So, uh This is a revisit. Um, we talked about this. I believe in january and um at our january meeting and we had We'd given some feedback to dr. Morris and um miss richardson on the lottery. Um, so this is Sort of circling back. Um and looking at that revision Dr. Morris, did you want to introduce this? Dr. Morris Sorry about that. Um, I'm back on so, um, we talked about this in december and january and at the january meeting, we've got some feedback um that the school committee would like to see um a higher threshold for students with spanish language background lottery and so, um We tried to come up with a proposal to implement that and and you know on average the last couple years the number of students who are spanish speaking, you know, has been a little under 20 Um, but you know, the future is uncertain, right? We don't know exactly what the demographics will look like so we tried Excuse me We tried to take that into account and come up with a proposal that took the feedback from the From the school committee and had multiple tiers of notification to give families more time to Enroll before seats were taken up particularly spanish speaking or spanish language background students So of course we're open to any feedback you'd have we do have our enrollment event on march 18th So we are hoping to tonight even if there are edits to have a final policy that we can share with the community At that enrollment event again on march 18th for comments or Questions dr. Mr. Demling um, so there's there's two changes to this that I'd like us to consider um And if it's okay with the chair, I'll go through them One at a time so, um Dr. Slaughter if you could navigate just for the display at home to the next page To the paragraph that starts if if fewer than 24 students enroll in the spanish Yeah, that one and it and maybe just uh Pop up the uh the hit the plus sign to make it To make it more visible um so so the part of the the policy that that i'd like to Ask us to consider to adjust is so basically we do the lottery on may 4th bilingual families we have the um The the number targets for a minimum of 20 and up to 24 students on that date on May 4th um, and then and then the second paragraph essentially Holds off some of those slots for the spanish-speaking potentially spanish-speaking families um until later dates um, and and and doesn't immediately fill up all available spots on may 4th with with um with the non spanish-speaking students And so so what it what it does it says if unfit if unfilled by groups one and two then two seats will be opened up On july 1st and two more on on august 1st, and What i'd like to see is change it to That the seats will be kept 24 seats will be kept available For the enrollment Unsubsequent date And that four seats would be open on august 1st um I really come back to the core principle about why we're doing this program is the main motivation for this which is If if we have 24 in district spanish-speaking students that want to participate in the program on may 6th Um, and we're allowing them in that program. We should we should keep that open and as late as possible so and You know the the disadvantage of waiting until august 1st to open up those available seats is that you have up to two English-speaking non spanish-speaking families That would have to wait four more four more weeks from july 1st august 1st The big advantage though is that if we have spanish-speaking students move into the district And depending on what year it is this it can be quite a number That affects their education for the rest of their rest of their time here in the district and You know with the primary motivator of Of addressing the achievement gap for spanish-speakers. Um, I think that that's in the cost-benefit analysis It's it's a it's a fair trade-off for me. So I want to get the thoughts on the from the other committee on committee members on that Can you state one more time specifically the edit that you would like to see in here So, you know, I'll just make the motion and then we can Do it so I move to change the paragraph that begins if fewer than 24 students enroll Now To the following if fewer than 24 students enroll in the spanish-speaking bilingual group at this time The remainder of 24 unfilled seats will be kept available for late enrollment of spanish bilingual students at one subsequent date If unfilled by groups one and two four seats will be opened to groups three and four on august first On august first if there are still remaining seats they they will be filled by spanish-speaking school choice students So we have a a motion for an edit. Is there a second? Second Are there Discussion can we go back up and just so I can look at the three four. I'm sorry. I my computer It died on the way over and I don't have a copy Um in paper. So making this decision without the ability to look at it all at once is difficult for me We need to go further up to there I guess my Opposition to this is just that I think it's a big burden to put on those families to wait until august first and at the Law at the potential to lose kids to Another program specifically a charter program would make me anxious about doing this given that I think last year I mean, could you remind us what what we're currently looking at in terms of the number of students in each program? Sure Yeah, so I'm sorry. I was just making sure I wasn't muted so So out of the 39 students and coming on to us right now. We started the year with 37 So 17 were Spanish speaking 20 were Or had Spanish language background, I should say and 20 did not and we've had two students come mid-year Who had Spanish language background or exclusively Spanish language? Skills and I will say it's been a fantastic Transition for those students to be part of a program where half their day They're getting academic content in Spanish. So we currently have 39 students in coming on days And it's a 2019 split I have a follow-up question on that. Um, it's actually not that but typically What is so basic are typical enrollment patterns, um, how is that how are these two different dates impacted so how Typical is it for us to see additional? Spanish speaking students, um enter the district after sort of between july 1 and august 1 Um, pretty typical, um, because families move to especially before kindergarten Families more generally move to the area. Um, oftentimes in the summer months. So, um You know, I don't want to say it's like a mad rush But there's you know routinely because registration occurs not that far from our offices in the summer There's there's people come in every day to register their kids Um, so not all from our kindergarten kids. Not all of them are Spanish speaking or bilingual kids. Um, but you know We do all our outreach in the in the spring, but what we know is that Families that aren't all here, um In the spring to register their kids because some of them aren't living here yet And and just to follow up in historically speaking Um, how often do we have more than 20 or 24 Spanish speaking students entering at kindergarten? Um in terms of registered it's not that typical it has happened. Uh, we went back and pulled some data. Um This afternoon, um I think part of it is that you look back and our class sizes are grade level our school sizes Just be a lot bigger. So, you know, you sort of have to scale down to the number of students who are in our district now In a kindergarten versus six or seven years ago when there were more students Um, but I would say this past year where we had, uh, 17 At the beginning of the fall and then 19, uh, right now that's a pretty typical year for us Mr. Spitter, yeah, so I guess I guess my concern is if if you and, um I'm sorry I'm blinking on her name, but if you and the team feel like there's a need to do this Change that, um, mr. Dumblings suggesting I'd support it But I I guess my concern is that holding these spots open for kids who are unlikely to attend would have no benefit Whereas it would have a negative consequence on the family that's waiting until august 1st I'm just thinking, you know, I've got young kids and in that transition to kindergarten It's a lot and it would be nice to be able to tell your kid you're going to be going to Fort river and not, you know, crocker farm or wildwood or, you know, starting to be able to have that Knowledge of where your kid's going to land july 1st rather than august um first and so I guess my other question the only other Thing is if there is how hard and fast is it that if say two additional kids like this year ended up enrolling after This deadline and we had filled those seats with english-speaking kids Would we have any wiggle room or is it is it really hard and fast? That we wouldn't be able to because I I go I really strongly feel like we shouldn't be saying no to anybody Who is an english-language learner of spanish? But could could you foresee a situation in which we'd have to do that if we had if we weren't to enact this change? um Yeah, let me think about that one for a second. It's a good question um You know, I mean I think last year we didn't fill beyond 20 english speakers partially because we didn't want the balance to be off, right? So we didn't want it to go to 23 and 17 because that felt like that's further away from 50 50 and what we know is that We typically get kids, you know Amherst has a fair through a bit of transiency in its school population and some of that transiency although not exclusively or overwhelmingly But does involve kids with spanish-language background So It's it's a hard question to answer, right? I mean because also 40 is not a magical number. We rather kindergartens that go over 40 We just try to keep this one as a new program. We wanted to keep the class size pretty reasonable Um Yeah, I don't know. I guess i'm not giving you great Uh feedback or advice for how to manage this. I definitely see mr. Demlin's point Uh about waiting and I think you've hit the nail on the head, which is At what point do some families make different options and Uh, I think the flip side is would this policy make it next to Impossible for non forever families Who aren't spanish-speaking to actually getting into the program, right? Like if you look at your group for Uh students, um You know, um You know I think once you get to that level, you know, it can get start getting a little tricky Um But I see both sides. I'm sorry. I'm not, you know, usually I come with a recommendation I'll definitely do that with school choice. I could do it with budget on this one I really understand where mr. Demlin is coming from. I understand the concerns and We will certainly implement both the what's from proposed which was based on feedback last time as well as mr. Demlin Uh, both of these we can implement without an issue. It's really for the committee, you know Which way you want to go we can we'll make either way work Mr. Demlin, yeah, I mean, I'll just say briefly. I think mr. Spitzer's points are very valid And you know, they are real concerns and um, it is a cost to doing this change. Um, I you know like I I mean, I think it is a cost-benefit analysis And you know, there is a risk that someone if they need to wait four more weeks to find out if they're in a program Might make a different option That those one or two Families might do that. Um, that is that is a risk that is a cost. Um, You know, I I weigh that against the possibility of spanish-speaking students moving here in july and then not having that opportunity for the subsequent education But but I appreciate the discussion and I you know respect the committee. However, we vote Right the only i'm sorry. There's one other thing I should mention So with the grant the second year of the bilingual grant, which we were fortunate to receive Partnering with holy oak once again We are trying to look about a summer program that would Happen likely in the month of july for students who are entering his optional program, obviously, but who are entering the dual language program And so Under either of these scenarios it potentially kids Uh, if they wouldn't find out until august, they wouldn't be sort of they wouldn't know enough whether They wouldn't have enough information to enroll in You know a summer program. It's still very much after works. We don't have all the details worked out But it's likely to occur in the month of july Um, it's not a huge factor But I you know just in the sake of giving the committee all the information That is a minor factor when we were thinking about things as well any other Comments Questions Are we ready to vote or on the on the motion on the table? Miss spitzer I guess I just want to echo that I I didn't hear a straight yes or no on whether or not we would have to Say no to spanish speaking kids who were entering the district. So I would just like to say that I would I would not be in favor of I want to make sure that I in no situation what I ever want to Deny a spanish speaking kid within our district the opportunity to enroll in this program So if there are a way that we could make sure that that's the case I don't want to be seen as advocating against Making sure there's room for everybody who's spanish speaking within this program So is there any way we could accept this modification along with the stipulation that in the event that somebody Enters like the two kids who entered mid-year this year that they would be accepted But maybe that would create a magnet of sorry, I'm just thinking out loud through this but because we didn't have this I'm sorry. This this proposal just came. So I'm thinking on the on my feet right now, but um I guess the only downside of doing something like that would be if it's Creates a magnet for Amherst for spanish speaking kids And then we don't have a program that's large enough to accommodate folks who move into the district I think that could be a real risk. Maybe not next year, but over time um So I'm just putting it out there because I I um I I think it's essential that we make this program open to folks who have that spanish speaking background Could I make a process recommendation? Yes Which is I'm looking and the registration event is the 18th the next amherst school committee meeting as a 17 Um just from the tenor of the dialogue and granted. I'm hearing it virtually and my head's not totally working at all cylinders right now. I just wonder if people had two weeks to think about it and We certainly can print in the morning on the 18th and And it's not going to affect anything we do on the 18th other than what we share Um, so if the committee feels like it wants more time to consider it If you want to vote tonight, certainly committee can vote tonight But if it feels better to have more time to consider Uh, all the variables and talk through and ask more questions Uh, that'd be fine with the administration if we put this on for the 17th and then have a vote that evening I I do think let's if I see nodding heads that that would be a good approach. Thank you for that suggestion um And I do just another question since we are sort of tabling this right now is I wonder if The there's a way to phrase this particular section so that it's it's also referencing the balance of English speakers versus Spanish speakers in there because I do that may help us get to the point that miss spitzer was talking about which is We don't want to be in the situation that we have That sort of 50 50 Target so out of whack because we've enrolled more English speakers than than not and so If we do have more students coming in after these after this lottery that are Spanish speaking that that might sort of You know like eyeing it not in terms of the number of seats But in terms of the proportion that we will end up with as a result in the total So I don't I'll just put that out there I don't know how to phrase that right now, but given this two weeks of time. Maybe we can Sort of ponder that Mr. Deming with the permission of the full committee as google is telling me I need In order to withdraw a motion. May I may withdraw my motion for the moment? Is that okay? Thank you. I withdraw my motion. Thank you. Okay So we'll we'll address this we'll come back to this on the 17th Okay Thank you Moving on to So the next item is item d on the printed agenda, which is our school choice hearing Um, and that would be would you like me to tell you the page? Dr. Slaughter it is All right, so it's 55 minus 27 Or 140 I don't have the proper What's the number again? I'm sorry. Um, it was in the old packet. It was page 27 So in the in the packet I have from online, it's 117. I'm not sure what you're when you're working. Yeah, 117 Yeah, thank you So just as a that's entering the Hearing this is a hearing and we're going to hear a presentation From dr. Morris on this and then we'll open it up for public comment specific to school choice planning And again, the process will be three minutes per per speaker followed up with if desired Follow-up comment or clarification from either the committee or the Dr. Morris All right, so as the I'll just read through some of the slides The dug put together that, you know slots in the past have made availability school based on class sizes Um and a lottery the tuition that comes to the district is $5,000 plus if there's student has special needs. There's an increment specific to the student that comes with that And they're attracting a revolving fund and they cover costs Probably paid by the general fund on the next page. You see the balance So the blue bars are their expenditures the Because I don't know what color that is pink ish Peach our peach. Thank you are the revenues and the fund balance you can see so the fund balance I know for some might look high, you know, my experience in Pelham, which is about one tenth the size of the Amherst public schools You know, it's it's uh, it's definitely healthy, but uh as a relative scale Especially when Pelham was high they were routinely over half million dollars In terms of school choice funds and the idea is that you want to try to balance, you know How much you're bringing in and then the revenue so you don't set up a structural deficit by Spending way more than you're bringing in and so for next year In conversation with principals and others What we're proposing is only to accept a very limited number of choice students into kindergarten Uh, there's a couple reasons for that Sort of filled the quote-unquote empty seats at the other grade levels. We don't see them. There's a lot of space For choice and in terms of a limited number for kindergarten We want to think through That we may have a consolidation plan for a building project And we don't want to have to add an extra classroom because we took 20 choice kids And so we're we're thinking in the order of magnitude of 8 to 10, which you know, if you distribute them across eight classrooms That's one to two kids per classroom. That doesn't require Building any extra spaces Uh for those students if they're still in the school when a consolidation Uh could potentially occur in the future. So again, we're really just looking at kindergarten Uh and a pretty limited number for next year. We feel like our fund balance is healthy And we feel like we want to you know, continue to not have that fund balance drop off But be cautious in our approach given the uncertainty of the building project and the implications that would come from it Are there any clarifying questions from the committee? Ms. Spitzer, um, could you just tell us how the 8 to 10 that you're proposing? compares to the last Average of the last few years It's a bit lower. Um, so, um, you know, we've been you know over 10 You know this past year I'm trying to think if Doug could bring it up, but I'm not sure he can it's hard not being there. I apologize Um, but you know, we've been more in the 12 to 15 zone Um Overall, um, it depends on the grade level some grade levels worked out where we didn't have spaces And by 8 to 10 if we we happen to have a high enrollment year that's it's not that we would definitely take 8 to 10 It's that if there are slots Uh an empty seats we would fill to that level not that we would automatically take that number But it is a bit of a reduction Yep so with that we'll open up the public hearing portion of this We've come forward and a just reminder we'll have three minutes for comment Hi, Tony Cunningham. Um, I'm really happy to hear what uh, dr. Morris is recommending. I think that's really smart To only take kindergarten and reduce the number so that in a consolidation scenario It will not require extra classrooms or extra teachers When those if if we go to two schools and one school has 600 kids if more than 10 school choice kids were there you would be or one to two per classroom you would be triggering another class Um, I still have the question about uh, what's the net school choice balance? So what's the difference between what we take in on school choice children and what we pay for those that go out? I don't think that was answered in the previous phase the previous hearing Excluding the special ed increment. Um, and then I just had a question about the deficit when you talk about a structural deficit I thought the idea was that school choice children did not add cost that they were added just in To top off classrooms. So When you say you're you're spending money that money is going on the whole pool of children. I understand it's not going on Just the school. It's not going on the school choice children. It's going on regular education So just a clarification of that because creating a structural deficit seems to indicate that you're spending money on those children Um, which I thought was not the case If you understand what I mean I do. Yeah, so I I could answer that. Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to go ahead Yeah, so I can answer the last one. Um, mr. Slaughter. Dr. Slaughter may be able to answer the other ones So what I meant by structural deficit for instance, what's happened in Pelham is that um, They were spending so much They were spending significantly more of school choice revenue than they were bringing in and so It wasn't that they were spending it on specific kids Uh, and I appreciate that that's you know, I need to be more clear about that. It's that So every year, uh, if you are bringing in I'm going to use kind of round numbers If you're bringing in 300,000, but you're spending 350,000 You've got a $50,000 gap in your budget and your total fund balance is going down $50,000 a year And if you don't address that structural deficit eventually that fund balance is going to be zero And so that's the thing to that we've learned Pelham to be cautious about is if that fund balance starts going down You're relying on that to fund your operating budget So making sure that it doesn't go down too too sharply. It's just something to be cautious about But I apologize about the confusion And do you know what the net school choice balance is? Do you know how much we're paying out? I don't I know it's significantly less than what we're bringing in but I don't have that off the top of my head I don't know if dr. Slaughter has that um, but I know you could get it that channel Just so it gets recorded properly. I don't know that number off the top of my head either, but we do have a Significantly smaller school choice out versus school choice in I'm having to report that to committee. It's a similar Question that mr. Dimling asked earlier relative to to a charter cost So I can I can put those numbers together for you and and for the public at large as well Any additional? Any further comment? Yeah, so uh, it's cutty dud martinez member of the school equity task force So, um, mike did I hear you say that? You are okay with allowing was it 10 kindergarten spaces? Is that what was said? For school choice 10 8 to 10 So on does that include the school choice for spanish speakers? For the dual language program Is that number being considered are those children being considered in that number? That's total school choice Dr. Morris Sure. Yeah, I didn't know whether to wait for the end to get all the questions or yeah Let's just continue with your no I want to ask that question the the other person asked that question is asked the question and then got the answer Because I I want to know that before I go forward Is that something? Sure. So the the state law around school choice is that um sibling Uh, having a sibling in the district is the only preference that one can have Yeah, but my question is in in when we were talking recently about the dual language program there was a group So that that I think I can clarify that is there's A school choice in so that's in the inside school choice. It's not being once they're right So okay, you don't have anything to do with each other Okay, if there happens to be school choice students kindergartners that are spanish speaking That's that group 2a Right. So I am definitely not in favor of not bringing in school choice I think that the school should bring should keep school choice an option Um, I don't think that you should eliminate it this year for various reasons. One is because you um, it could actually be the potential for bringing in spanish speakers From other districts. There are many of them So there can actually be some kind of um Outreach about that and to let that know that this program is actually exist And you just might get other people. I'm not I'm I'm uncomfortable With that there are less spanish speaking children and more non Speaking non spanish speaking children in that program already. So this might be a good way You know, uh, so I would not eliminate it. I would I would suggest to this committee not to eliminate that and and there's other reasons So I started off earlier saying that public education is funded mostly not completely but mostly through property taxation And which we already know causes inequality. I think the amber school district has Um privilege, right? You have more resources because your property taxation is higher This, you know, it's a wealthier community than many other communities around and so you just have that that's a privilege that you have Which to most people in this country is unfair Children should all children should receive the same kind of funding for schools All schools should be just as well funded It should not be because there are wealthy people in the neighborhood and because of that some children get better So the amber school district has a social justice mission It has a mission for multiculturalism And so I feel that it has a moral response responsibility to share its resources A lot of families who want to access amber school resources Probably don't live here because they can't afford it If they could they could live here so their children can go to these schools They can't afford to live here. We all know there's a crisis in housing here for low-income people and that is a fact So they live in in other areas and hope for the best that their child might get into this school Because they feel like this is a better school district with more resources for their children So um, that's why I think you should not You should accept children in school choice and um And you know and particularly think about how that can also become, you know Attractive to Spanish speakers for the dual language program. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Deming. Uh, yeah, so, um Our former chair uh, anesthesia adonias. I had some input uh tonight for the school choice hearing. Uh, she was unable to make it Due to a scheduling conflict. Um, but I have her about one minute comments if that's okay to Read into the public comment for uh school choice hearing Go ahead. Okay Uh Dear school committee and superintendent morris. I'd like to comment on school choice school choice increases diversity of students and families in the district High-income families already have school choice because they can afford to move To and live in areas with high quality public schools or they enroll their children in private schools By keeping modest school choice options available in our amor schools We ensure that our students and those of neighboring towns get to benefit from our educational offerings By keeping a reasonable limit on school choice We also keep class sizes small since we hire the teachers we need and we're able to maintain a low student to teacher ratio Having served on school committee. I know that school choice seats are open to only when enrollment of resident students is low enough The choice students can be accepted without exceeding class size limits set by you and the superintendent Keeping school choice also amplifies our reputation as a desirable public school district Families who choose to attend amor schools want to be here and school choice students bring different perspectives and experiences to benefit Our schools in many ways I encourage the school committee and superintendent to continue our school choice options School choice students do not excessively contribute to cohort size number of classrooms or school populations Thank you for all you do anastasia ordinez Thank you Comment our questions. Um, we will move on and close the public hearing And now we were we are back to our Agenda order, so we're moving to what is item b on the printed agenda second quarter budget update At this point, I think I will uh depart. Um, thank you for uh accepting my virtual participation tonight Uh, I would have rather been there. Um, just health wasn't contributing to that, but I really appreciate your flexibility tonight Thank you All right. Thanks everyone. I'll see you soon Feel better Thank you We we are at the second quarter update, right? Yes. Okay. Good. I don't have to tell you the page I brought this as a separate file. That's why it's like that. So it's a little Um, and I'm going to shrink it just a little bit. I don't know if that makes it too hard for people to read Let me know if that is the case, but I kind of want to put all the numbers on on one page if at all possible Yeah, it's gonna have to be a little bit tiny there. Um, hopefully that's you know as projected is is available for folks to read Um You know the long story short through the first six months of the year the first half of the fiscal year Uh, the budget's doing okay. There are a couple of problem areas or I shouldn't say problem areas I should say areas of concern by virtue of the fact that we had some unexpected expense This was noted by mr. Mangano earlier in the year those those expenses were Anticipated the full extent of which were not as well known at that time. They're more well known now And then so that's what you see in the district wide sped and the in the district wide support Both of those are considerably over budget at this point in time The other areas under contracted under payroll accounts under contracted payroll Largely we've accounted for and and encumbered or And by encumbering I mean, you know, we're sort of reserving the money in anticipation of expense that we're going to need for For certain kids over the course of the remainder of the year But that's a fairly, you know, we've we've expended a Fair amount there's not a lot left relative to where we are in the year And so there's not a lot of wiggle room if something else comes up that needs contracted services that weren't anticipated So So that's an area to keep a close eye on which is why we've we've highlighted it in in yellow And so the rest of the the second quarter budget is is is in pretty good shape in other words that the you know Payrolls where we think it should be for this time of year and are you know our expected expenditure? Plus what we anticipate for the rest of year works out to be about what we think it's going to be Our specific expenses at the schools are in in You know other programs administration information systems, etc. Are are in pretty good order You know a couple are a little over where you would expect them to be so it looks as though you like utilities or or Facilities, excuse me is a little over budget again That's about you know our projection and whether our projections accurate accurate or not, but that's a fairly small Overage in those couple of areas you'll see at the bottom is control accounts in a sense You know this is a variety of pieces that go into that control accounts But that sort of holds some of those various resources contingency funds and the like that we use to help support Those unanticipated costs and that sort of thing What's not in here is the the umass funds so they're not shown at present in here And so that's that's part of why I say that what we'll do during this next quarter basically which we'll end at the end of the month But what we'll do at the end of this month is we'll we'll weigh those different Resources whether it be umass support of our our district this year And and uh Contingency funds that we plan for and then the third one with she was alluding me at this moment because it's getting late in the day And you know potentially some of that money that we budgeted to to go into contingency You know we use it before it actually gets into contingency for contingency So we'll we'll weigh those different options as to what's the best approach The idea being that we'd like to get our state special ed stabilization To that to that balance. We were anticipating this year without these These unanticipated needs So we'll weigh those different options and we'll come to you with those as as necessary to to To sort of balance out the budget and finish out the year Um And so you know, we're in the very very fortunate circumstance of having that support from umass this year I think that really gives us some options available to us I think we would have been able to cover those those overages. There are I will also note that uh, you know, there are things like circuit breaker and there are things Like what what do they call it? I believe extraordinary aid I think is what they call it So if you have an extraordinarily large expense in a year the state does have some funding available to help Districts that haven't a really extraordinarily large unanticipated Particularly special education cost So you can get some support from the state to help that We will apply for those funds as well and that'll help You mitigate this as well. So so there were a You know when we're when we're building contingencies into our budgets Sometimes we're doing it because we don't know the answer to the question yet Which is what mr. And dr. Morris was talking about earlier with the you know Kids that are being evaluated and they're trying to assess. What's the right program choices for those kids? But sometimes it's You also plan in some some Some circumstances that you just you don't know that they're coming They've just moved to town and and they have needs sometimes people sometimes that doesn't happen. So The reverse happened in the regal school district this year. So in on their end of things a couple of kids Moved on or moved out of the district and so there were anticipated high costs in in special education That weren't realized in this circumstance in Amherst this year We had the reverse of that we had some kids moved to town who had and need some support in ways that That put a rather significant Crimp on our budget and so you know, that's why we have some of those contingency funds We we plan those in in a few different places. We we plan those in in in Our anticipation of what our health insurance costs are going to be because we don't know All the people that we're going to hire for next year and which ones will or won't elect Health plans and what kinds of health plan so we build some of that into our budgeting as well And we try to you know, we try to use the experience we have over several years to to Identify those those types of contingencies. What are reasonable sized numbers? And try to you know, not over commit funds to things that aren't directly Available and useful and and so we're trying to strike those balances all the time Um, but just to just to recap the long story short is the budget's okay There are a couple areas that that are of concern will keep an eye on we will have to divine what we want to do relative to how we fund those overages and what's best suits our overall trajectory of of How we want to structure some of our contingency funds for the next year Excuse me. So I think with that I'll leave the questions to you guys Mr. Spitzer So just um going right off of what you ended with it sounds to me like these Um increases in the district whites that accounts in the district wide support are those then going to be It sounds like they're already reflected in the The next fiscal year's budget and they are and that's tied to that special Contingency line item that we were seeing in the adjustments or no I think in in in in regard to the I would say that the the lion's share of the kids that are here now are budgeted in the regular sort of normal places Um, there are other kids who have um, so I'm trying to say this in a way that makes makes some sense So the unanticipated kids that we had come this year may have come with an IEP for example or a particular set of needs Um, the contingency that was so those kids have been budgeted for that expense in the coming year I think the contingency that that was in the additions and reductions was in particular a kid that has presented in this year And is in is currently being Identified and what is the right programming for that kid? So that's in the contingency because we're not sure exactly where we would place that in the budget at this point We're likely to anticipate a need it may not realize it may be once they finish the work that they do In in evaluating and determining what this kid's best programming needs are that It's not nearly that big or it's not in you know Or it's exactly that big and it goes in this part of the budget But until we fully have that realized and and figured out it sort of sits into that that contingency category for now Mr. Demley so with some of these expenses being eligible for circuit breaker You know the change with the the phase in of the transportation being eligible Is that something that tracks back a year? Like we we incur the expense one fiscal year and then we apply for reimbursement and then it shows up In the next fiscal year I'm just you know given given that the transportation is slowly phasing in over the next five seven years in terms of eligibility circuit breaker, I didn't know how that So fortunately, I went to a presentation by The department of elementary and secondary at today on that very subject and Dr. Brady was also there and so So the interesting thing is is circuit breakers is a particular sort of flavor of support and it relates to sort of It's funding that the state will grant you in a Above a certain funding that you cover. So there's a foundational amount of money that's Expected of every district to fund their their program at four times that is the multiplier Once you get above four times that foundation cost and you're eligible for circuit break So the money's above four times Unfortunately with this new change to to allow transportation cost to be considered in that They set the the four times number based on fiscal 19, which is actually better because the it would It makes the threshold a little lower to be perfectly honest So once our cost for a given kid get above four times that foundation Funding which for this year is I want to say in the 45,000 dollar rate So once those costs for that kid get above 45,000 dollars, then it's eligible for for that circuit breaker Support and so those dollars that are above that that threshold Are eligible And then they try to fund For the services that are provided they're trying to fund it at 75 percent of that So you figure out the number above The sort of threshold then you take that number and multiply it by 0.75 and that's the support they give you So you're still It's not they don't make you whole once you get above four times They're they're doing the best they can and sometimes it's less than that depending on the overall amount of money available You know Based on what was appropriated. So if the needs are externally high that 75 doesn't always get met The addition of of transportation allows for us to add transportation costs To to that and so getting to that That threshold for a circuit breaker it those transportation costs now help get us to that threshold Which would potentially qualify a few more students But it's fairly nuanced there's still you know They're phasing it in as far as the support for the transportation costs that fall above the the circuit breaker threshold They're phasing in at 25 percent and then they'll go to I think it's 25 50 75 As they go through the next few years So they will pay those monies next fiscal year for expenses incurred this fiscal year That was a really long way to get to the answer that you wanted, right? I'm sorry about that I was just trying to paint the picture a little bit. But yes, you're typically capturing the money the next year And then you have you can use it in the year in which you're paid or you can carry it another year Circuit breaker allows you to carry one extra year. So it's actually you can use it two years after you incurred the cost So again, this is one of those where sort of rolling funds can be helpful to sort of mitigate spikes and valleys and in funding sources and and and expenses But you do have with those circuit breaker You do have the year that you receive the money and one more And you and and then if you don't spend it you have to give it back Which we don't do Thank you Any other Comments no, okay. Thank you So moving right along we are Looking at fee vote And we have seen this fee schedule before so what we're looking to do tonight is to vote on On this proposed fee schedule Correct. It hasn't changed since mr. Mangano actually presented it to you. I think originally in october perhaps early november Do you need any explanation or Maybe a brief explanation because um, at least one of us was not on the committee in october All right So long story short on on the fees is that we're we generally are looking to increment them A little bit each year instead of having big changes in them And so what you'll see is percentage changes are fairly small by and large There are times however when when we'll want to do for example, if you look at the preschool We went up 25 cents Because it's a nice round number it works out a little bit easier Some of the other ones when you start getting in before school programs, uh, and the the full fee, you know, they're pennies Because on the overall cost it doesn't it doesn't end up mattering that much on the school lunch We we jumped a full quarter again That's partly about making changes to at the register is a lot easier when you deal with quarters instead of pennies And kids that are in third grade, right? So, you know, um, that's part and parcel of that the other thing with the with the school meal prices in particular is there is By virtue of participating in the national school lunch program. We are compelled to have our price set To keep us eligible to to remain in the program. And so we can't have our costs too low And so we we're trying to move those along just enough to stay eligible in the program And if you'll look at the history there, you'll see that we went to three dollars And we stayed there for four years and now we're going to go to three and a quarter We'll probably stay there three or four years as well before we're compelled to change it again But it is a a bit more sizable jump Then the other changes that are in the one two 3% kind of range So the idea again is to kind of keep Peace with inflation a little bit and not have huge shocks to people's system as they as fees change Or need to change Thank you any questions No Any motions Move to accept the fiscal year 2021 fee schedule as presented Sir second Second Moved in second in all those in favor signify. Yes by raising your hand The proof four to zero Thank you So Our next item is item e So we're back on track now on the on our agenda flow and and this is Looking at our warrant approval process again so I can give a brief introduction, but I I don't know if dr. Slaughter if you have anything you want to add, but I know that We had just as background we had discussed that we were going to Sign warrants and approve warrants as a committee rather versus an alternative approach acceptable approach would be to assign or a point one member of the committee to Sign all warrants and present the warrants at the At each of our committee meetings What I think dr. Slaughter and dr. Morris have experienced is that that becomes problematic given that we meet just monthly and We've discussed at our recent meetings because of the massive quantities of paper that that get produced in in that process that it It feels a little inefficient In that in that process and Potentially cumbersome for for the district in terms of meeting needs Do you want is there anything the only the only other thing I would would add to that is just you know One concern that we run into as far as you know it's it by virtue of the nature of purchasing in in And expenditure generally is fairly Well Byzantine I'll use the word Byzantine You know there's a lot of steps that are involved and required For auto purposes for you know compliance purposes for a relation purposes etc And so it's a fairly complex process which makes it a little bit slow to begin with and so Anything we can do to help move things along because we can't release checks to people to pay them until you guys sign And so I think about not so much this time of year where we meet a little more regularly Sometimes more than once a month, but when we get to summertime and we might go a long span You know the the municipal modernization act helped by creating this new mechanism By which you can designate someone who then just reports next time But by virtue of that then when you don't do it that way then you've got a much more cumbersome process than what you had before so You know I'd love for you to change it but again, it's your call is with regard to that and and So I want to support you guys as far as what you need informationally You know we we use some reports that sort of Categorize it by sort of broad areas of spending If that will work for you as as it seems to have been working for the region That's perfectly fine by me, but if you want something a little different You know one of the concerns with putting sort of the full warrants into like a packet electronically is it often contains some Sensitive information we want to be very conscientious and careful of that So that's the other thing Mr. Deming, I mean personally the driving principles for me on this process are as long as we're legal The school committee members have access to view the detail warrants should we want to so should we show up to the district office and request them And that we're efficient with the limited resource of the committee's time To that end I feel like the regional process has worked fairly well for appointing a member I'm getting some different shakes of heads So perhaps that's a bit of a discussion But uh Yeah, you know and if we're going to vote Just having the confidence that it's been reviewed you and you're not having a A stack of papers that were hardly going through At the time seemed seemed suboptimal, but anxious to hear any additional points of view I think uh I was nodding when you said it's working well But I I do it had a it had a rocky is probably too negative a word, but I had a cumbersome challenging start That said I I do agree that appointing one person to sign warrants may help this process along and can be efficient just modeling after that and Unless somebody else wants to volunteer to do that I will volunteer myself to be that person But unless somebody wants to violently overtake my volunteer It might be wise to designate a backup in case you're not available That would be wise. Yes, because we've had to leverage that for the region recently So I guess we're looking for a um unless others object um looking for a backup to me as a I believe I might be the only one able to actually serve as the backup So I am probably yeah, so um I mean, I guess so just to put in my two cents on this process and not Thank you for volunteering and I will support you being the person to do so, but I just want to put out there that it it is quite um time consuming and as the person who's been the backup for the region Can I discuss that experience here? Yeah, I think so I think it's informative to what's going on. It's informative to what's going on. I'm not going to debate it, but it's just that um It it's time consuming and it's it's um In that you go to the office you need to review all of the warrants and then you sign them and then you need to report So I think it would be useful um and maybe we could work together because currently I am the person doing it for the region to come up with a way to Report it efficiently like creating a spreadsheet or google doc or some some way that we can standardize how it's reporting So when that person if you're away on a work trip, it's easy to step in and and Take over that duty because I think because we're new to it The pro the process is not um solidified yet. So we need to figure out. I think a good way to Automate it for lack of a better term Um So I I will volunteer to beat the backup I'm currently going in now to do the region So it shouldn't be too much of a burden, but it does require also a good con I would say make sure strong communication with the staff in the business office to Coordinate the timing And to that point if I may I think for us as far as operationally is if if you have a regular time that you can come Then we'll plan accordingly. I mean that always works best, you know, and so Um And now it's not to say you both have to have the same time so that if you're not available She's available by first of but but I do think that that helps us get into a rhythm as far as our workflow and planning our work And that sort of thing If that's not possible then that's not possible and we'll sort of can you know There's a lot more emails that have to go back and forth to coordinate But if if if you can pick a regular time and that makes it a lot easier for my staff to go Okay, I've got this this deadline to try to meet and try to have as much sort of put together in In a timely way So that would be the one one thing I would ask And I think that works easier for I think our representative as well so So you'll probably need to take a vote which probably can include who's going to be the signer But the other thing is you actually do have several warrants that I passed in front of you earlier Which you will need to actually Make motions on and vote and I think there are maybe five of them there One is a transfer of funds for a student activities account what the others are all just Sort of expending X dollars for accounts payable So let's tackle the that's the second piece But I don't want us to forget that and then not actually be able to do anything with them Yeah, I realize that but we did it in the reverse order than the way it's listed under this agenda item So I apologize. Um, so do we have a motion on the warrant approval process? Um, I moved to have Allison McDonald serve as Our appointed person to sign Amherst school committee Amherst warrants second Moved in second all those in favor signify by raising your hand approved for zero Um, and I moved to a point to carry spitzer as the backup Warrant approver and signer for Amherst school committee Second moved in second and all those in favor signify by raising your hand For zero Now moving on and I'm dr. Soderman asked for your help and how we should Read read these into the exception of these The rest of them what I would do is the following um I moved to approve the warrant dated This or this amount, okay, that's pretty much all you can do you can do you can do all of them in one motion Okay, those kinds of these are just um Transfers are moved to you know appropriate the transfer Got it, you know, okay. Thank you um Chair could I ask for um, I was about to suggest a five-minute recess anyway um And I would be more comfortable having a little bit of time to review the warrants that we're about to vote on um, so that would kill two birds with one stone, so A second all those in favor for five-minute recess For zero we're recessed Okay, so I have no gavel but Um calling the meeting back to order at 8 25 Ow They didn't they didn't leave the gavel for you. Yes, that's my my hand my Handmade uh, yes, I should but um, okay, so I will read these um We are approving a series of warrants and I'll read them off now that we've all had a chance to review them during our recess um To approve I move to approve the warrant dated march 2nd 2020 Number s zero three zero two two zero in the amount of 36 thousand dollars six hundred and thirteen and 27 cents And the warrant dated january 31st 2020 number s zero one three one twenty In the amount of four thousand three hundred and two dollars and seventy three cents The warrant dated february 7th 2020 number s zero two zero seven two zero in the amount of two hundred and thirty five thousand nine hundred and two dollars and thirty five cents And the warrant dated february 21st 2020 number s zero two two one two zero In the amount of 53,091 dollars and 49 cents second So move seconded um all those in favor signify by raising your hand Passes four zero And now I move to approve the following funds transfer requests from the uh, fort river principal requests a transfer of 1,781 and 88 cents From the town control account for subsequent deposit to the school student activity account dated february 19th 2020 and The transfer requests from the crocker farm principal requests transfer of 2,100 dollars From the town control account for subsequent deposit to the school student activity account dated february 20th 2020 second Moved in seconded all those in favor signify by raising your hand four zero so moving on we are At item f joint capital planning committee um, so this one um At the first meeting of the joint capital planning committee Not quite a month ago. Um, or just about a month ago. Um, we Discussed the agenda and schedule and um, we're able to have that schedule adjusted to Meet outside of standard business hours so that the meetings will now be on Wednesdays at 5 30 thank you In um in the banks center So seeing that a we've Lost one of our our jcpc members with eric nakajima leaving And resigning from the committee and also I am not able to Continue my service on that um committee as well. We need to appoint two representatives for uh from this group To serve on the jcpc Do we have any volunteers Excellent, uh, mr. Demling. Yeah, so I appreciate the so you've been doing a lot of work recently because uh vice chair of region and Chair of this committee as well as the other subcommittee. So um, yeah, we do have to share the load We have some other big ticket time consuming committees coming up Like the school building committee and I'm not sure I'm going to be available Uh to do that as an option. So um, I'm more than happy to to do this. The one Time conflict I have is I'm going to be out of state on wednesday april 1st, which is According to the schedule that you sent out the day for Doing the final vote from the jcpc vote. I may be able to uh participate remotely in that meeting I'm not sure yet, but you know, if the committee is fine with um with that You know somewhat of a schedule risk. I mean, I would certainly be able to uh Communicate with miss spitzer any concerns I had at the meeting And it sounds like things are going to get mostly drafted and finalized in the meeting before that anyway, so But with that I'm I'm I'm happy to serve Thank you, mr. Demling Miss spitzer and I would just also really appreciate I wanted to state my appreciation of um your service on it But also for advocating for moving the time because um, I would not be able to serve work to stay at the original time So thank you and thank you to everybody else on the jcpc who Accommodated our schedules I feel like i'm the vice chair of scheduling lately so um So um unless there's objection or comment from anybody else then we will um officially Appoint miss spitzer and mr. Demling as our representatives for jcpc. Thank you And I will let the the rest of that committee know that um who Who will be representing us? Thank you Um moving on now to item g msba update. Um, so at our last meeting we had a conversation about What we had a presentation from dr. Morris on the msba? process and the formation of the school building committee and we had some discussion at that point about Our input to the town manager On that composition of the building committee And we tabled that and mr. Harrington and I met briefly to talk about that and sort of come back to this committee With some thoughts on that so mr. I'll turn it over to mr. Harrington to Share what we talked about All right, so like the the key points that we had were that we would uh We would need a group that's committed to an an outcome as outlined in the soi statement of interest um, we would also need At least an individual with experience in community outreach and communications like that would be very important to open up the conversation We need a parent from each elementary school And possibly represent I missed that and then um So overall kind of like the idea was to have like a larger group with uh subgroups And potentially a dedicated outreach subgroup That being the the key element is the outreach and broadening the conversation kind of about what we came up with We were um in the building on the comment about the the size of the committee I know that in past um when we've talked about feasibility committees or building committees um, there's always And I I wasn't on the school committee at that time, but I remember and recall conversations about the size and The effectiveness of very large groups and I think Sort of looking at sort of some of the recent working group models where there are very large groups of and constituencies It works well when that is able to be able to broken up into smaller groups So I think what we were what mr. Harrington I were talking about was that we wouldn't be averse to having a large group If that sort of same approach and model or similar approach and model was taken that There could be sort of subgroups that could be tackling different pieces of it For example, the community outreach and an engagement process Mr. Deming That's it's interesting on the size of the committee So over the years, you know, I've heard from people who have observed the committee who participated on the committee And more recently I tried to reach out with to people who've served on and and a pretty common theme was that the Thought of the committee was too large. Um, and but um attrition is a real issue This is a pretty massive time commitment, right? And not all the meetings are exciting You know, there's a lot of boring sort of procedural procurement kind of stuff you have to get through And so to have someone there You know who's there at the beginning and through the educational vision and then the proposals and communication Is important. So it's it's I don't like I guess I can see it both ways, you know, the sort of the pro con The larger a committee you have the less likely you are to have everybody Be showing up consistently and to um to be there throughout the whole process Yes, I Personally, I don't feel too strongly one way or the other so long as As the work gets done efficiently, but um Yeah, but that that is a consideration. I think one um We we did sort of encounter this theme back in the day when we were forming up the um Uh the footwork feasibility committee and we sort of Came to the conclusion that you know, if you if you really wanted representation from every person And every every group um that you were interested in you would you'd end up with a 60 70 committee at at the minimum and so um So I think I think on that front if if you went with a smaller committee I I think it's important to emphasize that that this is you know The the the purpose of the building committee is to facilitate a solution that the community is going to support It's it's not where the uh the preferences the battles over personal preference should be fought Right. It's it's uh, like I'm sure people will have very strong views and and it's it's good and healthy about you know Where where the building should be how how should we get to 600 students? What's the? um What's the implementation of net zero going to be all those all those things but And in in my sort of understanding of what the focus of this committee should be There should be no bullets or flags flying at these at these meetings, you know, I think that's something that um as the interviews are being conducted by the town manager should be emphasized is that um If you want to advocate strongly and make your personal views known great But this isn't the venue to do that this is uh You're kind of shelving your own personal agenda in order to facilitate um collaboration, um I I do like the idea of trying to get um Multiple teacher input in a way that's manageable for teachers teachers already have a full time job Um and uh and already you know volunteer a lot of their time for our schools um so but uh One common theme I heard from uh former members of the building committee is that that educational vision Of what's going to happen in the building is really critical to uh To the best kind of building design and so when you talk about the dual language program you talk about building blocks And aims and ilc and uh what's going on with project-based learning at at wildwood all these specific things that you want to have Supported in the building you know that that information and how that affects the space really comes from teachers And yet you can't have you know 13 teachers on the committee and so um So this idea of having sort of a a cohort a a group of teachers who can meet regularly and provide input I think is is a really good um is a really good idea. Um And the other last kind of wonky um bit of feedback that sounded um that made a lot of sense to me is having someone with um past experience of of the process of actually building something. Um Whether that's uh Someone with planning experience, but just um You know if it's your first go-around of interacting with engineers and architects. It's not that you have to have all that Uh expertise knowledge yourself But you know what questions do you ask a project manager when you are at the at this particular stage of the educational vision? What more questions do you ask the architect when you're going into Full schematic design of both sorts of things that you might not think of. Um, so someone with some Experience and in municipal projects like that. I think would be Would be really helpful. Um, and and you you both stated at the very beginning But I do think it would help to be just just very clear and matter of fact that this is um, you know, we need Everyone on the community to be supporting a one building solution And that doesn't mean that it's Being prescriptive about how we achieve that one building solution, but um, but we had A lot of work from a unanimous school committee in town council to support the statement of interest That we're going to take care of both of these buildings in five to seven years and that seems like a pretty Uh achievable core principle that everybody should be asked to Express their their viewpoint on if they're if they want to participate in this committee, so Uh, yeah, that's all Okay, thank you Mr. Spitzer No, I'd like to just say thank you for working on this. I I guess my question was you mentioned one out of many potential subgroups I know that we have constraints Or correct me if i'm wrong, but I believe again I don't know what accidents the packet but um, I believe we have constraints about who needs to be on it So in some ways this question of size is driven Um by the requirements of the state process Um, but did you discuss any other potential subgroups because I well, I agree outreach and engagement are Core to getting anything achieved if we don't have good foundations for what they're asking people to outreach and engage about then And so what are the other potential subgroups that you were considering if any? um I think uh your observation that Was exactly what we were building off of was that that so much of it is prescribed and so What we were looking at is so within that What would we what would we add to that right so? and sort of and and the idea of subgroups was really more to If we can't find sort of that you know a handful of unicorns that have that can hit five of the required Profiles on the building committee that it's okay to go a little bit bigger So long as we're looking at it as sort of like how do we make that effective to mr. Demling's earlier point of how do you How do you operate effectively with a very large group of people so it was it was sort of A proposal or an idea of how that could work if we can't somehow pull together volunteers that Meet multiple of those sort of profile contingent requirements Yep, and so I would just like to say I support that idea especially having worked on the enrollment working group I think one of the advantages of it Is that we were able to meet in small groups at a time that was convenient to maybe four or five people instead of trying to find a time that was convenient to 20 to 30 people and One of the things that I don't see a good solution to but concerns me about this process is knowing that You know not everybody's going to be Able to find child care or have the means to put aside, you know However many hours of time this is going to require So I think to the extent that we can try to lower some of those barriers even just a little bit it's worth doing um Because it's going to impact so many families in our town and particularly families of young children who are those who are the least able to Kind of find the time to join a committee like this So I think whatever we can do to try to get their voices heard is really important. Um, so just my Thank you, and I think if we can push that all further and trying to make this accessible to those with small children or other Things that get in the way of them being able to be present at these meetings would be useful Thank you Do you want it? Yeah, yeah, I was I was just going to add that uh Like the more opportunities we have for attendance because that that was one thing I kind of looked at just recently was attendance numbers from Previous school building committee meetings, but yet the more opportunities we have for people to attend more often the better off I think we are Anything more to Well, I think what um what we can do is a as a next step is is sort of compile all of this feedback and conversation into a single document that we can Then um share with with the town manager as sort of our thought process on school School building committee composition Okay, so Yeah, moving on to item h the process for filling vacancies and elected bodies of the town um, so the purpose of tonight's Conversation is a discussion of the proposed process which we do have a slight revision um the revised document that we received from the town council president um, I will point out that uh, Ms. Griezmer is in the audience. Um, uh and is prepared to answer any questions that may arise on the On this process that I may not be able to answer. Um, so thank you. Um I believe um I don't believe that the that the revised draft made it into the packet and because we don't have printed packets We don't have that. Um I think if correct me if i'm wrong. Ms. Griezmer the only change in the revision was the dates Is that correct? So the the item that's in our in the packet published packet. Yeah packet includes um Some revisions to both the uh timeline mostly in the way of detail not in the way of dates um, except for the possibility of moving to the 28th for the second meeting. Um, the other thing it does include is changes in the process and just you know, again, it's tinkering. It's not Huge it's more clarification Um, and also then changes in the draft announcement. It's uh critical that we release the draft announcement tomorrow We're hoping to do that on or around 10 o'clock tomorrow morning. Um, and the um Let me just step back and say a lot of this was developed using First of all the charter and also the uh state law as well as prior practice of the select board Much of which is similar to the way the charter describes it what the charter doesn't do is provide an enormous amount of um detail about the process like when what gets mailed and that kind of thing and um um What we wanted to do was provide which is possible their letters of interest and then besides that For commi