oh no okay test test there you go thank you everybody ready yes okay I call to order this meeting of the Hamilton wam Regional school committee on Thursday March 7th at 7M I invite everyone to join us in the Pledge of Allegiance flag un States thank you um I to remind everybody that this meeting is being recorded and live streamed out agenda okay so uh we'll start with citizen comments uh do we have we have anyone in the room who would like to comment just come on up just as a reminder timer yes we need a timer please um just as a reminder before you start if you can share your name and address and um we'll have a three minute timer going and can you give us Jackie is that mic light on it's on yeah I don't know if it's supposed to be moved up yeah you can move it up if you want yeah just or not and we'll give us morning jul good yeah okay um hi good all set I think did that microphone just get oh it's just no it's still on I think that's for the board okay okay good evening Jackie Mar uh 142 Railroad Avenue Hamilton Massachusetts uh also Miles River Middle School and uh Union vice president so good evening school committee and Hamilton Wenham Community um the Union is here tonight to express our frustration on the current negotiations for our office Personnel a unit of 11 members the Union's latest counter reflects flexibility bargaining in good faith and we encourage you to ratify the agreement in our next negotiations meeting on March 18th the union has been continually candid and amendable to adjustment throughout the bargaining process we've come down almost $7,000 in market rate adjustments and degree credit proposals and most importantly our recent counter reflects a compromise from our original Proposal with a 2% reduction in our Cola request this is a fair and just agreement for office personnel and after six meetings over five months it is time to finalize our agreement and move on to our teachers unit as a teacher at Miles River I also have to speak to the value that our office Personnel brings to our school our office staff is the perfect blend of Competency efficiency and compassion this applies to the way they greet our students in the morning many of whom are late due to anxiety and an inability to get to school and how they interact with the staff during the day it would be difficult to find a single staff member at Miles River that has not gone into the office for a mental health break with a chat with one of our office Personnel in addition they are the professional faces our parents and our special education Advocates meet when they first enter the building I'll be honest I don't know the full scope of what they do but if you are looking for an answer about logistics scheduling supplies visitors field trips they either know it or we'll find out immediately they are the True Heart of the school and they ensure the dayto day is running smoothly they offer a sense of community posting staff Christmas cards writing riddles on daily attendance bringing in flowers for the front desk or baking for the staff during holidays our full-time secretary has dedicated her career Hilson wenom her tenure has seen eight superintendents and six principles her institutional knowledge is invaluable anytime a new Administration enters they know they have a resource they can rely on in fact everyone in the Hamilton Wenham Community relies on these individuals in some capacity I can't imagine why we would refuse to invest in their future in our schools perfect oh wow that was amazing perfect timing thank you hi my name is Bridget odonnell I live at 105 Main Street in winham um I'm the instructional coach at winp elementary school um at as you know our office Personnel play a crucial role in our district they are the first impression of our schools and are dedicated to supporting staff administrators students and families every day they perform a multitude of tasks that go often above and beyond their job description from ensuring that the kindergartner that arrived late makes it safely down to their classroom while carrying their lunch and talking to them all the way down the hall to keeping teachers informed of many last minute end of the day plans that parents phone in at the end and teachers are Donna always make sure that they all everybody knows where they're going at the end of day so they're safe it is truly impossible as Jackie was saying to express all that they do to keep our district running they are truly Irreplaceable I urge you to support the office Personnel contract it is essential that their safety concerns and requests for pay increases are not only heard but also respected I firmly stand with our office personnel and I kindly ask for the school committee's support ensuring that they are valued and protected thank you for considering this important matter thank [Applause] you hi I'm Maria mahart I live at 14 Chestnut Street um in Hamilton um an winam the Town Line actually goes right through my living room um I am a veteran teacher but a new employee to the district I'm a 30-year resident of these towns um but just now new coming to your meetings so I come as a taxpaying resident as the parent of two um alumni of the school district and now one of your hardworking teachers for the disabled children of our community and I'm laying before you my Ardent hopes for an agreement that confirms what I think we all agree on that that our office Personnel are The Gatekeepers they are the lifeblood of our schools that each of you and all of us are empowered to get the right thing done it is never wrong it is never wrong to take action that uplifts people who have less than what we have and I just know that the right outcome can be achieved and that you have it in you to be the ones to bring it about because the gap between us is not so wide um I had an interesting encounter with a student on Monday she asked me Miss mahart um what's with all the shirts you're all wearing and I tried to be very objective and explain to her what the shirts are all about we were all wearing our stronger together shirts and I explained in the simplest but most honest way that I could that we are working really hard together a lot of adults in the community um to figure out what it will be like to work in the offices of our schools and she said you mean like Miss Curran and I said yeah like Miss Curran and she said what about Miss Peterson and I said yeah like Miss Peterson and she said well I hope you win I said well you know it's not really about winning it's about just making sure that the right thing gets done and I believe in my heart of hearts that this is the right thing there's no risk to any of you the next time we're together to get a tentative agreement signed um and everybody is going to feel good thank you thank [Applause] you uh hi my name is nor Bernett and I work at the high school I'm also a union rep so earlier uh when Jackie was talking about our amazing staff she talked about how they were the perfect blend of Competency efficiency and compassion they're also a wonderful blend of loyalty they know this school they know the staff they know the administration and they know the students they are as people have said the first ones to greet them in the morning the first smile that many of them see especially those who maybe are a little late to school they need that support and they need that familiar face they know the job they love the job and they work so hard at the job always above and beyond I can't tell you how many times they have helped me out in so many different ways they've helped me bring speakers to the school including one of the original Little Rock Nine that I could not have done that without the help of Lisa Heights they just offer so much and we just want to make sure they understand how much they are appreciated not just how much they are needed but how much they are recognized and appreciated thank you thank you hi I'm Shantel Clark I teach at wiip school I didn't prepare a speech but I just wanted to say that um I've been teaching here for 20 years plus and um I've known two uh school secretaries Adelaide lepto and Donna brockenbow and I have to say that I have couldn't probably on one hand list the principles that I have seen come through winthrip school I just want to say our school could not be run could not function when Donna is out we're like What without the support that she gives teachers students and parents I mean I know at the elementary school level you parents are calling all the time we've got lots of moving parts we have lots of programs at our school um she is worth her weight in well she's kind of small she's worth a lot more than that and and we we couldn't we couldn't pay her what she's worth but let's let's get close thanks thank you um is there anyone else who wishes to speak come on up hi I'm Kathy O'Shea and I I teach here at buer school um like Shantel I did not prepare a speech I Echo what everybody said before me um but to build upon what shant was just saying I too have been in this district for a long time uh 36 years I've traveled to all three elementary schools and I may have had four secretaries in that uh office Personnel in that amount of time and I think to say that they are the bones of our schools is an understatement I think to say that they are the ones who make the first impression and we know first impression is everything they are the ones who make the first impression probably shouldn't say this but when we interview usually if you're waiting for an interview you're talking to the secretary so at the end of the interviews we always want to know from the secret from the um office Personnel what did you think like this is what we thought because they read people they want people who are going to come in the school and be part of the community that they have helped create we had a situation this year where Chris Petro left Chris Petro had this school running like clockwork if we needed anything Chris Petro was five steps ahead of us when Chris left and Gloria came into buer school there was no list of how to do there was no one working with her to take the place of what Chris had created to make buer the best it could be I know just because I'm here and Gloria came in early I think it was Wednesday morning and she would be on the computer with Donna at Cutler school who was helping her to make sure that this school continued to run smoothly that kids were coming in late got those hugs and smiles and reassurance and walks down the hall to their classroom I cannot encourage you enough to please support them we're talking about eight 11 positions right now they are worth the worth the investment I encourage you to to step up and show them that they're worth investing in because if not we're going to lose them and we're going to have to keep retraining which is really them training themselves to keep this going Hamilton whenham is a great great district and it's because of them thank you thank you are there any more comments okay anybody on Zoom nobody on Zoom all right I appreciate everyone coming and sharing their thoughts um we're gonna move on to the review of the school committee protocols Jia I think I sent that to you yep as elected members of the Hamilton W and Regional school committee we including the superintendent endent accept the high honor and trust that has been placed in us to ensure that the students of the district receive the best education possible to that end we hereby commit to the following in conduct of our business protocol 8 school committee members will vote according to their convictions will avoid bias and will uphold and support the decisions of the majority of the committee once a decision has been made positions will not be used for personal or partisan gain thank you um next I think Jen you have the school committee mission statement the Hamilton winam Regional school committee will lead and inspire a district that inspires all students to realize their fullest potential and feel a powerful sense of individual and Collective belonging thank you um up next is the consent agenda does anybody have anything they want to hold I have one thing um I just want to hold the model un field trip I just have one question make a motion uh I move that the Hamilton Regional School District accept the consent agenda um as were pulling aside the sorry which one was it um the model us model un for further discussion there a second second second by Jen all in favor that is unanimous of six members present six six yes not unanimous thank you it is unanimous of six unanimous of the six members present and the the sorry who un of the six members okay I thought you changed it I was like wait a minute and um the consent agenda passes with the exception of the model un field trip the only question I had was in the permission slip there's two hotels listed I'm guessing it's just like a copy and paste error or like reusing the form but I just wanted to clarify um so the the Comm it takes place in two places they're staying in one hotel and they compete in the other across it's diagonally across the street I say okay I just wanted to make sure because one of the hotels I think is Cambridge and one is Boston yeah they they they actually stay at the Cambridge Marriott and then they they compete at the uh Weston Cy okay sorry it's it's like a five minute walk perfect thank you all right um so we just need one more motion for that uh I move that the uh Hilton Regional School District except the model yep model un exhibit as presented second second by Julia and all in favor passing unanimous passes of the six members present and that item passes okay um I just also always want to note to say thank you to the friends and boosters groups for the donations that are within the consent agenda good stuff in there um okay next is new business with the um FY 25 budget and annual report thank you each year when we finish our budget process we we meaning Vinnie uh Chanelle and uh Jen cell myself we we put on uh kind our heads together to get this budget book and each year we go through the process of meeting with the towns and they kind of give us feedback for the things that they're looking for this year's budget book has all the stuff that we've had in the past plus some uh if you you know Breeze through it it's really a uh a compilation of really an entire look at the entire School District so when you when you look at this you know where the money is what school is it in where it's getting allocated to um we've had each of the principles and and budget holders write about their own sections and where things are you know what things are happening in their schools and how the the finances impact that and then as you get to the end there's there are a lot more statistical things like you know AP scores and um some comparatives like SAT scores abaj JCT scores um then the rolling averages across uh five years I believe now right yeah um and then looking at add it through different lenses as the towns have uh requested um you know I I have to say that this is a I don't know how many times we went through this I think we all went through it eight or nine times over the last two weeks so uh it is a a long drawn out process that starts usually in mid fe uh January and works its way through till now so we have it available one of the other U pieces that we had to add to this that we've never had before was the accounting of the stabilization fund that's a requirement of the law we have to publicly account for the use of the stabilization fund um so we added that to this book so it's a public document it'll be on our site it'll be presented it'll be available at town meeting uh it'll be sent out to all of the select board Finance boards and everything and I just think it's important for for people to see the things like the stabilization fund we haven't spent anything yet but as we do we'll list those things in each year so that we have an accounting that we can present to the towns we also added uh OPB the opep balance which is in excess of $2 million and we're going to bump that up even more this year so we should be one of the communities who's further ahead I believe than most of the communities around here a quick dip stick of the communities around here shows that we're U making much more progress on our on our opab uh fund so Kudos sa for that for keeping that moving forward but certainly want to thank Jen Coffield Janelle Powers Vinnie for their work their time uh reading it over and over and over and over and making sure it's all right so take any questions if anybody has any um I have a question a comment and I'm trying to find the pages um the pie charts on pages uh 15 16 I think those those were the two big ones I think they look great that writing is really really tiny and could be a little bigger yeah um uh but other than that I I thought it looked really good Vinnie yeah and this is one of the things we tried to add that the towns request I don't know if you remember they requested during our quintuple meeting like yeah we see more charts so we got more charts but we can see if we can figure that out I know the whole chart comes as one piece so we may have to just add in we can fix it we'll fix it I agree I can put it together in Excel so you can change the fund oh no we can do it okay yeah we can do it yep I just have a quick question so all of this we've seen we've seen all of this data except for the capital stabilization fund data cor because I was looking at it and I felt like I was going through agendas and I was seeing we had already gone through all of these numbers new this year stabilization funds new okay okay because I was thinking that I wasn't as familiar with those all right but it looks great to me um the enrollment like the enrollment charts are a little bit different we added they wanted a chart we added a chart I mean it doesn't show much but that's what they they were requesting but we have uh that looks great just a few more pieces of information I think you know the towns are trying to say okay what do we get for our money well here it is this really covers everything that's going on plus some of the statistics that are being driven with the with the finances this is great and this is meant as a like to distribute to the public to distribute to y y we'll start sending it out tomorrow tomorrow we'll send it out to all the boards and then post it on the website and then it'll be available we a few copies available at at town meeting we don't make 400 of them because they generally just end up wasted paper so but digital copies are available on the site thank you can we make some of the paper copies available at places like the senior center and places where people like don't have a maybe the library yeah that's a great absolutely that's a good idea yeah it's usually available at Town Hall it's because we send it to all the members of town hall the town Town managers Town administrators but yeah we can do the library and the um I was just thinking of places people might go who don't have like internet access or routine interet access AB absolutely any other questions comments okay just need to vote to approve vote on this one okay uh I move the Hamilton Regional School District approve the FY 25 budget annual report as presented second second by Jen uh any discussion think we did that sort of um following [Music] favor and unanimous of the six me members present and that pass uh the next item on the agenda is under new business security cameras to me again to you thank you um as you know we've spent some time and quite a bit of money over the past year 18 months or so um getting our security cameras up to date placed in the right places positioned right working functioning properly um and we're trying to now figure out different ways that we can take advantage of the Technologies we have um our Technologies are fairly straightforward where believe it or not on a snow day I am looking at the cameras at around the buildings to see you know what's happening and and uh what's going on but um see how much snow's on the ground but the uh the camera systems really once some once everybody leaves they're really there's nobody watching if you will they're recording they all record we we record and and save all of the data from the cameras for 30 days and then it self deletes and so it has been useful for sign thefts and damage at schools and things like that um so we're trying to in conversation with the Hamilton Police Department they are using the same group that we use to install cameras in fact some of our Technologies are actually based out of the police building that the our our tech people manage some of the servers over there uh so as part of the conversation that we had in safety and in continuing to to to keep connections with our First Responders they have requested to uh have access to our outside of the building cameras um so that whomever's at the desk they would have the screen in front of them and they could monitor them outside of school hours um and then in an emergency shooter you know I'll use that as an example as a shooter at a school they would then have access we would we could grant them access to the inside cameras so that they could have another spot to manage from if you will the the scene so that's what this request is for there's you know we do have a policy I have the request letter from Lieutenant treer uh have talked to him at length uh he and I have talked about this probably for the whole last two years to try to really improve uh our securi at the our facilities and then just wanted to show our our give a copy of our policy um where they would not be uh keeping the recordings we keep them they would actually just see what's live so they if they needed you know they said oh we just saw five cars come in and blah blah blah they could not go back in time they would need us still to go back to the recording so it's really just kind of them live and keeping an eye on it they have a a new they installed a number of cameras around town uh including around some of the buildings in town and the um the this is good opportunity I think just while that company's finishing up to just make a direct connect it's not going to cost us anything and I think it's a it's an important kind of improvement to our security in the in the facilities outside of the facilities question do do the camera systems incorporate motion detection as well or is it just pure recording yes yeah they're they're basically um always on if you will but that as soon as like if you if you pull up um where's the camera out here there's a camera right outside here um it's on right now and if I pulled it up it'd be on it's recording real time but it also tracks on the bottom any motion so we can get to a point in time where we can say oh here there was motion at 1:00 a.m. here and we could see what it was it could be you know it could be a rodent but it could also be and the police would see that y so that okay great they would see it live they just couldn't go back and time they could but they could note it and say hey at 1:00 a.m. we saw this is what we saw or you know they generally call me if there's an issue sometimes at 1 a sometimes got two questions for you one does this change um data security around access to the cameras in any way uh no because they don't store it we store it all so all of the access they can they can see live but they can't they're not recording so they don't have any access to that our our databases are separate from that what was the the second part I haven't got to the second part yet uh the second part is um more of a comment yeah um I think that um I I said very much support this I think the way this goes wrong is if it begins to increase the um criminalization of behavior on campuses um and we get contacts in you know uh urgent or emergent Fashions between students and police officers that normally wouldn't happen um and so I think that it's important to know that that's a possibility and track if that is occurring absolutely because I do think that that's the way that this this could prevent a lot of tragedies that it could also lead to some um and that's concerning to me yeah no that was actually the point I was going to bring up myself but you said it much more eloquently than I so yeah the the the issue with um kind of the the visualization is also they they combine them with night patrols uh several times a night through the through the each of the schools so the nice part is somebody at the desk would say hey go check this out rather than saying something's happening go you know there's something wrong send the whole whole send the whole Force but I think the the beauty of that is they they can now more easily direct it so now it's random like somebody could go through at 11 o'clock the high school middle school complex all the way around no problem go back at two and something had already happened so right now it's just chance if they you know they sometimes they run into an open door open something and you know so it works out well but sometimes they miss it's happened in the past where they've missed kids by sometimes minutes where they've come and done some damage or taken something or driven across one of the fields or something like that so yeah it's definitely something we would keep an eye on and and the I think the nice thing is it's not they're not they don't have access to the recording so they're not like sitting there playing it back and it's it's really an opportunity for us to say great that you're keeping an eye on it outside of school but you'll let us know right away if something happens you know and they I do have a really good relationship with both departments and both Chiefs call me when ever there's an issue even if it's in the middle of night so I think that helps me to feel a little bit better about the part that you're talk you're talking about yeah those the examples that you gave you know I think having um students doing things that are inappropriate or sometimes damaging and then having that be separate from a encounter with a police officer is insulating in terms of not allowing there to be a situation that gets um inadvertently out of hand yeah um that doesn't mean that this is the wrong way like I said I can see a hundred different ways in which it could benefit stud but that is something that I I think that if we track it and are able to say that that's not something that's occurring then that's excellent yeah and we can certainly say let's track it and come back in six months and say okay what's happening where are things you know have we learned anything has anything change so it may make sense to do that to say okay you know in what month is this in you know September let's say okay we got six months of opportunity to work with it work work through it yeah um any other questions we have a motion please um I move the Hamil twam Regional School District approve the um what would this be proposal request our cameras request to attach the security cameras um with the Town police departments as written in the agenda is there a second second second by Jen um all in [Music] favor and that's unanimous of the six members present and that item passes okay just got do a computer switch here computer switch happening next up is the fy4 Q2 Financial forecast with Vinnie comfortable use caster for okay thanks for letting me uh present to you tonight we are here to review uh the FY 24 yearend Financial forecast as of quarter 2 ending December 31st 2023 uh so for tonight in addition to reviewing our financial forecast uh I am proposing a vote on the prepayment of a district special ed tuitions in addition we are going to review kind of the plan going forward for quarter three uh and then last vote on a few budget transfer requests that we've included in the presentation tonight uh so while conducting the year end forecast uh Incorporated here I am predicting that on June 30th uh I have estimated that we will end the year with a positive balance of roughly 1.3 million uh presented here is uh the Breakout by Desi category uh just like to point out I am predicting two Desi categories uh will end in a deficit at this current time it's our instructional materials and equipment and our operations and maintenance uh there is a third item on here but I really don't think that third item will end the year and a deficit is is currently uh just scheduled to be $100 I don't think that will actually come to forsh at the end of the year it really is just those first two this is that same chart uh Broken Out by school or location uh that same 1.3 million so while conducting the year in forecast uh there was a few major budget drivers uh that I'd like to go over before we dive into a little bit more into the detail uh the very first thing that was noticeable to me was our health insurance residual balance uh this really comes from about three different sources uh the first one is the health insurance premium uh for those of you who' have seen this uh year-over year every year our health insurance goes up a little bit um during the budget season I work with our insurance broker and meet with jav Pilgrim our insurance provider and get a rough idea of what they think that increase might be year-over-year for the FY 24 budget cycle we had Incorporated a premium rate increase of 75% um as the year passed I started negotiating with Harvard Pilgrim and I was able to reduce that to 4.9% uh that ultimately resulted in savings of about 115,000 uh which is a pretty substantial amount of money based on those negotiations uh in addition to that we have our enrollment that plays a major portion uh that plays a huge role in our our health insurance uh cost year-over-year historically we always anticipate a little bit of an uptick in utilization that means we anticipate that one or two more employees will enroll in our health insurance year-over-year uh what we found is that it's the exact opposite that's happening uh we're seeing less people enroll year-over-year and then third uh while building the FY 24 budget or any budget for that matter if there are any vacant positions while we build the budget we usually incorporate the full cost of health insurance for that vacant position uh some of those positions are still vacant now so not only do we have their salary savings we also have some health insurance savings uh as well so in addition to those health insurance premiums as I just mentioned we still have some vacant positions it's not as much as it has been in Prior years uh but currently we are running uh a 350 $57,000 uh Surplus because of these vacant positions across the district next relates to our Transportation uh this comes from two different areas uh $664,000 from our general transportation and 154,000 from our a district which I'll get into a little bit more detail later in the presentation uh in addition to that 154 in a District transportation uh we are anticipating a residual balance of 186,000 for the out of District tuition placements uh in addition as you heard me talk about in the 25 budget cycle there is turnover every year so that's people we budgeted a certain amount for their salary uh for whatever reason they were either asked not to come back the next year or they uh did not return uh under their own decision that has resulted in about another $110,000 in savings year-over-year uh some of these savings are being offset by overages uh the two first ones listed here relate to our maintenance department uh the very first one is a projected overage in our custodian and maintenance supplies uh we've seen an uptick in the cost of these supplies year of a year uh So currently we are just about at a break even point but it is only January uh this still will be a big Supply order placed uh in April so I'm anticipating that by year end we will be in a minor deficit of 25,000 in addition just like we've seen in our own houses our utility costs have skyrocketed this year uh I will admit this is a high projection uh I am not a utility usage expert I just did a simple calculation what is our run rate so far this year and what did we use this time last year and kind of projected that out uh for the next six months I will admit it's probably going to end a little B bit lower than what I have here but just to give us coverage I I included kind of the high end of my projection uh in addition just like we've seen year-over-year um we are requesting to purchase additional student and staff devices this year this is something we've kind of done every single year for the past three or four years uh when we see kind of higher balances left over in our health insurance where we know uh that we budget High when we see those savings during the year we always come to you guys and ask for a transfer during this time of year to help pay for some of those technology devices uh that we purposely kind of budget low during the budget cycle uh and then last the big thing I noticed was the new ESP contract uh fy2 represents the first year of the new contract we did not know what these numbers were going to be when we built fy4 uh So currently we're running a deficit of just over 200,000 as it relates to the new ESP contract so I'm going to go a little bit more uh deeper into the numbers one thing I wanted to point out uh to everyone hopefully this works for me I attempted to do it before uh this slide right here is uh is a slide I took directly out of our fy2 final budget presentation I just kind of zoomed in here this item in green is uh represents uh an additional $55,000 request for the buer elementary school to help pay for the 1.0 ESL teacher I'm going to attempt to back up and move forward two slides you'll notice on the very bottom of this slide is that same exact number just the opposite direction so most of the things we talked about during the 25 budget cycle were a result of things that happened during FY 24 so in FY 24 we move this position from the central office uh Dak to buer uh so for the 25 budget we asked for additional $55,000 to cover it the exact reverse happens in FY 24 we're seeing a deficit of 55,000 because we made that move in FY 24 so a lot of the items that you're going to see in detail we've already discussed during the fy2 budget cycle so some of the things I might not go into detail because we've already talked about them many times already but of course stop me if there are any questions as it relates to them but I wanted to point out to you that a lot of those things we've already talked about is because of what happened this year so just to back it up one slide uh for each of the locations instead of doing a detailed Breakout by Desi category I just developed the same Desi chart by Dak to kind of summarize where all the money's going to just try to make the presentation uh flow a little quicker so for the buer elementary school I am anticipating that we are going to end in a deficit of about $85,000 as I mentioned the biggest thing is the additional ESL teacher uh in addition to that the items I mentioned before is the new ESP contract uh but what's offsetting a lot of that is our vacant positions our vacant lunch monitors there was the vacant night custodian position here for over three months um and there's the turn over from our instructional coach so all these items that we kind of talked about again are showing up in the buer deck for the Cutler elementary school I am anticipating that we'll have about 151,000 left over uh the main budget drivers here is the fact that at Cutler elementary school we did trade in one teacher uh for additional esps and in addition we sent those esps to the winr school along with the entire program so as a result we're going to have additional money left over at Cutler because it all got moved to winth uh excuse me in addition we are seeing a balance left over of just about $119,000 for the uh 6 FTE Library ESP that we did not hire because we requested from you earlier in September to hire a 1.0 teacher instead uh so you're seeing the savings from our ESP but in the in the opposite you're seeing the cost of the teacher uh ex exceed the cost of that ESP again all things that we kind of went through during the 25 budget cycle for the win Elementary School I'm anticipating about a $104,000 residual balance at the end of the year the biggest bulk of this is our vacant SLP teaching position uh that combined with two teacher turnovers we're seeing Savings of almost 107,000 which is where a lot of winthrip schools uh residual balance comes from that SLP position has been vacant for the second year in a row it has been very difficult to fill all of our SLP positions uh and across the district we really just have not been able to fill that last position uh and a lot of it is being contracted out when we contract out the work it falls to the student student services deck as a result there's savings or money left over in the winthrip school um in addition some items that are being offset is that additional preschool teacher that we requested during the beginning of this school year as well as the three new esps for that new uh I'm sorry three new preschool esps for those uh new preschool classrooms at the miles River Middle School we're seeing a small residual balance of about $199,000 uh the main cause of this comes from two different areas it's the salary scale advancement that did not occur and the reduction of the utilization of our teaching six class stien uh this year we were able to fill a lot of those gaps in the schedule without having to hire a teacher for that additional uh sixth class uh that is being offset uh by the increase in our 0.25 es es L teacher position as well as an increase in our utility costs at the Middle School uh for here I combined both the high school and the athletics department for a combined total of about $90,000 left over at the end of the year uh we saw a lot of savings this year from staff turnover at the high school three positions alone we were able to hire at a reduced salary which R which resulted in a 67 $7,000 savings uh some of that again is the same thing being offset just like we saw at the middle school the other half of that ESL teacher position and again an increase in our utility costs for the central office deck we are seeing a pretty substantial balance of 405,000 uh the main reason for this though is that switch in positions again that I mentioned from the central office deck to the buer deck that ESL position was originally budgeted in the central office but it wasn't spent there it was spent at buer resulting in a deficit over there and a positive balance in the central office stck uh in addition like I had mentioned before we are seeing savings uh from our uh Transportation contract that really comes from three different things uh the first thing is we no longer have our homeless and Foster Care students that were transported ing so we're seeing savings there we're also receiving a little more reimbursement from the state and then last we received a substantial credit from Salter because of the lack of buses that they did not provide so every day they're supposed to provide roughly 14 buses if for whatever reason um they don't have a bus driver that day or the bus breaks down it results in a credit because they did not send us 14 buses they only sent us 13 so there's a little bit of savings from that one day with no bus uh we go after them or I should say Jen Cofield goes after them uh for every one of those buses missed uh so we are seeing savings there as well which goes against the full cost of our Transportation uh next for the central office stack we're seeing a pretty substantial savings from my office alone and all the turnover and vacant positions uh my administrative assistant position has been vacant all year and most likely will remain vacant for at least another month or two that's resulted in $56,000 in savings uh in addition I had turnover in my accountant's position uh it was vacant for I believe three or four months uh resulted in another $32,000 in savings and then again we had our HR uh go out on leave and it created a vacancy for two months so just from these three positions from the business office alone it saved a about $100,000 but cost me probably 100,000 pieces of hair in my head because it was constantly filling in for somebody's uh position for whatever reason it was uh in addition we are some of the things that might offset that we are seeing an uptick in our legal costs we are utilizing our our uh attorney a little bit more this year because we are in negotiations with every single Union uh so that cost is increasing a little bit uh in addition we are seeing I am estimating that we are going to end the year in a deficit when it comes to our long-term and short-term substitutes ever since covid I've kind of noticed an uptick in sick day usage and as a result it's costing us a little bit more every single year for the substitutes uh next up is our maintenance stack I just want to point out that this isn't the maintenance cost alone every single school has a section of its budget that's dedicated to maintenance this is just the districtwide maintenance that isn't tagged to an individual School uh right here we're seeing just a little bit of a residual balance at year end of around 6,000 there really is only two kind of big items that stood out to me uh it's the fact that they also had a vacancy during the year with their maintenance technician uh position being vacant for about four months I believe uh and the exact opposite because they have these vacancies we need more people to fill in in that position so they get paid overtime for it so they get paid at time and a half to come fill in for these vacant positions uh so at the same time we are seeing uh an overage in our custodian overtime uh moving on is our benefits and fixed charges where I'm estimating we will end the year with approximately 392,000 uh again the biggest thing here is the health insurance as I had mentioned that lower utilization and the lower enrollment as well as the savings uh from negotiating a lower health insurance premium uh in addition we do have a cross uh a crossing guard vacancy which has resulted in about an $1,000 savings uh but we also are seeing an uptick in the health insurance deductible reimbursement costs uh so one of the um one of the items we have negotiated with our unions is that the district will reimburse them for the first half of their health insurance deductible uh this year year we've seen a much higher uptick of that uh cost being incurred and right now it's estimated that we are going to exceed that by roughly 25,000 the next one is our Capital acquisition and improvements uh and replacement of fixed assets um right here I'm just really giving you an update on the three items included in this um Desi category was the 1.7 million transfer for the capital stabilization $275,000 for smartboards and $300,000 for the high school theater lighting upgrades in terms of the capital stabilization uh the transfer has been made we opened up a separate Fund in our accounting system and opened up a separate High yielding bank account uh that money was moved I believe in either August or September uh so far through January we've earned 2 $8,000 in interest on the 1.7 million both of those get combined together for our total uh stabilization balance uh at the end of the year the smartboards have all been ordered the purchase order has been uh the purchase order has been made and encumbered and we are lining it up for the replacement to get uh to start in January as soon as the I'm sorry in June as soon as the kids are out of the classrooms and we can get into it and start drilling into the walls uh last but not least is the high school theater lighting upgrade project I did run into a little hiccups with this during the beginning of the year and the bid did go out a little later than I wanted to uh so right now I had I issued the bid we received two uh bids back I went with the lowest bidder uh right now the total cost came in at roughly 240,000 so there is about 56,000 left over right now however that is not included in this projection because one thing I've realized is especially with electrical work in our schools sorry this bug's flying in my face um especially with electrical work in our schools as soon as they start pulling wires and opening walls they find something else and they issue change orders so right now I'm just playing it safe and reserving that 56 in anticipation that they're going to find something in the 50 plus year old theater up at the high school uh next up is our schal education deck where I'm anticipating a balance of approximately 422,000 uh just like I had mentioned before it is 186 for our out of District tuition and 153 for our out of District transportation in addition to the two AO District items we are seeing a lower usage rate in our tutoring Services uh and in addition the student service department also has a vacancy within the administ ministrative assistant office uh that has been vacant all year and so far we've uh We've I'm anticipating saving approximately 32,000 uh last but not least is our technology deck where currently I am anticipating a very large deficit uh that re this also um ties into the budget transfer that we're going to ask you for in the next couple slides uh we are again as I explained with our health insurance uh we know we over budget in health insurance and under budget in technology so right now we're requesting uh to use some of those funds uh to get ahead of the life cycle replacement and order the iPads for our seventh graders and the Chromebooks for our sixth graders which we'll get in uh this year get them all programmed through technology and get them ready for deployment uh in July uh in addition we're asking to replace uh 53 laptops for all the teachers in the middle school and then last uh give each of our three elementary schools one uh iPad cart which comes with 30 iPads each so that would be 30 new iPads for each of the three elementary schools these four items are the normal life cycle replacement that we do every year so what offsets that is the same thing I'm asking for you now we asked for you last year we asked for money last year to help pay for these things this year so we're doing it again this year just a little bit larger than what we did last year last year it was about 43,000 okay so just to bring it all back together uh taking all these things into consideration again I'm estimating that we're going to end with approximately 1.3 million one thing I did want to point out is this assumes that we are going to prepay out of District tuitions again so that 1.3 million you see assumes that we prepay out of District tuitions if we do not that number will shoot to more like 2.3 million because last year we prepaid about 1 million for this year's budget cycle um so I do have the prepaid motion but I can stop and take any questions if anyone has them anybody have questions Jen five or six Jen has five or six questions okay okay let's start on page nine all right can I see Pages here yeah um this one yeah yep why are we short $3,411 in idea Grant offsets uh because Grant supposed to be pretty predictable yes but they do fluctuate every year the percent the dollar value that we get changes every year and sometimes we'll put it towards salaries sometimes we'll put it towards contracted services so it does fluctuate a little bit year-over-year so that Grant isn't like an NSF or an NIH Grant where you get like the exact dollar every year it does not it changes every single year every single one of our grants change in value every single year there I do not I can't recall one grant that is the exact dollar amount year-over-year it all depends on your student enrollment your um special education population um so it it some things even come in on how many uh lowincome students might reside in one school over the other so it does change every year okay um page 15 it's quicker if I just do this this is what Happ happens when I don't have time to no ask away that's that's what I'm here for that $155,000 for teaching sixth class diens can you just explain what that is yep so every teacher uh correct me if I'm wrong here Eric teaches five classes and sometimes the way the schedule lands we might have one class that falls out of somebody's schedule so there is a stien in the teacher contract that says we will pay you if you pick up this sixth class so we almost remove your prep CL uh prep time and we pay you for it which is called the sixth class stien the high school and middle school uh historically use it year of year uh this year I'm not sure exactly what the middle school did but the way their schedule landed they didn't need to utilize it as much yeah yeah it's it it generally ends up the Singleton classes like the it's one of those Singleton classes like we have just enough kids to run it but it doesn't quite fit in the schedule configuration if somebody is willing to do it it's actually fairly short money to to have another course no I just I don't remember seeing that at that level before so uh page 16 yep um this is High School athletics it's combined uh I combine Dax this time I okay historically don't do that but I did hear Athletics by itself it's corre the high school plus it is combined the only reason I did that is because Athletics I was projecting to end the year at about 4,000 I just thought it was more time and more slides and I I put them together but that still is a seven and a half% increase in the teachers category over what we budgeted it's like almost $300,000 where's um say that say that again sorry uh we have an amended third line down teachers we budgeted 3,979 yep or 3 million excuse me 979 th000 we SP uh that's school choice so school choice is an offset this presented Yep this presented here is after offsets so thank you yep um page 18 I don't know if you fixed this um the middle category the year-to date Administration you I got way too many decimals there that that's a quick and easy fix that's Vinnie salary there we go 95 Cent uh for healthc care deductibles you say that we pay half of our teachers deductible correct so for yep right so I don't know what deductible is for we would pay 500 correct the first 500 first 500 at what point in time is it going to be cheaper to just pay for a $500 deductible instead of paying an additional 500 per teacher when the health insurance deductible reaches about 115,000 right now I believe we're at 75,000 so once it hits there it means the majority of our people are utilizing it and we should then consider to switch correct we are not quite there yet um and that fluctuates every year next year maybe people don't um utilize it as much but that that's about the threshold is around 110 115 something like that okay and my last question thank you everybody for being patient with me is on uh page 27 and 28 y so uh that the money for the iPads the Chromebooks the laptops and the normal iPads it's about $200,000 correct how come if we're doing doing this on a yearly basis we aren't just putting it in the budget to begin with uh it really all started with Co and the need for all the additional iPads and one to one uh if you count back about four years that's when Co hit so right now we are losing devices uh by the masses because they have about a four to five year life cycle so right now they're uh kind of dying on the technology department at a much higher rate rate uh so one thing I've asked Allan to do is try to map out a way out of that and that is to slowly kind of disperse those extra iPads we bought four years ago over the next four years but at the same time we have to deal with the ones that continue to die okay um so this does give him a bigger um pool of kind of extra ones for when a student comes in with a broken device cuz right now I think he only has about 5 to 10 iPads to deploy if some start breaking this will kind of give him that extra cushion for if more start going down over the next few months and my other question uh related to this is I think it was Allan who had talked about putting together a technology plan yeah that that's du at the end of in it'll come we'll we'll see it in June he's actually working on it okay do we really really want to spend $200,000 until we have that plan in place um yes only because we're we're we're really looking at now and not next year if we were plan if this was planning for next year I think it would be um something you can say yeah let's put it off for until next year but these are current Replacements right I thought we were buying the the iPads and the Chromebooks and the iPads and the Chromebooks not for this year because our sixth and seventh graders already have those but for next year right but if he comes up with the technology plan that comes out in June and that technology plan says oh we don't want to use Chromebooks at all that that wouldn't be implemented till next fiscal SE go FY 26 okay so his technology plan is not it's coming out in June we haven't budgeted for it we would we wouldn't budget to until the fall so we would get the plan then build the budget and then it would be FY 26 but the replacement ones not not necessarily the uh the Chromebooks and the iPads the other Replacements are needed now yeah The Replacements I get it w it was the new ones for next year that I was like maybe we should hold a bit one year one more year before we actually put the plan in place so he'll come to us in June with the final Tech plan um he's looking at really talking with kids and teachers about what makes sense now so that he can build that in and then in the fall when we do the budgeting process we'll use that as the Baseline those are a lot of the pieces we've been able to put together with a strategic plan to be able to say okay we now have these documents that we can go to and say how do we plan for the future even if there is a little bit of redundancy and overlap there'll be places to like you like like I are you thinking that they're probably going to suggest moving up to a a Macbook at the high school level or there'll still be places or eliminating the Chromebooks in in their entirety they last years you then shift down with the you know with the um iads sorry to totally how to blank that well I mean this doesn't take into account the high school at all so that that if it took into account the high school I would definitely ask to wait until we have our technology plan my concern is that we buy all these Chromebooks for to be used next year and they're only used for a year like I said there'll be you know there'll be places to utilize them you even if there is some redundancy okay a lot of the ones that get returned too after the use gets pushed down to the elementary schools cuz we're one toone basically middle school and up not so much at the elementary yeah so a lot of them will get pushed down to the elementary schools okay yeah the Chromebooks are the problem I mean that's one of the things we've learned three years maybe if you're lucky maybe you know depending on the kid kid who has it um so it's it's really uh yeah I don't mind the iPads it's I just durability is not the Chromebooks best feature all right any other questions you don't have any more Jen come on just one more you explain everything so there's a few motions in here I'm um okay want me to take it oh you said you a little water go now uh Hamilton Regional school committee authorizes the assistant superintendent of Finance administ ation to prepay fy2 out of district tuitions with FY 24 funds not to exceed the amounts established by mgl chapters 40 subsection 4E and chapter 71 subsection 71d second done the second um any other discussion no all in favor and that's unanimous of the six members present and that item passes and looks like there's one more Yep the next thing up is our transfer request and kind of the plan for uh the next few months uh so right now there is that request that we just talked about for all of the iPads Chromebooks uh and teacher laptops uh in addition to that as I mentioned in the first few slides our operations and maintenance stack is uh anticipated to run a deficit of 61 494 by the end of the year uh So currently we're asking for that transfer to bail out the operations and maintenance and get it back to zero uh back in the black but that just gets us to the black if anything happens between now and then we really don't have any money to react to it uh in addition to that there are a few uh Capital items and facility upgrades that we would like to make I do have a list of them and a little breakout that I plan on bringing to the capital planning uh Finance subcommittee on Monday I believe for them to go through the projects and kind of rank order what we think uh might be our our first one if this uh transfer is approved uh and if we can actually carry out the project uh before June 30th uh so in addition to that 61,000 we are requesting uh 250,000 uh in addition be transferred to the operations and maintenance uh for those two things to be able to reative anything breaks between now and the end of June uh and to help fund uh some Capital needs across the district so I can go to the motion for that one excuse me the Hamilton one Regional school committee approves the fy2 24 operating expense budget transfers as recommended here in by the assistant superintendent of Finance Administration and has presented to uh on the previous slide entitled transfer requests Q2 a second second second by Julia any further discussion question any what what capital items do you have in mind the biggest one to me is the Middle School Windows because that is very easy for us to um deploy at the moment um the other ones are uh asbestos abatement is the next biggest one I'd like to do um would that be all of the ases across all the schools no not across all the schools that would uh be more than the money I asked to transfer uh the main focus is here at the buer school y any other discussion okay um all in favor and that passes motion passes unanimously of the six members present thank you guys thank you Vinnie thanks Vinnie um next up our committee reports first is Capital Financial Planning subcommittee um so we're meeting on Monday uh we have I didn't count them but minutes lots and lots of minutes minutes to approve that was of minutes that's okay so glad you didn't wasn't even thinking you guys are off the hook tonight I forgot my computer okay so that's and we'll talk about Vinnie's Capital project I can even I'll leave my my us everybody though just I have it who sent it to me S I mean I'm the secretary I'm the one on the hook for all these minutes oh because I'm the secretary some of them are from well before you or I was on were on the committee yes and I'm trying I'm still trying to figure that out but yeah yeah and those I'm not sure there's much we can do about okay it's okay um how about policy sub commmittee there there hasn't been a meeting in between since the last meeting okay we we have a resolution to bring before the committee that was a result of that but not at this meeting not at this meeting get noticed and then the negotiations subcommittee um the first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to recommend that we actually utilize the ex session tonight um just to update you guys on the office Personnel contract um these guys actually refer to me as the optimistic one I actually do think we're very close to a uh ta but excuse me I just want to uh keep you guys informed what's going on um also uh March 25th is going to be the first day we're meeting with uh to begin the teachers negotiation so there is a chance that we will have two open negotiations at the same time um and actually possibly even more if you guys uh approve this next um thing I'm going to suggest um we actually have been asked to open negotiations with the custodial contract and it is our recommendation um and hopefully you guys will V to approve that we have um Eric and Vinnie actually take care of that they're able to meet during the day take some of this um just some of the um of the meetings off of M and Dana's plate and whatnot it would really help to sort of expedite this uh process um so we think that this is a good idea we recommend it um Eric are you guys um willing to pick up the other contract as well or just this for right now ABS me and and the new the new uh cafeteria yeah we'll probably do them together okay so um that would include the new cafeteria workers contract as well anyone have any questions on that like we said this it seems like this one would be pretty straight forward so it would be a huge help um so then I guess I'll just make a um the Hamilton one Regional School District um Grant Eric and VY the capacity to negotiate on our behalf with the custodial and cafeteria worker unions second second second by Jen any other discussion okay all in favor and that passes unanimously of the six members and I do have one last thing that I just want to um plant a bug in your ear um it would be really helpful if we actually had a third member um on the negotiation subcommittee right now we are trying to stay with sort of M it's like every other Monday afternoon um about 3:30 4ish we meet for a couple of hours um it would just really help you know there been times that like I got stuck at work and so I'm like late and when it's only uh Dan and I it's tough because we can't do anything until the other ones in the room so having a third person would really help not asking for anyone to sort of volunteer now sort of see your schedule uh could talk to myself Dana or Eric you know try and get a better date uh idea when the dates are or whatever if you're interested um you know we're going into this I you know it's hard work but it's it's good work and um you know I'm always PR cautiously optimistic going through all of this that you know it is tough sometimes but um it's really important work and and I enjoy doing it very well even though Monday afternoon sometimes I come in grumbling but um you know like I said it is really important work and and I am always optimistic um because I care very much about making sure we take care of you know all the members of um you know our district excuse me everyone that's working for us so please keep that in mind okay yeah should I put that as a topic for future meeting oh yeah maybe okay all yeah I think so because we'd have to vote y yep um superintendence report all righty lots of stuff Happening Now cool kind of in that transition period so things are ending and things are starting uh currently we have uh our six students uh moving forward in the History Fair state competition which will be at Winchester High School on April 6th um during that previous process to that two students received honorable mentions for their projects um always fascinating if you've not ever been involved or seen it take the time to do it it it is an educational experience um High School spring Athletics will kick off on March 18th I can't believe it we're kind of like where did the winter sporting season go but um it'll be kicking off very soon and currently right at this moment there are 109 students at the DECA States we wish them all the best of luck um most recently in the end of our winter seasons the girls basketball uh unfortunately lost to the number three South Hadley High School on the sweet 16 uh division 4 Mia state tournament uh this is the the girls basketball team's fourth straight state tournament appearance as well as their second uh sweet 16 birth in three years so congratulations to the girls for another great season boys basketball fell to David proudy High School uh last week also on the road in in the uh division 4 Mia state tournament um they conclude their season by having made it back to the state tournament they haven't been there since 2020 so congratulations to the boys uh cheerleading competed in the msaa North Regional uh championships last week in b r heo this past weekend they finished third in the division four which is great because for several years previous to this we have not had a cheerleading squad uh Unfortunately they didn't advance but they qualified for regionals this year for the first time since 20 5 um little quick update on the Cutler principal process we are moving forward uh we have two two final candidates that will'll be interviewing next Monday and Tuesday um and that'll be a process that will start around noon time and go through at 6:00 at night where they'll meet the leadership team uh get towards some classroom uh walkthroughs toward the building um meeting with the staff faculty and then uh meeting with the parents later in the evening uh of the Cutler school so that's that's exciting and then uh we have posted today and are actively looking for a new director of facilities maintenance and operations that position has been posted um so if you know anybody send them our way we're looking for somebody to start um fairly quickly to keep up help take one one position off Vinnie and I plate so uh I think that's everything have you got the job description you said you were going to get the job description yep refund send it to you yeah yeah I will y sure is it th it's it's three pages long all right that's the way they should all be okay thank you um next is the chair's report you might notice I'm not the normal chair and I appreciate everybody's patience with my my little script I don't really have anything to report um topics for future meetings I have written down voting on a third member for the negotiation sub commmittee anything else future meetings yes um so it's come to my attention that some of our friends of groups at the schools um just have very little participation and there is a good likelihood that some may not continue to exist and the reason that I think that's important is that some of them raise funds and distribute money and serve um and so I think that I don't know what this group's role would have in that but I do think that knowing that you know that support that has been historically in um place might not be there moving forward for certain events is probably something to talk about okay thank you I think I think we have Leons to each friends group we do so maybe it's time to be a good place to start so we could maybe convene all of the aison and think about marketing strategies or how we can best encourage participation because yeah I agree it's pretty dire in in years past this is sort of um the time of year when we've really sort of started pushing out when we've had you know with um town meeting coming up yes usually pushing out to the Friends groups in different groups around town um just meeting up trying to hit one of their meetings or whatnot just sort of going over the budget real uh quick with them and answer any questions so every every year about this time things do pick up because always seems to have fallen off somewhere a lot of the line so but that's a good reminder to that we should get into that thank you all right any other topics future meetings okay I am going now to move to vote to AJ or move to adjourn to Executive session for purpose number three to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining with office Personnel Union if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigating position of public body and the chair so declares to not return to open session second is this a roll call Vote Yes okay yes take roll call vote uh Jen yes Trent yes a yes yes yes yes thank you and we areed