e e e e e Mark you're back there now so you got to give me the uh everybody stand in accordance with the open public meetings act adequate notification of this meeting has been provided by advertising in the rest record and posting notice of this meeting in burrow Hall and the superintendent's office I hereby call to order the public meeting of the little Perry Board of Education Monday March 18 2024 at 7:01 p.m. can I have a roll call please toing here Bal here M fos Mr scy here M here M vuso here Mr bisac here Mr belli Mrs Bradley here and Mr R here we have a four be resolved that the little fery Board of Education approves the minutes of the regular public meeting held on February 15 2024 do I have a motion motion second second okay M yes M spatel because I was at Mr P is abson M scotley remotely Mr meing yes M vuso yes Mr B Mr belli and Mrs Bradley yes motion passed I'll now ask Mr carpado to provide a superintendence report this is usually the part I love most about the meetings but I don't have my voice isn't all there tonight so I'm happy there's only just one so I just want to announce the great five winner uh for the February student montho prestig Po's teachers in fif grade had the following things to say about him he is self- motivated student who is a leader in the classroom he puts forth remarkable effort in all he undertakes he has unmatched intrinsic desire to succeed he is efficient tidy and organized mod through congratulations e all right for the rest of my report um the H report for since our last meeting we have Z reported HS in both Wasington school since our last meeting the chonic survey was sent out we had all we had retrieved all the result to see practive action plan has being uh uper approval tonight at board meeting I just want the community to know and board to know that we are considering those results are going pushing out a dedicated newsletter with u suggestions and picking those results making sure people understand uh the information that we got which we're pretty excited about uh the district will be visited by qac tomorrow which is is a quality assurance for the school district they come tomorrow morning Mr Gomez are his part about a month and a half ago for facilities and tomorrow they're coming for personnel of governance so they will be spending the better portion tomorrow um in our schools before turning over my report I have two two updates before turning over to Mr I just wanted to thank the little card Community for coming out voting on botom referendum on Tuesday March 12 it was a great turnout incredible outcome for our district and for the board of uh the board school expansion committee met this afternoon for our post referendum meeting and have begun the next steps to building with the middle school I want to reaffirm that the promise I will make is to continue to secure any additional funds that I can towards the funding of the project and lastly before Mr goes Leslie it is nice to have you back on the day back and forth but I able to come tonight and guys everybody the board home everyone's my family I wanted to come thank hello Mr FL is yours good evening everyone we had an amazing month two weeks ago we had a spirit we in honor of Ross America and Dr Su the elementary students had their annual one school book initiative featuring the author n Mar in the Middle School the from each grade had one that included a question and answer to celebr read Across America the entire School participated in the Scholastic book the seventh grade class enjoyed class trip to Arena stem in Gard St plaza where they combined stem education with entertainment B was had by all on March 15 2024 the e8th grade graduation committee V their annual CH trade fundraiser it was our biggest and most successful event year thank you Miss Jo and Miss ke and the parents conted to making this event successful three 3 33 was significant this year because we witnessed of history with the opening of the Washington school's 110 year old time capsu letters postcards pictures a school book a Bible and a flag with 48 Stars gave us some insight to our p and finally a big thank you to the committee of little fairy for voting in favor to the community of little fairy for voting in favor of the new school referendum it shows that every vote counts even though will no I will no longer be a royal KN in the in the district I still I am still excited and as as I am sure you are see what the future holds than you night always World night remember that all right that concludes my report thank you Mr far uh we have uh allow the students the month to go only if they want to uh totally up to you but just so everybody knows Maria and I actually went to school together 30 years ago so uh it's just such a joy that we're still in the same Community together building the community together and watching the kids grw is phenomenal Mato congratulations I'm really proud of you uh we'll now open it up to Mr Gomez for his board secretary report all right so tonight I'm gonna D from my normal uh business administrator update tonight we will be presenting to the board the preliminary budget so what goes on tonight is the board will vote to send it forward to the county for County approval so this is not the budget hearing the budget hearing is scheduled for May 1 so um some highlights on the budget um there's going to be a 2% tax levy uh we could have gone higher but what we did is we had budgeted fund balance and we used quite a bit of it we forced to so it's money that we've saved up a prior budgets and when you hit a certain percentage you must give taxpayer relief so that relief on this budget is 1,239 th000 and 811 so that's where we were able to make it work one of the largest budget drivers is your salary cost we're able to keep the increase 2.34% uh through uh folks retiring uh reorganizing the district so 2.34 is a pretty good number compared to the rest of the county um so major highlights our operating budget that's expenses um is only up 086 of 1% so under 1% on the operating budget and on the overall General budget which includes the operating and the capital and uh fund 12 which is equipment was up 1.78% so those are pretty significant numbers in terms of our tuition to uh Richfield Park we were basically flat the increase is. 17% not 1.7 177% so we're able to keep that flat that's another one of our larger budget items um yeah so tuition overall for special education and the high school all the students that we sent out of District was 8,994 481 which is a drop of 3.13% so we're starting to bring students back from the higher cost placements uh the biggest restriction on us is how much space we have but the administration was able to drop the special ed and plus by 3% we're going to be putting we're going to be SP we set aside $250,000 of capital reserve um and for Capital Equipment what we're able to do is we're going to do a refreshable all the Chrome grooks in the district and we also included in the budget the possibility of adding school bus um we'll wait to see how the year goes with an additional School Bus we'll be able to cut some of our uh routes you know bidding them out and be able to bring them back in so that's what we're trying to plan the biggest obstacle to that is just the availability of buses so we set the money aside for that so the total general fund budget is 29 milon 9796 now the total budget is at 32 million but we don't budget the grants at 100% we only budget them at 85% because we don't know what that number is until June so it's a little bit misleading uh the prek uh we the increase in the prek I'll give you that number so for uh for state aid we were up $347,000 which is 7.5% the preschool Aid which is held in a separate pot of money which is down with the grants but it's not a grant that was an increase of $676 or 4.5% we also had carryover in the preschool from the bir they pun you one year at a time so the total for the prek is 2.9 Million for this next year now you're allowed to not spend all of it and you can keep it going from year to year um the state is very committed to funding PR so they've never taken one penny back so some of the things we're going to do with that money is we're going to be building a playground right outside my office so that's yeah we we should be breaking ground soon as it's warming up so that's all been done uh so that's the big highlights in the budget um so other things so salaries uh were 11, 79452 that's at 2.3% increase so benefits um if you look at the and the public will see when we have the budget hearing you'll receive a copy of the userfriendly budget so you can see all these numbers until that point until the county improves it it's not a public document yet but I can tell you that our health benefits uh drop 3.2% so that's a matter of you know newer folks with on a different plan so that's significant now the state is projecting next year's increase so right now the increase of January was 15% for next January six so that's a significant change in the health to be under 10% so transportation is at 1,509 374 um that's a slight increase on that that's why if we can buy the bus we can bring that back down down that 10% security is 18691 that includes our SRO which is a shared services agreeing with the township and our own security officer and so that's 3.38% increase but overall we basically in the operating C flat budget that's uh and we at superintend been able to keep B the programs and also take yeah you want me to go okay so I apologize again my voice is little shot but what this allowed us to do U as Mr Gomez and I put together a budget he was working through the numbers we had a couple things that we wanted to add on to to the district so what the budget is allowing us to do is add a additional school nurse and that we'll have two School nurses which will be exur the beneficial for our district our Thrive mental health providers who uh where full schedule is in our building right now will be maintained for another year they were being paid through some of our s grants and now we were able to incorporate that into our Opera budget uh additional preschool disabilities classroom which is why you saw that drop speci Ed number because you bring back another full class for preschool disabled students and keep them in their whole District additional MD teacher so we had a retired teacher that we had brought uh back not a retired littleberry teacher retired teacher working in the program last year we able to cut that number down du bring students back in the inreased number we're now going to be adding an F teacher again prob to see that reduction in cost we're maintaining all of our current programs we involve our current staff uh an additional um ASD which is an Autistic Program we're going to be able to add power professionals to that program to follow code additional secretary dedicated to preschool and other needs some of that will come out of the fun line that Mr Governor talking about preschool state aid the new PR books addition of the school bustion and then new programs CD opportunities just that we're going to be doing so we have a class link which is going to be beneficial for community and for the teaching staff go everything I don't know how many of you log on now to anything on your phone have there's a pass pin that gets sent to you you got to put that you got to show your face there's always those mully layered activations so what class link does for the teachers and for the students and families it makes it a one time authentification then once they're into the platform all of their apps and everything open up so same thing if you're home witho and he's trying to Bo up computer he lo you can log in from your phone and you have he doesn't have to remember any of those passwords as soon as he's in now he's in and you can access everything um so the teachers were informed about that they seem pretty excited about it and then rooms is a program that we're going that runs through Genesis with our student information system what rooms is is if you have like uh Class Dojo or Team snap or game changer for sports this is a platform that is going to be operated by us through our student management system teachers can communicate with parents parents can communicate with teachers you choose your home language or your native language that receive your messages in and then the school from the liability standpoint will will have copy uh a copy record of all those conversations so there's no putting words against one another we have all archives and stillo points Behavior charts does all those S different things both of those U I think relatively cheap for the product that you're getting a new K to math uh K to 5 math Series 6 to e ma math series six to8 social studies series um and then admin initiative money which was something that Mr another District shared it with me uh and I thought it was a great idea to add to the budget giving each admin a few thousand not in their pocket but a few thousand to run an initiative that they want to run something that they hear about something that they want to build it gives them the the educational freedom to that money to something productive students um and we're really excited about the budget I think when we lay this out for you at May 1 meeting you'll be able to see the finer detail that is our our budget that is all right so capital projects that will be starting with this budget so right now we're going to be conducting a roof forit so we're GNA have a company come in um architect um arrang it for us where they're going to scan the roof what does that do it lets you analyze what areas need to be replaced and not replaced so you don't go ahead and dive head first into a million2 million do roof project you start doing it section by section to the ones that are deteriorated so you don't start throwing away something that still might have five to 10 years so we're doing that uh the board will be approving that vender uh we're going to be doing uh univent so we'll be upgrading and replacing some of our older units uh most of that's going to be funded through the federal money the last uh piece of that money which called Esser 3 um and that'll be going out to bid this spring because we have to get it done before September 30th in order to get reimbursed by the federal government uh we'll be doing more primary rooms replacing the carpeting with BCT tile which is much more resilient and Carpeting and a little bit less disgusting uh we'll be we're looking at being able to lock down the building with the push of one button so we're looking at we're getting close on electronic key sets for each door where if you want to enter a classroom you would use your your access part but we'd be able to lock down the entire building at a moment's notice yeah and part of that we received a small Grant from the school's Development Authority for $20,000 that would be supporting that we're going to Rey the building but we decided to take a step ahead um and increase the security of the building so that's what we're looking at good news the basketball court outside recess area as soon as the weather gets warming up be getting resurfaced the fence will be repaired cleaned up we're also going to install larger um gate so we can um use our snow removal equipment instead of having everybody shovel it we're also getting four new uh poles and backboards so that's all ordered and we're just waiting for the weather to get warming enough to and it's going to be Mill all the way down and brand new ass and we'll paint before so and last but not least through our fun 60 which is the Food Service account we will be purchasing a stove and hood for our kitchen out in the module so that can let me Segway into so the food service program in terms of finances so when we signed the contract with Asos it was a guarantee of breaking even right now we have a profit from September of $58,900 and Caitlyn because without them I actually had this budget done two weeks ago so they really helped me put it together um the financials were done the seventh of the month and U Caitlyn did that since I was tied up with the budget she did that all by herself so I like to thank my staff thank you Kaitlyn I can't see you you are that's all I have Madam president it was really nice thank you Mr option oh absolutely and I being so we have too much money in the food service so the state told me I have to spend money so we decided being the superintendent at the sto so now we can increase the offering that we have great we'll Now open up to committee reports uh Mrs BR Personnel we had a Personnel meeting last Thursday March 14th uh discuss question were regarding the secretary codian contracts they're ongoing uh the school calendar was also discussed by the calendar to be um available for approval by the board on the April agenda the administration attended the BCA job fair Pas Hills on Saturday March 9th they met several potential candidates and head set ofs there are several anticipated openings for the next school year and those positions are posted on NJ school jobs and lastly Mr rante was selected as the American Legion teacher of the year recipient and he'll be honored at the April 6 presentation conratulations thank you missusa for Education yes on March 13 teachers had a full day of professional development including that in a stetic class vertical articulation between grade levels learning alley and people uh we uh they make all preparations for the March 19th H that's my thank you Mr mil for poliy policy report the policy committee discussed the recommended policies and mandatory policies provided by the superintendent policy alert 232 Strauss we also watch the video explanation mandatory policy changes most were changes most changes were language changes to be more inclusive the policies from alert 232 are in tonight's agenda for your read thank you thank you Mr Mrs Patel for transportation sure um there'll be a joint update for transportation food service so the uh committee met on March 4th um around the transportation the bus routs have had really no issues reported th nor school year um the snow days abilities were manag as suspected um as Mr Gomez shared uh this year the budget preliminary budget came in um you know on On Target however the committee is looking at various avenues for savings for next year which may uh include comining routes um however this is still to be discussed over the next few months uh around the Food Service the committee met on March 4th but there was a and as Mr Gomez mentioned U there's plans to install a new oven vend and additional equipment in the kitchen to allow cookie to be um to Aid in the onside cookie so that's really exciting um on March 7th mashio our food service provider held the first of two State mandated advisory panels for the for the program uh the first purpose of this program purpose of this panel was to U understand the voice of the client which is our students and and faculty and edmin um to understand and obtain feedback on The Taste opportunities of improvement and your suggestions on future offerings the on-site manager shared how the Food Service program um was required by state including servings for dairy protein and vegetables he educated the uh the people in attendance those in attendance included representation from students grades 5 through four a 5 through eight um they're known as The Home Room Ambassador there was approximately 16 students two parents were um onsite admin and board members all attendees were provided with three different new new options to try including a veggie burger a chicken veggie pasta and a bacon Cheeseburger um overall the new items were well received and the survey input will be considered for future changes to the menu great thank you Mr very thorough um Mr Boris do you want me to provide my update I Ste your thund so expansion um update obviously most notable thank you so much to the community for passing the referendum uh we celebrated one night but the day after we immediately got back to work within less than a week we've already met with our financial advisers and our architect to uh begin the the process of now building the building um one thing that we can uh share with the public is that we are working towards bidding the project for the end of this year before the end of this calendar year so we'll provide uh monthly updates during our expension committee updates but in the meantime if you have any questions please feel free to continue to use the is the little fa future site still up right okay we'll reach out to Mr parado if the have and that's all I have and uh Mr to provide the bur AC report I will say this excuse I attended we attended the first B on C at B which is very very nice well attended and more events great thank you and another welcome to Mrs scotley and I don't know if you have an njsp update this mon no I don't added that no problem all right so we'll open it up to public comment on agenda items only if anybody has any questions comments or concerns agenda items is the school on the agenda item I guess we'll find out what you're referring to well um it's great that we passed the referend it's fabulous it makes me very happy now I have a couple of questions regarding the new school I saw photos of the new school and it looks like second and third floor has a lot of glass and I'm assuming that construction company is going to put a special tinted glass or film to prevent bird strikes that can happen uh so just to keep in mind that the renderings that you saw aren't final designs um the second and third floor yes they'll have Windows but the Architects will be able to uh provide us with both sustainability options as well as I'm sure environmental yeah I'm assuming that this is something that's right and we don't want Birds to p on the kids when they're going into school exactly okay the the second thing is that I understand that when it goes out to bid that by law you have to take the lowest bid lowest respons bid okay well see anybody who's going a bid probably licensed certified and everything else you know but if let's say for instance the lowest bid comes in and there's something about the particular company that you don't like you have an option all right so you can only disqualify a bidder in that situation you've had negative prior experence what I meant low lower response is they have to have all the paperwork in order everything so that's when we had the demolition bids we reject them because not everybody was responsible so that's what we look at but say to disqualify a bit or just you have to have the negative like right now there's a contract in New Jersey that's having issues in the three Northern County in order for me to disqualify I had not had that negative so so we haven't had a negative report but three other Counties have had negative reports you still have to take that person if it's the lowest b as long as they have always paperwork unfortunately yes and that's one of the things that people should reach out to your legislators because they need my opion it needs to change we agree with you 100% yeah yeah now most of the time a lot of those bids are nonresponsive because they're just so bad at what they do right so they have to be dpnc qualified that they have to have the right bid Bond they have to have all the paperwork so say they're owned by three individuals all those individuals have to be present paperwork is about that thing so what we do is anything of this size any bid it goes to the attorney to VI right because I'm not I know a lot but I'm not the material expert on legal questions so they get reviewed that's what happened on our our bid with with the Demolition a few companies they go out cont that work through them they they have a lot of money if they get a certain threshold even if they respons respons bter once they hit that threshold they're not allowed makes them respons now the state does have a list you can go online it's called tart and those are the contractors that are that nobody can do business with and as these contractors build up you know those bad experiences with with their customers they'll end up on that list but it is one of the problems with you know our our state law to that and my third question uh let's say the bid comes in at 38 million just throw a number out there now will you have something in the contract that takes care of any other contingencies like something broke there's a delay bad weather or whatever where they're going to a 38 million becomes 45 million so there's there's a cap on how what we can change it's a 20% cap then you have to get State now a project this big we were speaking about this tonight has to go down to the state controller and they do a full review of the contract and all those contingencies everything's got to be in place know so that once you're over 10 million you have to go down to State they R all that voters don't have to vote on that plus plus the no well the 20% is just so you would would never 30 million and then the contingency would be that buffer between the 30 oh I see okay you're going lower okay yeah you can increase contract cost without I don't think the controller would so there is a cap up a hard okay great well thank you very much any other questions comments on agenda items all right we'll now take a block vote on f8 to f11 do25 to d41 p16 to P20 C4 F3 and P1 do I have a motion secondi yes pel yes Mrs goley yes Mr misso yes M bisac yes yes all resolutions passed great all right we now open it up to public comment for non-agenda items all right do I have a motion to address second