[Music] Y flag United States of America the stand indice yeah just watch Mr here miss Paso Mr Paso Mr P here Mr patronia here Dr scardina here miss Stella here and Mr Val here this meeting provided by following means notice forent record clerk posted in Lobby Town Hall Board office C schedu work sessions and public meetings of the board approval of minutes have a motion roll call Mr Mr Andre for Miss Paso Mr Paso Mr P four Mr petronia or Dr scardina obstain m Stella for and Mr Bano for motion Carri student report good evening everyone and welcome to the April Board of Education meeting my name is Neta onesco and I'm serving as a student representative for lard high school as mentioned in my March report congratulations to everyone who placed an Atlantic City for the New Jersey future Business Leaders of America state competition those who have Place have the opportunity to travel to Orlando Florida again congratulations to All In addition congratulations to those who passed their sea look by literacy test provided in various different languages this is a great opportunity to our seniors who speak another language though I do not have any significant issues I would like to bring up at this moment I would like to know the progress and inspections being done on the issues I have brought up in previous board meetings the last I been told was the bathrooms were being looked at I would like to know or get at least a timeline of when the lighting or locker rooms will be looked at I think to improve the building the main issues must be addressed first to move on to any small issues during the month of May I plan to run a survey conducted via Google classroom and Google forms where students can anonymously report any changes they would like to see the building have in addition I will not forget to add that suggestions will take time and unfortunately big changes will cannot happen overnight I plan to document the results in the survey in my next Board of Education meeting thank you all for listening to my report today and have a great rest of your night [Applause] State our state monitor Mr Wayne neov is viewing this remotely uh I have his report he ask me to read this into the record I have reviewed the financial reports for the month ending march 2024 and support tonight's resolution that certifies that there were sufficient funds available based on the marched financials to meet the district's Financial obl oblations for the remainder of the 2324 school year as we continue to monitor the 2024 financials all indications are that the district's financial position should remain positive for the remainder of the school year on the agenda this evening for board approval is the final 2024 2025 District budget that has been approved by the Department of education's County Superintendent I support Finance resolution number s and ask the board to approve the adoption of the linger School District 2425 budget I have also reviewed and discussed the other resolutions on tonight's agenda with Mr torso and support his recommendations to the board that they approve the other resolutions on tonight's agenda that concludes my report for this evening thank you Mr do and before I hand it over to the superintendent I'd like just to say we must be doing something right to see all these students here tonight here getting a an award it's fantastic seeing everyone of you here I probably know most of you and uh I'm glad keep up the good work it makes our school be number one thank you now like superintendent thank you Mr pasano yes welcome everyone we're extremely excited the board and I were just up an executive session we were talking um you know tonight is really you know why we're here um we have a tremendous number of students being recognized tonight um from our fpla which was mentioned our seal of by literacy students our music program our Athletic program we have every group pretty much represented here tonight and um it's really why right we come to work every day to see the success of our students and and clearly we're thriving and so um I welcome all of you tonight um I'm going to go just through the agenda a little bit to kind of let you know what to expect um we're going to go Group by uh group and recognize everyone I ask that um you please stay till the end of the presentation of all the awards so everyone can see um and be recognized um but no towards the end um the last presentation that we're going to do um speaks to um the north Jersey spelling be um after those Awards the board will then pursue our regular agenda there'll be a budget presentation tonight and then we'll go through regular board business um so if you don't want to stay for that we understand we you're you know of course invied to stay we like few to hear what we have in store for the 2425 budget but at at that would be the time um if you wanted to exit um so that's the agenda tonight we're going to start with the fpla but before I do just wanted to address our student representative's report um she has raised concerns at the high school and certainly the board has committed to the improvements at the high school over the past several years we've done a variety of project at the high school last summer um we did the upgrade of the whole first floor students um are here could attest to the fact that we had only flooring put in the first floor we painted the entire first floor um the gy area was renovated about 3 years ago we do know or do know that the locker rooms are in need of some work but at the same time right the budget has to be prioritized in totality and so we've gotten estimates to redo our locker rooms it's roughly $2 to $300,000 to do the locker rooms and then the bathrooms would would pay back on top of that so um you know certainly we take the concern very seriously um but we have to look at and evaluate the budget across the entire District so we certainly have additional plans that be to upgrade the high school and we're going to phase those in over the next couple of years um the high school cameras were also upgraded uh last school year so it has completely new up-to-date camera system um which includes VAP sensors in our bathrooms and so there's definitely been money and and resources allocated to the high school and that will be ongoing um we prioritize and then we go from there so um we certainly going to look into everything um that you stated and uh for right now um to be fully honest the locker rooms are not going to be slated to be done next school year due to the large cost of that project but it is something over the next couple years if we continue to build our capital reserve that is a project um that we want to do so it's certainly um on our facilities plan and hopefully in the near future we'll be able to address those needs but um again welcome everyone we're extremely excited to have you all here we're going to start with um the FBA which is um Mrs saell and Mr Jan CI um as well as our high school principal um Mrs launo so I invite you up here and we will start our presentations yes [Music] I'm going have to go up there what just turn it on turn it you got to press the button you want me to thank you hello everyone beautiful night we're at tonight um my name is Dian this is my co-advisor Anna saell for FBLA and of course our principal Laura vuno we just a little bit of history and then we'll move it along fpla future Business Leaders of America we competed in March in our state um conference and we brought 74 students that qualified for states which is amazing theze of our school we can everything from accounting to web page and everything in between presentations normal objective test everything and we're happy to say we have a lot of awards to give out tonight we placed first place in many things which just to give there's 5,000 students competing from all over the state and lindur as you know is a very small school district and we're up against the biggies in there to come into first second third fourth place in a competition like this is amazing and so we're very proud of all of our students that are going to move on to Nationals which is in Orlando Florida this year and now we we will be representing New Jersey and the Nationals with all the states and some territories as well so here we go um before I start calling the names I just want to congratulate one of our officers Nikki an tanesco for sitting as our student representative it's a true Testament of what kind of a student she is and what kind of an officer she is and we're happy to to get to be and see her speak today okay um first we're going to call up uh Dr Effie ozer uh he is our business person of the year so what we do is the kids have to pick a business person that is um a part of our community Dr works with our athletes um they thought it would be cool to um nominate him they have to create a proposal of how they want to work with Dr Effie um they will be showing their proposal to him today uh and then FBLA decides if that is a proposal that is fitting of a business and you know a business and school relationship and we were nominated as one of the top schools and Dr Effie was nominated as business person of the year for New Jersey f so we'd like to thank him for um willing partner also too M Dr oser is a graduate of Linhurst High School I don't remember the year but I'm definitely going to age myself oh God 2007 so we're very proud to have him um as an alumni at flter high [Applause] school okay guys when we call you up just line up Anthony Amaro um he is a his team won for sales presentation I'm going to call the whole team up together Anthony Shawn and Michael they won fourth place for sales presentation their presentation was outstanding um it was amazing if you saw it you would be so impressed I wish do it for you tonight we were taking Gabriella leuba for Client Services there it is Brianna Verona digital video production Michael Rizo [Applause] niceta anesco Sienna Del Valley that's nikk yeah she had come down the stage uh Debbie I'm not even going to pretend to say your last name right but I'm going to try it Debbie o [Applause] Alexandra [Applause] [Music] Lorenzo Danel [Applause] pazi kale Tano [Applause] Rebecca Ruez Joseph Brennan DZ Alita [Applause] [Music] KOA Natalia Baris man GAA [Applause] Skyler montillo KY Marino Julia Tasman Nina aono [Applause] we have some overachievers in the group Kyla participated in two events and she also won first place in her other event so Kyla again [Applause] is Anastasia luses and Serena beris I was going to call Everybody's event but I thought this would be much more of a visual so stand take a step forward if you were a first place winner so these are our first these guys top of over it could be some categories have 200 kids some categories have 100 kids um take a step back second place winners take a step forward thir place winner St that go [Applause] fourth place winners take a step forward okay and then we have some honorable mentions that were um that they placed in their category so I just want you guys to get an idea of how many of our kids placed where and we have a lot of people that were not able to attend there was a lot more of them so we're really proud of them they put out a spectacular product they work very hard we keep them in for lunch a lot they don't like us but they do the work and step forward take step forward if you're going to Nationals in Orlando so we like to congratulate all right thank you very much guys you can have a [Applause] seat uh we forgot something Nicholas ad all by yourself why didn't one of my officers know it oh it got stuck it was here it got stuff before we call our next hear me there we go before we call our next group of students I just wanted to uh congratulate our students once again wish them the best of luck in Nationals but I also wanted to um just thank our advisers um Mrs saell and Mrs jany put a tremendous amount of time and effort I think we should give him round and I also want to thank Mrs moo for supporting the program I know recently um we're trying to find and we did find money for to support our students to go to National so of course we're going to support the fin I would next like to call up Mrs roas who's going to speak to the Seal of by literacy Miss funo will present with her and I just wanted to point out um you know we have a pretty small um group one school compared to other districts right so um many high schools have three and 4,000 students throughout the state we roughly have 7 800 students here in lur and we're competing with these large large high schools fbaa clearly you can see all the awards that we won but our seal of biliteracy program I believe it was two years ago maybe 3 years ago was recognized by the state of New Jersey in all the state we have one of the highest amount of students in the state receiving the seala by literacy it was a tremendous effort to our entire program but I wanted to leave with that and Mr show is yours I'm pretty L hello everyone bues uh thank you for joining us again I am so proud this year this program keeps growing and growing uh I am so proud and honored to be a part of this I know that when we started we started maybe with 13 kiddos uh this year I tested 62 students in 12 different languages I am very proud to say that we have 52 candidates this year in in nine different languages so our town is getting rather large Mr Toro so keep those funds coming and I will keep this program running I will do my very best to find we have over 200 languages available and foro and wor Miss Klein and everybody that I drivve crazy at the high school just to make sure that I can test these kids and I know that you accommodated me so much this year during our delay over I was testing from home till 4:30 and 5:00 in the afternoon just so that we can get the test scores into the state on time and again I am so deeply honored to do this it is my pleasure to to allow your children to graduate with the Sea by literacy under diplomas and this is going to benefit them tremendously I have students emailing me former graduates thank you seora for pushing me for making me take this test for making me study for telling my grandparents that I had to talk to them every day seriously please talk to their children your children all the time I will take care of Spanish we will take care of Italian Miss lll will take care of Spanish Miss Vega will take care of Spanish but you do your job and make sure that they keep their native languages well because this is why we can get the Sealab by literacy under diplomas thank you so much I really appreciate w okay we have a big crew [Music] guys we begin with gel AO [Music] Arsley and [Applause] mon Valerie araral [Applause] Spanish some students had to work and they wanted to keep their responsibility with their shift I do not know if they made it here but I'd like to acknowledge nashla and William Aro if they are here please come and get your medals and your award if not I'll glad we'll give it [Applause] to VZ SP Anthony basora [Applause] Santana De Carlo Bautista Spanish [Applause] Genesis Blanco Spanish Alanis ganga Spanish Ashley Carr [Applause] Spanish Samantha cardo Spanish [Applause] [Music] Andres seos Stan Fabiana Chavez [Applause] Spanish Briana figeroa [Applause] [Music] Spanish Nicole forero Spanish [Applause] W Samantha Garcia Spanish [Applause] Rama hanur Spanish Michelle inosa [Applause] Spanish Francesco infa Spanish W Fernando Lucero [Applause] Spanish Sarah Lucero Spanish [Applause] [Music] Lucas Melendez [Applause] Spanish Marcelo Navaro Spanish [Applause] Aaron O'Neal [Applause] Spanish Joshua orasa [Applause] Sophia opina [Applause] Spanish Renzo B jahid Pera Spanish Stefano perz Spanish [Applause] [Music] Marino [Applause] [Music] Spanish jamy Lei Ramos Spanish [Applause] [Music] Sophia Riva [Applause] [Music] Spanish Milton hia theii span [Applause] Alanis [Applause] Rodriguez Nai Rodriguez Spanish [Applause] Kiara Sanchez [Music] [Applause] Spanish giovana Tino Spanish [Applause] [Music] Ashley Torres [Applause] Spanish Camilo Torres [Applause] Spanish Remy urick Spanish [Applause] Alan Vega [Applause] Spanish Amber bedar Spanish [Applause] Eric bedara Spanish [Applause] Michelle buet [Applause] swah Julia zad Ukrainian [Applause] re Isabella European [Applause] Portuguese [Music] [Applause] I Anastasia lutr [Applause] right Kito vumi [Applause] Georgia El [Applause] Albanian good even Julia P polish [Applause] and last but not least Tara talo [Applause] turkey conratulations ah there they are all 52 candidates congratulations congratulations to our students and I just I just want to thank all of our families for for supporting our students to me this is truly a representation of our community and and our diversity um students receiving the seal ly in nine different languages I think that's a tremendous Fe and again I think it speaks to how wonderful diverse our community so congratulations to all our students okay I am going to shift now if parents want to take pictures I'll give you a moment to take a picture before we move on to our next presentation [Applause] [Music] while we're finishing with our photo shoot um I just want to say and I know Mr dorso uh had mentioned it um you know I just want to thank Mrs roas for all her time and doing this it's true I mean we had snow days and she was testing students from home so I want to thank her for all of her time she has to find the tests she has to secure the tests we have to pay for the tests um and I also want to thank the students who gave up their snow days to test I know know which ones you were but thank you very much um and also and also um Miss Janowski and um Miss sella because we have programs like this and as many students as there are involved getting as many accolades as they do because of the time and dedication and effort that our advisers put in there's so much uh that goes on on the back end um but as long as you see the end result uh that's the important thing so I just wanted thank them for their time and effort for all of this more group for the high school yeah one more for the high school I'm going to ask Mr Cardone uh to come down and present the Jazz Band Awards we have two Awards to give so sileny students congratulations again and at this time we can make your way back to your seats thank you so much [Applause] [Music] for [Music] good evening everyone um I'm here presenting on behalf of our music teacher at the high school uh Mr sh he apologizes that he couldn't be here he's unfortunately out sick so hopefully um he's back soon um tonight we have two students we want to recognized for making it into the NJ AJ region one North Jersey Jazz B um these students went through a very rigorous audition process in front of a panel of Judges um well a blind panel of Judges so they went through a whole audition process reading music and improvising in jazz and had a performance earlier this month which really kind of goes through a professional setting of learning music very quickly and having to put on a very high level performance um they also got the opportunity to perform with the cane University uh jazz has bed uh Last Friday Night along with the rest of our high school students but these two students because of their achievements also got the sitting with the college band and audition so I'll call them up now um these two students first are George shalad on G and Joseph Brennan on [Applause] [Applause] [Music] trumbone congratulations I'm going to now shift to our middle school I'm going to ask U Mr rzo Mrs brenn to please come up and um our middle school students are going to be the last students uh recognized uh tonight so Mr relle Mrs Brennan good evening everyone thank you for coming out we have three categories we're going to be recognizing students tonight uh first is our school spelling be champion who also participated in the Bergen County Spelling be second category is for the Montclair State art scholarship program and the third one are our music awards for the Bergen County uh region chir and region band award recipients would any students from the Middle School that are receiving an award tonight please come down here and sit in the front row so we can be easy all of our middle school students receiving an award come on down now and our three faculty presenters as well thank you the star of our middle school music uh first I'm going to call up uh Mrs Brennan for our Music Awards she will explain all those and uh call our students okay I am very very happy to be here tonight presenting these Awards to our LMS choir music students um as you know I'm a music parent so I know these kids put in a lot of time um they had to go up to fairon to audition for this select choir and we had eight students from the Middle School who did audition and all eight of them made it in this was from um a pool of about 300 students who auditioned and all eight of ours made it in so when we call your name please come up to get your award we have kayen Elise Bosch in the region one mix choir keni mix choir Nicholas Brennan mix choir Tiana langua mix [Applause] choire mine Sherer it's choir next we have our trouble choir that would be Lexi danowski Ali [Applause] rues and Isabella [Applause] Sone that again congratulations on this prestigious accomplishment [Applause] follow [Music] [Music] up all right thank you guys next I'm going to call up our media center specialist Miss Dillis Vasquez uh to present our spelling be Champion hi everyone my name is Dyan Basquez and I'm the school librarian media specialist here at Linhurst middle school so way back in September we actually start preparation for the scripts spelling be if anyone has seen the nail biting show on TV that's what we prepare for and it goes through a pretty rigorous process where students prepare we give them lists I give them worksheets and they work to really develop an understanding of the language it helps them on so many levels more than just memorization it helps them to speak in public it helps them to have confidence in their abilities now we go through a process of elimination like in any competition and there was one young lady who became our schoolwide champion she represented ly Hurst Middle School in fact she represented our district at the Bergen County SP at Bergen Community College where she went up against 65 other municipalities in our County and she did a fantastic job so please give her a big round of applause Miss Olivia about [Applause] congratulations last I'm going to call up one of our art teachers uh who is also the host of our Arts Fest this Thursday night 6:00 to 8:00 here at the middle school if you want to see see come see all our students art uh Miss Juliana Fel [Applause] carer hi my name is Juliana fero I'm one of the art teachers here at lers Middle School the art Department consists of me and shiron Howard who canot be her tonight but she's very sorry um so this is actually my first year teaching here and it has been an amazing year cuz we have so so many talented art students so every year um shiron and now me we would pick about six to eight students who get the Monclair Museum art scholarship and with this scholarship they could go take classes at the Monclair Art Museum absolutely free in these classes there's different ones offered so there's painting and drawing there's sculpture there's mixed media and there's fashion design and it's open to all the middle school kids in New Jersey so these kids that were picked we picked six students and every single one of our students were accepted and this is out of I want to say like over 200 300 hundreds of application um applications so um I'm really happy to announce um who we're giving these Awards too CU they're very very talented students so the first award goes to Aaron Ortiz and this is for painting and drawing the second award goes to bura Glen and this goes for painting and drawing the next award goes to Anna Anna I'm going to say her last name wrong most sh okay mul media art she got a the next award goes to Joseph Sapone and he got his award for pottery and wheel growing the next award goes to Hanley espanol and he got an award for painting and drawing the next award goes to Mia Fernandez and her award goes to Fashion [Applause] Design Qui photo congratulations to all our middle school students being here tonight appreciate thank you Mr R Mrs br and congratulations to all of our middle school students at this time we were going to move into the regular board agenda which uh includes a presentation everyone is more than welcome to stay for the rest of the board meeting but if you didn't want to exit now would be the time yeah yeah yeah oh [Applause] I let's go my mom getting Get Out Boy anthy's really proud of himself yep he always is yeah [Music] presentation is you sure it's us and not people up there okay at this time we're going to start the budget presentation so um if if you want everyone can come down I'll I'll meet you I give you a budget presentation where we're going to just the presentation and hand out a hard copy for everyone at home the presentation will be proed online onto your computer the presentation as we go through but if you're in the audience and you'd like the copy of what we're going to go through um it's here with the agenda so if you don't have a copy you want to come up and grab one you can um if not I will just start um Mr hman and I are going to go through the budget presentation um and then the board will ultimately tonight vote on passing the 2425 budget so I'll give everyone a moment it's the uh PowerPoint presentation there's a the bills list the agenda and then e um we look at obviously our instruction program um all of our Curriculum maps um have to be up to date into to the state standards so New Jersey has what they call New Jersey student learning standards and part of the budget is ensuring that all of our curriculum aligns to these standards and um our principles as well as our supervisors um and directors they look to analyze to see you know what c what in our curriculum is relevant and what maybe is a little outdated and we have a curriculum revision cycle and so as we go through that we ensure that our curriculum is up to date um right now um we're currently um analyzing our language arts uh curriculum in grades K to 5 and with that um we are going through a pilot program which was budgeted next year so we're piling sever several different language ARS programs next year and ultim by the middle of next year we're going to be picking a new language arts um program that will be implemented then the following year um so that's a major highlight in our budget for next year um the district also um has made a huge commitment to keep our class size numbers down and um we've been doing a phenomenal job with that we have some of the lowest numbers we've had um in a very long time in that has been commitment um to the community and then of course technology which I'll speak to a little bit later but we have a large technology um program um which spans grades 3 through 12 and so we'll speak a little bit that later in the presentation because there's a slide that speaks to justn as we move along to the next slide a huge uh part of our budget is also our special education program so um students with individual education plans IEPs um they can receive a variety of services which can include occupational therapy Physical Therapy speech services and Services um with that we are ensuring our students are in the least restrictive environment which means um they have access to our general education curriculum um and their program is individualized for that student and so um we had to um add in next year's budget we have another speech uh therapist that we've added to the district um due to the number of students that need uh speech services um that's a highlight that I'll have towards the end um but also um we ensure for that our students um we have students in District that live in Linhurst however um they may need to go to school outside of Lynhurst and so that impacts our budget as well so um any student again that lives in Linhurst but may require a special education school that's outside of lur the board of met is responsible for budgeting and for paying for that education um so that includes tuition to that school and also busting services so each year um Mr having an iip with our special services department we look at where our students are going what those tuitions are and those have to be implemented um into our budget and then um because any student um that resides in Lindhurst be are responsible for their education um we always budget for a couple of students extra for out of District placements because we're not really sure students could potentially move into our district so even though our budget um is getting has been submitted to the county already and ultimately um will be a board approved tonight um we could have a student move in to the districts next week or over the summer if that student requires an add a district placement our board still has to pay for that so we always budget for additional students to transfer and and that's considered unexpected transfers so in our budget we always budget for a few students for that as well moving along we support our building principles and their goals we call them School level goals and so um you see tonight here we had our Middle School principal as well as our high school principal um our elementary principles as well um their various programs and um initiatives that they want to bring to their building so um the budgetary process is long it I would say it starts in towards the end of January February March it takes three solid months to really go through and develop our budget and so we're having meetings continually with our Administration um to see what exactly they want to budget and what they want to put into their building for the following school year and ultimately we look at and evaluate what is on the table and then you know we decide what programs are going to go into the budget um we operate a zero based budget that means um everything for next year we try to think about in advance and balance the budget so that there's nothing unexpectedly that could happen so certainly right there's emergency repairs of things that happen we have funds set aside from that but ultimately when we um move into next School year which starts July 1 um you know in a lot of financial institutions right you run a fiscal year a school district is different our our fiscal our budgetary year um goes from July 1st to June 30th so our new budget rolls over July 1st and so um we're planning these months and ultimately we try to account for everything that we possibly can keeping rolling rolling tallies from from this year to account for expenditures for next year and we try to be as accurate as possible and so um that's how we um managed to decide what building LEL programs or ultimately U make it into our budget As you move on to the next slide you're going to see that's the slide I was speaking to about technology um prior prior to co we had um a technology initiative in the district that SP from grade 6 to 12 every students received a device um for a while the high school students received IP but um over the last several years and and during Co everyone was switched over to Chromebooks um and because of that we expanded that program down to third grade so all of our students in grades 3 through 12 receive a district issued Chromebook and because of that we have to budget for what we call technology cycle and so um you know Chromebooks do not have a long life expectancy um 3 to 4 years and and so every 3 to four years as a district we have the budget to replace those devices and so ultimately um the high school is in line next year to receive all new Chromebooks so all the high school students next year will receive um new Chromebooks um aside from the Chrome BS themselves of course there's technology programs um whether it be apps and and different um web- based programs that we subscribe to um brain pop is one of them um parck formative um um Ras kids is another and so as a district those are online subscriptions and so um again through the same process with our principles and and administrative team we sit down and we look at what programs our teachers are using and what they feel are benefiting our students the most and so of course then after looking at the programs after getting the teachers feedback we decide what subscriptions and what services we are going to pay for as a District um so that our students have access to those online learning platforms so that falls under our technology budget um as well the other the other thing that falls on our technology budget um if you're in and out of our buildings you'll see we've made a a really um strong push to update all the smartboards in our district so for a long time right the latest and greatest was you know first it was D remember in school was right it was overhead projectors every teacher had an overhead projector and then finally you know there was the the projectors that project and they were on cards and ultimately we went to short throw projectors um that were mounted on the ceilings and many of our classrooms have still have those short throw projectors but over the last several years we've tried to update those with as many promethium boards as we can which is to touch um interactive boards where our students can come up and engage with that technology and so um as a district now um each school year we slate a certain number of classrooms per building to get updated promethium boards and then we've made a commitment that if any other older projector um breaks we do not replace it with an old projector we replace it with a promethium board so there's a line item in the budget for um devices that break such as the pan boards in addition to the fact that we replace a certain number of year so over the past several years we've um we've um installed many um prum boards and we're going to continue um to do so as a district we've also also made a commitment to update our security cameras um we've um at this point completely redone the high school um with all new security cameras we've updated um some cameras at Columbus and Memorial School um the Franklin school is getting updated um in early June and we're going to continue to um to update our camera system um unfortunately it's not as simple as just updating cameras due to the technology and where it has come our old cameras um don't work with the wiring that is behind them so it's not as easy as just replacing security cameras all of the wire in the building is completely redone and so um through a grant and through a partnership with a local company we're able to complete Franklin School this year like I said the high school was already done we've made upgrades into certain buildings when things when things aren't working so again we're not going to replace old technology and Band-Aid things so when things break in buildings we will upgrade um where we can and ultimately expand the goal is over the next couple years to have security new security cameras in the entire District um over the last two years we've also updated all the swipe and access panels in the schools those are the swipe cards normally I have one around my neck I I don't have it right now but um all the Swip um access cards that are teachers faculty have throughout the district we had a very old dated system as well and so that was updated for the entire District already and so um you know there's different projects that we have to phase in um you know we have a large budget but of course we have older buildings and we have to just prioritize and Fe certain projects in at certain times then ultimately there's also a line item in the budget for cyber security unfortunately um school districts have been prone to cyber attacks um and outside hackers have actually um hijacked School District's data and and student records and such and so um we budget we work with the company that handles our cyber security um multiple times a month this company tries to actually hack in get into our system and reports back to our Tech Team and then we decide what measures need to be taken to ensure that our network is um secure so that's in the budget as well um facilities obviously is a huge part of the budget um like I said um you know we always have to plan for the unexpected so um certainly um we have money and capital maintenance reserves to do that but in the budget we also support um little projects each year um you know I know our high school representative has spoken about some of the deficiencies at the high school and why certainly I agree with those deficiencies at the same time we're looking at The District in totality so I would love to go and spend um $3 $400,000 right now to do the high school locker rooms which I know she's brought up several times however um there's roofs that need to be replaced um at the high school and boilers and some other things and sometimes um they're not the um the glitz and the glamour of the district but they're the nuts and the bolts that we need to have in order for students to come to school every day so um last school year we um through facilities um we changed several boilers in the district um and so you know we have to prioritize again and pick what facility projects we're going to do as we move forward um due to the number of facility projects we've done the last 2 years in this budget there isn't any major facility upgrades um that were budgeted and that was because of the number of projects we did last year um we did multiple boilers in three buildings we did a large section of the high school roof and so um you know as a board and as an Administration we have to be responsible with the money that we have so um we're really looking to to um boost our Capital reserves before we do any large large projects um at this time so um I'm going to ask James hman our business administrator to take over he's going to go over the last few slides which really speaks to the the numbers behind the budget where the revenues come from and um and that tax impact to our community so Mr H yes all right so the numbers uh 2024 2025 the estimated revenues and expenditures the General expenses are going to amount to about uh to 51,2 n2,500 605 862 the special Revenue which is our grants and our state uh state funded programs in uh IA and Esa is 1,6,2,5 [Music] 7475 this year for a total budget of 54,3 194,195 uh for the school year 2425 the tax levy impact uh the tax levy for the budget will be 43 mil 975,000 over last year uh the homebased average assess value for the township is $477,000 what this uh Levy increase will do will increase the annual household uh by $171 and 6 cents annually okay so so the budget highlights I'll hand this over to Mr thank you so so just to conclude that's um so the nuts and bolts and the numbers behind the budget and you know the programs obviously that go in um to a large budget it's almost $55 million um which is substantial obviously um you know our responsibility to see the town taxpayer is to manage the budget and ensure that it's balanced each and every year um you know earlier in the evening um in work session I pointed out that um this current Year's budget is is running in a surplus um which is a good thing that means you know with a zero based budget we try to account for every single expense but you know we we're conservative with how budget and at the end of Any Given school year we might have excess funds and an example of that would be um energy right so this year we had a mild winter we budget X for for gas for heat but if we have a mild winter like we did this year um we don't necessarily use all that that gas money and so at the end of of June this year you know we're seeing that we have money in in gas which ties that also is be budget for salt budget for plowing uh gasoline for the snow blowers all of these things so um you know when we have a mild year with a zero based budget when we're accounting for all those things as we end a school year you know there's there's times when we have a surplus right now we're running in a surplus which is wonderful we had an audit report um come back and our auditor finds the same thing that we found um and I reported that to the board in the finance committee is that you know there's an expectation that in June by the end of June the budget will run a surplus and what happens then is the Surplus is put into either a capital reserve account or a maintenance Reserve account and the goal is to continue to run with the Surplus so that year after year we can build our capital reserve account and then ultimately right like I talked earlier about the ideas of redoing say the high school I know it's been a common theme our high school um locker rooms the idea IDE is if we run a surplus say for 5 years of say $300,000 and that's $1.5 million ultimately that the board can put toward capital projects and improvements in a locker room would be an example of that and so um we continually want to run a surplus like that and put money aside um the capital reserve is also not just for projects such as those it's also for um if situations arise that are unexpected meaning we have a storm and a building gets flooded or takes on water or a roof leaves that same Capital money has to be used to fix and repair um our facility so we have to be careful right as much as I want to upgrade and update everything in every building um at the same time we have to plan for the unexpected and that's pretty much impossible to do right so we want to make sure that we have a healthy capital reserve account so that we can be prepared should anything like that happen and so um it's just an example of sort of how we're running things and why someone might say wow you know you have you know a large amount of surplus want you do X Y or Z you know those are some of the reasons that we have to take into account and so when we look at the budget in totality the last page here um it just speaks to some of the things that we're we're done in the budget um as I mentioned um we always try to budget a little bit more in our energy cost to ensure um that we have that covered um of course there's Healthcare increases um um right now we received um some healthcare increases and we have the budget for those um that's for all of our faculty prescription and their Healthcare as I mentioned we um we're adding a speech therapist um we're also adding into the budget register Behavior technicians um that support mostly our special education classrooms and students with IEPs um we're moving our ER classroom that we started um that Memorial School that received an award this year from New Jersey school boards um I didn't mention that to the board um we're going to um bring that classroom um and those teachers and counselors to the next board day but the um the brand new classroom of course that we funded through our budget um received award from the state of New Jersey um as being recognized as an exemplary program um for students with special needs and so um the teacher and our director and our counselors that support that classroom are going to be honored at our next board meeting we're moving that classroom from memor toille as I mentioned um there's new Chromebook slated to go out to our high school students and so um with all that being said the last bullet point there is you know as I as I mentioned earlier we have a zero based budget and ultimately when a zero based budget is developed um a lot of Administrators like I said come together um and people put their wants into into the budget and ultimately we have to determine at the end um what our needs are versus what our wants are and ultimately hard decisions have to be made and um there's times when um collectively as a group we say Okay um we'd rather fund this program over this program when we're looking to balance the budget so we have made some shifts in programs which I'll highlight um at the next board meeting because due to the size of our district um if I mentioned anything specifically you could then identify who um might not be back next year and so I don't want to do that publicly until um you know those um faculty have been notified and so um again um it's just part of the budgeting process and part of looking at what as a district we feel um needs to be continued and what does not need to be continued so I'll speak a little bit more about that in our next meeting ultimately um that really speaks to our budget process in its entirety and and the numbers behind it so um thank you for the board I hope um I've answered your many of your questions during work session we support our budget tonight so um with the conclusion of that presentation um I conclude my superintendent report so thank you agenda [Music] okay we have our report for finance Peter pursuant to the recommendation of the superintendent of schools the committee on finance recommends the following resolutions be moved forward for rooll call vote I make a motion to move forward Finance resolutions 1 through 44 to be adopted [Music] roll call Mr B Mr androp for Pas Mr Paso Mr par against the reason why I'm against it is I don't think we should be going up at Mr petronia four Dr scardina four Miss Stella for and Mr Val for motion carries can I get a volunteer to do education pursuant to the recommendation of the superintendent of schools sorry uh the the committee on Ed education and curriculum recommends the following resolution to be moved forward for a roll call vote I make a motion to move forward education and curriculum resolutions 1 through n to be adopted second roll call Mr aat for Mr andropoulos for Paso Mr pasamano for Mr F against certain things on here I am not for Mr petronia for Dr Scardino for Miss Stella for and Mr Bano for motion carries policies rules and regulations El pursuant to the recommendation of the superintendent schools the committee of policies and rules and regulations recommends the following resolutions be moved forward for roll call vote I make a motion to move policies and rules and regulations resolutions one through six to be adopted second Mr P roll call mrat for Mr andropoulos for M pasamano uh Mr pasamano Mr par against there's things on here that we're vot we're voting to approve that already have been done so I will not vot for some post dated Mr patrono or Dr Scardino for Miss Stella for Mr valano for motion carries all right safety security and health Chris pursuant to the recommendation of the superintendent of schools the committee on safety security and health Health recommends the following resolutions be moved forward for a roll call vote I make a motion to move forward Safety and Security and health resolution item number one second second no roll call Mr aat for Mr andropoulos for pass the matter that Mr Pas Mr par against once again we're voting for something that happened prior to our voting tonight so I will vote against Mr petronio for Dr Scardino for Miss Stella for Mr valano for motion carries recommendation superint School of Athletics and students activities recommend the following resolution to moved forward called V I make a motion to move forwards stud resolution adopted second second Mr petraia R call Mr aate for Mr andropoulos for Mr pasam Mr P obain Mr petronia for Dr Scardino for Miss Stella for Mr valan for motion Carri Personnel Michael pursuant to the recommendation of the superintendent of schools the committe on Personnel recommends the following resolutions be moved forward to a roll call vote I make a motion to move forward personal resolutions [Applause] a a roll call Mr aate four Mr andropoulos four Mr pasam Mr pada against certain things I do not approve on here Mr petronio for Dr scardina for Miss Stella for Mr Val for motion carries new business in the motion all in favor against exensions meeting ad jours thank you everyone for coming have a good night all set it's czy yeah