ask you to stand if you're able and join me and saying a pledge of allegiance to the flag pledge of alance to the flag States of America na indivisible and justice for all thank you everybody um does anyone wish to speak on anything not on tonight's agenda as part of public comment seeing no one I'm going to move down to school committee members does school committee members wish to speak on anything Jessica go right ahead you just double check you're going out of order so that we don't start the public hearing until I can't start the public hearing technically till 7:15 okay um so let's see if I can remember everything I wanted to say um first of all um I'll start in reverse order um Chris and I had the pleasure today of joining in on the uh fifth grade career fair that was organized by avat and both of the um Elementary principles um it was a fantastic event um got to see a like four three four busloads of fifth graders all come into the MHS gym and go around and talk to people with various different careers um and this is just a start of their their career study unit and they're going to do another uh like a more of a presentation final event on uh May 23rd so um we're very much looking forward to to seeing what comes of it but the students were all really engaged and interested and asked a lot of uh really good questions so um it was great to see so many members of the community come out and be there to talk about their various careers so um I don't know why we're on that topic if you have anything to add Chris just to yeah I think it was a great uh event overall um having different students with different uh circumstances and different interests be able to see different paths already uh in fifth grade I thought was big uh I also really like the socialization between the mkg and hbb students I think that's a great um kind of beginning that merge because they're all next year going to be together at the Nickels um I just want to thank everybody involved in planning it and I think that it should be something we do every year and then let's see going backwards next uh the guidance was able to hold the rescheduled scholarship night for seniors on Monday so just a note of appreciation as somebody with a graduating senior it was a really big help to learn the process and um get their their excellent guidance in uh knowing how to go about proceeding through everything um and then last but certainly not least on Saturday um the MHS hosted the massachusett educational theater gu Guild metg uh preliminary one act Play Festival um it was a spectacular day from beginning to end um our students did us so proud being the host for six other schools throughout Eastern Massachusetts um they um we all so incredibly supportive of each other and while it was a competition there was no competitive atmosphere uh the students really supported each other anyone who got an award um didn't matter what school they were from everybody cheered and stood and applauded and congratulated them on that I do want to take um a moment and just thank Mr Sam moer for um all the work he did um Bridget redpath who is a teacher at the high school was also excellent at managing the deck and keeping all of the other schools safe when they were doing all of their technical pieces and everything just ran like a well-oiled machine you wouldn't know that it was the first time any of these people have done this as hosts so it was a wonderful wonderful event um and just to call out um I don't know Aiden's last name Sam ferer Aiden Ferrera who's a freshman won for his lighting design he won award uh technical award um Ashley Soul who is a sophomore uh one for acting U and uh Liam Lenahan who is a junior also got a performance award so um congratulations to all of them them for their accomplishments and to the entire cast crew and uh students who came in to host um and support their fellow performers and technicians in what was just a wonderful wonderful day other comments from school committee members I I have something but not on this topic what was that I have something but not on a separate topic oh another fact oh um I I don't know if I was lucky enough but I was at the parent teacher conferences yesterday at the Nichols Middle School for a sixth grader and an eighth grader and um despite screwing up every single sign up online that I possibly could and showing up the day before the parent teacher conferences and I made every mistake possible with that system I certainly am not a Sign Up Genius but uh the school was great the teachers were great um and I I we certainly didn't get all great reviews from my kids but the way every everything was handled and treated and everything was uh was really nice and uh I just appreciate it and my apologies to the two clusters that I completely screwed up the signups for so thank you anybody else Chris I just got a few uh questions about the the mech roof and how that's coming along do we have an updated timeline at all yes thank you uh U Mr Benson for bringing that up so a couple of times I've updated you on Friday flashes to say and construction is going to start Monday and then the weekend comes Monday begins and either the temperatures have been below 40° or it rains or it snows so I just spoke with uh the facilities director Mr Hutchinson earlier today and he said Carolyn we're finally there we're finally there we're going to get a good stretch on Monday we can expect that it's going to start barring any catastrophic weather events so hopefully by Monday I'll have an update and by the following flash an even better update um by the end of next week great thank you thank you anybody else no go right ahead um we were invited to join um as observers of the mkg colonial plays tomorrow I think it starts at 130 um just a a a thanks to the teachers who sponsor those events for giving us the option to come and support the students there so I'm looking forward to that event as well so that play is at the h BB Auditorium even though it's theg play so just keep that in mind it does begin at 1:30 and uh it's a really you know a time-honored tradition in our district the kids do a great job um you will not regret coming the kids do a you know kind of do the whole thing from soup to Nets so it's exciting under the direction of the teacher of course so if anybody can take a long lunch break two days in a row come join anybody else have anything um I'd like to point out that on Sunday I spent the vast majority of the day at Oak Point um I was with most of the people who run the oako um yard sale and do the oako scholarship funds um and to a person they went out of their way to have a great conversation with me about how much they appreciate uh Carolyn meeting with them and Paul Brenan being with them and having lengthy conversations about the future and what happens um and so that was sort of un I wasn't expecting that I was just there for something else and um everyone did that so I wanted to raise that the other thing I wanted to mention to everybody is on Saturday is a really nice program at the Council on Aging it's Middleboro services to the Elder Le is having a soup and sandwich fundraiser um and it's a great opportunity and they help support the council in Aging in a lot of ways um mainly providing resources for um seniors in the community who need help um they're always there to step up and help and I know Bob's a member of that um Mr solivan out in the audience and I want to um thank them for that sitting on the Council on Aging I know all of the good work they do and if you can swing by there on Saturday it would be a big help oh I got more now too it's still vamping what was that you still vamping for another five minutes sure yeah we got five um next weekend since since we don't have our our lovely student representative I'm sure he would have put it in his report um next weekend um is SBA so if um I believe the concerts are open to all um so Saturday the 16th I think the first concert's at 1 and the second's at 3 and they're at Silver Lake High School so we have many students uh from the high school I think it's like nine maybe this year um who are participating in uh the various concerts there so that's exciting opportunity for all of them um and then the next performance for the students at the high school um death by chocolate has uh Friday night the 15th show at 6:30 and Saturday night the 16th show at 6:30 so many of the students who were super busy last weekend are going to be super busy two weekends from now too so um please consider coming out it's a wonderful uh murder mystery uh amusing entertaining uh celebratory play so please consider coming out and supporting the students anybody else have anything we have a couple minutes we should thank all the people who went out and voted yesterday on Monday excuse me H Tuesday it's been a long week already yeah we appreciate um about 20 7% of Middleboro came out and voted so we appreciate that um in the presidential primary um with that if no one has any anything else we'll take a two-minute break and then we'll be right back okay Middleboro High School boys basketball has reached the quarter filal round Mia do2 tournaments so um tomorrow 3 p.m. tber High School the bus will be leaving and then the guessing the game is later on tomorrow afternoon so kudos to our uh basketball team for continuing to move forward and we wish them all the best in their next okay we can take that two minute break now we'll take the two take the two minut break e e okay I'm going to bring it back everybody all right so I'll reconvene our meeting and I will move into at 7:15 I'll move into the public hearing on the budget uh the requirements of the public hearing on the budget are twofold one that the school committee U published their the um a notice of hearing in a local newspaper and we did that in the masket weekly um and the second thing is to have a copy of this presentation available the day before and that was available at the superintendent's office um so with that I will turn it over to Carolyn lions and Mr Brian Hyde to talk about budget preses great thank you chairman young members of the school committee I spent um a considerable amount of time last meeting making my presentation to you in consideration of the fy2 budget um and with your permission I want to review some of this information but certainly not all um in the interest of not being you know duplicative just by way of review we really engage in that four-step process of first conducting Research into our expenditures and our needs analysis of the data um to drive our data informed decisionmaking action by the leadership team in determining our actual needs and proposals and then the M we're here at the management side presenting to school committee for approval of our process um we did talk a little last time about Chapter 70 um funding and the form the foundation formula which we can all agree is difficult to calculate and really what we were talking about was what goes into um Public Funding of public schools which is really a very basic math equation of your local contribution plus your Chapter 70 Aid to get your foundation budget um so we went through that and I want to highlight I want to highlight for everybody tonight sorry I'm advancing to slide decks at once there we go um just just the budget drivers I want to review those briefly so that we're clear on um all of the drivers of the fy2 budget so first and foremost is that strategy for continuous District Improvement that is the document that the district has created to drive not just our continuous Improvement but the the financial buckets that we're going to use to advance the district fixed cost contractual and salary increases make up a considerable amount of our budget which is why it's such a significant budget driver special education tuition and services which is always um you know particular services and expenditures in every budget across Massachusetts technology and Facilities so not just hardware and software for computers and that sort of thing but also different needs for each particular facility Sr funded resources we talked I'll go through that slide again but just that we had considerable f fing coming into the district since 2020 and the Sund Downing of that funding now um that is obviously a budget driver in this you know these positions and and this proposed budget curriculum cost again to advance our our you know um instruction and quality of of instruction in our district and then transport transportation for all students um these are all relevant um budget drivers we talked at length last meeting about the three hurdles that are really presented challenges for this budget and I'll go through them again just briefly the first is the increase in special education costs and I want to be careful again about how I talk about that that doesn't mean that there are many more children in special education it doesn't necessarily mean that needs have increased the operational services division sets the tuition rates for private schools and over the last 2year period those tuitions have increased um almost 19% so that's a very considerable increase above and beyond you know our increases as a district so that's the first hurdle I wanted to talk about the second hurdle is that loss of Esser funding so as you can see in this box um you know Sr one which came in came online about 2020 Sr 2 about a year later and then Sr 3 um only 6 months thereafter we've seen an influx of $4.5 million that have been added to the budget that will not be continuing and we recognized that we knew that at the time this is what was referred to as the fiscal cliff and then finally hurdle three was the governor's budget which is admittedly a projection until that budget is finalized which may not be till September if not later um what we we have to go on what the cherry sheet estimates tell us and this Aid has not just flatlined but it represents that minimum possible Aid the state can give to the town of Middleboro this is different for every town um and that's a major hurdle so when we look at this budget and we talk about the salaries which represent just over $35.5 million and the expenses which total just over $10.5 million are fy2 all funds budget request is 46,4 2,135 I'm going to break down that number further for you um because we won't be asking for that full figure because of the offsets which we talked about last time and I'll go into this in Greater detail these are alternate funding sources when we met with the town the town generously gave us 4,578 654 as you can see there's a variance of about $5.2 million so the question became how are we going to um solve this issue what we did and this is the new slide for the committee this be a good time to turn around to look at the alternative the alternate funding sources you have to look at all the different um funding areas of money that come into our district some come every year some do not come every year and these amounts change so when you look at Title One and title two these are the amounts that we received this year when you look at the idea which is the special education grant 240 is the fund code you see that 920,000 that represents what we received this year school choice represents the students in our district that are remaining here in our district whether or not the committee decides to continue with school choice students don't leave even if you decide to not continue with with school choice those children stay with us until they receive a diploma that figure represents 282 772 th000 circuit breaker is the reimbursement program for special education tuitions from the state this figure is a real figure because ideally you use this year's last year's circuit breaker in next year's tuitions that figure represents $1,497 1873 the prek revolving account has $70,000 contributed to next year's um budget that includes the amount of money that model peers pay to be included in the program and it also represents um offsets for Staffing for that program try to remember in a lot of these accounts you can't use that funding for any purpose you're limited so prek revolving funds as an example funnels right back into that program Esser 3 is the reallocation from our remaining Esser funds yes this this these grants are sundowning this year but we have the ability to look at what is remaining and allocate that appropriately to to offset the variance and in the two numbers this year so that represents $466 6,998 uh the facility rental account of 565,000 represents rental incomes that we have received over time so it's important to note we don't necessarily take that that amount of money in each year um but given the financial constraints that faced us for this year um we thought it was prudent to tap into this account in order to get us to budget um the migrant Grant is the newest bucket of income from the state this involves our newcomer families um and the allocation from the state for the number of students that we received as a district for every day of their attendance here in the in in our school year um this figure represents $54,900 000 represents the contribution that our before and after Care Program contributes based on our families utilizing these Services the special education 262 Grant is another special education grant with a focus on Early Childhood so again that money is limited where the idea 240 Grant can be used for any special ed expenditure virtually uh the 262 funds are limited to Early Childhood um and then finally we have additional miscellaneous grants to total 162,000 $612 so when the question was how are you going to offset over $5 million in variance it is through these funding sources that we'll be relying on that um in the in the coming year and why is that not advancing it's not advancing on either one there we go there we go and looking at the transportation budget remember that the transportation budget is not part of the set of numbers I just presented this is money paid for by the town $4.39 million this includes all different types of Transportation when I say transportation for all students I do genuinely mean all because it involves our students in K through 12 our vocational schools um some transportation to vocational schools our mini buus Fleet specialized transportation both salaries and expenses our crossing guards our contracted Services which includes Transportation needs that we cannot meet ourselves mckin vento and homeless transportation and Foster Care Transportation when you get to this slide this is a summary of the total cost from all sources of funds so you see that 4,578 654 is the operating budget the additional 4,39 250 for transportation our circuit breaker reimbursement at 1.49 million our anticipated IGA Grant at 920,000 and our revolving account and Grant funded sources of just over 2.8 million we arrive at this total which is the total it costs to run the Middleboro Public Schools at50 m244 47 so with that I will move to the recommendation for a motion but prior to that I think if there's any questions I want to make sure I answer those questions or take any questions for U Mr Hyde as well questions from the committee um on the uh slide for the the fy2 alternative funding um what I know some of those will be back for 26 I'm just thinking ahead are there C obviously Esser but like for the facilities rentals is that is that pretty much cleaned out or oh good question does that does that empty out that account in some total yeah great question no facilities rental that does not empty that account it reduces it by just about 50% but as an example that Champions account will bring it much closer to zero okay okay so we were judicious with how we borrowed from certain accounts remember that something for facility rental the reason the justification for not emptying that account account in sum total is that there will be expenditures that the that the district will have to fund that are not going to be something that you could get reimbursed at um capital and you can't ask the town to pay for absolutely everything the example of that is the maintenance of the LDL building or Lincoln D Lynch sorry I should not talk in acronyms the Lincoln D Lynch building um which is leased out by massao Community College so for example when repairs are needed in that building it's not something that we can go to the town and say can you can you please cover all of those expenses so that's one of the reasons that facility rental account you know um needs to have a certain amount in it um the rest of the accounts so Title One title two and 240 um are accounts that come up are um monies that come in every year so it is hard to project exactly what the figure will be but those figures have not declined so I think it's a a reasonable estimate to use this year's figure it's not going it's not likely to go down it may go up but it may not go up substantially which is why I didn't want to over project those numbers either that's the case for all of your grants I don't know how long for example the migrant uh grant money that is a technically a homeless Grant but I don't know how long that money will be around so I am treating that like onetime money only because I have no history to go off of um so we will I mean there will be continued questions for FY 26 for sure but this I I think gets us through the hump of fy2 so they'll replenish other than Esser yes for the most part or theoretically they could in in theory you should see most of these accounts with the exception of Esser um and again Champions will not replenish at the rate at which we've drawn but it'll still replenish I will say the Champions contribution has gone up every single month so Testament to Champions obviously it's a good program and our families that comes right out of our families that means that our families are using this programming and helping our our Working Families in particular who need child care on days when the school is closed thank you sure I think we should point out too though that so while certain places replenish um we have constantly use those to fund issues that have Arisen for example we've paid we've replaced basketball uh courts over periods in time um we've used the facilities rental money um to handle buying merchandise for the facilities crew um anything like that has been over and like uh Carolyn said you know we are landlords so we do have a responsibility to make sure that the building is in good repair so we've always put more money in there too um I'm not I'm not saying don't do this it makes sense given where we're at but it does diminish some of the things and there are projects coming later um for example there's a shelf life on the field in the stadium and so you have to replace those things and we would always looking to do that through facility rentals and those pieces but if you incorporate those into into to running the schools it becomes harder and harder and so that's sort of the piece that you have to be careful of and just make sure and I appreciate that they didn't cut out all of them um and taking pieces but um you know the Champions one has built up over time and um we've sort of used we looked upon Choice school choice and champions as two separate things the bulk of our school choice came in at the time through high school so we're always using those funds for um extras at the high school or adding things that we weren't able to fund in the past we've added teachers um positions especially around um issues that we've seen in um mcast scores so science and things like that and we use the champion funds for because most of those kids are either in the elementary school or in rare occasions the middle school we use that fund to sort of offset things that we weren't able to buy like that's how we replenished a lot of the computers in the early days we were able to use Sesser funds later on but those things were being used for different things like that too so that takes away some of that in case things like that come up later on and and certainly this was the sentiment that when we were in subcommittee this you know was the sentiment that was like this is the the best way forward it's not going to replenish right away but it does generate Revenue so other questions um I do want to point out one thing that I think is important there across the state has been this concern about how Chapter 70 funds came in this year and next Friday mass Association of school committees has a learning lunch on the Chapter 70 funds it's at noon time it's virtual so if people are interested um you should have gotten a piece from masc but if you didn't let me know because I can send you the link I can also put that link in the in the flash tomorrow oh yeah that would be awesome I'll be other questions um no thank you for explaining the um the revolving accounts because I think that was a big piece that people need to be made aware of that even if we're drawing money down um that there are ways to replenish it um also just one other question on the migrant funding I know the last time we met that for subcommittee the check was in the mail have we received funds yet from the state that's a great question I asked that same question today I'm waiting to um here back I asked my business office who said we have to check with the town so if it's in we don't have it in here hand but that doesn't mean it hasn't come into the town so I can double check on that certainly for tomorrow I have a feeling if it was in we would have been notified the town's very communicative with us about it so my assumption is no we we haven't gotten it but I'll continue to ask and if we haven't received it by tomorrow it would be appropriate for me to reach out to the state to say you told me the check was in the mail a couple weeks ago so thank you other questions about this and anyone in the audience have questions so with that we'll be doing a motion correct yes so let me so we're going to break the motion down yes we're going to make we're going to break the motion down ultimately into three distinct pieces first to move that the middleb school committee approve 44 m968 N4 as the fiscal 2025 local education budget attain a motion for that so move second discussion hearing none all those in favor say I I opposed it's unanimous so the second part involves the appropriation of 4,578 654 in the operating budget and then this separate part the transportation budget 4,390 250 and further that that total appropriation of $44 m968 94 is in compliance with Ed Reform Act of 1993 and recommended by the superintendent do I hear a second second I mean make a motion thank you do I hear a second second discussion hearing none all those in favor say I I I opposed abstain I one um it's uh 51 thank you go ahead and then finally that the school committee direct the superintendent to allocate the following additional funding sources which total $ 5,275 53 FY 24 anticipated circuit breaker special ed reimbursement of $1,497 1873 and revolving account Grant fund and grant funding totaling 3,7 77763 the final approved expenditures for the schools would be 50,2 44,47 second discussion hearing none all those in favor say I I opposed that's it anything else that concludes my part of this hearing here I'll set okay um before we close out the hearing I'd like to thank a few people I'd like to thank the budget subcommittee for their hard work on this particular piece so I like to thank zek and Marcy I'd like to thank the superintendent and all the admin administrators um for their hard work I'd like to thank Dr Sullivan for participating as a member of the finance committee um I want to thank Brian and his team uh for the hard work they put in for this and we really appreciate it Brian so uh with that chair will entertain a motion to close the budget hearing do here second second discussion hearing none all those in favor say I I opposed it's unanimous thank you very much budget hearing is over back to to regular meeting okay I'll turn it over to the superintendent for superintendent report uh okay did you want to we already did the school committee you want to do the no one else is here I don't see mea um I don't see mea in oh they're here they sent us a note oh okay oops I didn't see that okay so I'll begin my report by talking about our candidate for the director of business and finance I'd asked Mr Michael Peron to come to the table um this is our candidate while he's doing that I told the committee several months ago that we would you know as we were on boarding services with TMS we would continue to to look for the right candidate and that if the right candidate came along we would assemble um as we did a hiring committee did assemble Mr Peron went through two rounds of interviews he met with the entire business office staff but also several administrators here in our district multiple principes central office administrator ERS um and was you know given a set of questions in both rounds we talked about his vast experience which ranges um from you know Florida to uh Georgia um to time in Massachusetts in a couple of local districts most recently in the Handover public schools which is a fairly similarly situated District um Mr Peron impressed really the entire committee with his in particular with his experience in doing this exact job and um I present to you this candidate this evening thank you so I just so everyone understands um business manager as one of the few um that school committee have authority over um and so this would be our hire um so this is our opportunity to ask um uh Mr Peron questions so Mr Peron if you don't mind I'm going to start it off by asking you to introduce yourself and tell you why you picked Middleboro to apply to sure good evening thank you for the opportunity um I'm Mike Peron I have been uh as the superintendent said uh business manager or in K12 Finance for almost 30 years uh in various different districts and States uh in different types of districts in size and demographics and and all that so um I feel very confident in my uh experience for the position um why Middleboro um it really just came up uh uh when I saw that the position was open I was not in a position at that time in my life to apply uh my wife and I moved back from Florida in 2021 to take care of of my mom and dad uh who were in a assisted living and we brought them home um and um they we're living with them right now in Plymouth uh I grew up in Lakeville my dad was the superintendent I graduated from Aon quit and I think the last time this well it can't be this building cuz it was in the 1900s when I came and played basketball here uh and so I went into the auditorium before cuz I was early and I'm like this is not where I played but I am local grew up here um and uh I contacted the superintendent um uh my dad passed in November and it gave me the opportunity to go back to work I left Handover to take care of uh my uh aging dad and so we uh my wife uh and I decided ready to go back and uh I just reached out to the superintendent which I don't normally do and I just sent an email and asked are you still looking for a business manager and she said yes and so it kind of went from there and when I came for the interview I drove down 44 and I was here in less than 25 minutes and I'm like God this is a great commute uh and I know the area and like the area I grew up here as I said so I I just think it's a great fit and it was pretty good timing thank you um we'll start off the questions if you don't mind I have a couple can you talk to me about what how you interiew building a budget so I'm not going to try to make this too simple but I did watch the meeting uh last uh the last meeting where the superintendent presented the budget um and almost 90% to 95% is exactly how I've always built the budget with collaboration with all the stakeholders uh whether that be working with the town with the staff and definitely with the uh leadership team and I think uh my position is more to help guide that in help you know with the communication and the uh collaborative working uh because there's a lot of people involved and they have a lot of needs and they know I always say that the principles are the CEO of their building and that they know what is best for their building I could help guide that and help with the cost and the um the different uh things they need and how to get there and and so I'm more of a facilitator in that piece but the I really like the way it was presented because that's the way I've done it in the past uh where everybody works together to come to a a common uh ground can you talk to us about what you view as your management style yes I have a I'm fairly laid-back person uh I am open door uh I do not micromanage I like to listen to people I like to hear their feedback one of the first things I do when I start is I meet with each person and let them tell me what and and and try to tell them that it's very confidential that what they're going to tell me is just between us and I find out what they are what they like what they don't like uh what they'd like to change if they have any suggestions and work with them that way and that's how I kind of go about uh everyday working it's it's collaboration uh and again if uh if I think there's some uh help that someone can use and and and give them some uh uh ideas on how to make their job easier I will offer that if they don't want to do that that's fine if they they like the way it's going that's fine uh we talked about this the change uh in the accounting system uh and I know there's some angst and that is very very normal um but I did ass sure and I'm not a uh you know the account um uh tech technology I wouldn't say it's my number one strength but I can help guide through a process like this because I've been through it and and that is the hardest part is getting people through it because change is difficult for people and I did assure them that when this is all over they will be happy that the change was made and in a year or two they won't even remember what that old system was was and um also told them that munice and maybe a little bit uh uh costly it is extremely powerful and everybody that I know worked with it I worked with it back in Silver Lake years ago um everybody loves it and anyone who left it wishes they went back to it so it'll be a little bit of a process but I could help in that dealing with the personalities and the change in the tough times because it is tough it's it's not easy for people to change after they've been doing stuff so I could I could definitely help in that way also and the last question before I turn it over to anybody else can you talk about your experiences in building relationships on the town side yes um so in every you I've been in I know how many I don't want to count and take the time but been a number of districts and there's been obviously a number of personalities that go that you meet and when you're working with towns uh and I've always had a very good and positive relationship with the people in the town that I work with uh and again that is collaboration I know where they're coming from uh I try to tell them where we're coming from the school I I never like it to be uh animosity it's always been uh a very good working relationship uh and I think it's just having an open mind that we're all looking for as much as we can get and that's not possible it's kind of like a negotiation with your with your staff uh everybody puts something on the table uh and uh you you get some things and and some things you don't um and you have to just move on from that but be positive with the fact that uh you know you you you did get something there there's old adage that if if both sides walk away from a you know even working with a town in a budget and the end budget they may say we could only give you four and you want five and you get four and a half neither got what they wanted so they walk away unhappy in a way but some old adages if both walk away unhappy then it was a a successful negotiation and in in hset if you look at that they wanted five you got or you wanted five you got four and a half they wanted four you both met halfway in between and that's kind of the way you do it and you do it professionally and you uh work together and with the town and the school you're you're you're middle Bor you're working for the same common goal so um I've always had very positive uh relationships with with town or city or whatever the governing body is thank you other questions Che thank you for join um in looking through your extensive resume I did note that um when you the different uh areas that you worked in in Florida and Georgia many of them had a budget that was twice as much as Middleboro or more um you're talking billions of dollars instead of millions of dollars um so what do you see as the the unique challenges for managing budgets at sounds sad to say the smaller scale you know was only 50 million instead of 1.8 billion um so in terms of that kind of transition back to the the smaller scale Community what do you see as the biggest challenges for for a town like midle Barrow that's a great question uh when I don't know if on my resume uh because I've been doing this for a while I had to start cutting things off my first job in K12 was in Connecticut in a small town uh and I brought this up in one of the interviews with with uh Mrs lines um it was 1,200 kids K12 in one building and when I went to I think the budget was 10 10 million that's what it says here that was 1993 or four something like that and then I applied at Silver Lake and um there were five board members in Connecticut and 36 board members at Silver Lake and one of the questions they asked me was how are you going to go from a $10 million budget to a $50 million budget so very similar to what you're asking me and and I will will tell you that I that it was harder in a $10 million budget cuz you have no room and a $1.8 billion budget the superintendent would come to me and say I need 8 million for a new math series K12 for 20,000 kids and I say okay got it you come and say I need 30,000 right now and you're like I don't know where to go get that so it is very difficult in the smaller I would tell you smaller districts are harder than the larger ones and um so that is a challenge but I've done it and and you you use the same principles it's just the dollar amount is different it's smaller or in the case from Connecticut to Silver Lake it was more uh and they were a little concerned that I wouldn't be able to handle that and I I was kind of looking forward to it saying I I think this is going to be easier a little bit because you you have some different different uh Revenue sources super had all those offsets up there I didn't even have some of those in Handover um so I looked up there and I'm like I didn't we didn't get that and we didn't get this and so they're different everywhere and you just you you adapt and uh so uh it is a great question because but I always say a dollar in in Thompson Connecticut and a dollar in Middleboro is the same thing you just have to deal with uh all the other aspects of it but but um uh it is a challenge but it's something that I'm very comfortable with thank you go um what do you see personally as the biggest Financial challenges for district like Middleboro going forward I well I think it's cyclical and today and it's every District across the state is the rising cost and superintendent mentioned it of special ed um and it's again not anyone's doing or more children it's just the cost of it and the revenue that districts are getting is not being kept up with that increase uh the transportation for special ed and the tuitions are just skyrocketing and that 14% you saw from OSD the uh last year we we were all reeling from that we didn't even know how to you know go to the board we couldn't we had to go to the town and they didn't understand it because they're not in it every day but that increase which was one to three for the last I don't know how many years went to 14 almost 15% we don't have the the town's not generating that Chapter 70 uh Handover and midboro uh to my kind of uh surprise are both in the same boat they both of you are getting the minimum uh and the chair you talked about uh something coming up on with regard to Chapter 70 I hope something comes of that because there I I think there's a difference between different towns and but to be getting the minimum is is is very difficult when you have cost going up especially in the special ed areas other questions Alan go right ahead how you doing I'm a uh I'm a Laker Al myself so are you really yeah um so I I I think start if um if we move ahead with this and you start you're probably coming in at the perfect time as a finance director because we literally just voted on the budget today tonight I couldn't agree with you anymore um when you said so you're your next budget is going to be all you yes when you look are you going to use there it there it and I apologize I'm not a financier or whatever that is um but I I know some people will use the last budget as a foundation and and just kind of build from there I there is a school of thought too that somebody will do that but they'll take like one department and zero it out and start from scratch and look for new savings and that type of thing is is that something that you do or how will how will you use this budget in preparation than your next budget or your first budget here yeah that's a great question also so zerob based budgeting is what you're referring to which is the ultimate perfect way to build a budget that's you wipe the Slate clean and every penny you're asking for a requesting you have to justify why you want it that as I said is the model that we should all use and it's very difficult to do that you do it as much as you can um it's time consuming to do that uh it's hard work um so I'm open to that is that me no good um so it is a it is a model zerob based or you start uh basically where you started the year before um and so I always use kind of a combination because it is very very difficult I would love to do it if you had the time you had the resources um so I will look at that uh and we may be able to implement in some areas uh you know when uh cost of paper and the reams of paper that you know that is something that we use every year you know the cost of it if it's got a price increase so you you know that that's you know you're not going to zero out the paper you could and then each principal would have to justify how many reings and you know what they're going to use but that usually doesn't change much there's some things that are kind of stagnant so you kind of let those go but the the it's the newer stuff the new uh requests that you you're really want to dig into and and and see why and um question uh why they need it and the cost and and you get into it that way so I think it's a combination of both but the zero base is what you're referring to and it is Utopia that's the way to do it um but it doesn't always work thank you appreciate it MH other questions with that we thank you for coming tonight thank you for having me um I just like to point out to the committee a couple things um in addition to tonight uh m Mr um Peron has been through multiple interviews with members of our staff um as presented in your packet um along with his resume the superintendent has outlined her review of his references um so this is the candidate presented to us tonight uh chair will entertain a motion um if the committee wishes to allow the superintendent to enter into contract negotiations with Mr perau second discussion uh I just have a quick question sure now as the contract stands now I understand that it will be negotiated um Sarah hickey previously was also in charge of uh some part of the transportation which was um mini mini bus driving um is that going is this also something that he's that he's been made aware of and and this he's he's okay running that if that's part of the contract or are is the will the plan to separate nope there's no plan to separate the role all right it'll be the same parameters that the previous business manager help all right thank you any further discussion hearing none all those in favor say I I opposed chair will enter also entertain a motion to allow the chair to sign the contract when it's done discussion hearing none all those in favor say I I opposed it's unanimous welcome to the team congratulations thank you very much I look forward to it I'm very excited thank you okay and with that I have only one final announcement before I close my report this evening which is that there uh Josh Porter was um putting on with you know this event fake and fatal um at the Town level this is a forum about the deadly impact of Fentanyl and other substances um very informed ative the new date will now be March 19th from 4: to 6:00 p.m. at Middleboro Town Hall um people are encouraged to sign up on event bright there is no cost for this event but I think it'll be informative all are welcome um and I hope to see you all there thank you very much and that motion to approve the consent agenda discussion hearing none all it applies to U minutes all those in favor say I I opposed it's unanimous we voted on the business manager our next school committee meeting will be March 21st chair CH entertain a motion to go to Executive session for purpose two to conduct strategy sessions and preparation for negotiation of non-personnel or to conduct collective bargaining to sessions on a contract negotiation of non-union Personnel superintendent's contract so mov discussion hearing none it's a roll call vote Mr fley Jess I Chris I bar i z i and a chair Vats I and we will not reconvene into regular session we will we will end an executive session thank you very much everybody