I'd like to call an order for a regular meeting of the watchong board of education on February 22nd 2024 at 7 p.m. may we please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance United States of America and to the stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all welcome to the meeting of the Board of Education of The Bu of watch please be advised Aon thanks I'll read it again welcome to the meeting of the Board of Education of the B of watch please be aded that this and all meetings of the board are open to the public and media consistent of the open public records meetings act chapter 231 laws of 1975 and that the advanced notice required therein has been provided this is a regular meeting of the Board of Education of which of Wong at which formal action may be taken this meeting is being live streamed in the district website we are recording the of the meeting will also be posted the public has an opportunity to be heard and shown on the agenda at points in the meeting provided for the public to address the board recording and photographing other than private personal use requires a consent parents Guardians who children may be included in the image miss Karen Bishop Johnson man please have R Mrs aaro here Mrs Amo here Mr fr here Mr Gonzalez here Mrs Harvey here here Mr Gracia here Mrs jet here Mrs Sanders here here thank you okay now I'll ask the superintendent Dr Glazer to announce the presentations that will be my pleasure um we have Mrs kid here our principal from Valley View School also and Mrs Morrison wave if you haven't met Mrs Morrison you might that's what I was just going to say if you haven't met her we've been telling you teacher of the year for valy you and back when we went into her classroom to surprise her the students played Just beautifully and we invited them to come to the board meeting it was a lot to get all of them to come to the board meeting especially after the Winter concert and we are grateful for our flute and opo group featuring uh Khloe shakon Gemma coair I'm sorry if I'm hashing your name um Elena delforno Maya kogan Katrina Ling Allison Park and Queenie are performers this evening Mrs Morrison thank you welcome and thank you um I just want to introduce uh what this group is these are sixth graders and um andp but this particular group they work very hard and very sriven so we do a little bit more than just the band music and um what goes on theth book um I've been last year they performed as fifth graders for the senior Lon and we did some little quets and different things like that so we are continu that we learning some different literature as a group in a smaller Ensemble so we doing to have such a great group so we're going to do the [Music] hartter [Music] for [Music] [Applause] abely thank you yes I was gonna say don't just let me do you guys are famous you're on YouTube now thank you all so much much we love having you perform with [Applause] us oh thanks you guys you could have left it a thank you all right thanks foring you ready Aon move on all right so at our last board meeting we had our audit report from our auditor Valerie Dolan um we in October had the budget report from our Ernie Turner um they come from two different perspectives and um although watching the video that that perhaps was clear um we wanted to make sure that everybody got a chance to um hear their message uh Ernie and Valerie both came back to the operations committee um since the last board meeting and now they're with us so valer you starting first the to look back y thanks so I guess I'm back um just to clarify a couple of things from the audit I just want to clarify some dates and time as I am June 30th 23 when I was reporting my audit was conducted for the school year of 22 23 so I am really the look back and what I do and go through on my audit really does then basically start to set you up for the building of a budget it does not involve the budget nor do we look at the 23 24 school year that you're in right now so as we said with the operations committee the way I'd like to say it and it's a kind of an analogy that we do use when we're doing presenting audits is we talk about um the area of when you're when we feel that districts are starting to get into either some financial distress or a little bit of information to give you is to really say we talk about it as being in the North Atlantic so right now you're sort of driving you're you're in your boat in the North Atlantic and there are icebergs all around you and our look at our audit is okay you're entering the North Atlantic you haven't HD an iceberg yet there aren't any problems that I would say you've slamed straight into the iceberg however as you see going forward into Ernie's conversation he probably started to say you're probably starting to navigate those icebergs and we were hoping that between those two and the budget you're building for 2425 keeps you away from the icebergs it's kind of the easiest analogy that I can come up with that kind of tells you where we're at so when I came in and we talked about having made some budget changes I was really talking about the 2223 and adjustments that were made in that budget year the Surplus that we described and gave you in terms of excess Surplus talk about the years of cycling back so that's the stability number and so each year I look forward to really where Ernie will come up and he will will talk about the budget that you're currently in and how it goes going forward so I just wanted to make sure you were clear that I'm really a look back and in in all honesty I'm normally here in December so I'm really really like we're late presenting the audit because the state is also late in giving us the information so we were out in September looking at June and the state held us up for our information I could have been here in November telling a previous board some information and so I don't I just want to make sure everyone is clear with that perception of where we came from when I came and presented and does anybody have anything they want us add or does there any want to come up talk future future talk present and future he's really more your president future uh Valerie I I had a question of course just going back to our last board meeting yes when um you mentioned that we have the uh it was 572,000 for the allowable fund balance that used to be allowed uh there was special circumstances during Co that allowed that to be up to 4% but now the max is 2% your max is two and then um you mentioned that the the excess that's being rolled forward is 81,000 that is correct that's in addition to the that 57 correct and that 801,000 is really going to filter into your budget but your budget was really supported using almost that kind of number from going forward so that really is keeping you like I said that's my stable number the issue becomes that if you do not generate Surplus so if I'm standing next year and I'm looking at that number and that number becomes say 600,000 or 500,000 that starts to build a budget hole so I'm almost the Tipping of the beginning to see where you come next year from like I said I haven't looked at anything from 23 24 so I've only what I've heard and what has been told to me also to say will you land with that kind of a number going at the end of June 30th 24 I don't know that answer you could could do fund balance projections to see what that number looks like you might not you may you may not have that number I appreciate that and we've had the chance to work with Ernie for the last couple years on building our budget and that so I'd just like to get your opinion or uh to confirm something about the so the numbers that I mentioned that you had mentioned last meeting with the uh 572,000 and 801,000 does that project every month we have our report of the secretary it's usually page four that has the three columns that shows the appropriate the budgeted Appropriations then the actual expenditures and then the encumbrances column so when we see um for the year end December 31st 2023 the expenditures and the encumbrances come to about4 million 500,000 but the budget is 15 m987 so is that what's these numbers that you mentioned for the allowable fund balance and the excess that's rolled into that's where those come from they come from the unexpended Appropriations um but you have to be careful when you're looking at those numbers because there might be purchase orders and incumbrances that haven't been set up yet so you if you in theory your budget's 15 million what you've actually spent versus what you've encumbered yes there's probably looks like a million dollars but that was at a point in time there are many purch purch that occur in the next 6 months could add up and use those but that variance column that you're really looking at is what the first line of driver for future B budget balances so if that number starts to go very low that means you're not going to regenerate what you're using and those numbers will start to come down so as you see those budgets getting utilized right but but the 1231 2023 uh report of the secretary is showing the the actual uh expenditures and so that that 14, 544000 um subtracted from the 15, 987 th000 it's all it's more closer to one and a half million one and a half million right but I don't know if every encumbrance has been put into place because not all funds are encumbered from the start of the budget salaries might be incumbered because you know you owe them but there could be line items in any one of your budgets for which yes you put a budget together for maintenance but you don't know what the electric bills are yet so you won't you won't have those spent so you have to really project out and that's what you know we had encouraged is to look at those and actually do what we would call a projection out where you would say of that unspent million how much do I know I'm going to really spend going forward in just just estimating out the electric bills the light bills all those bills that have to be put in and then what do I have left left right and that's um why I asked the million and a half you know between the actual incumbrances and then the the budget um what dates should we look at because I saw in the operations committee meeting minutes that the discussion was it your audit was based on June 2023 right so then um July 1st is beginning of the new year those reports are they start again right the budget rolls and a new budget starts in Jan July so if we look at that or then December 31st is year end what what's the best uh because the school calendar year so you're really a June 30th so December is half your budget so as of December half your budget's been spent so that would be the question is if you're looking at December and you're only seeing a million now is all of it encumbered and that's all you're going to have left or did you spend a half H most of your budget in the first six months of the year and leave yourself nothing for the the second six I haven't seen the reports so I can't tell but that's really the most important and I guess that's the question maybe you ask is here I'm looking at a board secretary's report I mean you should be getting the monthly you should get reports reasonably within a month or so after close where are we spending and not only on those variances what do you think you're going to spend of that variance because if that's the real answer it's the unknown at this point you don't know what you're going to spend yet I mean you be could say you know you feel that I've already I'm looking at that I mean we have districts where I'm looking at that and it's December and I don't have anything left and that's when they'll say we're not spending any more money and we put in a spending freeze so don't know for me I would say I would leave that to Karen and maybe even Ernie who'd be more familiar with what's going on in 23 24 okay thank you very much um Mrs um M Dolan so in leman's terms um last time you were here um you left us um pretty informed right um but just for clarification purposes there's still much more to than than your statement correct of what you have said and now I'm also seeing that the budget ends through half a year um it's a September to June your no your budget's July 1 to June 30th right so I'm really was looking at your 2223 budget I have not looked at your 232 for Budget won't do that until the year's over got it I'm behind the scenes after the fact I don't work within the budget that's by Design they have the Auditors be independent so that I can come back and give the independent look after the fact I don't get involved during the fact during the budgets because then it takes away my Independence to then report on it at after after the fact date thank you so much wor it I have sorry go can I just confirm that you said also that you know we had a lot of covid money in that year in federal grants but if you take out our referendum interest we did still finish $100,000 lower than the year before correct okay thank you yes right thank you so much anytime I'm glad thank you for coming back no problem all right now Ernie good evening everyone good to see everyone um I just want to start off by saying that everything that your auditor valy Dolan just mentioned to you I'm in agreement with all right because this is something where she has looked at it in depth understands the district and understands the finances uh of the district and everything she mentioned to you is uh is I agree with it totally and it's been it's been consistent with what I've been informing the board down through the past few months and if you remember in October all right we did some rather drastic things with reworking the budget since that time my opinion as to the financial status of the district for this year and that's the 2324 year is still consistent it hasn't changed so all of the the uh adjustments that were made to the budget at that time in October were appropriate and are at this point in time look to be able to accommodate all of the things that we needed to accommodate within the budget all the things that I explained to the board during my presentation uh back in October so I can say there's nothing new that has come up that has surprised us from a financial standpoint I think that we're in a stable position this year to be able to get through this year in a positive fashion from a financial standpoint um but it's also important for everyone to remember one of the things that I I mentioned when we were making these adjustments back in October was that they were one-time adjustments all right these were onetime adjustments to to address the issues that we needed to immediately as we go through budget development again decisions are going to have to be made to address whatever is needed to be able to meet the obligations of the district and that will be done during budget development so as it stands right now for this particular year there are no new surprises everything that I've spoken about to the board and to the public in the past is consistent there's nothing that's changed from that it looks as though for this year from a financial standpoint uh we'll be able to get through this year in a positive fashion so I'm available for any questions can you clarify so you said those are one-time adjustments that means that the adjustments that we made in order to get through this year financially stable are not going to be available to us next year we'll have to make different choices that's correct okay and we don't have a sense yet as to how much of an adjustment that would need to be going into next year no it's too early budget development's still going on we still don't know state aid figures there's there's a lot of information that we have to receive yet um and that'll all be happening in in March I have question do we have the ability to handle a surprise do we have say again question again I didn't hear you do we have the ability to handle a surprise like a lawsuit or well you know managing a budget and um I've been doing this for 40 years and I've made a lot of presentations to boards on on budget matters and finance matters you know really when you come down to it a budget is only good one day out of the entire year and the next day after the budget's approved improved it change it has the possibility of changing so it's a constant fluid motion it's not a stable environment so to address your questions if something were to come along we'd have to do something to amend the budget and adjust the budget to be able to accommodate something that's unforeseen and there's always something unforeseen that happens you know so you always have to be prepared for that you know so that's just unfortunately normal course of business you know so if something were to come along actually would have to be taken to address it okay so we're saying that we're okay until June of this year right now yes projections show that we'll be okay through June I have one more question to add to that so financially stable yes this question is actually for Dr Glazer right Financial stability does not necessarily mean operating stability would you say knowing that we have been losing administrative staff because we're not paying them enough and because we're missing out on certain administrators who we cannot afford in order to make that budget stable that we are in a stable place operationally and that this is sustainable this budget that's a big question um we are um not currently sustainable operationally we don't have enough people to do what we need to do um at all uh you know that we you see it on the agenda we had a resignation of somebody we just hired several months ago that means that in my time here that's going to be the third person in the seat and I understand um the sixth person in the seat in two years Karen as you know um is the six business administrator um I'm the third superintendent it makes it very challenging to be stable we learn every day we're learning right we have spent again as you know um countless countless Karen's just here a month this today tomorrow or whatever next week is just six months for me I know for many of it seems like 20 years me too six months so I can't tell you we're stable and I'm going to say if we have to keep transferring at the rate we're transferring even if we're good through this year right no that that is not sustainable right I'm I'm not saying anything that different I want to make sure we're on the same page yeah the the goal is is to uh establish Lish a firm Financial condition for the district it doesn't presently exist that that then you can build on from an operational standpoint right you know I I used to teach the class for school Finance and Accounting and on the very first day that I would teach my class I would ask the uh students in the class what is the purpose of a school business administrator all right or superintended right and they would say you know to do the budget to do the audit to take care of facilities and I said' really I said' when you think about it what the purpose is of a an administrator superintendent and a business administrator is to create an environment for others to succeed and that's what it's supposed to be and that's what we're trying to work towards right now all the efforts and everything that have been done by by Julie and by Karen by Patty before Karen uh has been trying to really move the district in that direction to get a firm Financial footing for for the district so that everything else can be implemented to allow others to succeed and it appears that it doesn't happen overnight no takes years and years and years to do it that's correct it's a long-term project but you have to keep moving in the right direction Y and I appreciate your commitment guys I know what you guys are doing I really do thanks they've been wonderful by the way really yeah I'm going to start wearing Dr Glazer and kbj shirts pretty soon I just had a follow-up question uh to the question that I asked our auditor Ernie maybe you could shed some light on on that also is um you know reading the operations minutes um and commenting on the audit was that it was uh older information because it was only to June 2023 so we have our a report of the secretary that we approve every month and uh so we've already approved the through December 31st 2023 and so the um the column has the the budgeted Appropriations and then the actual expenditures plus a column for the encumbrances and it's showing actual expenditures and encumbrances totaling 14, 544000 but then the budgeted amount at 15,980 so it's uh almost you know 1.5 million uh there that is uh able to be it's not used at this point or it's uh it will be used what dates do we look at to see because uh Valerie mentioned that perhaps there's some encumbrances that haven't yet been recorded into the report but um where do we start looking for that because we you know we have the January report without uh much change and then we'll be back to June so what are we not seeing encumbrances that would raise that 14,500 th000 number compared to the $15 m987 th000 budget that's absolutely correct all right and to just give you an example of just one item okay because Karen and I before the meeting we were we were discussing things on the budget and right now there's an item that's unencumbered and unexpended on the budget of 83,000 it's the pension charges that we get assessed every year $183,000 and it hasn't been encumbered it hasn't been expended yet so that would come right off the top that's just one item are the annual pension charges of 183,000 so there are several things like that and then there's also the unknown out there as well too because some of the expenses vary during the course of the year so you could do a run rate and do a projection but then again it would only be an estimate on some of these things because the the uh actual expenses vary during the course of the year so if if you remember back in October when we did the reworking of the budget in its entirety we projected what the demand on the budget would be for the entire year and that's what we adjusted the budget to was that number so it's still my opinion that we need that money to get us through the end of the year and hopefully generate some Surplus because as Valerie mentioned as well too the excess Surplus or the budgeted fund balance of 571 th000 we have to generate that in Surplus again this year just to keep that number the same anything less than that 571 th000 is equivalent to the loss of a revenue and now now you're further in the whole all right so we want to be able to generate Surplus as well as pay our expenses so Anthony I I would say that uh again it remains to be seen where we're going to wind up at the end of the year but there are a number of expenses that have not been recorded on there yet because they haven't been presented to us thank you and I I understand you know there could be things but um it would have to exceed 1.5 million before we would actually exceed the budgeted amount and that's one of the reasons I'm asking the question is just because as we are approving these monthly reports part of what we're attesting to what's being tested to and what we're approving is that we're not going we're not overspending from the lines of the report so it would be a concern I'm not as concerned seeing that right now we have 1.5 million less expenditures and encumbrances than the budget but um if if there were enough things not accounted for in these reports we might at some point not be able to make that a test to that not having overspent well if I could say your your concerns are right on the money you're that's exactly what you should be concerned with all right and that that was one of the reasons why we rework the budget the way that we did but I can say in in dis having discussions with Karen she's been TR up a lot of the incumbrances especially the salaries which are a big part of your budget your salaries and your health benefits and some of the bigger ticket items that are on your budget she's been working and I know she's been putting in a lot of hours and making sure those numbers are correct and making sure that there isn't a surprise hidden in there that if you you you encumber a million dollars in salaries but it's really 1.5 million that would be a surprise in the wrong way for us but uh again she's been taking the time to True up those numbers make sure those encumbrances are correct so uh you know with each day you know the numbers that are on there uh there's more and more confidence that you can have in those numbers all right and I know there'll be more budget discussion in the the next operations committee meeting and um you know we'll have to uh vote for the tenative budget coming up but I guess um what's already been discussed uh just with basic increases is what we're looking at for the the coming budget and so if we had a 3% increase in teacher salaries or which is you know by contract or a 10% increase in transportation or 10% just using rough numbers increase in uh health benefits or other benefits that um when you when you look at that um as you say like running out the the numbers it's still maybe 15 million 200,000 even with some allowances for uh the inflation in other areas that I didn't mentioned so I guess um that would still be less than what we have budgeted for this year so yeah I I'm I mean I'm not going to sugarcoat anything here it's better to face up to the facts but it's going to be difficult you know this there's going to be some tough decisions that have to be made you know and uh you know you can't run away from the facts you know what whatever is pre presented to you you know and and the decisions that have to be made um it's not easy but then it's not supposed to be easy either these These are tough times for school districts especially with their finances I don't know if you just re recently saw an article in the in the paper but they're considering raising the 2% cap on the tax Li I've never seen that that's brand new and I've been in the business 40 years you know so there are a lot of school districts you're not alone with the financial challenges that you're facing here it's Statewide and I work in other districts I I I consult in other districts it's the same the challenges are real and they're very significant so uh again a lot of hard decisions are going to have to be made um before you finalize the budget for next year it's going to be a challenge could you Ernie just and maybe Valerie too maybe both of you I'm not sure one of the things that we've talked about in the operations committee I think operations and I'm not sure which person brought it up but you had a school board's training on finance and talked about a glossery so everybody had a Common Language one of the the words that I think is Mis understood for people and um you've both done a really good job of explaining it just maybe not in this public forum is Surplus right we talk about excess Surplus and I fear that people think you know that's available funds I know Valerie addressed that last time she talked about it in operations you use a different language you call it stability stability so I want people to understand between the two of you whatever common language it's the same thing right so people understand it's what we not the budget we're building now the budget in the future again because each budget cycle obviously you aren't balancing your budget completely with revenue of generating Revenue either from taxes state aid or other sources of revenue you're balancing your budget with fund balance so basically you're taking what we call the audit loves to call it excess Surplus I don't really like that term I believe it's a misnomer but it is the amount of money that's going to funel back into the budget so by why I like to call it stability stability number instead is because that number rolls back into your budget which brings you back to zero so it brings you back to where you started so now your budget has still has that same Surplus that you're using and when you go to build your budget as you're picking up increases okay where where are we going to get those increases from are those increases going to come from additional Revenue are they going to come from an increased tax or are they going to come from an increased use of surplus which I believe is one of the things that you did when you reworked your budget is you actually used a little bit of your more Surplus so when we say Surplus it's really fund balance um and so that number if you start to see that number with a budget you have a million dollars I think is what you were looking at on your budget if that number does says says ends up being a half a million dollars at the end of the year that's now you're going to put yourself in a hole because that stability number that you built your budget with is a different number and when you try to so what I always try to say is try to keep the amount of money that you don't spend out of your budget to cycle back into the next year's budget just so that you can stay constant because that's the real challenge in most districts face is your costs are constantly Rising there are no new sources of revenue for a school district haven't seen one in years we haven't seen an increase in state aid um so really the only source of Revenue increase that a school district really has is taxes and so obviously and that's capped so it becomes very difficult to build a budget especially in this inflationary period we are facing a lot of increases on costs so as you're building that stability is even more important than in previous years in previous years what we would have said when things were going in districts you had some extra money that's the money you can do to do the one-offs the things that you can do that you wouldn't have been able to do if you needed to do a major project or something now we're saying just try to keep that so you can stabilize the budgets because it is a little bit of and Ernie alluded I mean we do 89 school districts it's a little bit of a while while Wess right now out there for most schools You are not alone I agree with only 100% many districts are struggling and many districts are trying to make very hard decisions there on a lot lot of districts that are suddenly like having an easy time so do not think you're alone guys thank you thank you guys both very much for coming back and for being with us we appreciate you good night you should don't I don't know you might need to ask the candidates to take these reserved seats because I don't again this isn't mine yes they're all here right so to move them up we're going to start the Board of Education vacancy interviews now candidates were provided with the guidelines and the questions prior to the meeting please make sure that you keep your responses to 3 minutes please told have um Aon that's what I was going to do you need me to pass microphone what do you want to do okay they just look like they've got a lot in their hands that's all who's our first uh interview so first of I want to thank you guys for coming here tonight um I know you're all watchong residents so I'll be seeing you guys at coffee shops and local places here and we look forward to to the questions and um feel free to feel comfortable have a glass of water we we got some bottles for you and uh we're going to get started uh Miss Harvey can you please read question one and we're going to start from the left to the right put them in order well they're gonna they're goingon to introduce themselves right yeah if you guys could just introduce yourselves with your name and then miss Harvey will ask you the first question I'm Jessica mad just pass or my name and then good evening Jennifer vinces Kua good evening Joshua Smith hello I'm George culy thanks guys do you want me to you don't have you need to go in the okay um can you please tell us a little about yourself what insired you to apply for a board position now and any strengths or skills you would bring to the work so just to remind you I'm Jessica Maddox um I've been a resident for seven years as of coming this coming July and I've got two children in second grade and um twins obviously uh they are going to Bayberry Elementary School and uh you know for me me I've always been vested in my community no matter where I've lived uh but specifically now that I have my children and you know I've got um two older children with my husband that we uh co-parent uh with uh you know my husband's previous family so they are now in college and I've just growing up with them or you know being able to to see them grow and you know them being a part of us as a family uh and it's really just taken a whole du new different perspective on on children learning education and just family unit uh I've been going to school and working for since I was a child literally um and some of you have my cover letter so you'll understand when I say I've been working and going to school uh for forever uh so it's important to me and education is extremely important my desire to work learn and to make a difference has always been a part of who I am and now that my boys are a little bit older you know they're SEC only in second grade but I think all of us have children understand that comment where now that they're a little bit older um I'm able to take a step away from just being the stay-at-home past my career and give back to the community uh once again and uh so for me just being an advocate for children children being an advocate for teachers and you know being involved in the school has been extremely important and just really close to my heart um I've had a great career when I was um before moving to New Jersey I've been in New Jersey for 10 years but prior to you know I had a really great career I worked for some really great organizations AAA Insurance uh I work for GE Capital General Electric and then I work for Security Pacific which is a a subsidiary at the time and uh my strengths were operations uh so I think you know just based on a lot of conversations that we've had tonight in addition to you know a lot of the previous meetings that uh I've I've watched and also just paying attention to what's going on within our community it sounds like we need some operational assistance and somebody that's strong in operations um I'm very good at uh requests for proposals rfps very good leader um I I know how to work with people I know how to talk to people and I'm a team player uh I've got a lot of reporting skills analytical skills um if you look at my degrees in computer science and um I would say that for me my super skill is um is business planning and implementation so I spent many years set setting up departments uh restructuring and creating performance objectives for different departments so um within within those departments it's been multiple departments from anywhere from Administration to um a finance to claims to whatever um I've I've been in U worked in multiple departments centers and States thank you so just is that it okay yeah sorry so so we're going to let her alarm go off within three minutes of and then we'll just kind it's hard to gauge because you don't know I'm like don't want to talk no you you're doing great no problem yeah or hard time could just go off you guys hear it you know we're wrapping up the question thank you so much oh we're going to go through we're going to go through the seven questions with her first right no okay so we keep going okay great okay so do you want me to repeat the question no I still have it thank you though uh so again I'm uh Jennifer venesa and a WatchON resident for 11 years and married to a proud lifelong watchong resident uh we have two boys that are part of the school district and um I definitely must say that part of what um my inspiration is drawn from is seeing the generational impact that um this school district has had on watching residents um I definitely see um many of my husband's um siblings their friends impacting Society in so many different spheres and Fields I think also you know just connecting back to um the wonderful relationships I've been able to establish with current um School administrators and wonderful teachers um wonderful involved parents just all of that really um placed you know um a spark within me to say you know what it is also uh time for me to be able to give back to this wonderful Community um I see the growth potential um within what we're seeing right now yes there are some challenges we're going to be facing but I think that um you know coming from um an educator background um and particularly the clinical mental health field I've had an array of roles in which I've been honored to teach train supervise partner with other professionals as well as develop programs um both domestically and internationally and so due to those experiences um being able to work with counselors that are specializing in School counseling clinical mental health counseling addictions counseling helps bring a a a wonderful lens to the different um types of needs that we may be seeing so what are some of those skills that I think I can bring to the table I must say definitely in terms of communication both the written and verbal definitely team oriented Stak culture engagement was absolutely um necessary and foundational in all of the work that I did across 20 years um in in various professional experiences uh project development and management was definitely something that I had the privilege of having handson uh contribution in um within the model of multisystemic therapy I had uh the honor of developing 34 programs uh both here in the US and abroad um so being able to see family needs in terms of the lens of the diverse needs um is something that I think I can give back to this uh wonderful committee um I know that we have challenges to face but um this model had a very sophisticated quality assurance um mechanism and I think that in many ways we need that kind of accountability mechanism to make quick decisions so that's just a little bit about me and uh thank you for the opportunity thank you perfect thank you you repeat the question I I apologize no problem so tell us a little bit more about yourself what inspired you to apply for the board position now and any questions or skills any strengths or skills that you would bring to work yeah so uh my name is Joshua Smith um and I currently live in Wong I've been here for two years uh I have a 20mon year old um and my wife here in uh in wung uh so not in the school district yet but hopefully uh in the in the short term he will be uh so I currently work as a regional account manager for a firm called ABM uh where I work with school districts and local government on uh generating Revenue producing opportunities I I do esip um for those who are familiar with Esco work in the state of New Jersey so uh this is kind of my my day job being in a Schoolboard meeting at 7 o'clock at night on a Thursday is kind of what I do uh week in week out so I'm very familiar with uh how school districts operate the challenges that we're all facing right now and uh I thought that it was the appropriate time to offer my services and and uh and see if I could benefit the the district um you know my background I'm a professional engineer I went to school at Stevens um in Hoboken New Jersey where I got a degree in mechanical engineering I have a master's degree from Cornell University uh as an MDA I have various number of certifications on on on Technical and and financial backgrounds um and and really I'd like to bring my skills you know on the facility side I I can bring a lot of assets uh to to the committee of uh operations and finance as well as uh you know um helping think about things from a different perspective my my job every day is to help School boards and local government uh make decisions on how to best allocate resources and also to come up with Creative Solutions for re Revenue generation or um uh you know utilizing existing assets in in ways that maybe you haven't thought of so I I just want to offer my services and and see if I can help thank you hi guys my name is George George coverly uh I actually grew up here in watang I I went to school at Bayberry School Valley View I went to watching Hills as well um recently my wife and I moved back here uh after the birth of our son uh he's uh only 4 months old but we do plan on eventually having him in the school system when he's of age um and I'm an operations professional I work for a major record label um where we manage a quarterly budget of roughly $20 million uh and that spread across our roster of 200 artists roughly so I'm very much uh skilled in budgeting planning Financial forast casting trying to get ahead of unforeseen circumstances uh as you can be maybe aware artists can change on a dime and so you need to kind of expect the unexpected at all times so it sounds like you guys are facing a lot of budgetary and uh Financial challenges which I would welcome headon love to roll my sleeves up and uh tackle um like I said I'm an operations professional so I specialize in mainly find operations and uh I was a Communications major at UMass so I uh do like to work cross functionally uh I'm a team player I I like to work in person and get to know people and see what their strengths are how best we can utilize each other and be a team um yeah and make sure that we allocate the resources and the funds properly so that we can get the best usage out of them and and really meet our goals uh whether that's just Landing the plane or uh balancing the budget and making sure that we get there on time but I look forward to working with all you guys and meeting all you guys and it's great to be back here okay so um uh I'm going to ask you guys a yes or no question um so board members commit to attending board meetings once a month on Thursdays um except for March meeting which uh would be Monday the 18th um the committee meetings um are the week prior to the board uh meeting so prior to a meeting like this um members commit to reading and prepping for for that meeting uh board members are held accountable for State codes um and of ethics and required to submit Financial reportings annually um they they must alert alert the District of any conflicts of interest that may exist in bidding and contracts negotiation hiring Etc um and your job as a board member is to enforce state laws and policies make decisions on behalf of the educational welfare of all the children and confine your actions to policymaking planning and Appraisal uh this is an oversight role and um you may not get involved in the day-to-day running of the schools that's what the focus in the schools are for uh and you may not prioritize the agenda of special interest groups or interests of your own children over those of our school district's children's as a whole is everybody okay with that okay great um Mrs J can you please read question number four question number four as a watch Young resident what district challenges do you see that you hope to address during your service start want to start with yeah you start say it again um yeah so now that I'm a new father I've come to realize that uh students are kind of bombarded by a lot of influential uh forces mainly that of the internet and social media um through what I do do at work uh for a record label we focus a lot on audience and demographics and kind of how they consume media and uh I think gen Z has a staggering number in which they over 75% overwhelmingly believe that their favorite influencer uh understands them more than their own family um so with that I want to bring that back around here where I feel as though um I want to give back to the town and I want to make sure that um we are securing the best future for uh the Youth of tomorrow and that they're prepared to enter this everchanging world whether that be things like financial literacy um and understanding what comes after graduation so to speak my generation being a millennial I think suffered a lot with the student debt crisis and it's still an issue today and so I think if I got to go back in time I would say that I wish the curriculums uh of my day focused a little bit more on things like financial literacy even just how do you pay your taxes and what are taxes and how do they go back into serving the community so now having the privilege to perhaps be a part of this community in a sense like this I would love to give back in that way and try and encourage those types of curriculums being taught to the to the schools yes so I I think um when I look at the past year and and the referendum that was passed um that's something that I think is really critical to the future of the school district and understanding um where those funds are allocated how they're allocated evaluating any opportunities and synergies that may arise from that referendum to put the district in the best financial position going forward U you know I I look at the district and quite honestly uh the the the financials are in okay shape right but I think we all know that we could we could do better uh but you have been granted a gift uh with the referendum to really you know hopefully uh upgrade your facilities in a way that are going to impact students positively and so kind of leveraging that and growing that and and looking at opportunities to uh unlock additional value from your assets uh make sure that we're planning for the future um and and working on you know projects and and Associated savings and benefits um on federal state Grant level uh type of things that you could Implement in in uh in conjunction with that referendum I think would be really beneficial and I I have the expertise to help you look at those opportunities and explore any kind of uh avenues that that may be agous of the district thank you it's incredibly clear that at this District we have wonderful key ingredients for Success short term and as I look at the challenges that are in the Horizon um when we think about District stab stability in connection to the finances um allocation of the resources seems to be a key need um and I think that that could be simultaneous ously uh worked on as we also continue to um take a really good look at the academic outcomes for our children um working um in a um research proven model provided the opportunity to see what the um procedures in place needed to be to promote that success and so there are many moving pieces and so being able to make those critical decisions as we understand the context as we collaborate together in terms of Community Partnerships all that is fundamental to making the right decisions at the right time for who we're called to serve which is at the end of the day our children uh of this community um so being able to definitely um take time to anticipate those changes and the barriers um being able to evaluate and measure um in in a a very systemic way so that we are not Reinventing the wheel over and over again is is absolutely critical for these times so that we can take a really wonderful District like Wong and take it from good to great if we think about the book from Jim Collins that is really at the place that we're at and I think that we have what it takes in considering um being able to stabilize and then ultimately be able to utilize and diversify our resources in order to um get those objectives uh for best student outcomes and the best positive trajectory for them for me you know the the interesting thing is that the the two things that really stand out which is a couple of the things that you guys are are focusing on uh the first one being transportation for our kids as we know the bus system has been uh this last year not great and I'm not going to emphasize anything we all know that uh wasn't great and there needs to be a fix uh my kids are on the butterfly bus and that was just a lot of fun uh but we've got some stability now but I'm I'm looking forward to next year um having a successful bus ride you know um the second thing and and obviously the biggest thing because it it does go back to the taxpayers and is is our uh budget we know that we've had that uh you know a signicant loss and you know questionable was to what happened but that's regardless the point is what are we going to do in the future in order to manage but also create solutions to to generate finances above the traditional funding uh and the biggest thing is safety for our children you know our our just making sure that um our children are safe whether they're on the bus whether they're at school just in general our safety uh for our children come coming first and um you know the other thing is resources for our teachers you know whether what's the student to teacher ratio and uh do our teachers have the have AIDS and do they have supplies that are necessary in order to be successful so these are the things that for me as as a resident um I think that are very important and uh some of the things that I'd like to focus on thank you mcia can you please read question three what is your vision of an outstanding School District so the vision towards an outstanding school school district entails a collaborative process um where specific goals and achievements are being met um creating a healthy envir vibrant School environment um and at the same time it really properly recognizes assesses for the strengths that are already involved and being able to leverage those strengths so that um we can address in a way um in a systemic way the any growing edges that we face um so that means the managing the resources for each of the levels going all the way from the students to the teachers to the staff to administrators um and Beyond um because there are certainly many dedicated folks that are willing to roll up their sleeves and contribute um however it is about being able to orchestrate it in a way that produces um positive change uh reaching those outcomes that we're looking for for excellence um so ultimately it is having um clear decision-mak um mechanisms through the policy that we have policies that we have the the different standards that are needed to be adhered to and being able to do it in a way that is uniquely oriented for our district at wung um in a way that is also pretty transparent and and that's what I would Envision um our school district to be I'm sorry could you repeat the question one more time five dollar to repeat this question what is the vision of an outstanding School District what is your vision yeah uh so to me you know the word that Springs to mind is collaboration um when I think about a successful organization it's an organization that that breeds creativity that allows uh all voices to be heard um and and make sure that you know we're listening more than we're we're talking um and taking that feedback and and doing something constructive with it um you know so so in my opinion um you know giving students uh parents teachers teachers Administration staff the ability to make recommendations tell us what's bothering them and figure out how to address it and come up with Creative Solutions on on how to do that um so you know if everyone feels that they can participate and contribute um that really breeds a a great community and and a great sense of collaboration uh within that Community uh so so that's the the goals that I'd be striving for so obviously I'd love for this District to uh be a blue ribbon District I think that would be awesome and to reinforce the school as being a pillar of of the community uh growing up here I felt that this was much more than just a school but uh a communal meeting ground for the families of watang I uh you know I obviously want parents to feel safe when dropping their kids off here and I want the kids to feel safe and feel as though that they could thrive in this District whether that means a more Hands-On curriculum where they could really explore their strengths and not feel pigeonholed to a very rigid curriculum um and that could be anything from making sure that kids individual needs are met and really got Ed in the direction that the school administrators and teachers feel is their best path forward um so happier kids uh happier parents happier families and and feel as though that Bayberry Valley View is an area where you can con convene outside of the school hours where it's not just I'm dropping my kid off he's going to school I'm going to work but I'm going to a place where everyone can get together and really learn to be a part of this community and function as one so for vision I see um for me the thing that stands out is focusing on education but a child life balance we always hear of work life B balance but child um child life balance and ensuring that kids are given time to be children I think that's important you know there's education is extremely important but also allowing them to be children and and really just developing that because that's how they um that's how they develop creativity creativity um where teachers care about students truly invested in their education and wellbeing and then also recognizing that education um kind of is redundant but education extends Beyond textbooks and that we Foster you know a community of emotional and social growth and now that we're you know everybody sitting behind screens it's important that they also develop that social ability which you know we somehow need to take them back a little bit so thank you start um there's yeah I know everyone answered the question so now if um Miss agaro if you can please read question number two sure could you please describe briefly any previous Community parent engagement or nonprofit experience you have yeah uh so I spent three years as the um uh the director of Technical and Engineering Services for a nonprofit in Manhattan uh called the association for energy affordability uh I I basically uh did a lot of work there on Community Development um Workforce training and um uh working with a lot of uh lowincome uh housing projects throughout New York City on energy and sustainability projects um so we really worked on developing um local community members to participate in in those projects um on top of that I I am a member of the New Jersey asbo as as an associate business member um and and do volunteer a lot of time on uh some technical uh boards as well for the state of New Jersey Massachusetts and New York um and so that would be my nonprofit experience currently I'm um certified on the community Emergency Response Team here in Somerset County and what that is is in case there's ever an emergency um you know backup to to assisting your first resp also just educating you know um the community in regards to how to handle um you know major issue or major um disasters whenever they happen and being a support system uh whenever there's needed um in regards to First Responders uh I currently volunteer on the PTO I'm a class mom for two classes and I also assist when with lunches uh whenever needed pretty much as a weekly basis um I also volunteer in any PTO type functions that are needed um always willing to help um my big passion outside of my children are um animals I'm a big animal Advocate and so I volunteer for um St huberts and you know any any animal that's in need I'm always there so uh I'm also um involved or was I haven't been involved in a while uh but the EO New Jersey which is entrepreneurial organization ation for New Jersey um my husband is an entrepreneur but um if any of you are entrepreneurs you understand the challenges that come with that and so what I did is I created the first um spousal Forum group for the um EO New Jersey um chapter prior to living here in New Jersey I lived in Nevada and I was in I was uh heavily involved in the Nevada partnership for homeless youth which also was very close and dear to my heart and and so that was educating children that were on the streets but also providing them with resources as they were living on the streets whether it be food whether it be training whether it be education whether it be places to live things like that and then the last but not least is the Las Vegas Valley Humane Society which is the idea of where I came from um that where I spent many of my years uh but I I was on the board and I was a treasur for the Las Vegas Valley Humane Society and I did anything and everything that was uh needed for all the you know the Humane Society uh when I was a teenager I uh actually worked for the watch young little league I uh I ran The Snack Shack and uh that was definitely my my first time being involved in a parent engagement type of role whether it was working with the parents who ran the watch young little league or the other parents of uh kids who were in The Little League who would volunteer to also help at the Beloved Snack Shack but more recently I do work with Warner Music Group and we actually have a fund it's a social justice fund uh it's a 10year $10 million initiative that allows uh staff at Warner Music Group group to choose various grantees up to I believe $115,000 uh to various grantees of uh certain initiatives one of my favorite ones that I was involved with was a initiative called music in the brain it was um a music literacy curriculum that we brought to underresourced schools that basically uh got certain kids and teachers invested Ed with more music literacy so it was a scalable operation where we were able to use the resources that these schools already had and with minimal investment whether that was training some of the teachers or allocating a little bit more music resources to these schools they were able to really build out these programs and we were able to pull data from these programs and show that schools that did implement this showed higher math scores reading scores critical ring scores than other schools that didn't have this curriculum I've had the opportunity to um be involved in community based work for over 20 years specifically uh providing services for Children and Families um whether this meant uh being a child protective specialist in New York City I worked in Harlem New York and worked with um diverse families uh of of different languages of different ethnic backgrounds um and along side that I had the opportunity to uh develop curriculum for adolescence uh just as a um a program that was provided on a monthly basis to um the community of Queens um when I was still a resident of that many years ago um currently I do a lot of community engage research which means that I partner with various um social services and educational um programs that uh connect me to families and and getting their perspective of their view of wellness and and how paternal Wellness connects to Family Wellness and seeing some of uh those particular outcomes um I also uh serve uh students currently who are um interested in uh you know developing their counseling skills and we have a uh counseling training facility that offers free services to residents of Union County um without any charge uh so there's definitely different um ways that this um opportunity to serve others um has shaped me I think it's uh incredibly rewarding um in the professional sense um I also have been part of various uh counseling associations in different roles as membership chair um as a board member um and also as um the social justice advocacy committee uh for uh a professional um student leadership uh counseling Association that we have and all of that I think has um just been very um not only is there an aspect of giving back but you get the opportunity to um shape Future Leaders so that they in turn can keep that momentum going and then they also contribute back to their own given communities and I've seen that time and time again and um those are that's just a little snapshot of those um those aspects that I've been able to be involved in okay um next two questions will be yes or NOS um Miss um Santos can you please read question number five yes no only clarify if no are you willing to accept the time commitment ethics requirements day mandates and financial disclosures required okay and U last but not least if you can please read number six will you agree to accept the board's votes as final when a decision goes against your personal views okay at this moment I'm going to request that we go into an executive session um can I have a motion motion to go into executive session okay any second second second any opposed no okay Mr Johnson uh will you please read um what we discussed in the Clos session um I guess we're going to read that after right so we're going to exective session now okay thank you guys so much really appreciate you guys coming out sorry if we put you on the spot but you know we're looking for the best candidate for our kids and you guys did a wonderful job and uh I'm sure now we'll be seeing each other every single day because now now it's like a visual but thanks again I appreciate it you're welcome to take the waters with you V we don't that's why she's GNA say they no take okay great so just to reiterate um we made a motion to enter into executive session um and everyone was in favor no one was opposed and Miss Bishop Johnson can you please read uh what will be discussed in the closed session the open public meetings Act njsa 10 4-11 permits the Board of Education to meet in closed session to discuss certain matters now therefore be it resolved that the Board of Education of Wang adjourns for closed session to discuss a matter rendered confidential by federal or state law student matters and to come and to and to come to a decision on the open board position okay that's it be back so we'll be back if that was what your question was we come back thought e let me just pull up our agenda again you have to you have to motion to go into open I have a motion to go into Open session so moved second second we do I have to do a roll call for that yes okay can I have a roll call AER yes Mrs yes Mr yes mron yes M yes Mr could you just confirm this to come back from EXA yes yes Mrs Santos yes all yes motion passes okay we have a nomination but we'd like to thank you all for coming here tonight um this was very very difficult uh we kept going back and forth I thought we were picking a championship player for for something uh much much much bigger than uh volunteering our time here but this was obviously very important too um so the the um volunteer that was nominated by us um was um you have to make the nomination oh so I nominate Miss Maddox um Miss Maddox uh the attributes that uh we were all geared towards was your volunteer experience um your time commitment um and um your engagement with the district and you seem like you were the most aware of our needs um so at this point you you are nominated for the opportunity um and second have a second all all in favor roll call no roll call call Mrs AG yes Mrs Amadeo yes Mr fr yes Mr Gonzalez yes Mrs har yes Mr Ang Gracia I'm going to abstain and I just want to explain that uh jet yes and Mrs Santos yes motion [Applause] passes okay Mr Yes W yeah okay I think as the nomination I think probably count as um I the only other comment I'd like to add to that is that um the purpose of us um receiving everything in a short notice was for your privacy we wanted to give you an equal chance to meet you here in person uh we we all got here 30 minutes early so we can review your resumes um we've expected you to be watchong residents we expected you to have the commitment towards the schools and the academic nature of our children um and overall I think we we all came to a consensus but it was very difficult if we could have picked all four of you we absolutely would have so I hope you understand that and thank you all right so um now we're moving on to superintendent's remarks um any announcements from the super we have so many so good evening um first of all on the agenda we recognize um retiree um another longterm um Valley View teacher um Natalie Deo Fontaine has been with us since September 1999 as an English teacher um her expertise commitment professionalism goes without even saying we'll be celebrating her also throughout this year um as she prepares to retire at the end of this school year and now let it be resolved the wat Chun burough School District Board of Education recognizes this retirement effective July 1st 2024 and we extend to her congratulations and best wishes for a happy healthy and enjoyable retirement um a loss another a loss to our longtime team but we do wish her the very very best and excited for whatever comes next um we did allow Mrs kid to go home so I have the principal's report I'm just going to read it through um the Bayberry school is celebrating Black History Month by learning about the accomplishments and contributions of black Americans throughout history our fourth graders have been announcing interesting facts during the morning announcements and students have been been exploring and appreciating black history through biographies literature multimedia and special projects students have also been learning about and celebrating the Lunar New Year and traditions through classroom activities and cultural demonstrations by parents and volunteers I learned something new while I was with them g f joy to Happy New Year to all of you in chines on January 31st the preschoolers performed a variety of songs for their parents dressed in winter white and colorful hats they did an amazing job thank you to Mrs Riley and the dedicated prechool staff for their hard work planning and practicing on February 7th the biggest day at Bayberry was the 100th day of school plus our world read aloud day students participated in engaging activities they enjoyed a lot of different guest readers throughout the whole day it was fun and then of course Valentine's day in a week of spirit activities and class parties where the students um enjoyed games and crafts and snacks courtesy of the room parents and other volunteers the third grade early act club which um works with the rotary has been busy with service projects around Bayberry visiting classrooms as guest readers and collecting donations for moms helping moms um it's a project um uh donation project and they have offered a big thank you to all of the families who donated I think they got more than they expected or hoped for so that's a wonderful thing the students in grades kindergarten to four have completed their midyear I ready diagnostic um in reading and math the teachers have already started um analyzing that data it's used to identify the strengths um areas for growth we often say just because we taught it doesn't mean they learn it and these are really good opportunities for personalizing and differentiating instruction the I ready parent reports are going to be shared in early March um in the Genesis Parent Portal also a busy month at Valley View um I was excited uh yesterday to officially welcome wil M goyes um and uh as already started but she met with the Architects yesterday Heather Berg to our Valley View Family Wilma is um a new teacher with us but with much experience and Heather is the new librarian here at Valley View both Wilman and Heather um like I said started working with staff and children and we are very fortunate to have them join our team February's Mountaineer Monday lesson highlighted the importance of self passion students viewed a video and held discussions about how our individual worth is not directly proportional to our achievements and how to take a look at the scale of our goals um different ways to manage emotion and how to create um an individual self-management action plan uh Additionally the Dare that's our um drug abuse resistance education program through the police department started this month it continues through April um our um watch on police officer and current school resource officer who is also the DARE officer um will continue um with the program um through April um and fifth grade um we did tell you that um Chief Anderly and um officer quos and his new um replacement officer quos was promoted and we will have officer delinsky starting with us in April but uh officer Pete will continue it there um with our fifth graders the instrumental music students also busy I know a lot of that actually made it into the Press I was proud of that uh in January 18 of our seventh and eighth grade students from Valley View participated in the sending District's honor band um those students were selected to perform with other students from different sending districts they rehearsed together once a week for two hours and then performed in a concert at the watch on Hills Regional High School it was beautiful um and at the end of January seven of our students auditioned for the Central Jersey Regional two band over 600 students auditioned for a place in one of the two bands um and I am delighted to share that three of our students Ryan Wen Jed Chang and Alec chowi were selected to be part of that Central Jersey region band congrat congratulations to all of our musicians um our coding and Robotics Club students participated in the Ste in the teams competition last Thursday February 15th teams is the test of engineering aptitude mathematics and science it's a one-day competition um and high school and middle school students have the opportunity to to explore I would say engineering and then apply the knowledge the students work together on real world engineering problems and they apply their math and science skills the other thing that is very important um we had our eighth grade meeting with the high school so they could start to plan that that moving up one of the things that um we do here in Wang burrow and the other sending districts with the high school is learning walks so this month um all of the sunding district had that for the science teachers so they get to work with the high school teachers share best practices um The Learning walks allow our teachers to tour the High School classrooms do some articulation around um curriculum expectations really um a wonderful thing that's been in place for years um the Holocaust Remembrance Day our sixth grade social studies classes read um six million paper clips the book is based on um what happened at Whitwell Middle School in Tennessee to help the students and the community in Whitwell um understand more about intolerance and Prejudice the classes read and also watched the documentary about the paper clips project and that um really captures how the students there responded to the lessons about the Holocaust and committed um how that committed group of students and Educators brought people together and inspired others around the world it's a lovely documentary if you haven't seen it um as the learning was taking place Mrs kid reports that several students commented that they would like to start a group that uh spoke out against joking around with each other um that really causes issues right a lot not just here at the middle school um the students instinctively realized that the behavior students in our schools were showing is not helping communication or relationships with one another and as a result they created an action plan titled it's not just jokes the conversations that these students are leading um I think that they not only hope they will I'm hoping that they're empowered to um decrease the amount of jokes and negative comments that students make to one another um Mrs kid reports that the suggestions have been really impactful many of the students wanted to mimic the actions taken in the documentary where this class-size group of students met after school to talk about ways um that they could learn about intolerance and inclusion and create a positive School environment and from those discussions um and what they focused on um about belonging and Prejudice they began discussing black history month and the experiences that um blacks and African-Americans have had and still have to contend with today the students chose black Americans that they feel have influenced others to make better life choices and instill a sense of unity the activity allowed the students to research their person create an open-ended questions and then interview each other in front of the class participating in these activities allowed each student to get not only valuable skills but great insight into the challenges many black people continue to face today looking ahead five of our sore students attended the science bow trip to the Princeton plasma physic lab thanks they're going tomorrow and the fifth and sixth grade Battle of the books is taking place next Tuesday um so good luck to our science sleuths tomorrow and our literary luminaries on Tuesday and I just want to say thank you to Mrs vickner and Mrs kid for doing this if they weren't going to stay to tell us but not just for their report but for all of their efforts on behalf of the students I think you know every time we get these reports every month it just highlights all of the opportunities and the different um perspectives that enhance the academics and all of the things that we are doing in the schools so thank you to them and all of our staff um that oh that's me again sorry I'm coming so I'm just going to say given the hour given that detailed principales report I'm probably going to skip around in my um superintendent comments tonight limit that report a little bit I will say there is an upcoming coffee and conversation with the superintendent and business administrator Karen Bishop Johnson next next Wednesday February 28th 9:00 a.m. at the Bayberry Library we'd be excited um to meet you and talk to you and share anything else you'd like to hear about them we have another coffee on Thursday March 7th at 1:00 at the Valley View Library um so there will be a Spanish translator in attendance as well um we'll be scheduling additional opportunities for coffee and conversation throughout the community during March and April please stay tuned for those details I want to make sure we give a special thank you to Aaron and Ricky they have worked hard to update our referendum website um with all of the latest editions including the latest bid opening it has been really busy up to this point with the referendum at least in my short time here um the third bid opening was postponed because of the snow day to March 5th um but we have um started all of those contractor meetings you're going to find that there will be fewer updates on projects from this point on just because until the projects begin in June much of the work is um behind the scenes with the contractors and construction management but it's moving forward on schedule I'm can tell you that work will be starting on uh Monday the Monday June 14th or 17th whatever the Monday is after the last day of school that fast um we are also continuing to make progress on Safety and Security I'm excited to share that the administrative team received their training in the use and operation of our new camera system we also add the training on our bark for schools which is the content monitoring tool of the students accounts meaning Google content um additionally we upgraded to the new cameras with the wung police department um as part of our memorandum of agreement and we also um receive direct access Police radios for each school so there'll be that um immediate um response and we're grateful for that partnership with the WatchOn Police Department it's again I've only been here a short time but I I cannot tell you how wonderful they are to work with and really plan and and discuss what needs to happen um Karen and I have continued our individual budget meetings and budget development we're looking forward to working with the board to share those proposed budgets publicly um I'll save this in case anybody's still here I don't know if they are Karen you have a business administrative report I I can give one unless everybody's tired of heing about the business n tonight well we have very small staff as you know but we are working very hard we have been discussing quite a lot about incumbrances lately and trying to make sure that everything we do have in this current budget is up to up to date as much as we can we did just take a look at our utilities we think we're in pretty good shape um especially I was very happy to see that our electric and gas seems to be able to be stable you know we'll be looking at electric coming up and gas going down as we're approaching the spring it's been warm so we're fingers are crossed um so we you know I'm really happy about that we do have one issue with our legal fees unfortunately our illegal fees have been rising and because of the account that the illegal fees are in we're over our administrative allowable cap so I I'm going to have to take that to the county I'm not sure going to do but or what they're going to tell me to do but something will um you know some some kind of direction will have to come from them because we are not allowed in our administrative categories which you know includes all of our offices and Tech and everything else we I'm not allowed to go above a cap so we have that has happened uh regarding the budget um along with all the other districts in the area and you've heard this I'm tired of probably tired of hearing it but we extremely concerned about the rising healthare uh we met with the Brokers we're predicted right now to go as high as 11% over this year's rate uh this you know it's it's the same for everybody so it'll you know 11% I'm going to budget for I we'll hope the number won't officially come out until the end of March but will'll budget the 11 to be conservative Transportation very concerned concerned you may have seen that in the paper we're concerned um as far as um insurance I met with the broker a video call the other day that is going up our property insurance 133% so that is um the bad news but uh it's every District as you've heard from multiple people tonight we are not you know single out or special in any way so we will just do our best and when we get to the point of budget presentations you know I'll show you where we are and we'll make a decision as to what we can do thank you thank you miss Karen Bishop um Mr frge can you please uh give us the HR committee report all right um the committee met on Thursday February 15th um from 6:20 p.m. until 8:15 p.m. I attended virtually uh Danielle Amo was also there and Anthony andr who also attended virtually uh finished at 8:15 and sorry I finished at 8:05 um and the president uh Manny Gonzalez and Dr Julie Glazer um the first item that we discussed was the esy program proposal which I'm actually going to skip over because we do go over it in the curriculum committee meeting uh minutes as well um we also approved the coordinator for the 202 for extended schoool year esy program and it's on this agenda um for the potential board agenda items Dr Glazer reviewed each of the proposed agenda items expected on the agenda under personnel which or approve appointment of it substitute currently during her speech inter internship at Bayberry approve appointment valy view volunteer will be working on set design for the play approve appointment of stem sore leave replacement teacher to replace the current leave replacement teacher in March uh approve appointment Bayberry extracurricular position pursuit of Excellence to cover for a teacher who will be out on Med medical leave approve appointment certificated certificated staff due to placement at the wrong step on the guide uh retirement accept the resignation of uh di in the business office and then as for new business Dr Glazer G us a budget update uh today Karen Dr Glazer and Ernie have been building the expens side of the budget Karen and Dr Glazer have held individual meetings and have have identified and prioritized what we need to open the doors which include salaries benefits Insurance utilities Etc uh what is necessary to provide a free and appropriate public education which is like the basics of special education multi- language learning technology and infrastructure what we expect in terms of Transportation sports clubs programs professional learnings uh libraries basic skills counseling and support services and where we want to be or where we want to grow uh which which includes an updated curriculum textbooks more programs clubs targeted professional learning and additional Support Services um like we said earlier we don't have uh Revenue information we will know State 8 numbers waivers tax Lees and rable information in the last week of February the line out on budget will be reviewed first with the finance operations committee and then with each committee um subsequent uh many also shared the Board of Ed goals action plan that Dory start started in operations and finance and has been added into each committee and then we had a a board of AD vacancy discussion and the district goals and actions plans draft um thank you Mr fres Mr W if you can please uh give us a curriculum report all right we met at the board office at valie Middle School and we were we started at 4:15 and we ended at 7:05 Dr Glazer was there Karen kid VI uh valy view principal was there Denise vickner the Bayberry uh principal was virtual Nicole doota special ed services was virtual Dory Harvey uh board member was there from 4:15 to 705 f f m Santos 415 to 705 and myself chair the committee reviewed the following agenda items the esy program proposal Mrs zota presented an alternative esy program proposal for summer of 2024 due to referendum construction at Bayberry and Valley View over the summer it will not be possible to provide instruction due to noise dust and Stranges in our buildings it has been recommended that we share services and classrooms with lill Township at the Gillette School shared services may include school nurse Stans and other staff 20 to 30 students have an extended school year summer program recommended in their IEP the program uh would run from Monday to Friday for 20 days from June 26th to July 24th the parent night will be planned to jail at school for parents and Guardians to become familiar with the facility prior to the program starting Transportation will be needed parents have been told to anticipate a move we will continue to work with Long Hill to develop a full proposal and contract for Board of V approval in March dissertation proposals it was agreed at the committee meeting that doctoral candidate Lisa Ferrara will be surveying parents and staff with a survey titled perceptions of School Readiness it was also agreed at the committee meeting that doctoral candidate Lauren zuk zugal will be us surveying staff regarding the relationship between a general education teachers knowledge base about special education law and his or her perceptions and implementation of inclusive practices in the general education classroom the principles and Mrs doota review the detail staff and program cuts that have occurred over the previous approximately four years that were discussed at the January meeting uh District goals action plan draft the superintendent reviewed some of the draft documents which so far meet our expectations the completed document will be provided to all committees by our March meetings the budget update was just done by uh Mo so we got through that we don't have to do that again and our Board of Ed Golds action uh action plan two additions were made to the board of ed Golds action steps and sent to the president for all committee to review and as Dr Glazer said we're going to have our uh coffee with the superintendent in February and in March the administration and board members will then be able to converse with parents outside of a board meeting Community meetings will also be scheduled thank you thank you Miss Harvey can you please um help us with the policy committee update sure the policy committee uh met on Wednesday February 14th Valentine's Day um the meeting time was between 5:10 to 7:46 p.m. in the board office um let's see Dr Julie uh Glazer was there myself uh Danielle medo Phyllis chewed and um Manny Gonzalez uh came on virtually I apologize I didn't put virtual next to his name in the minutes but he was virtual um the committee went over were the following agenda items the committee decided to move a good number of policies that we had on the agenda to um a later date um for us to start in March um so those were listed on the agenda but we didn't go through um most of those we just moved them we didn't have uh time to get through those at this point so we set up our schedule um um we also went over bylaw 0164 which is conduct of board meetings it was brought to the committee's attention last summer uh the board members comments do not appear in any other uh Board of Education public board meeting agendas based on this the committee agreed to eliminate the board member comments under uh order of business from the bylaw uh because board members still have an opportunity to speak during the board business part part of the agenda so eliminating board member comments from the agenda does not prevent board members from speaking during board discussions on action items and during uh board business so this bylaw will be on the meeting tonight for a first reading um we scheduled the review of the following policies and regulations from March to we say about November 2024 the Committee created a schedule to eval valuate the policies and regulations that shra Esme brought to our attention during uh their audit so um I won't get into a lot of detail about which policies are which because we'll be here for a long time uh with us going through them but essentially in March uh we have a total of nine that we're going through um some of them are um about school safety actor shooter U active shooters reports of violence vandalism and whatnot and I want to note that these policies and many others are reviewed regularly we're not behind on our efforts and just because we're reviewing the policy does it mean that we don't have a policy in place or procedures to follow so the committee spoke with the superintendent regarding those concerns and it was reassured that our district has been and will continue to follow all policies and regulations even when uh reviewing them in uh policy um for April we have so far about six um that we're going to review may we have another six June we have another six July we have 10 um August we have six more and some of the policies there were four that deal with Food Services uh that we did not have to go over because they don't pertain to our district um the committee agreed that the schedule is flexible uh because we'll need to incorporate policy alerts which we just got one from Strauss asme um into our committee agendas when they occur so some policies on the audit might be push to August through November the committee also understood that when we review a policy we must also examine the regulations that accompany the policy the committee continues to discuss getting all of the regulations on the district website but understands that the board office is working on the budget referendum projects Etc so this will be a project we will try to tackle uh potentially over the summer um after the new budget goes into effect um we did we do have our 8320 uh Personnel records which is a second reading on the agenda for tonight if everyone remembers this is us deciding that we were not going to charge employees a couple of cents to get their personnel files copied um so the committee did not have any suggestions or concerns about the policy and we didn't receive any anything from any other board members uh so that's on the agenda for tonight um I'm not going to go through the district goals but we did go through those and the committee um felt that it met our expectations uh we did this discussed the coffee with the superintendent um and that was discussed earlier as well so I won't go into that um we did get a budget update um which I won't go over that as well because you guys have pretty much heard that um we did look at the board of ed goals action plan um so the committee reviewed the action plan and suggestions um from one board member uh were sent before the meeting so the other committee members agreed to submit Sub Sub sub suggestions I'm sorry guys uh by the next day so that the action plan could be updated for the Personnel committee meeting uh and then we uh discuss the board leadership uh potentially reporting updates on our board goals at the board meetings to provide our progress toward our goals to the community um we did under new business we did did uh have a discussion about the board vacancy update um let me just Breeze through this the um the main thing that we came up with was that the business administrator should indicate to the candidates to wrap up their responses when it gets close to about three minutes and that happens so thank you um and then the last one is that I wanted to note that we will review policy 01 43 which is board member election and appointment in May um hopefully in May I'm going to say that um and after um we fill the board vacancy which we just did uh I'm just asking for all the board members to please email any suggestions um to the policy committee to discuss when we review this policy about the process that we agreed to go through um in filling the vacancy can see you know what what you think worked what didn't work uh because we can uh add things to the policy if that's what the board so chooses to do and that's that's about it thank you okay um Miss hold on oh I goog eror uh can you please um it's a great name it's I'm going to get used to it um Miss Arrow can you please please uh give us an update on operations and finance sure um the operations and finance committee met uh virtually on Tuesday February 13th at 5:00 pm for approximately two and a half hours we met virtually because of the snow day the committee members and attendance were myself Dory Harvey FMA Santos and Boe president Manny Gonzalez also in attendance were Dr Julie Glazer Karen Bishop Johnson Frank Wilby of drg Architects Ricky Boyd Nicole D TOA Valerie Dolan who's our auditor and Connor O'Brien from Legacy construction management and Ernie Turner we had the same special service uh same presentation on the esy by our special services director Nicole ditota we also received a presentation from auditor Valerie Dolan and Ernie Turner it was the same one that we had at the beginning of this board meeting so I won't go into it um for referendum projects updates uh the package three roof bid had to be canceled due to snow the bid has been read vertis and the new bid opening will be Tuesday March 5th so we may need to have another committee meeting after that um the acceptance and approval of a bid would be on the March fly agenda Connor O'Brien from Legacy Management reported on the contractor meetings with North nor Eastern NHS from this point most of the work will be behind the scenes with few updates until the projects begin all work will begin Monday June 17th at Bayberry and Valley View work will be Monday through Friday a leg Legacy CM will be on site and Ricky and his team will create a schedule to complement this work there will be no students in the building and it is recommended that the other 12 months staff work remotely but this has not been discussed yet drg architect Frank BBY reported that with the exception of the finished work Ricky is doing the phase one case workk is complete for phase two case workk including the rooms with toilets the contractor will complete the work and Ricky will not have to do anything inhouse phase one of the attack resistance film is complete phase two will be done with the Bayberry and Valley View office Renovations in the secure entrances that'll be this summer uh Ricky reported the Valley View faculty room update is being completed during spring break April 1st through 5th Dr Glazer reported that the memorandum of agreement is complet compl and has been signed by the county and the prosecutor the crg digital mapping update is complete and will be shared with law enforcement Karen Bishop Johnson uh had a discussion with her about the Board of Ed vacancies and also reviewed potential board items including the payment of bills transfers and financial reports um that each year the district requests a semi waiver which is a special education Medicaid initiative due to the low number of eligible students and this has been we have applied for an SDA Grant uh for emergent and capital maintenance projects in the amount of $4,650 this will be used for the repair of the leak in the Valley View girls bathroom the replacement of a gas valve on the Bayberry air conditioning unit and towards the repair and establishment of emergency shut off switches for the boilers um Karen also asked for the authority to void outstanding checks over six months old to remove them off our books she would also like to employ positive pay as a protection against check washing and check fraud U finally an approval for V Ricky to attend the annual buildings and grounds professional development uh we discussed the coffees Dr Glazer reviewed her District goals action plan which met our expectations and Dory introduced The Board of Ed goals action plan that's it great thank you so much Miss um board the aison reports Mr fridge any updates on legislative leaz so I have nine but I'm going to cut it down to four because again the interest of time and they're very long so uh first one is the emergency bonding Authority uh which authorizes type two school districts without boards or of school estimate including those districts that are classified as New Jersey school developmental Authority districts to issue bonds to finance costs relating to repairs to school facilities and other furnishings and equipment that were damaged due to a natural disaster under this new law the bonds may be used without approval of the voters of the District of a type two School District without a board of school estimate the bill requires that a district may only issue bonds if the repairs are deemed to be necessary enough or necessary to provide a thorough and efficient system of Education uh as for the second one uh there is an elimination of the April budget vote uh the required public vote on school budgets below the uh tax levy growth cap for type 2 April districts has been eliminated uh the new law also creates start and end dates for board member terms of 11-1 1231 for November district and 41- 430 for April districts rather than rather than the terms starting and ending at an organization meeting uh the law further ensures that a type two School District the school board may not conduct a meeting other than f organization meeting between January 1st and the organization day in districts with a November school election and May 1st and the organization date for district I'm going to skip over this because we're not an April election um okay then I'll go through it an exception is provided for the meeting if sorry if a meeting is needed to deal with a matter of urgency and important as set forth in the open public meeting act and if all newly elected members present are sworn into the office prior to conduct the business the ngba supported the bill which takes effects immediately for the third one expedited certification route for pair of professionals the legislature first sent a541 something to the governor's desk in December 21 uh 2023 at that time time the bill would have required the New Jersey State Board of Education to authorize an alternate expedited route to teacher certification toep Professionals in instructional assistance uh the expedited route would have been required to include a formula for applying direct classroom service to any student teaching requirements a form of GPA waiver and a requirement that the school district in which the candidate is currently employed make it's currently employed make every reasonable effort to permit the candidate to perform any required student teaching in the school district while if possible continuing employment as a par professional or an instructional assistant on January 8th the government or the governor conditionally conditionally vetoed the bill the legislator agreed with the governor's recommendations amended the bill accordingly and sent it back to the governor the governor signed the amended bill into law on January 16th in response to concerns expressed by the governor that contrary to the goal of the bill its original Provisions for an alternate certification route and the potential to cause signif significant confusion to perspective candidates in the application project process in part because the NJ uh doe already expedites certain steps of the certification progress forair of professionals and that therefore instead effort should focus on addressing obstacles facing education support professionals when seeking teaching certification including by providing supports towards degree attainment the law now established a par professional educator pathway rather than an alternate route to certification the pathway would include and expand on Provisions contemplated by the initially passed bill for counting certain pair of professional classroom classroom service toward clinical practice requirements and for encouraging districts to place the candidate in a classroom matching the pair of professionals desired endorsement area I'm just going to stop there um president Gonzalez I just wanted to say uh based on the the legislative update um the part or the one that uh Muhammad read about eliminating April budget vote the S 4209a 5879 um I'd like to bring that to a discussion in the policy committee as to changing our Board elections to April instead of in November so um we'll have that on the agenda I guess for us to discuss thank you okay um since you have the microphone M Harvey can you give us a Somerset County Educational Services Commission Lea this this one's going be short nice so uh we had for suers County EDS Service Commission the we had a meeting of the representative assembly slbo of directors on February 7th 2024 uh we saw a presentation from auditor Paul Freda uh who presented the highlights of the 2023 audit uh business administrator Jeff sapola presented a summary of the 2425 budget we were informed that they're dissolving their transportation department and must sell nine school buses uh assistant superintendent principal Dr Paul ra rafalowski presented the 2324 Governor uh educators of the Year all items under their Finance transportation Personnel program and policy passed and they are all available for public to for the public to review since it's a public board meeting um they are in the middle of negotiations with their par professionals so there was an executive session regarding negotiations but I recused myself since I'm a member of the njaa and our meeting uh our next meeting will be on April 10th so I will have an update at our April 25th meeting thank you very much M Harvey Miss am can you give us an update on the Somerset County School boards Association y uh the Somerset County SBA is hosting an unsung heroes award ceremony on March 18th at the votch high school in Bridgewater this event recognizes students who make outstanding contributions to their school and Community um but are often overlooked by other traditional student recognition programs um Somerset County's nomination is watch on Hills student Samantha Cole um so I just wanted to let everyone in town know that and um welcome people to attend if they would like um I'll send out details to the board after this as the the um Board Association is encouraging a small $5 donation for an award so I'll just let everyone know where that link is in case anyone's interested thank youo School boards close um School Board Association Winter meeting was January uh 22nd it was held virtually I attended as did Mrs jet um there was a guest speaker that went over the board's role in student achievement um they came up with six main um items referring to that um to review all policies through the lens of student achievement um understanding and responding to social conditions that can deter success understanding and promoting the benefits of prek considering the achievement Gap and the employment gap over challenges through collaboration and supporting labor and management collaboration on March 2nd there is a leaders leadership series Workshop dealing with Personnel issues and that is free and then on April 19th there's a women's leadership conference and that is $99 thank you we're going to move on to community engagement is there anyone here from PTO I have there stuff I have we and P2 so um if you don't know the PTO is having a fundraiser at stumpies March 1st you do not have to be a PTO member to attend there are Flyers everywhere it's online um we we you know obviously are excited for the PTO to be successful they support the schools dramatically um I also have we I don't have cpeg but I have we okay so with we we are I I wish they could have stayed I saw them here earlier so so grateful to we they are fully funding the refresh and replacement of our adventure program here at the valley Bo school they're also um funding the recertification of Coach Lesley we were not able to run the program this year um due to the budget it's been a loss for the students it's um something memorable here at Valley View something really important so their generous donation um does allow us to start again in September after the referendum upgrades to the gym they'll come and reinstall the equipment um and I believe coach Lesley um actually gets recertified this spring even though it's for the fall um in addition we also funded U musical instruments that couldn't be replaced for Mrs Morrison's instrumental program so again could not um be more grateful those um donations should be on the March agenda for for all of your approval um so there you go I'm excited to share that on their behalf thank you very much so nothing for CPAP right I don't have okay all right seeing that there's nothing for CPAC now we're going to move on to board member comments are there any board members with any comments okay seeing that there's no board member comments now we're going to move on to comments of the uh from the public on agenda items only we welcome input from the public there are two times during the meeting when the public is invited to speak the first opportunity is to comment on agenda items only as now the second opportunity for public comments is towards the end of the meeting total time allotted for public comments is 30 minutes before you make your comments please state your name and Municipality of residence in the event it appears the public comment portion of the meeting May exceed 30 minutes the presiding officer May limit each statement made by the participant to 3 minutes duration our Republic forums are not constructed structured as question and answer sessions but rather are offered as an opportunity to share input on with the board in instances where the board feels the response is needed the presiding officer or superintendent will address the comment New Jersey statutes do not permit the board to discuss Personnel or hiring in the public sessions name of students should not be used members of the public should consider their comments in light of legal rights of those affected and identified in their comments and be aware that they are personally legally responsible with potential liability for comments that they make through the board the board shall not be held liable for comments made by board members of the public seeing that there is no sign in there you want me hear as well sure thanks stand thank you hi Christine Eid 105 Tiffany way thank you all again for everything that you do um all your volunteerism is so greatly appreciated um so I just had a quick question what are you allowed to carry forward um from one year to the next I think in the budget meeting I thought it was a million but I think it changed pre-co and then Co postco two 2% she said car over oh yeah your carryover for the right so when you look at the if you look at the auditor's report right it it'll show you I'm pretty sure Valerie was saying 801 on 801,000 it starts the budget okay see it in the auditor's report I can't say the numbers off the top of my head but is that like a a Max like are you are you do you have a cap on that as to what you can and can't carry you can carry that over okay just that amount well it may be a little more complicated but that is one of the amounts that you are allowed okay and that's what you use to build your next cycle budget um so we're 2425 yeah correct start you take that carryover and then you uh not it's not I think that's what's confusing it's not really car fund balance it's right it's that stability fund that she was about correct so you take your your your fund balance uh and then you're and now you're waiting for the end of February to get your state aid numbers and and that to add to that well that's the revenue side right right that's what you'll build your next budget with that that's your Revenue okay right thank you thank you now we're going to move on to action items it's Agera can you please uh move the administrative items sure I move uh action items A administrative one approve minutes of previous meetings two affirm the superintendent Hib report and three except Bayberry and Valley View School security drill reports second second any discussion call please M Ken Bishop this AG Aro yes Mrs Amadeo yes Mr fras yes Mr Gonzalez yes Mrs Harvey yes Mr Ang Gracia yes Mrs jet yes Mrs Santos yes all yes Mo passes thank you okay uh Mo can you please move personal items I move personel items one approve retirement uh two accept resignation three approve leave of absence for approve appointment 2024 extended school year esy coordinator five approve appointment substitute six approve appointment valy view volunteer seven approve appointment of stem sore leave replacement teacher which has been revised uh eight approve appointment of stem sord sorry no one's ping the other you got it uh yeah nine approve appointment Bayberry extracurricular position 10 approve appointment C certificated staff which has also been revised is there a second second any discussion just want to check so was one between you said seven and eight was one replacing another or are they two so seven is a current leave replacement who ends March 22nd and eight is going to pick up that leave replacement March 22nd through May when the leave Replacements done thank you V call please uh Mrs IG yes Mrs Amadeo yes Mr fr yes Mr Gonzalez yes Mrs Harvey yes Mr Gracia yes Mrs jet yes Mrs Santos yes all yes motion passes thank you okay operations Mr fr can you please move operation items move uh operations items one approve payment of bills two approve transfer of funds 2023 through 2024 three accept Financial reports four approve the cancellation of outstanding checks five approve agreement with p&l Business Services LLC six award contract uh seven authorized waiver of requirements special education Medicaid Initiative Program eight approve submission to NJ State and acceptance of related funds nine approved professional developmentschool travel in related expenses second any discussion I just had a quick question on the uh Financial reports and uh if you could just confirm Karen Ernie Turner brought up in the earlier part of the meeting that there was a a new encumbrance for this 183,000 that was um per liability right for that is not yet reflected in this it is not encumbered so do you think that that presents any issue for us voting on this item tonight this is January 31st well right it's still not encumbered either way but um it is something that has to be encumbered and paid so I see it did change a little bit from a yeah 100 uh a, 443 change to uh a mil 418 the bills keep coming in the uh unrealized balance but that doesn't the bills keep 183,000 so right this reflects a certain time frame right and so that new bill will come in and reflect in the be refle in the next month that bill is actually due on April 1st with a 30-day time to pay it so it's a lot of money hold the money a little longer make a little interest but we will obviously be getting it paid on time again the reports given are as of January 31st yes yes these reports get done you know we close a month into the next month and then the auditor or the um Treasurer reviews then the reports get put out there right but for an encumbrance that's for a future what if I read what Ernie was saying correctly he would prefer that it was already in this report under well the pur liability comes out from the state it it probably came out I'm not sure the exact date it came out it comes out it doesn't come out early in the year it came out recently whether it would have made the prior one I'm not sure but so you feel comfortable with us still going forward with that report as yeah oh yeah thank you okay please M Karen Bishop Johnson okay let's see are here Mr fras yes Mrs Harvey yes Mr Ang graia yes Mrs Santos Mrs jet yes Mr Gonzalez yes Mrs agaro yes Mrs Amadeo yes all yes motion passes thank you and now we're going to curriculum there is in the curriculum there's no actions uh curriculum so we're going to move on to policy um Miss Harvey can you please move policy items sure I move one first reading for bylaw 0164 conduct of board meetings and two second reading for regulation 832 zero Personnel records0 second second discussion roll call please miss Karen Bish Johnson Mrs Harvey yes Gracia yes Mrs Santos Mrs duet yes Mr Gonzalez yes Mrs Amadeo yes Mrs agaro yes Mr fras yes all yes motion passes thank you okay now we're going to move on to board business is there any Bo business to discuss I'd like to say something and I apologize I probably should have said it during board comments um but I just wanted to say you know I'm pretty hard to impress um but I've been really impressed with both Dr Glazer and Mrs Bish Bishop Johnson your work ethic is staggering outstanding um I'm getting emails at 10 o'clock at night with thoroughly researched uh answers um the wealth of knowledge that you both have behind you has been incredibly helpful um I find you both to to be open to suggestions professional patient with us new members and I want to just say to uh parents and the public that even though our district is having challenges um we're in very capable hands and I want to complement the previous board for making a great hiring decision with Dr Glazer and a great hiring decision with Johnson so thank you very much thank you I second that no further discussion on that one all right um comments from the public on any items any other items um please remember to state your name and municipality okay can I have a motion to adjourn I moved all in favor say I a second anyone opposed okay oppos we move in thank you for joining us this evening this meeting is now adjourned this