##VIDEO ID:Z8K1rubgzbo## all right I'm going to call the meeting to order start with roll director Assad Lucas here director bastelli here director Goldstein here director Marsh holen here director Potter here I will entertain a motion to approve the agenda so moved second director Assad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh Holan I director Potter I all right rise if you are able for the Pledge of Allegiance please IED Al to the flag of the United States of America and to the rep for it stands one nation under indivisible withy and jusice for all thank you okay superintendent update thank you Lori uh hopefully you're feeling uh duly informed on what I believe are the big things moving forward in the district as well as some of the smaller things that I think are still helpful for you to know about through e email Communications I send and certainly we have some significant things on tonight's agenda about finances and moving forth the bond and things of that sort the main other thing I would toss out there is we're going to start to enter into a season where we are posting a lot of uh leadership positions for hire for next school year so as we head into the winter break I think it's likely that we'll be posting the chief of Human Resources position that Milo has held as she uh prepares to retire and exit in the spring executive director of elementary schools vacancy that we've had since James Scott departed in August we have uh retirements happening at vantage point and at Northland High School with Sherry blunt and Alan Hollenbeck and so we'll be posting those positions and then Woodland Elementary as you know has had an interim principal for over uh I think by the conclusion of this year more than two years and so we look forward to hiring an outstanding leader for that school there may be other things beyond that that happen spring tends to be uh busy with Personnel change but we're going to start jumping in and try to get earlier into the hiring process than we sometimes have been feels like there's more more interest uh throughout the region I'm posting at midwinter break and making hiring decisions in January and uh early February and so we want to be part of that same timing and get outstanding people to fill those spots so we'll keep you posted on how that goes forward but we've got some big shoes to fill in a lot of places and we're hopeful that we're going to get some great candidates to do that work that's it for me thank you all right Board of Education comments recognition Awards and vision we'll start with Courtney thank you president Goldstein um good evening everybody I just want to use this time to say thank you thank you to all of our Community Partners it's been fun um hearing of all the different things going on to support families in the atams 12 area I saw recently there was um a shopping trip at I think a Target where they had partnered and supported a lot of our families I think we had some staff there as well as some of our police officers our school resource officers supporting them um food for Hope does their feed 5,000 this time of year um and there there's just so many of our our partners that come in and they really lean in to support them and so I just want to say thank you to all of them for making this holiday season extra special and I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season thank you Alexis yeah I would just say um I hope everyone has a great holiday and um I was excited to find out Legacy was the um halftime show at the Monday Night Football game on December 3rd my sister attended and um said it was phenomenal and they got lights and organized with the I don't know something with an app with the phones and um it was a whole lot of fun so and it's on their Facebook page if you want to go see it um so big congrats to them otherwise we attended the casby conference and I know we'll talk about that later but um that's all I have thanks thank you Paul so I just wanted to start by wishing everyone a preemptive happy holidays um I was going to read a poem but then I thought I think my gift to everyone will be not bloviating for too long um but uh it was essentially about the kitchen table and the importance of the kitchen table in our lives we don't tend to think about it but so much of our Lives revolve around it and so I was just going to wish you all I hope you have a warm loving kitchen table in your in your holiday season that you have lots of good moments in um we will be talking about casby later I think I but just to touch on it I think my theme was school accountability and just trying to figure out how that worked so I attended a lot of things in that area I I also attended a problem-based learning panel at stem launch called democracy detectives uncovering our rights um understanding rights is a very heavy subject and these were third graders but I think they showed bravery in really wanting to rang Wrangle with it I loved hearing their ideas on how to get people more involved in our community in the variety of different ways people might participate I really appreciated their focus on responsibility um a citizen's responsibility to their Community they they were still trying to wrap their heads around their own rights and what that means to have rights as a kid but um they were doing great work uh the best part is always talking with the best part of this job or this work is talking with the kids it's my favorite part um we have another pbl this Friday at stem lab uh this pbl is called beyond the ballot it's with fifth graders similar topic I'm looking forward to it um and then yesterday of course we had our legislative dinner so again preemptive happy holidays and I hope you have some good times thank you Amir yes so I'm do you mind if I run in the back and grab that big check so I could show I was going to brag really quick about the foundation and big check that they shared yesterday while she's doing that we'll just talk about the foundation breakfast yesterday I was really it was really well attended um the partnership that we have with the foundation is very phenomenal in my opinion and just the changes over time that have occurred and the increase in the amount of resources and money that Shannon gets for all of us for all our kids okay so this check was presented to the district yesterday from the foundation for 2,9 2016, 68050 7 cents so this money is what the foundation has supported the district with in a variety of ways through our CTE programming which I think is a big chunk but um our resource closets Pro making sure that our students and our families basic needs are met and I've shared a lot about we cannot expect our kids to you show growth and achievement if their basic needs are not being met and the five star Foundation does such a fabulous job partnering in the district to make sure that happens you know and then other things that the foundation has done to support the district and almost $3 million worth of ways and so we are so incredibly appreciative of them and all the work that they do and how they support our district and we would not be as successful without them so I really wanted to give a shout out to the foundation for everything they do and um their leadership by Shan and Hancock and her amazing team and just a phenomenal board that they have uh I was able to go to Stellar Elementary I think it's last week everything's kind of meshed together time like warped but um last week and got to roam the halls and see this amazing activity that they did schoolwide for the kids uh so each student got to take home a character like a you know a a printed out little person and then they decorated it however they wanted that represented their culture represented them as a person represented their family and some of it was just beautiful and amazing um we were joking how we think the parents enjoyed this more than the kids in some of these and um but it was just so beautifully done the other really cool thing that seller did I wanted to highlight was all the the whole staff wrote um I Am poem an I Am poem um and so it was all displayed outside of all their doors or offices or whatever and then um they're going to make it into a book so all of it will go into one bir that all the staff can have and when I was talking to Jen the principal she sharing how um it was just such a beautiful thing because it just got the staff to know each other in a different way but also that's like oh my gosh I didn't know that about that person and that makes so much sense of why maybe that's you know why they are how they are and um just really brought them closer together and so it was just really cool to hear that and be a um and see that um and then did we we I did a a pbl at stem launch was that last week that two weeks ago when was that okay it was right okay yeah so that was really fun and um again how to be a um good citizen essentially it was third graders right yeah um um and they're just so amazing and had such great ideas um and even when you ask them and uh uh inquire further into their thing they're able to answer that and get feedback and yeah they're just amazing and then last night we had dinner U with some of our legislators and got to share um some concerns we have but also some excitements that we have have and yeah it was just a great time to be able to connect with some of our legislators so that is all I have happy holidays everyone thank you um one thing that um you've forgot was that we went to the North Glenn um Arts and Humanities Foundation Gayla um it's kind of interesting because sometimes you you know commit to going to some of these things you're not sure what you're going to find but I'll tell you Sister Act what was fantastic that was the play that they did for us um we spent the whole afternoon in into the evening with um Northland and uh a lot of our kids so you know it's a it's a community um theater group but a lot of the kids in the play were from our schools not you know not one particular school and um there were um and it was it was done so well and then of course the Gaya um it highlighted some of the um kids over that have um done amazing things with them and they lot some of them gone on to do really cool things um thanks to the thoron chamber um for having the Thanksgiving dinner on um the Monday before Thanksgiving I um popped into that and then after Thanksgiving break um just scrolling through my C oh I went to Bowman on December 2nd Monday uh because we were honored with the presence of Governor polus to come see our cyber security class um along with the College Board um with the AP stuff that they do and um it it was great um I I know the woman who um put all together um she's a personal friend of mine and um then afterwards we walked around the school and Governor polus checked out some of the uh other programming that we do and he had some really good questions then I went and finally visited Independence Academy I hadn't didn't I couldn't go to the ribbon cutting but I did stop over there to see and it's um there's a lot of opportunity there for um helping some of our kids with some really great needs down the road and then I'm off to casby and we'll tell you more about that later and then um Monday I went to Northstar yesterday um or Monday um Northstar is a um tucked away down there in um old Thorton and I have to say that I feel that the principal there Grace is she works so hard for those kids and she's been trying some new things and she's had some help from Teresa gilberth and um I see some possibilities there and then yeah we had our meeting with the legislators but one of them couldn't meet with us but we set up a time to meet with him before um the future senator from District 13 I think it is and also Chris and I and Tanya are lobbyists got to do that and that's about it so on to General Public comment oh wait time out board comment Le committee lays on reports Dak and fact or did you want to nope that's I was just going to prompt you to the Dak meeting was the Wednesday night we went to casby and I am not safe in a car when it's too dark on the highway so I I was driving and Bo was also driving I think so uh we otherwise heard it was fine okay back back meets tomorrow morning tomorrow morning okay well that's the Dak and fact report anything else okay now general public comment uh no one has signed up to address the board during public comment tonight thank you all right on to board business c one resolution defeat of certain prior bonds I will entertain a motion to adopt the resolution authorizing the Defence of the final two maturities 2035 and 2036 of the district's 2016b bonds through the escrow agreement as presented so moved second okay and Gina and Friends do you want us to introduce ourselves while you doing this okay well Gina is pulling this up we will um introduce ourselves so I am Maddie panovic with Hilltop Securities I saw you all not too long ago um uh we serve as the district's Municipal adviser and I'm Maria Harwood I'm with Butler snow the district's Bond Council I'm Courtney dardi and I'm also with Butler snow serving as the district's Bond Council welcome they're here for moral support because most of this is financial related so um and I should say this presentation addresses this agenda item as well as the following agenda item because they're somewhat related so you'll hear me talk about both um so the topics that I'm going to review this evening um are a review of The District's outstanding General obligation bonds a discussion of that 2014 B defeasance that we you just introduced um and then uh summary of the 2024 election authorization Congratulations by the way um and then a brief discussion of the plan for the issuance of bonds early in January which will be the first issuance from that authorization and then some future considerations around um potential future election Cycles borrowing capacity and to address some questions um that I think arose specifically related to some um the campaigning or or uh language used by Aurora Public Schools as it related to their override so um with no without further Ado I'll jump into the debt summary so um the district actually will be making a a principal and interest payment in just a few days here uh on December 15th and so uh what we've included here is the principal outstanding after that payment occurs um so you've got about $293 million of bonds outstanding uh after that payment uh and then the bottom of the slide just shows The Debt Service by series there so relatively level until the end you'll see in 2035 and 36 we actually previously had those dark blue bars there um but you may recall and for those of you that were here we did the defeasance in Spring of 2023 for those two maturities with funds available in the bond Redemption fund which is why you no longer um see those there and then uh at the top there I'll also just point out there are um two election questions essentially currently outstanding for the District 1 in 2004 and then the most recent in 2016 so uh and I think we talked about this a bit when we did the defeasance last year but from a big picture perspective the district sets A M Levy every December which will be happening I don't know a few agenda items after ours um uh in addition to several other M levies um but the debt service and the revenues for the the Deb uh M Levy for Debt Service go into a bond Redemption fund um those funds can only be used to pay debt service or to prepay debt they cannot be used for any other operations of the district um because of that when there are excess revenues in there from just continual collections year-over-year um we like to work with the district and and our other school district clients where this occurs to uh prepay or defease bonds which helps save taxpayer dollars because we're essentially you know prepaying uh that that principle which will save you interest costs just like if you paid your mortgage off tomorrow um from from a tax perspective and um my attorney friends here can weigh in in more detail if there are questions but um we really like to make sure that balances uh no more than one year's Debt Service at calendar year end I know it's really easy to focus on the big number at fiscal year end but the dollars that are in there on June 30th are actually required to also make this December principal and interest payments occurring in a few days so what we really focus on is what's happening basically as of December 31st um over the last last few years uh as I mentioned you know we've utilized some available funds that have accumulated over time to uh prepay or defease debt so in 2023 we did that um with two maturities of outstanding 2016 a bonds which saved about $ 38.6 million in taxpayer savings some of that had to do with essentially the maturities that we defe as well as some Investments that we were able to make with those dollars um additionally uh as part of the 2023 assess value and mevy certification process um for taxes paid in the current calendar year um the district was actually able to provide some tax relief to taxpayers by lowering that Bond M Levy by about by exactly three Ms from 21.66% 2024 election authorization um as part of our analysis for that election as well as anticipating issuing new money bonds uh from the successful election um we did evaluate the district's 2014b bonds um become currently callable in a few days essentially yes I have a question about the 2014 yes because I know we did have a mill in bond in 2014 that failed yes so where did can you explain this yes so the 2014b bonds are refunding bonds along with the 2014 bonds that refunded those I believe were both Advanced refundings I'd have to go back and look at my notes but they would have essentially refunded bonds that were previously issued from the 204 authorization so most likely post 2004 election the district would have issued bonds somewhere between 2004 and 2006 those Bonds were then refunded in 2014 that is what we're paying off so yes it's a the series that's the year they were issued not related to obviously an election that occurred in that year um and I should say while I'm on here you know municipal bonds and I think we discussed this previously are issued with a 10-year call date typically so unlike your mortgage whereas rates go down you can go back and refinance it pretty much at any point in time municipal bonds entally have a lockout period for the first 10 years and then they're callable meaning they can be refunded or prepaid at any point after that um you can do it before but it has to be done on a taxable basis which doesn't really happen in today's interest rate market so um uh as part of this analysis we did look at um the refunding or prepayment of those bonds so essentially what the district kind of has two options here you could go out and issue refunding bonds so another series of bonds that would just refund those at a lower interest rate or we can utilize funds in the bond Redemption fund that we were otherwise going to use towards a Debt Service on new money issuance from the election authorization and just pay them off completely um the math is that paying them off you are now eliminating any interest cost related to those bonds so you save more money so you're essentially saving $3 million in interest costs by prepaying those bonds rather than only about 1.2 million if you did a refunding because you're still going to have interest associated with the refunding bonds that could be issued so we talked about this with Gina and I think she discussed with cabinet and uh the result of that is that you know we're recommending to proceed with that prepayment which is the first uh resolution that you're considering any questions on that okay so moving to the election authorization uh so as you all know uh the district uh received authorization to issue $830 million of bonds uh we have repayment parameters that we need to stay within so that $70 million of maximum annual repayment cost and the 1.4 billion of total repayment um and as we discussed you know earlier uh the commitment is to keep that M Levy at 18.66 5 Ms and still issue all of uh the debt um we uh are fairly conservative in our estimates and part of that because the attorneys make us do that so um to be able to make that commitment we actually utilize uh we assumed there was no going to be no assess value growth in The District in perpetuity um obviously we know property values are going to change but they don't like us to rely on that to be able to do that and so um we do feel fairly we feel very confident that we're able to do that and keep that mevy constant um here it says through uh 2029 and actually what would happen after that point is that mevy could could decrease if there's not further authorization received essentially um and so uh there is some room essentially which I'll get into the last section here of uh capacity for potential future authorization as I know we just came off of an election cycle but um as you all are well aware uh school districts are always kind of looking to what is the next cycle that you would potentially be considering as you're looking at Capital needs throughout the district because obviously the 830 million does not cover everything that is needed um and so with that uh we are planning uh to issue three different series of bonds with this authorization and a lot of that has to do with again legal requirements for the lawyers are always so much fun um uh from a IRS perspective uh the district has to certify that it has a reasonable expectation to spend 85% of bond proceeds within three years of issuance um and so particularly because of some of the projects the district has uh we're being a bit strategic about how much we're issuing and when and for which projects um and that a lot of that has to do with the Thorton high school project just because of the time of that uh and how long how when when that would actually start and then how long it would take once it starts um so as of right now we are planning on sizing uh the first issuance uh which we're anticipating in early 2025 to generate a project fund of about $185 million you'll see in that total that's $186 but that's cuz there's about a million dollars of just issuance costs essentially related to that transaction um the thought process then is that uh that should give the district enough money to comfortably make it through early 2027 which is when we would come back and do the second tranch that is a bit larger at about 360 million of project fund I believe that sort of the real the big start on the Thorton high school project which would then also carry into the 2029 issuance where we're getting we essentially issuing the remaining par authorized at that point um which under current interest rate assumption gets you close to that another $360 million essentially uh of total proceeds for a total of about N9 a little a little above 900 million for the total project that is um the current 2025 bonds are based on current interest rates as of early last week the other two are current rates plus 50 basis points so half a percent um just to be conservative right obviously if interest rates stay where they are today that means more premium so more funds for do for projects um if rates do go up we you know then have that cushion so that we're comfortable kind of committing to to what funding is actually available any questions there so this is what our projected Debt Service looks like sitting here today um we are structuring another step down or anticipating structuring another step down um potentially between 2030 and 31 so you'll see the bars are you know s a little bit above $80 million there over the next 5 years or so and then it drops down in 2031 to about 70 million and then a little bit of a drop down then in um 34 or between 34 and 35 uh that is essentially what was in place previously for the district is they were planning for the most recent election cycle that would then give the district flexibility to come back if it decides to do so uh for an additional Bond uh election um I'll get into like capacity for that in a in a little bit but the other benefit of structuring the issuances over multiple years and and multiple series is that we have a lot of opportunities to change this um right so the red bars are what we're anticipating with the 2025 issuance but the dark and light blue are all subject to change right that that's what we think is going to happen sitting here today but what I can tell you is having done a lot of these they never look like what you think they're going to when we start right and so um if that's the case as an example if 2030 is too soon to continue uh to consider additional facility needs we have the flexibility to kind of stru push that out a little bit um we don't have as much flexibility to kind of move it forward um 2030 is kind of the first shot we would think um unless assess value Grows by a lot um but from a big picture perspective we have a lot of bites at the Apple I guess the way I put it here to um kind of change the structure as needed over the the issuance of these bonds okay fusure considerations so um uh we were asked to kind of pull together what would that no tax rate increase capacity be then in 2030 um and that really primarily has to do with what are the assumptions around assessed value growth between now and then as well as just that structure that we just talked about um so sit sitting here today if assess values do not change at all between now and 2030 which I'm hoping that's not the case um you're talking about about 160 million in bonding capacity that obviously increases materially as you go through different assess value assumptions what I'll also say is this is a very fairly simplistic analysis that we're doing because a lot of this also has to do with when does that growth occur if it's occurring on the front end then these numbers actually would be larger if it's occurring on the back and that's what this is showing so it's the smaller dollar amount so those would be higher if as an example in the reassessment cycle next year you have a 10% growth well that actually allows us to change what those bars look like in that graph um which then would change what these numbers are but this is just sort of a big picture very basic preliminary review of what that capacity would look like on that piece I'll just share uh that my recollection is shortly after our successful 2016 bond election we had some conversations with Maddie and crew and we tried to project out six years down the road what kind of capacity we would have and I think we were in like the $400 million range right obviously we're a couple of years later uh getting to the issuance then than what we were contemplating them but to be at 8:30 versus some of the numbers we were talking about then correct at 400 things can move in dramatically different ways my gut is that property values are not going to increase as rapidly and significantly as they did during that stretch but just being a half a glass half full kind of guy I'm hopeful that it's at least the 30% sooner rather than later starting on that uh that we can be again around the mid 8s when we're looking at a 2030 measure but time will tell yeah and a lot of this obviously also is dependent on what happens at the state level in regards to property taxes right so um we've benefited uh or the district has benefited from the fact that even as assessment rates have gone down which would otherwise actually decrease your assess value you've had enough property value growth to help maintain that growth um obviously if that changes at the state level then all of this goes out the window right but sitting here today yeah Maria loves to talk about that so sitting here today this is you know this is sort of our best guess and then finally um I just was asked to talk about how Aurora Public Schools um kind of came up with their structure for their bond and override election the bond was um a bit different the phrasing was a bit different than what you use they're not actually saying like without an expected increase in the tax rate they said without with no without imposing any new tax um which is actually this a legalistic difference between the two but for all intents and purposes it sort of means the same thing um and then they did a $30 million de free schools or Capital Construction technology and maintenance Levy um which legally they were required to say that it's a tax increase because it is um but as it was communicated to voters the basically the messaging was that the overall District mevy the total mevy wasn't going to change um and there's a couple of way reasons for that um primarily the tax base is very different so they have another billion dollars of assessed value to work with um and their Mill levies going into this election cycle uh their bond M Levy which essentially what what we did is we reduced the bond and I should say uh we both work with Aurora Public Schools um but uh we reduced the bond M Levy to then absorb the increase from that override um and they were starting at a higher M Levy than where the where you all were starting um going into this election cycle so the higher M Levy and then the higher assess value means there's just in total more dollars being generated that can then be kind of deployed between debt service and then this new um override the other piece I'll add is just their debt structure um was a bit different they have um we had done some re they had some refundings that we were able to restructure in 21 and 2021 and 2022 um to sort of push amortization forward to kind of fill up to if you think about um multiplying your M Levy by your assessed value call it like a revenue line right so we were filling to that Revenue line as best we could to really enhance their step down so I think their um decrease in debt service between 2024 and 2025 is like $50 million so there was a lot of room to fill in of debt from a Debt Service perspective that allowed us to be able to kind of maneuver things that way and I would say that the planning for that started um really like a couple of like years ago right um in this in a similar vein of of you all working on your election cycle but the thought process behind that started um a long time ago to be able to make sure that they were able to implement that but I'm happy to answer questions or give more specifics if it's helpful so given uh the $70 million a year uh authorization for payment of principal and interest and then the 1.45 billion uh total repayment cost do you feel like that language May position Us in 2030 to do a similar strategy to Aurora or does that have any bearing on that with a um Bond and override kind of trying to do a no tax it it really depends on what happens with assessed value right and so because if we go back to this slide right those numbers are for Bond only um so what that really means is that if they had not done the debt free school's Levy and um kept their bond Mill where it was they could have had capacity for well in excess of a billion dollars of bond authorization they kept it at a billion to then sort of move those revenues over to that that um debt free schools levy the whether the district will be able to do that or not is really dependent on what happens with assess value between now and then because um and how much of a bond authorization you would ask for right so you could conceivably do that if AV Grows by 30% and you know your borrowing capacity 600 but you only want to do 400 then you can sort of free up those Mills basically um to then convert to that override so there are options um and I think the other piece to consider is if you wanted to potentially try and um at if assess value grows as an example next year and if you were considering going back to voters any time before 2030 for an override or debt free schools levy would it be more beneficial to utilize that to help offset a tax impact at that time rather than sort of saving it for 2030 so um you know that's what we're here to help with is to you know we work with Gina and Aaron very closely on an annual basis even when we're you guys aren't in the process of a bond election um to make sure that you know we're thinking through all these things so we don't miss that opportunity if it [Music] arises anything else well we going to call the vote on this director Assad Lucas I director belli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen I director Potter I all right on to number two 2024 Bond and debt issues I will entertain a motion to approve the 2024 Bond resolution authorizing the sale of General obligation Bonds in an amount not to exceed 185 million as presented so moved second on to part two so we don't have a formal presentation for this one but Maria is here to answer any questions if you have any I believe section five is the part that you really care about um the parameter it's a parameters resolution right so we will um go and sell bonds we are currently targeting January 14th for that um we are uh required if you you adopt the resolution to stay within uh the parameters that are outlined in that resolution Maria can tell you there's a whole lot of other legal things that are very important that happen into that in that document but um section five is what we really focus on and so that's where you'll see that restricted par amount of 185 million um the rest of them uh candidly are pretty generic because it's really your constrained in this instance by what was in the ballot question so that's why you'll see you know the maximum annual until rep payment parameters are constrained by by what the voters approved um and then the rest of those are more um mechanics of issuing the bond so essentially refunding um uh dollar amounts as well as um premium uh or dollar price purchase so we're essentially saying that you have to get at least all of what you are issuing I don't know if there's add the parameters are um put in place so that we don't have to come back to the board on the day that we sell the bonds so these are definitely a fence around what the district can do and what you're doing um is authorizing Gina um and Chris to approve the sale of the bonds within those parameters um they don't have to if something in the market goes Haywire but um you're basically just saying we trust you within the four corners of this fence so that's really what is going on here and it takes the parameters take into account your goalss as far as um raising money goes the rest of this resolution has a lot of um legal process and also the process that people are going to need to follow to to issue the bonds to pay the bonds all that kind of stuff really what you need to know is you're promising to Levy taxes to pay them that was a long resolution yeah do I can talk a little bit about the process for the rest if that's helpful so we're obviously here with you this evening um we have calls scheduled with the rating agencies tomorrow morning um so we've actually been working with Gina and Aaron on getting that presentation pulled together um so we'll speak with Moody's and standard and pores tomorrow um and then we will have a call with the working group Next Friday uh for a due diligence call which essentially a requirement of the underwriters um the sort of a bring down to kind of give them a legal checkbox essentially that they're they're good with things um we are planning on posting the preliminary official statement which is the Disclosure document um on Monday January 6 so sort of once we're all back from uh potential holiday breaks and then uh we will be scheduled to price uh that following Tuesday on January 14th and close a couple weeks later at the end of January as Maria mentioned you know this resolution does not obligate the district to actually go sell bonds um you know what we'll be doing over the next month basically is evaluating the market and determining if we think that's the right time to go um and sell bonds uh I will say the market was really strong last week um we uh we worked on two large school district transactions um that performed really well this week as we're kind of heading into the holidays things definitely slowed down a bit and pricings the last two days were much more challenging um but our goal is to sort of come back that second full week of January once investors are kind of back reevaluating their books have cash to deploy um and I as of sitting here today I think uh Adams 12 will be the first district back in the market in January certainly any one of size so um that we're going to kind of ride that wave and and um make sure that we get some great results for you all thank you any questions I was reminded by Kim uh while visiting at casby that in 2016 yes we had students present uh from M Range High School as part of the pricing and selling of bonds and I don't know if we've reached out to anyone like Hillary Wimer over at the High School of Business at mountain range but it could be another really great learning opportunity for students to be in the room as that's all going down we'd be happy to host again yeah we can certainly do that the other nice thing in today's day and age postco that uh was not really accessible to us in 2016 is um all of the stuff is online like that we essentially monitor an order platform um on just a website um and can if if students aren't able to leave for the day and and do like a full trip we could certainly uh Zoom or teams into a class um and kind of explain what is happening so definitely happy to do that thanks for exploring it if they can go there unless you're offices have changed the views were amazing number one and number two it was almost like being in the New York Stock Exchange where there's all these like screens and charts and TVs and monitors and I think there's a big wild Factor about being in the room we definitely can do that that again well I'm going to volunteer Butler Snow's offices for that [Laughter] again I want to see Butler Snow's offices all right I guess we'll call the vote director Assad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh Holan I director Potter I all right thank you on to number three auditor presentation of the fiscal year 2023 2024 draft annual comprehensive financial report or eer from Clifton lson and Allen and there is no motion on this one thank you Bard sorry I'm height challenged I'm going to need a step stool um to see this a little bit better so we have John Paul from Clifton Larsson Allen here to present on the audit good to see you welcome arrow through it's a PDF right sounds good thank you so again I'm John Paul Lal with Clifton Larson Allen or CLA uh happy to be able to present the results from the fiscal year 2024 uh financial statement audit as well as the single audit um so I know you already had a lot of financial information a lot of that looking forward now we're going to be looking back some um so my intent is to be pretty broad Strokes with the financial statements but if there's anything that makes sense to um further discuss go into more detail would be happy to do that okay so to start I just wanted to start with a reminder on what the uh annual audit includes and a little bit about what it doesn't include so our audit is uh focused on making sure that the financial statements that are issued are free from any material misstatement that they include all the proper disclosures and information that's required to be included by governmental Accounting Standards um what it doesn't include is uh we're not specifically looking for fraud uh it's not like an IRS audit where it's contentious or you know it's the the district's audit is a very collaborative effort I like to U give the analogy that we're kind of like the editor if the district is the author of the financial statement book we would be the editor double-checking making sure that everything in there um is accurate and presented correctly uh so the scope of the audit contains really two primary segments there's the financial statement audit and that gives all of the financial results and disclosures uh for the annual financial statements as well as the single audit which is towards the very back of the document uh that's relating to the district's uh Federal awards that are received and so that's a federal requirement each year um to go through that single audit which reviews a sample of those uh Federal Awards making sure that there's um comp the district has complied with all of the requirements that the federal government outlined saying you know these are the things that we want Auditors to check for um and then we also do have a list of findings and recommendations uh we're be very pleased to be able to say that for this year we did not have any uh material weaknesses or significant deficiencies those would be the um more significant items that would be actually included within the written report we do have a couple of it recommendations these are really more at the best practice uh level not that are significant enough to again be included within that report so looking at the financial statement audit we're pleased to be able to say that we were able to issue an unmodified or informally referred to as a clean audit opinion um that's the highest level of audit opinion that uh the district can receive and I think I've said this every year and I know many of you have heard the presentation a couple of times but it's also the audit report that you should be expecting to receive each year uh if you were not going to be receiving that this is not the first time you would be hearing about it um so but again pleased to be able to say that we were able um to issue that unmodified clean audit opinion and do have again just very broad Strokes a couple of graphs to look through the actual Financial results um so this first one is on net position which is um so the the district presents two sets of financial statements one of them is on a long term basis that's similar to what um large compan public companies would be presenting and then the other is more similar to a budget basis uh the budget basis is generally uh what most boards and are more familiar with because that's discussed a lot more frequently um but this long-term basis I think is helpful to bring up because most of the time this is the only time that you're really looking at it is with this annual Financial uh report so with this you'll see that um the graph is downward because um all of the numbers are negative if you remember from previous uh presentations uh the main reason for that is the net pension liability which is uh relating to the district's participation in Colorado PERA and the defined benefit pension plan that comes from that so if you look the net pension liability for fiscal year um 2024 is a little less than 800 million if we look at what the net position is it's a little less less than netive 100 million and so the two of those would offset and so the district would be uh in a positive overall Equity position if you subtract out that net U net pension liability that net pension liability is not something that the district is able to pay off even if it wanted to it's really more of an informational disclosure in the way that it's presented it's something that is saying in the future the district will either need to contribute more uh will either need to have much better uh Returns on uh Investments or uh benefits will need to be adjusted in order to uh maintain its Integrity um into the future there's also something uh called uh the net OPB liability OPB stands for other post-employment benefits if you look here uh it's a little less than $20 million of a liability so not nearly as significant as the net pension liability I mainly bring it up because otherwise you generally don't see these words um and so it's just a reminder of what that relates to it's a health care subsidy that uh perah provides to retirees um and since it's uh considered to be a health care subsidy and not part of the pension it gets disclosed separately so that's why you'll see that uh net opep liability also included uh again that just relates to Pera and it goes through the same process as the pension liability does okay so moving to fund balance this is more on that budgetary basis um and this would be showing um how much is left over at the end of each fiscal year so if you take the district's assets minus its liabilities as of the end of the year this is what's left over and that does not include the bonds um with because this budgetary basis is really like if you consider your mortgage this is considering the principal and interest payments it's not considering the entire mortgage um and so I did split it out between uh the overall fund balance and the building fund separately you'll see that that's a different color uh the reason for that is those uh funds are primarily U Bond proceeds and so the spending down of that is really intended um and so while those bars are increasing showing that the district is in a stronger financial position than it was before at least from a a dollars and cents perspective um that also um including a decrease in uh those Bond proceeds um also noted as it was brought up earlier fiscal year 23 did also include a $68 million uh reduction with the payoff of the uh bonds um the early payoff and that is going to be a decrease in this fund balance again it's like if you paid off more of your mortgage your um you know your the cash that you have left over is going to be less than it would even though you're going to be saving in the long term um so this uh graph will likely look look a bit different next year uh depending on the timing of the issuance and the use of the proceeds it's likely to go up quite a bit just with those proceeds being um still sitting in um cash as of the end of the year any questions on again broad Strokes with some of the overall uh Financial results okay great uh so very briefly on the it recommendations um there was a new auditing standard that was applicable for this year which required and we've done this some in the past but it required a little bit more in-depth um review of The District's um it systems policies um cyber security Disaster Recovery plans very surface level but still a broader scope than it did in the past as part of that we did have some recommendations primarily relating to U you know like policies um making sure that those are updated making sure that backups are being tested things like that um and so we did uh communicate those directly to um District personnel and so that's something that they're working through mainly this is just an FYI since it's not included within the actual uh audit report itself okay so moving on to the single audit results as I mentioned towards the beginning um this is the uh audit that's performed specifically over Federal Awards uh the district did receive in fiscal year 2024 a little bit less than $50 million in federal Awards um as part of that again the federal government puts out guidance every year that says this is exactly how we want Auditors to audit uh different Federal programs um and so we did select two uh programs the special education cluster or idea as well as the emergency connectivity fund uh which was uh an additional uh program through the FCC primarily used by the district for the purchase of Chromebooks um and so both of those totaled about $15 million of the total uh 48 million we're pleased to be able to say we did not have any uh findings or issues that were found during that so our sample basis testing didn't have any uh issues everything was as it needed to be in terms of compliance as well as the district's internal controls primarily review processes sign offs approvals things of that nature uh were all in place for those programs so um again kudos to the district for that the single audit can be very black and white if we you know it's on a test uh sample basis so if we select a $6 trans action that doesn't have the right approval it gets written up as a finding even though it's was for $6 and you know wouldn't be that significant so that's kind of the it's very black and white like that um but kudos to the district for not having any uh issues or findings during that process uh so the last couple of slides are were required to have certain communication to uh the governing board at the end of each audit so this just summarizes all of those um the uh couple things that I'll point out uh there weren't any significant changes in accounting policies or estimates for this year uh which the um Finance and Accounting departments are breathing a sigh of relief after the last couple of years it's been a lot of changes um and so there was nothing significant for this year of course in future years there's a couple other things coming down the pike but at least at this point uh for this year there was nothing significant as I mentioned we did Issue an unmodified or clean audit opinion that normally sounds good but sometimes the audit process can be an absolute disaster to get to that point and you can still get to that clean report if there was issues that would be what would be shown on this slide uh but I'm pleased to be able to say that in that uncorrected and corrected misstatement section there were no uh adjustments that were posted during the audit and so that's really while the unmodified opinion is what you need to receive this is really saying that the auto process actually went went very smoothly um everything that management gave us was as it should be everything was in order um and the auto process went very well so again kudos to uh Gina and Aaron and the rest of the uh Team for all of their uh diligence making sure everything was recorded well and everything was uh kept the way it should be um so nothing really else all that significant on uh this next slide um The District's financial statements do include the charter schools that were uh that are within the district um obviously those are governed separately with a separate management um but some of the key financial information is included in there so you'll you'll notice that those are included um the management representation letter um is really a document that kind of what I said about being the editor and the district the author that's really the district saying we take responsibility for the financial statements and Auditors you were the ones double-checking this so that's the other uh item that would be attached to this uh communication so again kudos to uh the district for a very uh clean audit um very uh pleased with how things went and uh you know appreciate their diligence and getting us everything that we needed to be able to complete the audit so with that any questions comments or discussion well just a comment to again to Echo what you said sorry to Erin and G doing a fantastic job maybe we need to get slide 12 framed I'm not sure what do you think yes thank you Erin and Gina yeah anything else thank you John Paul great thank you want to add anything okay all right um on to number four a established fiscal year 2024 2025 tax revenue and M Levy I will entertain a motion to adopt the 2023 2024 mil Levy certification resolution as presented so moved second all right Gina all right thank you board third times a charm I got that one up with um relative ease so tonight we are now here to talk about certifying the um mil Evies for the district so here's the items we're going to cover some of this information you have seen before um not a lot of it is terribly new but some updates with our um M levies that we need to certify we' like to include this slide to help you understand why we're doing this tonight basically you have to so the counties are required to get the final assessed valuations to the district by December 10th thankfully this year they were all really early we got them the week of Thanksgiving which might be a world record for for both the counties um I will say kolina who you guys have met my assistant has done a really great job of fostering relationships with both counties to help us get these things emailed to us in the past they would only snail mail them so we're at the mercy of mail delivery so um anyway getting them the week of November or Thanksgiving this year was really helpful in US putting the information together for you all and then we have to certify these by December 15th yes Chris so two questions did we do a motion before we started with you and number two I worry uh as I look at the language in the motion and talks about to adopt the 2324 M Levy certif ation resolution the subject line says establish fiscal year 2425 uh tax revenue and Mill Levy so those twoyear references are not matching I will entertain a motion to amend the motion you so moved is that adequate Phil because of the importance of this one I'd like to start over Okay I will entertain a motion to adopt the 2024 202 M Levy certification resolution as presented so moved second thanks for noticing that you bet back to Gina all right so you all are required to certify these Mills by December 15th um which is really incredibly important especially especially with the bond election because we have to be able to pay our bonded debt back so incredibly important uh here's an outline of critical dates that you all can look back to um the the Highlight right now um one of the things that you may have read is there's been some discussion about could counties look at collecting taxes over a longer period of time and I think everything I've seen is it's been shot down and there will be two um tax payments for homeowners so I want to to mention when I read that I was a little surprised all right here's an overview highle overview of what we're asking you to certify tonight and so we always certify 27 Mills and that will generate about $11.2 million that's our local share of the school Finance act and is required um then we have the overrides as you well know we have several overrides that are fixed dollars and that totals 35.4 million our 2018 mil Grows by inflation for this year that was 5.2% and will generate about 33.9 million and then we have another line called the abatement Mill and so basically what that allows us to do is when taxpayers um contest their tax bill if they are awarded whatever they you know my valuation was too high well we certified our Mills based on that higher valuation but our collection would be lower so in the next year we get to go back and change our Mill based on these Corrections that were or adjustments I wouldn't even say Corrections adjustments that were made in our prior year to keep the district as whole as possible and then we have our Mill Levy um I'm sorry our bond Mill Redemption and that is 18.66 5 and will generate about 76.9 million and that's to pay back our bond that's right so that Bond Redemption Mill like Maddie had spoke earlier cannot be used for any other purpose than paying our debt and last year we lowered it by three mils that's right okay so I think you guys have seen this um picture before but it's just a nice reminder about how we're funded as a school district and why that 27 Ms that we are required to do as so important so the first thing that happens is um the calculation is made to determine what is our local share that we are contributing as a district to our state Equalization so that's a combination of the 27 Ms we just talked about and then a portion of um the um so the ownership tax on vehicles and so that is our preliminary funding mechanism part of the school Finance act and then the total program is calculated and then we take that number minus our local share and that's what the state backfills us for our total funding and I went through all of those pieces in two slides like that fast so um I I think it's a really good picture of how it's being formulated because as we've talked about especially in years when those AVS are going up so much that 27 Ms it doesn't matter what it generates our funding from the state from the state Equalization the school Finance act does not change has nothing to do with our 27 Mills that we collect it's just offset by that okay and so you all have been very much a part of the mid Levy override planning how the district uses those funds and so here is just a list of all of the things we do with the roughly I'm going from memory 66 is Million Dollar we're doing all of these things something that we started talking about last year that we wanted to highlight was understanding the difference between a fixed Mill and a fixed dollar M ly override so what we're seeing here between those two different bars is what the value of the mill was when we passed and how the value of that money has changed with inflation so you can see that big gap with those fixed dollar Mills what 4.5 million could buy us in 1992 is very different than what it can buy us today so I think it it's really helpful to see while we're still providing the things we said we would provide the cost to do that is much higher we're really lucky that the 2018 mil does grow by inflation because it helps offset some a small fraction but it does help offset some of that change in the value of money so one of the pieces I didn't cover in that um overview of the Mills you you're going to see in the resolution that part of the certification is a one-time temporary credit of 07 Ms and that's because um if you look at that little footnote at the bottom in February of this year we received a call from Adams County in a panic that they gave us the wrong number for our assessed valuation and as you can see um it was off by quite a bit when we did the math in the calculation we were really grateful to see that it was only a 07 impact to our number of Mills but that's the primary reason for the changes in the values for Adams County we also did see some reductions and assess valuation for oil and gas which was completely expected luckily that is a small portion of our total assessed valuation but um it it is part of why we are seeing the assess valuation from last year to this year changed the way it has and then here is a comparison of last year's certification to this year and so you can see that our total revenue is going down by $3.9 million for these Mills the bulk of it that in this case is a good example of why the state formula works really well is if the state didn't back fill we could be down $3.4 million so instead the state is going to have to increase the propor the amount they share with us so really good example of this would be a year we are looking at losing 3.4 million we are not because it's one bucket of money um and then our milley override as we talked about will grow a little bit with the um inflationary increase so not a little bit 1.7 and then you see some small rounding pieces for the fixed dollar Mills that's because we have to go we have to choose a number of decimals to go out and we can't Levy um that much more so we have to make sure we keep it within that range so that we're as close to that fixed dollar amount um Ain and I went back and forth about should we force these numbers to match but this is the reality of the math and then our bond we lowered the rate and then with the lowered assess valuation so between the lowered rate um and the lowered assess valuation well we lowered the rate last year but we're still going to collect a little bit less for the bond I have a question and I so we have the M Levy overrides that are fixed dollars and then we have the one that is uh adjust for inflation what would it look like or is it possible to to make the fixed dollar ones or what could we do to make them all um injust for inflation I would expect we would need to go to the voters and ask for them to approve making that change but I'm not a lawyer not a lawyer so sounds right to me I mean we can double check with Kim and others to verify but I think that's true yeah the piece we would not be able to do is we wouldn't be able to say with no taxes increase because as you can see the 2018 Mills we do increase them right so um but I I think that would be possible I also think it raises to some degree would you do that independently would you do it at the same time as another mevy override ask if you did it with another mevy override ask there might be interest in trying to have a single ballot question instead of two but my gut is the attorneys would say you need to have two separate ones but we'd have to Noodle through all of those pieces um and we're happy to ask some questions and get better insights about that definitely I um I think it's a great question any other questions on this slide okay um we like to show what is the impact to a homeowner with the changes in these mevy rates and so for 2024 as compared to 2023 a person who owns a home valued at $500,000 will see an increase to their taxes of approximately $29 and Gina just to be clear that $29 is because of the County's air and assessment and certifying assessment to us this year in February so it's a combination of two things if you look at the rate reduction of 07 that lowers the number of Mills and then the override for the one that grows by inflation increases the Mills and it Nets to a net increase as well as um abatements also changed you're right um so it Nets to a total change in Mills to the homeowners of 0945 next year unless knock on wood um assuming no errors are made by the county after we've certified that 07 will go away and so our Mill with no other changes would increase by that 07 abatements change every year I would um go out on a limb and say that abatements go up after an after an assessment year and then stabilize the next year so I would expect that abatement number to not go down but it depends on who who is um arguing their case and then here is a comparison um this is really related to the the top line is the changes in net assessed valuation and what that percentage change was so you can see we went down 3.4% compared to going up 25.2% last year um and then the amount will collect in our M Levy overrides so the the um inflation piece was 5.2% that I already mentioned and our percent change is actually only 1.6% for the total revenue the line that is the 76.9 million um that should say bond in front of it I apologize I I I knew what I meant um but did not but did not put that in rating for you so this is the comparison of the Bond as you know we lowered the rate and so with lowering the rate and um the um change in assess valuation our collection for 2024 will be 3.4% less than last year which um what had grown 7.8% even with that lowered rate but because of that really high increase in assess valuation and then we are giving you a little Maddie talked a bit about the bond fund balance and so here is how that fund balance has changed over those years and so you can see in 2022 the year we did that first prepayment of debt we um lowered the bond fund balance and we will expect to do the same thing with the resolution that you just passed so you'll see that next year in that 2024 column or 2025 column um this is a slide I think you guys are very familiar with and so this is showing that comparison of our assessed valuations compared to the Metro districts and you can see that significant Gap and then here is another side you I know you've seen and um that Gap just continues to grow in the per student dollars we receive for an override and then something we wanted to highlight and share with you all is um there are currently only three districts in the state who do not Levy 27 Mills for total program two of them Englewood and Sheridan will eventually get there there was um a change a few years back requiring all districts who de bruised to get to 27 Ms Cherry Creek will not get there because of the way they de bruised and I'm going to look to Aaron I think their total program is 18 something Mills so and they will not go above that they will stay at the 18 and whatever Mills very uh very hard thing to look at as we talk about these inequities in the mevy override so um something we wanted to point out all of the 15 districts have approved M Levy overrides 10 of them are above that 25% cap the ones not at that cap are Adams 12 12 Ms 14 27j Doug Co and Jeff Co everyone else is at that cap um and then there's a summary of the special Mills that Chris has talked about what districts have them so just wanted to share that information because it as Chris shared last night the inequities continue to grow with these measures so that's the end of the presentation any questions questions okay director Assad Lucas I director belli hi director Goldstein hi director Marsh holen hi director Potter hi thank you Gina and Erin good job thank you to put I you know I appreciate putting it into non-financial people's more you know that level sometimes you call it the 7-Eleven test I guess all right on to averaging and funding proposal okay so um Paula drafted this um letter that you have in your packet and um it's been through a few ER iterations and it caused a lot of conversations at casby um I presented it to the casby board I talked to some of the other um School Board people on other school boards who were not on the casby board um I talked to um the case executive director Brett miles I talked to the president of col Education Association and basically um what it says well if you well Chris has talked about what the governor's proposal is to take away the four-year averaging because we are of declining enrollment um it's gone from five it's supposed to go to four and he wants to take the governor wants to take it to zero and you know if you do the math which um Chris is very well and you have shown us that's a $13 million deficit potentially for next year in our budget and when you start talking to other board members in other places all but about 30 or 40 school districts are in declining enrollment and so this has got a detrimental effect on lots of school districts and so what it caused was um more conversations and we talked to our um lobbyists Tanya um bow Kelly and it's kind of ballooned in a way this whole concept of we need to do something to let the governor know that we're not happy about this and um I've been told that casby case and CA are going to take this on and push it out to all of us all districts to us for us to consider uh supporting this letter so it's going to be changed a little bit um it's it's in its draft form still but let's talk about it I think it's great and thank you Paula for pulling it together um I thought it was very thoughtful it was well written and I think it does a a fantastic job of getting all of our concerns um out there and it's exciting to know that not only did you put this all together but you brought a lot of really positive recognition to Adams 12 um with your hard work on that so thank you and great job yeah um thank you and thank you Lori for shopping it around casby I think um you know representative bird said it really well last night and that it's just not possible to go from four years three years to zero years and that's not realistic and they can spin it however they want but um you know we we said we were fully funding schools last year and we need to hold that promise so um I appreciate it yeah well I think one thing that I really appreciated also I think is representative bird but um that because we promised to fully Colorado promised to fully fund public schools and get rid of the BS Factor this is just a backo method to bringing that back um without calling it the BS factor and it would you know I think CH shared last night when that originally was on the table everyone thought it was going to be a two maybe threee period because it was during the recession saving money and you know 15 years later they finally got rid of it and we lost what was that $500 million over that time frame just in Adams 12 alone and so next year would be 13 million what would the year after that and the year after that and the year you know and so um that's that's significant when wanting to support kids and do what's best for kids so from my standpoint I'm just happy that that we're having this conversation and that people are willing to move forward with this like case and caspan um I ca I think I'm in CA thank you and um as I told Lori I have a PhD in English which means that a lot of people have ripped my words apart and bled all over my work with Red Pins so I'm perfectly fine with them kind of picking it up taking it doing what they want with it um as long as it achieves the same outcome right which is addressing this um backdoor BS Factor well and I appreciate too that it doesn't put atams 12 um under a microscope as much as it could um it the other districts are potentially well although you know standing with us for the same thing um what I do know is that probably once this gets going it's going to be on a very quick timeline because the legislative session starts in January what I would wonder or inquire of you all is not knowing exactly what that letter is going to say but knowing what the concept's going to be is it something you would be willing to make a motion and vote on that once it comes out we can each sign on as individuals and we can also sign on as a complete school district and I just want to emphasize I think it's really important that as boards we pres try to present a unified front um you know because it just shows that we all recognize the negative impact that this is having and um there safety and numbers no I agree I was GNA actually say the same thing I think um if this is something we do we do come together and because I think not just us as a board and individual board but then when casby comes together and CA comes together and all these other districts throughout the state come together um that that just makes it that much more powerful but then when it is Bren Bren down we can say yes we're all we're all in this to ensure the state fulfills its promise well then I think we would have to have somebody make a motion to support this letter once it comes out right Phil can we do that well you're potentially approving or endorsing a draft letter so I guess I would want to say that you approve the concept of this letter and authorize the superintendent to uh approve a finalized version yeah I think that kind of motion works fine feels similar to me to the parameters resolution you did earlier tonight about you can issue debt so long as it falls Within These guard rails and if you want to adopt a motion saying we authorize the superintendent to uh authorize the inclusion of Adams 12 festar schools on a letter to the governor concerning uh proposed elimination of the four-year averaging uh mechanism provided that the final letter is substantially similar in tone and content to what's been presented tonight that's a long motion but good thing you've got an attorney now who's a lot less wordy than the old guy us [Laughter] to can I make the motion that Chris just stated yes you can if Stephanie has that it's recorded I think that's I think that's accurate is a tad long but uh procedurally what do we do if we're making that motion as a board so Chris is doing it as our board then how do we do it as individuals ual you can do whatever you want as individuals I think our when the time comes our individual vote is what is the support is right like our individual vote on this motion is then saying we as the person support this but then if we all support this then we're unified as the board is that okay yeah final letter I'll definitely share out with all of you and you may say I'd like to sign individually I just want to also mentioned the possibility that we may get feedback uh from the people coordinating this effort to say we don't want to clutter it up with lots of individual names because then it gets really long and they may want to just have institution names like case casby CA Adams 12 five star schools I'm not sure where that's going to go um but if they're looking for individual signatures I'll make sure to get it to all of you and you can make some individual decisions about that okay so I believe we have a motion a motion by Courtney I did not hear a second yet second okay is there any more discussion director Assad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen I director Potter I and then also too could it possibly be when you put down Adams 12 passed unanimously after Adam the Adams 12 we can again well will probably have somebody who's making like those consistency judgments across the board and they may say we're not going to do parentheticals we're just going to do it the same way across the board and just have the institution name sometimes that's more powerful if some of the votes are split so that people aren't just out there picking it apart but we'll see what um Case casby C I think they'll probably be taking the lead in this effort how they want to handle that piece well I hope the fact that we voted support it gets them going and gets it done yeah we will let them know that we're on board and look forward to seeing the final version or the final draft to consider thank you all right great job guys thank you it's the it's kind of a beautiful thing to watch the evolution of a resolution all right on to debriefing the casby convention um just let's take our turns and just give our Reflections so we'll start with director pter yes so um casby is always a fun time it's fun to connect with other board members and spend time with our board and staff um this year I went to several interesting topics um or breakout sessions and I feel incredibly grateful to and honored to serve on a board that is um not facing some of the struggles as a lot of our other districts are facing um I think one in particular that I was thinking of is I went to a student panel about gifted and talented education and some some of the struggles that these students were talking about were pretty immense and we don't face a lot of those same obstacles here because we do support that Community pretty well um and so I'm just grateful that we have the resources available to us and while we talk about a lot of the financial obstacles and hurdles that we're going to have to overcome um at the end of the day we still provide our students with a lot more than some of some of the districts in our state are able to and so I'm I'm very grateful for that and I think it was a really interesting um year I I it was a little little different we had a lot of our friends staying offsite um which I think was the first that I was able to kind of connect or see that um so we had like a good amount at the Broadmore but we also had a good amount at Cheyenne Mountain and so there was a little bit more disconnect but it was very peaceful there was a lot it was a lot easier to kind of get from class to class and not feel overwhelmed the keynote speakers were fantastic um I think one of my favorites was talking about being um kind and caring and the things that you do and showing empathy and compassion and I think that's something that we can all strive to be better at in areas of our lives and remember to always treat each other with kindness and so overall I thought it was a very good productive use of time and um this will likely be this was this past casby is likely my last casby and so it was just a special year and um I was very grateful to be able to go the last four thank you thank you Alexis yeah I would Echo a lot of the same um it's it's such a great time to be down with um other school board members and um I think I talked to more staff um from other districts this year than I had in the past and um that was really interesting as well I know most of you are sick of I talked about it for days but my most favorite one was the AI um uh session and I do think maybe a pbl um could be in order for solving this because um you know they know more than us my son at five knows more about technology than I do or his grandparents do so um it was I mean it was really really interesting to try to find um the line between technology being helpful and Technology um spreading uh fake and dishonest information and um the way that those technology bases uh don't take into account um racial and gender um biases so it was just an incredibly fascinating topic and um I think everyone should go watch it I think um it was a year that was we're kind of in this in between with a large Federal Administration change and I know that's created a lot of angk so I was really happy that casby had some um presentations to address that and I think that um us as a board reminding our community that our schools are safe our schools are welcoming to all students our job is to educate students um regardless of where they come or or their sexual preferences orientation or how they identify they are coming to our building and we are to educate them and keep them safe so I think that continuing to get that out to the public is absolutely our responsibility as a board so so um I when I attended casby my favorite speaker was actually the designthinking speaker um and it wasn't just because we got to see all the cool speed skating moves and things like that but um design thinking is sort of a part of one of my Mas so it was nice to hear about it and it was great to get a free book out of it um the by and large what I attended was the CDE the Colorado Department of Education was offering a series of um U presentations panels on school accountability as I mentioned before but particularly in relation to your role as a member of the Board of Education like what to do with that sort of information and how School accountability works in the first place um and I also attended a school turnaround presentation too luckily we are not in that space with any of our schools yet um I think to me the real well and then also we didn't talk about the real highlight which is getting to have breakfast with our Vantage Point High School students that's my favorite part we always have this super thin kid who comes in and eats an amazing amount of food and makes the rest of us feel really bad because I gain weight looking at a piece of toast um but yeah so we had wonderful conversations with them I one of them writes poetry which is fun to hear about the other one likes to read women's dystopian fiction which is also fun um so that's always the Highlight but I think it's also really important to attend casby because we get to meet so many other board members from so many other districts and as a district like Adams 12 where we do have our funding debacles struggles Etc it's great for us to also meet rural School District members um to hear what they're experiencing and you know learn from them it helps us make sure that Equity is at the center of any conversations we have around school funding that it also includes our rural Partners um and I do want to emphasize that right I think it helps us remember that rural districts are our partners I think sometimes in school funding we've been kind kind of positioned as Frenemies like H you know we're going to do this and then you you know we're positioned against each other so it's a great experience just for that reason to meet those rural Partners um and hear about their experiences um era yeah well as mentioned um casby's always really enriching uh and get a connect with board members across the state the kids are wonderful as always um that is probably one of my favorite Parts just sitting at breakfast and getting to talk to students um so I think for me it was pretty impactful tending specifically the um breakout session on IM immigration and so a long story short it was the superintendent from Grand Island it was during the 2006 raids of um ice raids on the the factory or the the yeah plant down there and um which so I'm from Nebraska as everyone knows my dad is an immigrant and that was the area where he lived in so that that plant actually was one of of the places he worked 30 years before that um in the 70s when he immigrated to the states um for school and so you know fast forward to 2006 and it was completely dis it was it was catastrophic for the community it completely disrupted the community it scarred the community it was awful 1,400 kids were impacted directly impacted um one of the things that I was talking about this morning at one of my kids school so kids go to Thorn Elementary I was there for um like a coffee conversation thing and one of the things I brought up is you know these are kids that were directly impacted but what about the secondary victims of kids that lost their friends um and you know my kids are in my kids are in that position and um and so any anyway I think that was just really um moving to here and brought things to the Forefront that we need to probably be having some conversations and talking about how to help our students and our families feel as secure as as possible I mean and it's probably not as secure as we would like but at least give them some level of security um that they might not have um so that was really impactful for me the other breakout session that I have some really strong feelings about professionally was cell phones and cell phone ban um you know and what I and it was really just more about how a few of the districts I think it was Jeff Co um Aspen and then um oh man I cannot remember now was it summit summit yes were the three districts that have paneled that just sharing their experiences and they all did it a little differently in different ways and um you know and so it was a very well attended session there was lots of interest about this topic one of the things that it really wasn't so much related to the band but um one of the things as I therapist that I've seen that's been impacted in it's inpersonal skills and that did get brought up I think that a brief conversation about in the in the session but it made me start thinking about how you know if you go to restaurants how many times do you see and I get it sometimes it's just easier you know if you want to have a meal in peace but how many people are on their phones and they're not even interacting with one another at the at the same table um and so that was actually they did talk a lot about like kids being much more interactive and those interpersonal but um skills and engaging more and playing games with each other in the comments and stuff like that but um even just on a broader scale it's transfering that back into you know them carrying those skills hopefully outside of schools and you know that was one of the things they said that they can't have they don't have any control outside of schools but um hoping to build that so kids want that more for themselves um but those interpersonal skills and that's really where we're seeing a lot of the social emotional impacts I believe again this is just my professional opinion but um is that our kids just don't have those those skills they don't have those self skills of how to how to make friends how to build friendship how to interact how to because they have this thing in their face and then there's the false dopamine and I mean I can go on and on about it but anyway I really like that session it was a great topic and um so yeah that is what my casby experience was thank you um I went to a session on uh how to have a relationship the superintendent board president relationship Bo and I sat in the back and had um made faces at Chris but no Chris did an awesome job Chris and um Matt Cook and and and it really wasn't really about us necessarily it was just in general this is how you do it because Chris has had a lot of board presidents over the 15 years that he's had to work with and we're all different personalities um the one thing that was a little different this year that we did purposely was um you ate your your breakfast in the same place that the vendors were so you were kind of forced to walk through the vendors but I like going to to the vendors because they're neat and it was interesting because um as soon as people saw there were people who saw me who recognized me from being from Adams 12 and then they had uh I was like there's like five or six people from different places that were all hovering around me talking to me because we have one of the greatest um and most important Bond projects coming forward and that's Thorton high school and um you know from people with Furniture to Architects the engineers and um and even curriculum so um one of the ladies um from the um one of the furniture places she says I've got this book for you and she gave me this book and it's it's a children's book called what would you do with a chance and if you're interested come to LR Pac next week and you'll hear it but it's true it's like we just have this wonderful opportunity to build this awesome new school in an area of our district that could so use use it you know we always talk about how um you know in the last couple of bonds we've built things F farther north but here we are finally building something in the south end of our district that's the lowest socioeconomically and we're going to have this amazing beautiful building and on top of it all of them praise Margie and Tim Margie Ammon and Tim dozel up one side and down the other they are very well respected and very um I can't wait to tell them that they're not here tonight um so that was really cool um and then I also went to the immigration one and also I think in there was an overwhelming concern among a lot of my colleagues in other school districts about the impending changes the administration and what that's going to do to the Department of Education that is a big concern um the the keynote the keynote with the H the hocky speed skater that was kind of interesting because one of my colleagues on the Mapleton school board that I've known for 30 some odd years he actually was at the 94 Lily Hammer Olympics and he wasn't at that particular but he did get to go meet um the skater and get his autograph and a picture with him I really appreciated Alex Boyer he was the final keynote um and the reason he was there was because of when we went to um youir and I went to DC last year to the National Association of school school boards Equity engagement he spoke there and um the president of casby and the executive director of casby um Lindley mccre and jual Yenni they decided that they were going to do what it took to get him to casby and they right as soon as they got back they made the arrangements and he was just so Dynamic and he actually did change up his presentation a little bit but he is a suicide prevention counselor and he talked a lot about that and he had kids come up on stage and do an activity these two girls um they knew each other they were from the same school and he said I want you to open this bottle of water but then he kept stipulating all these other things like you had to open it without your hands and without your teeth and without anything and of course if you think about it that's kind of impossible but because of that he asked them some questions he goes so what could you have done and one of the girls was very insightful and she said well I could ask for help and that just snowballed the conversation and it was it was very inspiring and I think the kids themselves were really inspired and that's the beauty of casby is having you know Grooms some leadership skills in in these kids and the line to get his book was out the door well I was into the other room and it lasted a long time because the casby board met after that and we couldn't meet for a long time because some of the gasby members were in the line but anyway it was it was truly um inspiring and Lori did get her picture taken with him yeah I just went up to him and said hey I saw you on DC last year and got my picture with him I'll do one quick ad and it was that David flairy uh from aelan strategies did a presentation lots of data that I loved including data at the state level as well as related to a number of School District bond and mevy override measures one of the slides that he spent some time on concerns the 2022 initiated measure by citizens that didn't make it to the ballot because that process started late didn't get enough signatures it called for using a portion of what would otherwise be refunded to folks for Taber refunds to better fund K12 I think you all have heard me many times just share uh frustration and pessimism about passing a Statewide ballot measure for K12 funding his message was I continue to PLL on this every year and a PLL surprisingly well and perhaps those of you who are uh stakeholders around this throughout the state ought to consider uh doing something at a future election like a 2024 and uh not get started so late as perhaps you have been in some past years so it was a different perspective than I was expecting I felt like the message would be just give up on Statewide measures you got to solve it locally and uh that wasn't what the message was entirely so we'll have more information to share with you as we get the slide deck and we confer with him to debrief our election results in Greater detail thank you and the weather was actually warm enough this year to swim outside at 5:30 in the morning all right stuff getting blown away without my stuff getting blown away okay governance process policy 4.9 leg legislative platform okay the revisions from last time were made from your suggestions and um if you look it over you've got your strikethroughs um I don't see a motion to adopt this do we need to formally vote to adopt this if we so I I will enter is there any well I entertain a motion to adopt the legislative platform as amended so moved second okay now is there any discussion did we get all the changes that everybody wanted okay director Assad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen I director Potter no okay on to review of board bylaws Phil would you like to lead this sure we are doing our annual review of the bylaws because the bylaws say we're going to review the bylaws uh every December or so I don't have any proposed changes to the bylaws this year but I'll listen to any suggestions from the board we took a pretty deep dive into revising ing the bylaws in 2023 and I think they're working pretty well comments I guess the it's just what's the process like if we do see something that could be a an item for consideration how do we go about doing that um you can go ahead and email Stephanie your suggestion and then she can bring it back to the next meeting for and hand it out to us ahead of time so we can think about it yes we can talk about revising the boards any board bylaws at any time it's not limited to once a year or to December so as things come up let Stephanie Lori me Chris know and we'll kick it around and you guys can talk about it as much as needed do you have any now that you'd like to bring up Paula no I'm just uh I would like to look at it with the that focused eye although there are some typos and I'm kidding I'm just giving pH a hard time okay on to number nine minutes I will entertain a motion to approve the minutes of the work study session of November 20th 2024 and the SP special Board of Education meeting of December 10th 2024 as presented so moved second discussion that was fast you got that out from last night the special ones are pretty easy uh director Assad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen I director Potter I okay on to monitoring report direct inspection monitoring operating limitations policy 2.7 communication and support to the board I will entertain a motion to acknowledge the board has conducted a direct inspection monitoring of board policy 2.7 communication and support to the board as of December 11th 2024 for the period June 8th 2024 through December 11th 2024 and finds the superintendent has complied with policy statements so moved second all right so um I will say that we are very well kept informed of what's going on in my opinion I would agree and oh jeez um I mean not only are we kept informed but I think when we have concerns or questions they are addressed pretty immediately and um thoroughly so very much appreciate that so I guess I mean we're just going down the line right um as the person who probably does too much Outreach asking questions I have nothing but appreciation for your willingness to overin me which is what where I prefer to be right um so yeah I have no issues with the communication yep I would agree I think um again being down at casby was a good reminder that some districts don't work well um or have uh growth to do and I think we're really lucky um and I appreciate you uh entertaining our suggestions as well as you do not um being somebody from this industry that that you listen to our and and staff as well and I appreciate that um speaking of casby I heard some um superintendent horror stories that I pretty much I mean I was just really shocked and to learn of some of the salary levels that our um some of the districts in the state are facing with their superintendence I am just immensely grateful um for your dedication to our district your dedication to all of us to make sure we're informed and we feel heard and valued um as well as your dedication to putting as much resources back into the students as possible so thank you for always putting the district first um and especially our students and I'll just say U I appreciate the two-way dialogue that we have I feel like that is the way it should be and regardless of what the decision or the role is that maybe make the decision having dialog that goes back and forth and isn't just one way I'm grateful for that and I'm grateful for the folks uh on our leadership team who often communicate with you in a more timely way than I'm able and I'm glad that you all um feel very comfortable as my perception not only in working with me but with others on the team when necessary to get more detailed answers or more timely answers so I feel like it's in a good spot okay director Assad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen I director Potter I okay consent agenda I will entertain a motion to approve the personal actions as listed resignations and terminations transfers and reassignments employment and leaves of absence so moved second any discussion okay director Asad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen I director Potter I okay and we thought this was gonna go on and on tonight um future agenda items we have a vacation coming up so our next board meeting will not be until January 15 um and you can see the items well I can see the items listed um we do have um some of the big ones coming up um new America schools Charter renewal will be up presentation there'll be some instructional materials Proclamation uh we have to um decide on the amended budget for the 2425 school year and um a monitoring report on asset protection and we'll already start talking about fiscal year 2026 so anything else I want to say to everybody that I hope you and your families have a nice holiday season however you choose to celebrate