[Music] hello everyone welcome to the May 15 2024 Finance subcommittee of the Brookline school committee we will jump right into the agenda once I pull it up um which is first items approval of Finance subcommittee minutes from March 20th 20 24 can I get a motion I motion thank you can I get a second Andy thank you Sarah how do you vote Yes Andy yes and I vote Yes next item on the agenda is acceptance of gifts and grants um Susan gave us a nice cover sheet um going through the with an overview of the gifts and grants so the gifts um there's $1050 in gifts 8 ,50 of that is in donations for the high school boys volleyball team um and 2,000 of that is from Project bread and those are from individuals to the volleyball team and then $2,000 um is from Project bread um for free meals I think we've received that funding for multiple years um is there a motion to accept the gifts Sarah thank you Sarah moves Andy do you second okay Sarah how do you vote Yes Andy yes and I vote Yes Susan could I make a request last year we added volleyball to the PSB gifts portal as a pilot because many of the sports programs were are basically using third-party platforms some of which charge extortionate fees to them and so volley was at as a pilot there was a question about whether accepting gifts through the portal would be somehow more difficult for staff to manage is it possible that at an upcoming meeting we could get a report from Kyle or whoever is dealing with that to see if it's actually pretty hand manageable and whether we could roll this out to other teams because again some of them are losing like I can't remember originally I think volleyball was like 50% or 30 it was some insane amount the money that was going to fees um so it' be great to know if this is something that can be more accessible for other sports programs and other fundraising some of the programs have fundraising through this they've figured it out other people are using um again it's not just Sports it's a broader issue but it's definitely Sports the portal doesn't have fees associated with it at all or it only has the credit card fees it doesn't have offer it doesn't have like handling or administrative fees that some of these other um Services charge right um is that okay Susan to get an update on that okay yeah absolutely I think has been working closely with Kyle on that anyways okay great thanks um the next update is or the next one is on grants do we have grants no grants this time right just the $2,000 uh oh that was a grant okay so can I get a motion to accept Grant I move thank you Andy do you second thank you Sarah how do you vote Yes Andy yes and I vote Yes as well and thank you to all the donors and awarders um of those grants and Gifts the next item on the agenda is the school bus contract update and so um I don't know if everyone on the commit on the subcommittee has had the chance to review the quick memo that's on page six um but essentially staff is recommending continuation and one another extension of the contract because it is both operationally going well and financially favorable um and so if Finance wants to the question would be if we vote to recommend to full school committee that this contract be extended any more discuss question from the subcommittee or are we okay to vote okay no questions can I get a motion to recommend a full school committee approval of the bus contract I motion thank you Andy do you second second okay Andy had you vote Yes Sarah yes and I vote Yes um sorry I lost the agenda next item is review and possible vote on not aligned hourly rates and stiens and this one is starting on page seven of that document Susan what I don't know based on this is what is the are these carrying forward rates have they changed the rates what is the um how does this compare just like can you give us sort of context for what's here absolutely uh what I've attempted to do here is to codify what um has been paid uh um over the last couple of years for these particular programs um that we offer uh the the original memo that I found was from 2022 and the information there was stale and there was a lot of confusion internally about what rates we're paying uh for the various um um programs that are typically held before after school or in the summertime um these are these are rates that are not included or part of a CBA and so the school committee should rightfully um approve them uh annually uh the so the funds that um were paid out this year are the same are are are what um are the r that I used in order to develop this memo but it is different from the last one that I could find that you voted um and to avoid confusion when hiring for the summer and for the upcoming year I wanted to make sure that you approve the rates and that I could then share them out broadly so Ju Just if I might restate what I think you said to make sure I understood essentially this is the current rates as you found them there's no increase from current year to next year no okay did I Sarah did you have a question you were going to ask I just wanted to know and what's our process in general to know like when we're up to date you know what what sort of current rates how do we figure that out is it by comparing with other systems or just by knowing sort of what's out there well some of them um such as the substitutes I did do a market analysis and brought that forward to the committee um in the fall fall to update because we found that we weren't competitive other rates here aren't um easily com um comparable in other districts because everybody has different programs and so that's a little more difficult I I would I think it was in um fiscal 22 there was an analysis done a study done I don't know how it was done all I know is that the memo in this format um is uh was the result of their their study um I don't you know but there was no backup to say where they got the information who the comparison I don't know if anybody that's on the call now that was here at the time knows anything more about that but um some some we can compare and we do and others are uh you know vastly different than perhaps other uh pay arrangements for programs in other school districts that sounds reasonable yeah um I vaguely recall that Joe Russo put that together Andy does that or Suzanne does that comport with your recollection no you don't recall I think it does but I'm not sure yeah the the memo I found said uh Joe Russo and Jim Marini yes whatever year that was that's when this yeah okay that was was right before lonus so yes that was the pandemic year yeah um one thing that I'm just wondering it some of these I'm a little confused by and I just wonder are they very clear like music extension rates just to pick on one that's right on the first page are those hourly rates some of them say they're hourly and some of them don't say so I don't know what they are if they're not hourly yes um hourly is my understanding but you're right that's inconsistent okay I can update that just so people have Clarity yep yeah that would be helpful and then and is music extension is what we're calling the Afterschool music that is a joint effort of Bas and the music department the performing arts department is that correct that's my understanding okay [Music] um yeah I think it would just be helpful to make sure that they're clear on the um if they're some other unit other than hourly yep absolutely and then on the part where it's esy and it has PSB aids for and it names ALC rise TLC and lab when you say differential plus one you mean plus a dollar an hour yes okay so essentially it's the same Paris salary schedule that we have now right because isn't that already in our yes okay I'm just skimming it cuz I didn't get the chance to look at it so do we need to vote this today or do we have the chance to look at it um um another time with a little more window yeah I when would the um next opportunity to look at this be probably too late that later than you want it to be so yeah maybe we just take a couple minutes now and take a at it okay yeah so essentially whenever we see something that doesn't have a per time we're taking that as a to be a flat stipend and then if it has a per hour yes okay and you'll clarify the final version yeah I absolutely will and then I can resubmit it um it's not a problem okay well we can still I think vote it and maybe you get it cleaned up by the time it goes to full school committee is that tomorrow yes okay Mar I would I be able to ask question yes of course go ahead um so I'm wondering about the stiens for uh child study teams and student intervention teams um do we know are we currently able to recruit as many people for those as as as uh as are needed I remember there have been some discussion of you know needing to possibly sort of put more emphasis on child study teams and in conjunction with that maybe raising the stipend at some point if it's not currently a limiting factor then I don't know if it's a limiting factor but I can tell you that those rates are higher than they were before okay so they have in fact been raised they have they were last were they raised oh last year okay yeah but what I can't see so what I see is the the memo that was sent to the school board that you approved two years ago and it had um rates for two years um the rates that I um I observe being paid uh this year are not consider with that memo I couldn't find where a memo was brought to you though it might have been I don't know where and when um so what I I I did was I simply went through what we paid in FY 24 with modifications that had been made when and how and by whom I don't know um and I Incorporated it into this memo um to bring forward to you so there there would be clarity around what we're paying and that the rates were not being changed without the the board's knowledge so this is kind of a reset I didn't have all of this information um in time for the budget so not recommending that we modify any of the rates because I did not include money for them in the FY 205 budget so so there are the rates if you look back at the last memo that I believe you approved though not entirely uh sure of that um um a number of these rates would be different in fact nurses were paid a flat rate uh we could not recruit nurses in the summer so that was changed per DM I don't know when but I can say that last year they were paid per DM so I just made modifications to reflect current practice so just just to be clear and then in the future we will you know um these will be brought before you consider and I'll do that in a timely fashion so we can incorporate any adjustments in the budget in upcoming years so those were updated long long way around to say Andy those were updated and I I don't know the answer to your question uh about whether they're having difficulty recruiting and certainly ask what does yeah generally I have the same question as Andy is whether any of these aren't competitive and like you said you had already updated the substitute rate with us in the fall because you found it wasn't competitive um I definitely am sort of puzzled by some of these but like for like you know the inperson translation is $20 an hour but document translations $45 an hour I don't I don't quite understand why morning movements $35 an hour but I don't like just but a hospital tutor's 20 it doesn't make sense to me um but certainly I was thinking that sounds like a good G morning which morning movement right $35 an hour I was like maybe I'll app I don't know what some of these things mean also like are all of these positions active like I don't know what coordinator of online learning at BHS means is that something that we actually using right now it's my understanding okay um there there were some things that were approved previously that when I reviewed it with principles and Senior leadership um we no longer offer and so they were eliminated from the schedule so everything here should be things that we're actively um paying people for okay does the do the beep enrichment cost beep enrichment is paid as an additional x amount per week for parents do the costs that are articulated here for beep enrichment are they fully covered by the fees that parents pay that's a great question and it's not clear to me if that's so okay I'll have to look into that okay um well I'm gonna make a motion to um recommend this to full school committee with the slate cleanup we talked about um knowing that this this raises questions for all of this but this is a very helpful um first pass to begin to get your arms around these questions and we're not answering all the we won't be able to answer all the questions right away but even knowing what the building standards and knowing where we should be looking for this and being able to articulate them to other people is a great first step and I thank you for that um so but the motion I guess I'm going to make is just to recommend this for to full school committee with the rest of that as an aside Sarah Andy will either one of you second is that a hand Andy I didn't see it okay Sarah how do you vote Yes Andy yes and I vote Yes um thank you next item on the agenda is fy20 24 Q3 financial report Susan I think that is you yes uh actually Di and did the document get circulated or Betsy did that get to us or no no I think the cover memo says that it's going to be um submitted under separate cover at the time of the meeting so do you have that Susan I do have it I probably queued it up and didn't hit send apologies we are uh doing a lot here um okay so I'll I'll present it uh which I was going to anyways and um and then I'll back up and I'll send it out how's that get it to Betsy and we can put it up online so this uh report before I have Diane go through um the actual Financial component has a complimentary um narrative to accompany it because as many of you know that there's some new school board members or school committee members here I have been um sharing throughout the budget process that um we're trying to capture some um increases in the fy2 uh five budget that um are showing up in the FY 24 so when we look at transportation and this big increase in the fy2 budget it's because we are running over I call that hot we're running over an FY 24 and so to the extent that uh we could see these areas that um were underfunded in fy2 24 uh we we captured everything that we could as of um January when I published uh the budget for uh the upcoming school year so I want to say that um and so this is really your first look at uh as we say you know we're we're running hot you know um uh meaning that um we we do not have sufficient funds to cover the expenses that are are coming um through as we process transactions in the finance department and so there's some areas that we I called out like transportation and um and there's a few other areas that um are also underfunded in the FY 24 budget that cumulatively um are are are causing us to overspend our total appropriation in FY 24 we still have work to do um this is not the final number this is you know as we see and what we see um at this point in time and so first what I'm going to do is I'm going to bring up the actual financial report and have Diane go through the numbers and then we'll double back and we'll talk about um kind of what happened um some of the causes of that and the actions that we're taking to ensure that um we close this year and can navigate the upcoming year uh with transparency and visibility um um with uh adding in some internal controls that need to be strengthened um in order to prevent this from um happening or at least we will be able to see when things are happening in a in a in a time space and sequence that we can take actions to mitigate them earlier in the year so I am now going to share while you're doing that Betsy do you mind promoting lonus I see he's an attendee but not a panelist one second arrange my screen lus is coming over now thank you and and folks see this document that I attempted to share do you mind making it um yeah smidge bigger or yeah even a little bit more than that sure how's that beautiful thank you okay so I'm going to turn this over to Diane um the first part will be the uh School operating budget um and then we'll look at special Revenue funds um so I'll I'll toss the mic over to Diane uh Johnson who is our school Finance director thank you Susan um as you look at this um you can see the biggest change from the second quarter is in the salary line that we have seen um from having whoops sorry from having a big um well a relatively happy Surplus we've gone to a deficit and there's a couple of things that explain that um and the main thing is that we were pretty significantly under budgeted in par professionals and we have many areas of additional compensation which are explained in the narrative that were very difficult to capture it was very unclear in the budget how much was budgeted and it was even more unclear how much was being spent it was only when things started to look dire and we sent out an all call for everybody to you know basically book their expenses immediately which has not then the practice in workline people tended to hoard their additional comp time sheet and turn them all in at once at the end of a project or later in the school year which basically means that all those expenses are invisible us and the finance department until they hit the payroll this is a practice that we have to end um I feel that talking to some of the payroll people who've been around longer we feel like we've got the bulk of them in now and the ones that have not hit because the work has not yet been done we have entered into the projection at this point so we hopefully have a better handle on where our salary is really going to come out at this point um in terms of outside services this includes um OSS Transportation distinguish from regular Ed Transportation the contract you were discussing earlier um we knew OSS um transportation was running very much over right in the fall um our current vendor was not able to meet our service needs in many cases and so we were forced to go out and get um smaller vendors charging higher prices to meet our need um to mitigate this impact we've gone out to bid successfully we will have a new vendor starting in the fall so we will have fixed pricing and all of our transportation needs met even they flux up and down and we hope that that will go a long way to help containing um The Runaway Transportation cost we experienced this year um it was a Diane can I interrupt real quick sure first off do you want us to ask questions as you go or do you want us to hold all the questions until the end a meta question because I kind of get wayed in my thought very good okay so Stephen will well yes thank you okay um supplies and materials we're running significantly under and everything else is you know what it is um I think in the equipment and leases some of that will probably um well right now we've got a freeze on so but the big cost drivers were definitely the big switch we knew about these expenses the contracted services for outside Services particularly S Transportation we knew about that in the second quarter um we didn't know the magnitude of it in the second quarter because those expenses weren't on the books yet and they came in in a flood um and then the salary change was pretty huge okay now questions Stephen I'm gon to let you go first and then we'll go back to order go ahead Stephen um thanks I'm happy to refer to committee Members First if there is someone who predes me go ahead okay I I just have a clarification question um when when you say that there wasn't visibility into the magnitude of these expenses can you explain further on that does that mean that are are we not able to track acrs before they hit the books or I mean surely there was approvals right of these expenses so so what does it mean to say that we we didn't have any visibility into it prior to them hitting the books so in the area of additional compensation there has not been a clear and tight budgeting process for all of these small projects that take place where people are making additional funds you know each school doesn't present us with a budget saying we're going to spend this much on before school after school homework help um so that we know that ahead of time um so it's all we don't the first time we see it is when the time sheets come in now in a when things are running beautifully as we hope them to do in the future in the near future we'll have a budget from everybody saying you know these are the things we plan to do W with these additional you know that we plan to spend additional funds on the following initiatives and then the time sheets are going to come in on a weekly basis and so they and us can track against their budget and see if they're over under or right about where they should be when it comes to the contracted Services there was some confusion early in the year about the approval process for contracts and the necessity of getting a contract and a purchase order in place before work started and and that is a huge problem because if the first idea that the finance office has that we've committed to expenses is an invoice that is the cart before the horse in a terrible way so we really need to work to make sure that no vendor is providing a good or service until we have a PO approved in hand because once the PO is in hand we've set aside the funds it's on the books we know it's coming and it's simply a matter of Po the funds are encumbered invoice comes in we pay the bill they move from a to exp spended and everything's great with contracted Services there's a contract that precedes the encumbrance of the PO but there has been a lot of looseness in this process over the years and people have started right away for various Noble Reasons I'm sure but what ends up happening is they're working for weeks before we know anything about it and that's a real problem that we have to put an end to so buildings have been contracting services but not against a specific budget and not before there's been a purchase order that's been on file with the finance office so that they've been able to track it that's okay thank you pal thank you U on the Personnel you said that most of it was additional comp I'm wondering what percentage or what amount of that is not and how much of that would track to fy2 as a potential issue some of it is additional comp not all of it some of it is um that uh PA professionals are about $1.2 million under budgeted the bulk of the money is PA of professionals right now so have we have we accounted for that for fy2 I guess is my question not entirely at this point um we are trying to get our arms around it um in term and we are also trying to get our arms around additional comp but we I don't think we're going to have a full and complete picture of ENT our entire additional comp expenditures until we close the year and the last of the time sheets come trickling in so is the parah issue because we budget a vacancy rate that is higher than what we're seeing or I think it has to do with the absence of position control which hasn't been operational for some time in the district you know it's it's easy when you have a good position control operational you know you budget all the chairs and you can't hire a person unless there's a chair that's empty unfortunately people think about hiring they think about replacing people and so it's easy to say oh Sally left we have to replace Sally but they forget that they traded in Sally's chair for something else okay thank you before we get to Carolyn I just want to ask one followup Diane on that when you're when you're ready does are the Paras um do the Paras represent any increase in Paras as opposed to trading in or were there like for example where there student specific needs that led to additional pair of hires um that is tied into this or was it merely that people were um lost track I'll just say of count I would say it's more we lost track you know we didn't have a we didn't have a tight head count it came with the budget so you know now we do I mean Susan did did amazing work to pull together a really tight headcount of what's happening this year and build that into next year okay so we're much better positioned moving forward thank you Carolyn thanks um and this is super clear and I really appreciate all the work that must be going into trying to get all this in in order um so I think I'm curious about the comp time I'm wondering is the is the comp time being bu are you seeing bigger numbers more calm time than has been build in previous years and is there any kind of policy like a a cap on that like is not that we don't want people you know doing work that's that's needed but um I'm just curious to learn a little bit more about how that works and then sorry I'm going to ask another question too on the I think Susan used or Diane said that a lot of the outside service um issue came from I think you said for out of District transportation so did does that result H how do we not know so we have a we have a budget for that for FY 25 so how do we not know going into a school year is it because people sort of decide to go out of District or get out of District placements last minute okay I think yes out of dist well I'll answer your second question first um out of district is constantly moving kids are graduating kids are rolling out kids are coming back kids are moving District you know they go from residential to day from day to residential um you know they go from one placement to another um maybe they were on a they were on a van with three kids now they're in a different placement they have to go in a separate van um it's constantly moving so that you know it's it's always moving we knew it was running hot and we did Mudge it more for 25 and hopefully you know hopefully if there's not a huge increase in out of District placements into 25 what we increased in the 25 budget plus the new contract hopefully will be okay but if we have a real surge in out of District placements you know that's a that's a toughy can you refresh me on your first question sorry I was just curious to understand a little bit more of the nuts and bolts of comp time and I fully understand and it's really helpful to hear that you've discovered that much of this is a process problem or the surprise of it was a process issue and I'm also just curious nuts and bolts wise whether you're seeing more build hours of come time than it looks like there were in past years and also whether um at some point do school do each of the schools have to have some kind of cap so that it doesn't explode in a way that isn't budgeted for um I'd actually say if anything it looks like it's a little less than previous years um what I think is the problem is the in congruity between budgeting and actual not actually the total amount that there's not been a really good way to capture it and to track it and so I don't think it's the absolute amount of money it's the unknown amount of money that you know that it just needs to be known and clarified I think it's just been too vague and catches catch can I'll give an example of that Carol um in the budget that we um uh what that we um that was approved in the FY 24 school year the line items were vague for extra comp so vague that you couldn't tell what was supposed to be funded out of it um there would be a title that would say something let's say like um advisors but there was no connection to advisors and anything specific in payroll that you could connect the dot to so one of the things that uh we we we're learning as we learn about Brookline is we learn about these programs and and I'll give an example in the summer we run this calculus project um we can't see where Calculus project was budgeted because there's nothing called calculus project in the budget and so we have a line that has let's say I'm making up round numbers just for illustration that has 150,000 in it but we don't know if that's for calculus project if it's for advisors if it's for homework club we don't know what is behind that number and when you budget you should know what's behind the number that you're presenting so that then you can you can one track expenses against it but also you know that this expense should be happening and so you can as we say shag information um because you're not seeing it process through and so as Diane said one of the big uh uh challenges with navigating this year was not having the budget detail to support to support the budget funding and um and then to complicate matters more the accounting code system was changed and we were not provided with a map from the old accounts to the new accounts so what may have been charged in one location at one time um the account codes changed and then even on the payroll piece not all of the staff that were being paid had an account code attached to it so we couldn't even take by account code and roll that up to see if that compared to a budget number because not all of the Personnel had position control numbers nor um did we know what account they were being associated with so um a lot of the it was it was like a um a situation this year where there was some technical challenges and then some some you know process challenges that converge um to cause this uh situation we find ourselves in so number one we focused our attention this year on creating the Staffing roster which is 80% of your your salary costs to make sure that your educational plan was tied to your funding and uh with the with the roster in place we can then have position control so we didn't have that when we walked in um we didn't have we didn't have the Staffing plan uh that that underpinned the budget for this year um and so we could we could I've only been able to share as we could see things um as opposed to being able to monitor against a budget that that uh that that we could um identify what the exact expenses were by accounts so it it it's been a little uh challenging and um and unfortunately we find ourselves here as a result not not not seeing this in the Forefront but in fact you know being on our heels and and having this this uh evolve uh rapidly um and here we are today so hopefully that context helps absolutely and I again I appreciate I I can see you are doing a lot of forensics here and and hopefully once you have a system you'll be able to to lock in going forward so thank you and thank you for the transparency um Sarah I'm gonna ask a question related to this and then I'll call on you um Susan in previous years and Diane in previous years in the salary there was like a $1.75 million lump sum that was supposed to cover substitutes and stiens so that still exists as an amorphous blob of additional money ah okay no it and and again some of this is related to Transitions and staff as well as Transitions and accounting uh code systems and trying to I think uh predecessors trying to transition to the Ed reform model that we're supposed to be following with varying degrees of success so one of the things um uh that that I think was uh surprising when we did the end of the year report is that over 2500 accounts were added um that's a lot of accounts and and the reason for that is that a lot of a lot of the way that uh budgeting occurred in the past was very centralized um and you you know that when you look at last year's budget you had all of these staff reporting to the office of teaching and learning but they didn't report to the office of teaching and learning but money was over there instead of sitting in the schools where the staff work so when you have these um um situations where funding's in one place but staff are in another it just gets really convoluted and confusing and so the work that we have uh engaged in this year was really to advance some of the work that uh our predecessors uh began and that is to move to a building based um cost- Center approach to budgeting which aligns with best practice uh and pro will provide that transparency but we're not there and and this will be an evolution you know it'll take us a couple of years to like get things really tight here um as we see things um as Things become clearer then we can tighten them up but uh a huge amount of work has been done this year uh to position ourselves for um you know better times ahead so thank you for that yeah yeah I think that's really I always assumed that there was a basis or a chart explaining where people could derive the stiens from so maybe it did exist but it didn't get passed along but anyway it's great to know that you're going to be nailing that down um and getting greater Clarity on I also think it's a question of equity you know why in one building someone should be getting a stip in for x and then another building maybe that thing doesn't occur because no one thinks that there should be a it's not a stipended position to me it's just really good to have transparency around who's getting money for what and making sure that that's happening in an equitable way so so thank you for that and and I will say that one of the things in the fy2 five budget is that each building has a certain amount of money for these these items right um that's at the discretion of the principal so we're not going to tell them what but what we're going to do as we get through the end of this year we're recording everything that we're spending money on by school and then we're going to provide the principles with an accounting of this is how much uh money that was spent in your school for these um we call them you know extra compensation which is for stiens and workshops and things like that um and they have all been given the same amount of money um in order um to spend in the upcoming year and then they can make some choices uh unfortunately will it be enough to support everything that they're doing no but it will address this issue of equity and the principles will be able to then see oh there's homework especially the new principles you know you you know they're coming in and they don't know about homework clubs and they may not know about some of these other programs that are offered here in Brooklyn and this will help us to um you know illuminate you know some of the programming that we do offer we can make some choices um uh locally at at at the neighborhood schools um and then we can make sure that we're funding things properly and transparently moving forward so it's all good it just this is just uh unfortunately not having those things in place causes us to find we find ourselves here now can I make too much comments on that sorry Sarah I promise I'll shut up in a moment just one is that some of our schools have twice as many students as other schools so funding them all equally um I think disadvantages the larger schools who have many more stud students who might want to participate in programs you know and so maybe that's what you've done this year but I would encourage us to wait that by the number of students in the school projected so that we're giving you know if you can only have homework club and morning movement and you have twice as many students to do that with and then students can't participate because there's not enough slots that doesn't seem like it's an it's an equitable approach even if it's even um true and the good news is is that by having this uh spelled out we'll be able to have those conversations yeah well and the other thing is by giving people money I mean as we just looked at that other memo some of these things are wildly more expensive than others for reasons that aren't very clear or at least weren't very clear on the face of it and so um you know what does it mean if a principal is offering X but that means they they can't offer I don't know it just seems like it might distort some of the choices made but again that's something to detangle over time I think um absolutely anyway Sarah go ahead you know we finally got to all my things at the very beginning I had five questions and now we're good so thanks no more questions no okay um I have one other question about um just the bus contract the bus so as I understood it the bus contract we voted was for in District and Meco Transportation but the bus the transportation challenges we're having are outof District transportation so we didn't just vote to extend a contract that was challenging right okay I just want to make sure my understanding was accurate so what you voted was regular Ed transportation and metco yep not that's okay challenges or with the OSS transportations thank you Stephen thanks um Susan your example about uh the calculus project was really helpful for me can I just ask you to to take it one step further just to further educate me under the old system how would then the expenses for the calculus project be reconciled at the end would it just be placed in a big bucket and then everything would just be reconciled at a very high level or or would there be bunch of categories or lines that would be reconciled against each other um I it it appears that it was done at a very high level um yeah so it you know which then doesn't allow you to tease out what you actually have funding for you know if if it's you have a big bucket and it's $3 million let's say um and and you don't know how the expenses that are coming through aligned to that three million you you don't know until after you spent the three million and you're which is what's kind of happened this year right you you you spent and I don't not saying the number is three million just you that for illustration but until you spend out the 3 million and you're only in let's say March you don't know that it was underfunded you know because uh you don't know what's behind some of the numbers and that's really in a nutshell what we're faced with here we have these smaller random buckets of numbers that um aren't significant and when we total them up it doesn't total to the time cards that are coming through and so uh but we can't tell what was in and what was out what was not included uded because we didn't have um the detail information and because we're new we don't know what the programs are so we we don't know what's in front of us unless we have a bit more of a road map than than um than than we can track within the systems here and another challenge that also makes it convoluted is that at the end of last year there was money left over in in federal grants that was expiring and so there was a desire to spend off uh money um that we were going to lose and so if you get into situations where you're trying to spend off money then you start pushing expenses into one-time Revenue sources which then when you're trying to look over time uh at at like a run rate or a spending pattern it it skews it because in one year you might see a million dollars worth of expenses the next year you have three 100,000 let's say and then the next year it's somewhere in between so being able to um not only Track by account but by funding and having some Fidelity to your processes will help you to be able to manage your resources um you know really with Clarity and we don't have Clarity when we look back I look at and it I don't understand why right I look at at at the close of last year a custodian Ians were charged against the use of facility fund well there's no money left in the use of facility fund and I don't raise enough Revenue to cover eight employees so I we fixed that in the fy2 budget I can't explain why that was done and I'm not criticizing it either I just I don't I don't know if in one year you have uh eight eight charged over here and then the next year you have two charged over here it makes it really difficult to be able to forecast costs and to look at Trends and patterns over time so we will clean this up um and we have done a significant amount of work um to clean up the grants and the revolving funds uh because we have a staffing plan that's tied to your educational programs now the last piece of work to be done is this extra compensation once we can nail this down we should uh really have some clarity that will help us to be able to make informed decisions moving forward to report in in a consistent way uh in real time and we'll be able to make meaningful um sense out of the numbers that we're seeing so I'm really excited about it I'm I'm sorry that we find ourselves here but um Susan that's that was really clear and I'm I really appreciate the work that you're doing at rationalizing all of this hey Susan if you will take a moment because again as you're talking about these these various um cost runs to also talk about the work I think the intentional work that you've been doing are you and the finance team have been doing with the partnership of those account building with the towns side as well because that was also some important learning there yeah AB absolutely because and this is another challenge right that the accounting system is not ours the accounting system is the towns and so um one of the um you know challenges that we've had is that the account code structure is the towns and the towns account code structure doesn't align with Desy requirements and so um some of the work that's being done that I began and and Diane has uh carried The Paton forward is with partnering with the finance team on the town side to um to look at you know our count our count codes and our structures and to make some modifications so that we'll be able to um print reports in a format that is customary for folks on the school side to use um as opposed to having to download information manipulate it put it in Excel have Diane twisted up and down and sideways into uh various uh formats for me to be able to present to you which is how we got through the budget season this year um you know uh so so that is significant um it's it's really h huge and Diane has a lot of work that she's doing um to prepare ourselves for this big shift that will happen over the summer where we're going to be updating munus um and again without having some of uh without having the Staffing plan in place position control in place the new account code structure in place and delineated within that um without tying the cbas to the compensation that's in the Staffing plan you know you it's it's really different ult to be able to have Clarity around um what your costs are and how they relate to different components of of uh of compensation and so uh we're really super pumped um that we're in a position to finally do what what many of the people prior to our arrival were attempting to do and that is to make these uh these changes that will really be game changers on the school side so yeah our our thanks to Melissa uh and uh the payroll department a huge amount of work's been done there um as well as uh Lincoln and uh of course I would be remiss if I did not uh call out our finance team too who's who has been uh amazing um and Relentless in h their pursuit of of getting um our house in order so yeah a lot of work there thank you B thanks um Susan when we started this conversation on this slide I think you said that people were um holding on to or sort of hoarding their time sheets has there been a procedure change so that there's a a time frame by which they have to be submitted so you know within 60 days of of the service or something so that there's a better ability to track so that we're not in that payroll crunch yes well we've asked folks to um submit their time card weekly um that because we ask and we explain and all of that doesn't mean that um everyone has modified their practice but uh what we're able to do if we can get and and then you have trouble damages be and the district got into some problems with that um this year and last year uh big magnitude uh uh the year before um because of not timely paying employees for the services that they rendered and uh um and so we keep driving home and um to staff that we need this information um at the time services are rendered so that we can pay that um so so yes we continue to have those conversations and and where we you know see time cards coming in that that folks have had all year and didn't submit them then um our payroll and and Diane are are following up to um explain to them you know what the protocols are are and the reason that it's important to follow them and is it because of the CBA that we have no recourse so for instance in my business if somebody doesn't submit their their um say reimbursement for mileage or whatever within 60 days of the month close they don't get paid they don't get reimbursed for it so is it because of the CBA that we don't have that sort of control ability well I would I would say some of our um Sops are not as tight and are clearly understood among staff and certainly even if you have S so standard operating procedures Sops um you you also have to monitor the implementation of that and um and make sure that staff when they come in and or transition into into various roles understand what you're expecting them to do so I think that there with the transition of so many people in all of these position positions I mean understand you have had a constant stream of people in your HR department as well as in your payroll and your finance department for years now and a lot of tacit organizational knowledge was lost and then as people come into the positions and they try to acclimate to Brookline if you don't have any any any documentation Andor any um um uh transition with with people that were doing the work before you then it's hard to impart that tradition and or Sops to the people that you're you're just uh uh beginning to work with so sometimes you know when you come in Diane and I have to see what is happening here you know what are the practices here where is the documentation what are the standard operating procedures um and uh we have struggled to find a you know um uh standard operating procedures that um are um are are clearly articulated and shared with staff so so all of this you know is is is a whole bunch of things happening um simultaneously that have that had kind of caused us to be in a really unsettled Place uh financially here thank you thank you [Music] um is this what we're going to review for or is there more for the uh there is Q3 report so um now can you read that I'm just teasing so now out my microscope all right so this is uh the beginning of the special Revenue fund so we have operating our operating accounts and and that is really what what our budget is it's appropriated um by the town uh for our spending and and then we have special Revenue funds which which are funds that come to us uh in the form of Grants federal state and private as well as some revolving funds which are set up in cases where we're where it's permissible by law for us to charge fees um and those fees are then um deposited into a revolving fund um and that revolving fund um purpose is is what defines what you can spend money um out of that fund for so I'll let d and walk you through uh the special Revenue funds we'll do it section by section I slide this okay um we start with the federal grants and we've broken um past reports sort of aggregated all of the the multiple years of a grant together and I've split them up part by Grant year because they are each year of a Federal grant is separate and I think it makes more sense to look at them that way so we are working on getting the old grants cleaned up and spent down um you know where there are expenses available we are moving them where there are not we will have to return funds but we're working um back to front so we're trying to finish out the old ones and move to the newer ones um um Title One title 2 a title three we have two years to spend them so we're still working away on the 23 grants so whoever is driving this if you could scroll down for me thank you idea we've made the adjustments with the with the salary lines um we still have a bit of overage here that we have to take care of there's um the bulk of this overage um some of it can transfer to the 24 Grant um but about 50,000 of it is salary is summer salary that needs to go to the general fund but um that will wait until we can uh make some movement and uh free up some funds can I ask one just question on labeling just to confirm when we say the FY 24 approved budget that's essentially the the award that the federal government gave us and then the revenue to date has to do with what we've drawn down on the approval is that correct okay corre thank you yes and what um if you'll scroll back to the top I'm sorry whoever's driving um the budget estimate was what appeared in the budget book and was voted okay and uh circuit breaker um we we expend we will fully expend that by the end of the year um metco we're on H pretty good Pace to spend that down we've been encumbering away there we did we did uh finish out the carryover from the old Meco Grant um all right can we keep going can I ask one other sort of technical question like on the on the mental health one from the state the prior year ends negative can we use the current year to clear the prior year balance or do we have to oh no that that's a point in time that was on June 30 the end of the year fund balance uh that had to do with cash received or not oh okay so so it was we were just waiting for the reimbursement I see thank you yep and then this grant is now fully expended um private grants have uh various lifetimes and various requirements we're you know with money being tight right now we're going back and looking at um some of the requirements and seeing what we can what we can utilize um and if we can keep going and then we're down here in the revolving accounts these are looking much tigher so any questions can you talk about Food Services a little bit sure what would you like to know um basically how like I can't quite tell from this given that some of it's point in time data are we spending more than we've made are we spending less than we've made are we on target um I think we're in good shape um you know now that we're getting now that the reimbursement is so so much more from the state you know with universal free lunch and I know that we have an incentive plan for a sales in all of the kitchens so I think we're doing pretty well I I think what they struggle with in Food Services is Staffing predominantly wait do you mean we're we have like an upselling thing happening yes H why are we upselling kids on lunch we're not upselling them on lunch it's additional things why are we upselling them on on additional things is it all ofarts yes it's all ofarts yeah I guess I'm confused why would be we would be upselling children on anything is your question if it's intentional well it has to be there's an incentive program to get people to sell kids like yogurts and stuff and I don't understand that I don't yeah I'm not I can maybe we can yeah I'd love to hear more about that maybe at a separate time but that sort of hits me at the surface level in I don't I'm not sure about that one maybe it's it's it's what what does upselling mean maybe might be a better I don't think it's entirely to kids I think that also encompasses catering so like doing um meetings and things like that okay so maybe we can get clarity on what's happening there okay okay um can you also talk to us quickly about base and if they're going to end the year I think we had a report last month right like they're going to end the year a little bit negative but they had a fund balance so they'll still be positive in their fund balance is that still the case I haven't heard anything to the contrary of that okay any other questions from others on revolvers Cliff I saw you unmuted I actually uh have been waiting for you to ask if advisor any questions on the earlier topic oh you you always have the I should have I mean you you generally ask so I just I wanted to I wanted to wait I'm sorry no that's all right that's it's it's not a problem um but I do not have any questions right now on the revolving funds I I mean I do have some questions on the material that uh was gone over um and you know I can do it here we can have a conversation offline it doesn't really um matter as far as I'm concerned it's uh you tell me no I think we shouldn't we can go back to it certainly and you can ask your questions and I apologize to you and the other members of advisory no worries there's a lot to go through um I guess I have uh I'm looking I'm kind of looking at I'm going to ask my last question first which is um yeah how what are the plans for dealing with this sort of a deficit um if at the end of the fiscal year or close to the fiscal year when you're closing things out um you haven't been able to narrow it uh substantially um that's that's kind of a first question um and and related to that I guess is uh trying to understand the timing of when this um uh again when this large gap really became um became known exactly when because you know while we've been doing the budget obviously uh for fiscal 25 um if there was information that could have been um used to talk about uh fiscal 24 um for two reasons number one is to you know show why things um more linearly why things were going from 24 to 25 um but also just to be prepping people uh because you know um to my first question uh the deficits have to be dealt with in some in some way um and I guess my third broad question uh is you know how does this change because I I've heard a variety of different things here maybe I'm misinterpreting a little bit but you got spending Authority at the building level um it sounded to me like you know maybe there were some people hired or certainly contracts entered into without um Central Administration knowing that you know how does that get rectified and what are the consequences for people if it doesn't get rectified um because you know because this is a real problem um sorry I do one other question Susan in in your research would you say this is idiosyncratic to fiscal 24 because we had a part-time CFO or do you see these issues um having been in the system you know going going back uh before FY 24 when you say 24 do you mean 23 uh last year yeah I'm sorry so for this year's budget for not for next year's budget for the budget cycle we into this year that was prepared by a part-time CFO wasn't it right yeah okay so those are a lot of questions sorry you I've been holding that much sorry that's okay that's okay but but I'm wondering so we prepared a narrative um to accompany this that I don't know if it's helpful or not to walk through because a lot I think many of the questions you've asked we've we've attempted to um cover in that in in the document or let me make a suggestion then why don't you let us let us meeting advisory the folks here from advisory take a look at the document as opposed to you know taking everyone's time to walk through it line by line um and then we can follow up um you know with questions you know and clarifications yeah that I think that's fair because uh unfortunately this is um as I said this the situation isn't simple there's a there's there's a variety of different things that have happened happens some are technical some are some are uh adaptive right um some are circumstantial um that collectively you know convened right here and right now to cause this situation and and so what what we've attempted to do is to cautify um as simply as we can so that that people can understand um um kind of what happened some of the challenges and what actions um uh and and we'll say uh guard rails need to be put in moving forward um so so that we don't find ourselves here um it's totally fixable but it's not something I can fix I Diane can't fix it right I mean we can we can take care of some of the technical things but yeah there's a lot of learning that uh needs to happen um and then practice that needs to change in order for us to get ourselves in a in the in the place that I I think people expect us to be we're the public schools of Brooklyn and we should uh we we should um we should do do better yeah I look forward to reading the document um and look as can I can I interrupt for one second sorry Cliff I just want to say that I don't want to skip us looking at this document I think this is an important part of the meeting and so even if we don't get into it in Great details I think that the question Cliff asked for example um what is the what is the plan from here or whatever for the rest of the year I think is important for us to stay in this meeting and not just to hand to advisory to look at offline okay sure thanks so some of the actions and happy to answer them I'm not trying to avoid answering questions I just want to know what's helpful um um given that you didn't have the opportunity to uh receive this in advance um so next steps uh will be um that we need to transfer some money from our salary line to our non salary line about 1.2 million in order to be able to execute purchase orders for things that were obligated to pay between now and the end of the year we can't issue POS um and so for Diane to be able to track from now until the end of the year expenses that are known we want to be able to encumber them so that we can see them and not have them hanging offline so in order to do that the way the systems are set up and I support them being set up this way I mean it's it's good practice right is that um there's certain triggers that if you there's not enough money that you can't just go ahead and spend right um Susan do you want to make this document bigger for every to see or no it's minuscule right now okay me see how's that that's as big as I can make it on on this is that helpful um it only goes to 200 and that's 200 okay it is what it is I guess yeah sorry so so that's the first thing we we need to do um next uh we're going to continue to encourage our budget managers to review and close out the posos Diane talked about this in in other sections we in this uh uh narrative we we discussed that further but we do need to have budget managers to review the P that are open and to modify them if if between now and the end of June we're not going to be spending money so um we still feel like there there there might be over encumbrance over encumbrances out there we're also uh wondering if in fact we are aware of of of all the uh work that has taken place for which we don't have a PO and that uh Diane has not been made aware of so so so that's some of the work that that we'll be doing also as Diane mentioned we're we're going to go through the next step for us is to go through to review the various grants and revolving funds to see if there's um to to make we're clear about purpose what grants and such were were um were were um approved for and and look at the FY 24 spending and see if there's anything there that should be charged off um over to the grants so that's work that we'll we'll be doing in the next um several weeks so that we can make sure that what is in fact in 24 um the operating budget is is uh expenses that that um are attributed specifically to to that and then if uh when all of that work is done uh there is uh there remains a deficit and I suspect there will be that we would uh seek a reserve fund transfer to cover whatever the variance is at the end of the year so those are the steps um that we need that we would we will be taking this year um going going forward of course uh um we have internal controls that uh will need to be put into place and um folks will need to be trained and um you know we'll we'll you know do everything that's necessary to make sure that uh the guard rails are up and um we're able to to have visibility um early so that we can uh proactively manage our resources within the Appropriations provided um so that answers one question there any other questions regarding next steps or thoughts about next steps so the only uh comment I'd make a recommendation really is um you know to the extent that you know a reserve fund transfer is requested um you know that means coming to the advisory committee uh and um you I think that uh a lot was said this spring uh and I think the folks at advisory um you know were were very comforted uh by some of uh what they heard um from the finance team this year uh and so I think that um coming to advisory with uh a very detailed uh discussion um not just about how you got here but what what you're going to do um going forward uh would be really beneficial um you know I particularly if some of these things uh have been uh issues that you can identify going back several years uh because you know we've heard about a number of things in the past but certainly also if if last year was idiosyncratic you know and because you had a part-time CFO and it's just it's a very different uh environment I I think those points need to be made um because it will help people uh understand um you know and appreciate what you're trying to do totally appreciate that so you had a few other questions Cliff if I can address them uh well you know of them was is the CD syncratic or not the other question and I don't know if you're in a position to really answer it is you know it's you're going to put in controls we we see that and understanding what those might be uh would you know play well to folks and advisor you happen to have a finance or accounting background um but you know the the question of and we did talk about position control in your budget message uh this spring um but the question of changing behavior and what happens if people kind of like ah they've tried to do that before and we're just going to do what we want to do you know what what from a personnel management perspective you know have you been thinking about or might you think about um instituting to kind of handle that sort of a a situation and I don't know if you can talk about that here but that's a question that that's a question people will ask uh and again you you may not be in a position to answer it here and that's fine I would just be prepared to um talk about those types of things so I I guess what I would say is um for me I I want to give uh the system the opportunity to um to learn and understand and I'm going to assume uh positive intent but um that the effort will be made I can say that in my conversations this year with with principls and Senior leadership uh there is an appetite to know and understand and I would say that as you suggested with the advisory committee that they they also feel um almost a relief to have these conversations because uh nobody wants to find themselves here um it's it's it's upsetting and um and so I I I do feel like in general that there is a willingness to grow and and Advance uh the financial Acumen of our team and I would even argue it's not just Financial it's it's management of Human Resources uh which is inter integrally related to um funding especially in education um and so uh how do we manage our resources time money um and and people in a way that um complement um and supports our other goals which are to be fiscally responsible um and provide a highquality learning experience for kids and this can be done um and so we need to um do some work in developing the skill set of our of our leaders in order to be able to to do this but there is an appetite I will say internally that's that's my my experience with the staff um there are a few pain points and there are some people that have um will say um as in everything some people are better in certain areas than others and so they'll require more work um should there be uh specific people that are aberant we'll say we then then you know we have to address those on an individual basis um I also know that Dr gillery um has had and and will continue to include in his Bud his goals um uh Improvement in in in the work that we do in TR you know in in the area of finance and budgeting so I I feel like there's some alignment there if you look at our strategic plan it really um calls out the need uh for uh growth and development in this particular area and so I feel like there is some alignment and energy um and Synergy around um uh improving um in this area so that that that's how I'd answer your question thank you as far as internal controls I mean we can certainly that's this section so after what do we do you know the next steps for this year we get into five important and these aren't the only ones right these are you know you can only tolerate so much change and expect you can't change everything in in the organization simultaneously because uh people uh will get confused and your ability to make systemic change will um decrease exponentially based on the the amount of change that you're trying to uh Implement so our Focus again Staffing is um really uh you know number one in my opinion um and and so position control uh so these are the five areas um position control um budgeting for additional and extra compensation um budgeting in general we need to strengthen our practice there and we are um contracts approval contract approval and oversight uh we talked about that tonight and we get into more detail on that um more specifically what we're talking about there uh purchase order management and accounting management and this this item in particular is um you know giving people the the the appropriate permission for what their role is this is a this is a huge area I've uh had many conversations with uh uh Lincoln down in the finance office about this you know it's really identifying the roles and responsibilities by position and making sure that uh people have no more or no less than what they need right now people have more and uh then then I I would argue that they should um because if you're going to be able to manage uh you know your resources then you need to have a hierarchy of of of approvals and so for the upcoming year for sure uh we want to limit uh some some Advanced control tools to just you know Diane and and our budget analyst and take some of those um rights away from other people because when people can move money around and you can't see it you report you you you prepare a report today and then tomorrow it looks very different because somebody has made some adjustments on the backside then you have to go back and figure out who's making the changes it's it's really uh you know it's it's it's h it's a problem so tightening down on that we've done some work this year we will do some more tightening next year so I give you a list of those and you know Mariah if you would like me to go through each I'm happy to if I don't actually I think there's a lot of good information there but I did want to make sure we covered the sort of plan for dealing with this um bit we are at 628 and I hate to make minutes go late that's a bad thing and we didn't get to discussing the town meeting summary Ben I see your hand is up so give me one second to just sort of preview what we need to do in two minutes which is we need to say that there is going to be a t a summary of the fy2 budget that's going to town meeting and it needs to get to town meeting before town meeting starts which is May 28th and Susan did you come confirm the supplemental mailings date with Melissa did you get the chance to do that yet or not yet the Sandra didn't she told me but I I honestly don't remember which sorry that's okay but there's we want to try and get the summary into the to the supplemental mailings um and that's something that Susan you and your team will work on in the next however many days we have I think there's still at least five days um to get that done and there's a nice executive summary that was already prepared for the budget already so it's really just refreshing that for um to accommodate the changes that were made to subsequent to the budget being published um Ben 30 seconds go um the first few seconds are devoted to the thank you to Susan GI and Diane Johnson for the presentation tonight the next few seconds are devoted to a recommendation uh you know this dribs and drabs that I feel like we're going through as a member of the advisory committee I know you're all working as hard as you can to uh find out what is going on and uh it seems to me we need a or that is to say the the school department or the school committee needs to be able to make a presentation about what's going to Ry and how it's going to be fixed learning something new every four months or six months is just not a way uh to gain uh well regard trust respect I think right now the advisory committee is uh boughten with Susan given we are so glad to have her uh on our team that is to say the town's team and we'd like to see a coherent I speak for myself I and I believe other the advisor committee would' like to would' like to have confidence in a coherent uh presentation there are issues fine we've all run into issues in our professional lives and our personal lives but getting developing response to them as as a as a as in in a large way is much more efficient than well today's infection is this tomorrow's problem will be that that's all I wanted to say thank you Mark right thanks Ben I know we're one minute over I'm going to take 10 more seconds to just say that there's a tension between being transparent as you go along and and which is I think what Susan and team are doing and holding it until the end to be able to tell a complete story and you know that there's a tension there and so you know do we get serial reporting we do do we get reporting much sooner than we would otherwise if we waited we do so there's that um we're at 6:32 I'm so sorry for the extra two minutes thank you all so much we will discuss this again tomorrow night at um full school committee and Susan it'd be great if we get the chance to circulate the document that we didn't get all the way through today so that um everyone can look at that for tomorrow as well thank you thank you Susan thank you Diane much appreciated yep and we'll update the uh this document as well oh wonderful thank you very much bye bye problem have a good evening you too