##VIDEO ID:gqOmPubd5G0## um well good evening everybody I'd like to call the Tuesday October 22nd Schoolboard meeting into order we'll start off by uh reciting the pledge allegiance if you so choose I pled ALG to the of the United States of America and to the for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you Full House this looks like a great meeting tonight we will start by uh the chair will entertain a motion to approve the agenda with the suggested motions and resolutions do I have a motion so moved motion by Stark do I have a second second second by Meisner all those in favor signify by saying I please I all those opposed motion passes next up superintendent and staff reports Dr Lewis thank you so much chair I'm absolutely thrilled to bring forward our students uh who are going to be doing a little preview for our year in town musical so you all can come up yay oh yeah yeah just put on the for uh Mr chairman uh members of the board uh superintendent Lewis today we have members from our coming production Ur in toown the musical um we have a good percentage of the cast here they will be performing a number called um oh look at look look at the sky um it will be sung predominantly by our lead uh kale Hol who is plays a character Bobby strong Bobby strong um other people that we have here tonight representing people in the cast include farra close Ary Petros Carol Coral bod um Valentina MUA Ugo Chaka um Natalie lson Wong zong Mimi Fowler Mo Al Shamari Naz Rudin Hussein Andrew Rylander Zachariah Muhammad and Michael har Michael hardell and we'll be performing that number is too loud don't be too loud the only way I get hit my nose is on my belt you got [Music] it she's a little quiet NE [Music] W off in the distance there's a beautiful Horizon all right folks you know the drill gleaming and radiant that's what I'll keep my eyes on same as it's always been and As the World Turns to face the Sun and start another day it suddenly occurs to me that maybe we can find another way look at the sky full of Hope and promise it's a shining ideal how I real when I look at the sky now who's first I am ma we'll take your fee now Mrs strong the improved fee daily we make them pay their nickel dim and quarters this is all I have Miss Pennywise daily we break them cuz we have to follow orders haven't you enough Mrs strong and we keep filling money bags with broken lives and dreams but what's it for I can't ignore these black immoral profit making schemes look at the sky high above this madness here below feel our shame in mop in the name of the sky here's all I have Bobby isn't enough hold on to your money ma really the fee is the LOB Bobby strong she'll abide by it or she'll join her husband and what if there was a new law in town Miss Pennywise a law that didn't come from any voting process or elected body or process of judicial review but a brand new law that came from an organ a muscular blood pumping organ like this one right here a muscular organ can't you see it Miss Pennywise well if this one's too small for you when I try that one on for size it's it's bling [Music] me look at the sky there's a great big heart there there's a heart in the sky there just is don't ask why it's the sky you'll regret this Bobby I don't think so come on Ma this one's on the house for everyone forever hooray your heart knows all things great and true the things mere brains could never know your heart points to the gra big blue where the people's Al must go tell me where at the look at the sky look at the sky when we look at the oh Bobby what's to become of you what's to become of all of [Music] us in the there a horiz f in the sky in the sky in the sky thank [Applause] you thank you thanks for coming tonight well done okay phenomenal job you can all stay and hear about the referendum or you can certainly leave we appreciate you so much thanks oh um can you get ug though he doesn't he needs to stay he doesn't have a ride okay got a little too eager there I think all right um I was counting it today makes the 12th presentation on the referendum so I know um for board and cabet this is a presentation you've heard many times this is our last opportunity from the board table to share about the referendum so a lot of this will be review for you tonight thank you by the way this video we've gotten a lot of compliments on it um just the Simplicity of it yet it makes sense and um this is one of our social media posts that has trended really well so I'm so glad that uh we did this video go ahead in 2023 as a result of a large budget surplus the Minnesota Legislature approved significant funding for schools but there's more to this story beyond the headlines with the new state funding there were also new mandates adding new expenses for our schools school funding is complex with most Revenue coming through a combination of State AIDS and locally collected property taxes the majority of our District's Revenue comes from the state in the form of general education Aid we also receive funding for specific categories but we can only spend that money on the category it was allotted for in other words just because the state is providing us with more dollars doesn't mean we can use those dollars wherever we like the remaining revenue for our district comes from local tuition and fees federal grants and local property taxes the largest portion of our budget goes toward paying our teachers and staff our people are our biggest asset and our most significant expense our budget also has to cover other things such as curriculum technology Transportation operations maintenance and administ ministration the state mandates some of our spending for things like special education services and certain required courses but many state mandates do not include enough money to pay for them so we have to take money from other important budgets to cover those mandates other factors that impact how we spend money include inflation class size ratios aging buildings emerging technology and the specific needs of our students and while we work hard to balance our budget every year sometimes unexpected factors can make a significant impact when we find ourselves in a situation where the needs of our students are outpacing the funding we receive from state and local taxes we may go to our community with a referendum to ask for additional funding each year we tackle the challenge of balancing all of these funding sources and expenses to build an effective budget School budgets can be complicated but what isn't complicated Is our commitment to using our resources wisely on behalf of our students we strive to be good stewards of the resources our communities have entrusted to us while putting the needs of our students first by working together we can keep our schools and our community strong I know right okay you can click to the next one so tonight we'll talk about our operational needs our building and facility needs our proposed Solutions the tax impact um in any questions and answers so as we've talked about um the funding Gap that exists between state aid and inflation continues to grow and this is not just a frle public schools problem this is a Statewide problem uh the bigger the district the bigger the Gap so if our state aid had kept up with inflation fredley Public Schools last year would have realized almost $4 million um um that's not the case but we just like to Showcase that so that um the public understands um how it hasn't kept pace what many school districts do almost uh 34s of them in the state of Minnesota is we use operating levies to help bridge that Gap um so operating levies are requiring voter or approval and that comes out of property tax base within Fridley Public School school district so this is businesses corporate and um household uh taxes that we get from property taxes I put this slide in here and I always talk about when I present that this may not make sense to be in a referendum presentation but the number one question that I used to get and now as we've talked about this more and more I just don't get the question at the same level um as we once did is why do we have so many students that open and roll into fredley public schools and the first reason that I'll talk about that is with Fridley Public Schools being a part of Northwest Suburban integration um School District the very nature is school choice so it's school choice for families that live outside of Fridley public schools that want to choose an IB Magnet so as we know starting when you're 3 years old and fredley all the way through 12th grade we offer the full IB Continuum um students May that are our resident students may want a steam magnet that's not something that you get in Fridley Public Schools so then they would choose uh potentially Brooklyn Center or another school district that offers that so that's really the first piece that I talk about is our seven districts that belong to Northwest Suburban are supposed to have open enrollment in and out by Design because of the work that we do as a part of the ation District um the question that I get about this is often times do I double pay so what property owners ask me is do I pay for students that are not resident students that open and roll in to Fridley the current um Levy amount is$ 5.99 a students so do my taxes pay for for instance a Brooklyn Center student do I pay $5.99 on that student and the answer is yes so so the way that the local Levy works is it's students that are currently enrolled in our school district where the confusion has come in and a lot of work was done in 2014 to change how this is um and how the funding has worked so I think that's where some of the confusion stemmed from the question is what if we have a resident student who open en rolls out into Brooklyn Center um so that's how that works the further question that I get is for for example in okah hennipen they have a much higher uh local Levy than we do here in Fridley so the question is if it's an Anoka hennipen student that's open enrolled in do we pay $5.99 on that student or we do do we pay the Anoka henen and it's the $5.99 so the money is for students that are enrolled on our local Levy amount people asked me to well I don't want my tax dollars to go to students that aren't resident students in our district so and open enrolled open enrollment was stopped and then there would no longer be open enrollment under Northwest Suburban our taxpayers would then pay on all the students that come back to us that are resident students also without open enrollment uh Revenue that we receive into our district that realizes almost $8 million a year almost $70 million the past decade so if we were to really look at that um Revenue dream uh going away that would be quite a significant amount of dollars that we would have to look at as a board to say what are we going to do with $7.4 million less so that's why I talk about this pretty in depth um and open enrolled students um really cause us to be able to have uh I believe we're still at the smallest class size for elementaries in the region and very close uh and competitive class sizes in the secondary as well so that really helps us with that as well there's also a piece on a referendum site about Open Enrollment and we've pushed that out a number of times on our social media and I will say that um when I first started my first meeting was the Lions meeting and I had heard it numerous times about Open Enrollment and what I will say is our community has heard this message loud and clear they believe the data and um now they understand how open enrollment works so I'm really proud of how our community has received that information and for many I will say they say to me like oh I've never had it explained to me so instead of arguing the point they say now I understand so I'm very proud of our community for that um our proposed solution here is to come on November 5th to ask our community um if they want to vote for increased amount on our new operating Levy what that would look like is approximately 1.65 million in new Revenue that's per year now this uh would not be payable until 2526 because it doesn't impact until tax is payable in 25 1.65 is our best projections based on our projected student enrollment so every year when we come to you with the student enrollment projections that's where we're basing that out of if we come in higher than projections then we would realize more um revenue from that same can be said in the opposite direction if we come in lower then we would realize a lower amount of dollars there and this really will help us stabilize our finances and reduce the projected budget Gap I don't like this part of the presentation but I always say to folks this is really about keeping what we have and it's not buying down class size it's not um new programming it's to continue um what we have now can we enhance our academics and do pieces that we've been doing of course we can but I don't want to mislead folks that this is going to result in new programs new initiatives smaller class sizes more course offerings because it just isn't um what we are looking for from our taxpayers is for them to weigh in on an increase of 424 per PW um and then this would expire its 10-year payable 2035 2036 uh school year how much will this impact our taxes so the average homeowner uh uh excuse me the average home value is a little north of 3113 in Fridley that realizes out to be about $163 annually and an estimated monthly cost of $14 so with successful passage of this If This Were to pass um when homeowners ask me so my taxes will go up $14 a month my answer is probably not and the reason I say that is the school district is one portion of uh determining taxes so there's the city level Levy as well as the county level Levy so when those tax increases come the school district could be a part of that but there's also entities that come into that so that's why there's the itemized tax stat Ms that really talk about which entity has how much another common reason that property taxes go up is because of property valuations so the school district could in fact actually Levy uh similar or same amount or lower but a taxpayer may actually see an increase depending on County city and um property value so those are just a few pieces there's also pieces about the expanding tax base in Fridley and again it's not city of Fridley it's Fridley Public Schools so depending on how that tax base is um expanding also there's uh businesses and pieces within fredley Public Schools is a tiff District so there's also some differences there when there's new development that comes in and by new I don't necessarily mean new construction I mean uh potentially uh buildings that have been demolished and rebuilt or pieces like that then often times the new owner has a tax rate is set where it um was at the previous valuation and that's typically between 20 and 27 years so that also impacts everybody's fair share of how much they pay so here is what we anticipate if approved it's a lot of what I've talked about maintaining our current class sizes maintaining our instru structional supports that we have in our schools uh retaining and attracting high quality teachers and staff and avoiding cuts to programs and Services I think um we've all seen the shortages that happen with um teachers and staff and we just want to be in a position where we are competitive um to retain our staff members and attract new staff members if not approved we will need to be looking at significant reductions to help stabilize our district financing starting with next year um also we will likely need to be on a trajectory of reducing in future years um I would probably come to you with a recommendation to again um schedule another operating Levy in November of 2025 um so that we can try again to get our district finances stabilized I always talk on this slide about raise your hand if you love to be below average so unfortunately we're not a little bit below average um we're significantly below average so as you can see we're at 599 currently State average is a little over $1,000 Metro average is a little under $1,500 um if we had successful passage then we would be uh still below State average but certainly not as much as we are currently and then um we would have made progress on Metro average this slide also I just want to make sure people understand there are school districts on this slide that are also seeking referendums so this can change um at any time as well next I'm going to switch to our building and Facilities needs we talked early on uh in referendums that levies are for Learning and bonds are for our buildings and our facilities unlike some districts um we are not looking at this to build new facilities we are not at that place our buildings are aging and we have an Ever growing list of deferred maintenance needs that we have to address and I always talk on this slide about the longer that you put these deferred maintenance pieces off the more costly it becomes and while this building that we're in right now is not uh a building that we're using referendum dollars for at the present simply because we couldn't wait to get it this is an excellent example of how for Windows and a parking lot it's $7 million and I do believe let me rephrase that our data shows us that last year we poured tens of thousands of dollars into this building and un mold remediation temporary carpet replacement pumping out the um playground so that's money that I don't want to say was wasted but it's money that when we secure funds and we are planful with our um deferred maintenance we would not have had to spend that money to be able to keep these doors open and to keep a safe learning environment here um and in Fridley Public Schools we're in a situation that our building and Facilities needs far out as far as financing them than the available money that we have so that's then drawing back on our learning bucket so our learning bucket is for things like staff salaries curriculum Etc we simply don't have enough to keep up with our building and facility needs so we're drawing on that money to keep our um buildings up and running um to the tune of $2 million I talk on this slide about catastrophic failures so when we talk about $2 million per year this is not and I always get nervous when I say this because I'm like am I predicting the future here but if a boiler went down that's nearly a million dollars uh as you know we hold that pool together as best as we can but we never know um with the pool and the pool it's kind of like when you take an older vehicle into the car repair you don't know how much is that pool going to cost to get it just up and running and I wish that we could say that the money that we're investing right now into our pool is uh helping us in the long term it's really just to keep the pool open so that's an example of a catastrophic failure that we just don't have budgeted in the 2 million um that's already occurring so we need a longer term solution so that we can proactively address our building and facility needs so that we don't have to be worrying and waiting another example of this is if you recall last may we ended up uh we were cited um and didn't take quick enough action in years past on our high school fire alarm and so we were literally um put on notice and we had to begin the fire alarm repairs before the school year was out last year because it was that detrimental to student safety and staff safety and some of you have heard me tell the story but but literally when uh the fire alarm would go off our building administrators would have to run around and check every blinking signal in the high school to determine where the source of the alarm was because there was no panel um and we couldn't do that and I think we can all agree that that's not a way to run our buildings um the high school fire alarm has since been completely redone so that is also not part of this month um because we were in an emergency situation and we couldn't wait as well on November 5th we're asking our community to vote on $30 million um facility Bond referendum if approved we'll move forward with a series of projects if you look at that project list which many of you have um that has a list of items on there um with rough estimated costs I would say the costing is is pretty good but when you're predicting out for 10 years you never know what that fluctuation is going to look like also I think we have it at 27.5 million and that's to give us interest and contingency so that's why it doesn't add up perfectly to $30 million our security systems are a significant issue right now in our schools last year at one of our schools on the second day we had a camera that was wasn't working at our front door the front door uh intercom to talk wasn't working um we hadn't fixed it and unfortunately our school staff um did what they should have they buzzed a person in and we ended up with a person that wasn't didn't have business at the school and um then we had a domestic assault situation occur uh outside in the parking lot that day and this is just an example that I could give of where we have vulnerabilities I would say in fredley public schools that we do really well with the equipment that we have I'll say that um in situations like that we're lucky and I don't as your school superintendent want to be lucky when it comes to S Safety and Security this is uh pricing in at about $2 million I want to be clear when you see the news about those push um pieces that uh push pads that school districts have um that is not reflected in this $2 million I'm not saying at the time when this comes up and relle leads the work around this it couldn't be something that we could consider but I just want to be crystal clear that that's not the caliber that this is priced out at next we have all of our sites are needing roof Replacements and our window replacements exterior door Replacements and Brook masonary restoration I think we can recall the black party for Fridley middle school with our exterior doors we were literally flooding that day into our building all over um and buildings can only sustain taking on water for so long and so much at a time so this is coming in just below um $7.5 million our next piece are flooring cabinets storage repainting um locker rooms and desks and chairs this is nearly $7 million when I talk about repair and replace desks and chairs unfortunately this isn't for Aesthetics reasons this is because we literally have students that are being cut um by the quality of our chairs so I shouldn't say the quality they're past end of life we literally had a staff member um two weeks ago fall in a chair the staff member was sitting in and it collapsed these are just pieces that I find unacceptable in our district and we can't continue um to do this for student safety staff safety um and frankly our job is to have a really good learning environment and I think all of us can agree when you're not stable in your chair I think it's hard to learn our bathrooms continue to be um an area that's unacceptable the bathroom here uh when whenever I ask people about this they'll say well you could burn your leg on the radiator which I think is true they talk about why doesn't it have a door um which I mean I like a door when I use a bathroom especially public um but what I'm actually showcasing here is handicapped accessibility so we can't even fit a wheelchair in here at all there's also a legislation from Minnesota uh Department of Education that was realized effective July 2023 um where we only have certain moments of time now a window where we need to have non-gendered restrooms in every one of our buildings so we need to also change um for that reason one of the uh highest use for family areas in our district is of course the pool and when you think of families you think of two-year-olds three olds and often if you have um as displayed in the back kids of a certain age that they're three you probably maybe have a one-year-old or maybe you have a 5-year-old right now if you want to change your child at our pool their diaper you have to lay them on the floor and I find that unacceptable um also our locker rooms the water doesn't shut off all the way it's rusted it's um it's not safe to use and it's not wheelchair accessible so we are well out of date in compliance of the issues we need to be our outdoor spaces as well I always say to people if you're looking for an insurance claim come to any of our pickup times at dismissal and you are likely to have a car accident um and that's just the sad reality right now we are definitely an urban footprint to the available acreage that we have in our district um so our pickups are very with student who are driving it's just um unsafe in many many ways so we need to be looking at how do we redesign that um pickup our our parking lots to accommodate for pickup our community center playground right outside here I think we can all agree it's definitely end of life um it's past end of life plus it's not sized appropriately um I believe Stephen that's like a 2-year-old 24mon um playground which we once served at one time we served kids of that age group we no longer do so it's a size problem but more importantly it's a quality problem when you look at things um like playground equipment you look at fall protection so when a student falls from playground equipment that's up to code chances are maybe they would sprain their elbow when you're falling on ours without fall protection it's a a higher likelihood of breaking a bone so that's just the safety aspect behind it our athletic and activities I get questions about this why can't students and families fund raise do we really need that why do we have to have um uh field Turf first of all field Turf hasn't been decided um that's a concept that we laid out both the costing long-term and short-term of field Turf as well as the costing long-term and short-term of grass um so that's available and we've pushed that out and that will be a decision that we talk about as a board and the board will ultimately be able to decide that um if referendum passes a question two and when we're ready to make those decisions I want to talk a little bit about our track right now our track is past end of life we are no longer able to host a true team event which was first of all great way to have school spirit and secondly um it was a revenue for us and a source of Pride our track if you walk on it it's heaving um and it's a trip Hazard for our athletes also um the amount of springiness that's not the correct term but um that you have in the track is uh virtually non-existent so it's really hard on our student athletes bodies as well our um football stadium and soccer stadium we received uh citations because we could not get the paint to be bright enough on our field um and so mshsl issued those citations we also were issued a citation because we don't have running water um in our concession so we're very limited we don't have bathrooms other than the Jimmy's Johnnies that we have there we also um are in dire need of our Press Box you've heard me talk about how our game my first year the first game almost didn't happen um because we failed inspection and we had to jam a rod into the Press Box um to ensure that it stayed stabilized we believe that the um scoreboard is from um 84 84 it's Justin ree's birth year so that's why I like I'm pretty sure yeah he's like it's from the year that I was bored um so um also when you're on the field um you will see our athletes and frankly our coaching staff will sometimes fall down sometimes that's because of the game other times it's because we have significant holes in our field and we can't um keep on top of that also at this time of year we were so excited last week to host the soccer team um the soccer sections and that was a huge honor but we uh had to spray paint a little bit to get our grass looking um at an acceptable level by spray paint I don't mean the lines I mean the the greenness and the grass so it's just beyond life also if you are needing wheelchair accommodations you have to sit in the visitor section we don't have the option for home also our gate entrances um um are not designed for a school district that's highly efficient and ensuring uh particular certain rivalry games where student sections do not ever interact with one another and that just makes us all safer when we have separate areas for that and right now it takes a lot of human power and a lot of monitoring to ensure that our visiting team stays enters and stays there and our uh students enter and stay um so just a lot of work that we're looking at are we looking at this to be a state-of-the-art facility unfortunately we aren't but we're definitely looking for this to be playable um and also fiscally responsible for our district we are really um looking at again back to that learning bucket question two impacts uh the learning bucket in that we will reduce by at least a million out of that learning bucket probably closer to $2 million um that again will help stabilize so if question one passes we've got a million dollars more coming into that if question two passes still in that bucket that I'm talking about for learning we have at least another million going into there so that's helpful property tax impact this is similar to open enrollment when we first started this uh people thought that it was fraulen because it seems fragant and through our public really helping us to hone our message and sending in questions and and bringing those up uh people don't ask about that anymore um so this really has to do with paying off debt so as we pay off more debt then we're able to bring on new debt through bonding and spacing it out um so that it doesn't have a tax impact to our district residents I always get the question well if we vote no and it doesn't pass then will my taxes go down and the answer there is not as quickly as you would think so um what happens with this $30 million if there was successful pack passage the district can borrow from themselves and frontload the money quicker but the first debt payment that would come off wouldn't real Iz until 2728 and as you can see on the next slide we will come back before that likely I I would recommend to our board that we come back before that to consider another Bond referendum just because we can't keep um peac mealing our buildings together in the manner that we have because it's just fiscally irresponsible to keep incurring these costs and not to have our Assets in um safe uh learning condition environments so if approved are Renovations and improvements would be at every District facility I'm really excited about this this is the first referendum that I've done where every building is touched by the funds so that's a big deal to me every um family can see how the money is going to impact whether they have a child here at one of our elementary schools or in the future at one of our elementary schools our middle school or our high school I would include um Vista but I think we can all agree that they don't need any repairs anymore for the time being so we're excited about that um if not approved our funds will not be available um we're going to continue taking out of that learning bucket um and I would say probably at an even more rapid Pace than we are right now so instead of $2 million I wouldn't be surprised if I came to you and said it's more looking like 3 million 4 million depending on what catastrophic failures we have um and our need for facility Renovations and repairs don't go away so as you've all been on a referendum website numerous times that continues to be updated here's our referendum site and I am uh touring uh the Rotary tomorrow is visiting Vista um I was going to do a referendum presentation there but as I took attendance informally I'm like every single person here has already heard it so I'll probably hype it up a little bit tomorrow but um that one was scheduled for tomorrow morning but we'll still tour Vista and I'm so excited for them to see that and then and uh I think it's 4:30 maybe um we're holding a referendum information session for the Stevenson community and anyone can come to that so with that I'll entertain any questions the board has probably same story different day though no questions okay I'll move on to the next part of the superintendent update thank you October is principal's month um so we are so thankful and honored to honor um gayy Iverson Veronica um Amy and um Kelly and they have just done amazing work you might ask why why aren't our APS on here that's April right where we'll honor them so um Lori and Mary Mary's back now have been working to push out um some fun pieces so watch our social media as we push that out um Stephen do you want to chat about our fall festival coming up yes hello board chair uh board members and superintendent Lewis thank you um we have a very fun event coming up this uh may you may have recognized this as our ECFE Fall Festival before we've uh rebranded this year and we're uh having a more inclusive event that is uh free it used to cost $5 to families but we're pushing this out as a free event and still with a lot of the same uh things that you're used to at the event so uh bouncy house some snacks for kids and some other activities so come out it's going to be a really fun event this year November 9th uh we'll have lots of similar famous uh friends and family there so just come on out and enjoy this amazing event and it's November 9th 11: to2 and it's for children birth to 5 so come on out and invite others uh if you're interested thank you so fun thanks Stephen I'm reading the room here um my three children are really over this presentation I'm almost dead I promise um oh okay there perfect timing I even though I didn't put this together I'm going to claim responsibility this time to try to get uh some attention back so now we're going to talk about our fun homecoming um so here's some fun sites from that it of course started with the dance and then lots of fun activities sporting events Powderpuff all of that and then we finished our week with a fun football win wasn't that like 80 degrees that night it was like a super warm fun um game and our band was fantastic and our um fley middle school and fley high school students uh in choir saying the national athem so you could just feel the school spirit that night which was great and then we have been working pretty hard on our new stencils and it take it's taken us a minute but but now um our stencils look really nice on the field and um homecoming night they just looked perfect so it's fun to see that um school pride come through as well okay and then we had the Apple run which was so fun so here's our cross country team we're excited for the first time in quite a while we have um female athletes on our cross country team as well so here's some pictures um I'm just going to stop here and state all of this canva work all of this is put together by Lori so she just does phenomenal work um with all of this and uh she told me she's going to be very upset with me with this story but she told me like three months ago I don't know how to use the communications camera and I said well I certainly don't I said but why don't you start using it and you'll get better at it and you can see she's got much better ated it so I'm so proud of all the work that Lori does to put this together to put um the Friday superintendent updates together and 99% of our social media you do um so just excellent work on that as well and now Michelle gets to share about Alex yeah I was um hello board chair board director superintendent Lewis I had the pleasure this month of having one of the employees that I support um when employee of the month for September um Alex Christensen is there and if you've ever been around the high school in the evening Alex is a familiar site who always stops to talk and share and wants to know what's happening um he's just a joy to work with um Alex is an expert at what he does um both in repairs as well as keeping our um School clean and safe and and secure um but also especially in the month of September Alex is really recognized for being a colleague to one of his colleagues that was um in distress and was supportive and um really um helped a colleague out so we wanted to make sure that we um recognized him so that was a great honor for me thank you Michelle and you can move on to the construction update yeah let's let's do that so let's talk a little bit about where we are we're kind of through our last year project so we have two projects that are in progress right now they're both at our middle schools we're remodeling space to add more space for offices um offices and and spaces that students can go talk to adults um in private and that was really important so we have those two projects happening um and also making sure that the environment that our staff are working in there's proper ventilation as well as the data um drops they need so just making sure our staff have what they need to really serve our students and our students have sa safe space to really share and uh make sure that they have space those spaces to talk to adults um we're in initial phase right now of a districtwide bathroom remodel project this will start um we're starting at the high school when we talked before about um gender uh gender neutral and single use bathrooms we'll be starting at the high school to um get them up and running so we have our first meeting on that project next week and as you could see here at the community center we're working on our Windows project it's going to be a very large project um great working with um Dr fing and Stephen Keeler about um really helping to make sure that we're able to do this project without disrupting services to students so Really Trying to minimize that for both our staff and our students so we might have some shuffling around but um we'll make sure that every all services continue um that window project will go as far as we can into winter until so we have to stop or we're unable to do it in a safe manner for everyone in the building and then we'll pick up in the spring and and move forward but we're really hoping that with kind of the thoughtfulness of the project we put together that we're going to able to continue during the winter and really make sure this project continues to move we're in the design phase project which is really a fun phase I've learned um being new to frle I kind of came right in the middle of a lot of projects so we are making some upgrades to the Fridley Middle School pool we've been actually out looking at different surf Sur surfaces um and again like not state-of-the-art but wanting to make sure that it's safe and that we're using materials that are going to last um and to come in years to come so excited about that project we're also going to be resurfacing driveways south of and behind Fridley High School so they're often Service Roads a lot of our equipment goes back there and there just needs to be some repairs there and then we'll also be upgrading HVAC system systems at the high school middle school and here at the community center so a lot going on and also um you know really looking towards that referendum and doing some planning about that um if we um on November 5th if we have a successful referendum um I do want to say because I also um support Athletics that we are 7 to six ahead in our game tonight at sections and um after a failed two-point conversion from our our opposing team team so I will keep you updated as we go on thank you thank you what you think the next to oh yeah this is great so really exciting so like this is a busy week um we have volleyball going on tomorrow t um and on Thursday our soccer team is actually in the state quarterfinals um we'll be playing Rochester Lords at 5:30 at the Adina Community Center so we are headed to State and I could not be more thrilled with our program and and also very exciting that our coach um Morales um is also was named the section coach um for our section this year so lots to celebrate with our soccer team too so please come out and cheer us on I know we're having a a lottery with our students they can get free tickets um if they're um they've got things ready to go and um their attendance has been up so we want to make sure we have as many fans there as possible to support where he's going to tell you another update oh update I wasn't watching my phone because I was trying to pay attention here but uh we have one so we are on to the next game which will be Saturday um against Totino Grace so yes so we're ready to go oh really it'll be at gra so cool yes yeah so thank you relle that's all I have for tonight uh thanks for letting me do the super size report tonight awesome thanks for the presentations and updates um okay so now we're up to some business action items uh the chair would entertain a motion specific to accepting gifts uh the following persons donated to our early childhood education Cup Foods they've donated school supplies for students and apples and gift cards for the Fall Festival and then Quick Trip donated $100 and gift cards also for the Fall Festival do I have have a motion to accept these gifts so moved do I have a second uh this is a roll call vote Miss Anna oh hi Miss Jones hi Mr car up as I Mr Keeler hi Mr Meisner hi Miss St I motion passes next up we have the chair to entertain a motion for the mshl a foundation Grant to support the School's application to the Minnesota State High School league foundation for form a grant to offset Student Activity fees do I have a motion so moved motion by Keeler second by Anna again another roll call vote Miss Anna I Miss Jones I Mr carop I uh Mr Keeler hi Mr Meisner hi Miss Stark hi motion passes next up the chair would entertain a motion for Consolidated polling places here at FCC to approve a combined polling place for voting on School District elections not held on the day of a Statewide County or municipal election do I have a motion so motion made by Meisner do I have a second we'll go keer another roll call Miss Anna hi Miss Jones hi Mr carop as I Mr Keeler hi Mr Meisner hi Miss Stark I motion passes uh last up as far as this portion goes uh the chair entertain a motion to accept the consent agenda to approve uh the agenda including the minutes of the business meeting held on September 17th Financial reports for July and August new contracts amendments leaves of absence resignations and terminations and Assurance of compliance for 2024 2025 all those in favor please signify by saying I I all those opposed all right uh next up we have some important dates uh coming up on October 23rd at Stevenson we have a PT meeting at 5:00 obviously at Stevenson Elementary and also on October 23rd at 7:00 at the frle high school a Auditorium you have MHS induction ceremony that's at 7 um as mentioned we'll also have the sectional soccer game uh I believe it's in right at 5:30 um on October 25th at Hayes Elementary there'll be the um Haze fall color run and then we also have a fun run at Stevenson on Halloween on October 31st at the Fridley High School we have the Minnesota ACC college fair on November 1st at 9:00 a.m. and then we have no school on November 5th for uh evaluations and planning days no school for staff development on November 5th which is also uh the day to get out to vote on November 7th at 7:00 a.m. at the Fridley High School we have a student wellness meeting and then as uh stepen had mentioned we have the Fall Festival here at the community center on November 9th and then we have another Stevenson PTO meeting on November 13th at 5:00 and then as we started the meeting off with today we have our Fridley High School fall musical year in town November 15th 16th 21st 22nd and 23rd obviously here at the Fridley Auditorium and then lastly the next meeting for the Fridley Public Schools board meeting will be here at the community center and November November 19th at 5:30 p.m. for the working session 7:00 for public comment and 7:30 for the business meeting with that the chair would entertain a motion to adjourn a motion to adjourn motion by Meisner do I have a second by Anna all those in favor signified by saying I I all those opposed motion passes we are adjourned at 8:27 thank you very much everybody