##VIDEO ID:B0z367FaL3Y## that was loud good evening everyone and welcome to the Holy Oak school committee meeting today is September 23rd 2024 and we are starting on time 6: PM roll call please miss Feliciano mayor Garcia here fa here Williams present Dr Rivera here Mr willan here Kore Miss Wilson here we're missing one more oh Mr Sheen sorry excuse me all rise for the Pledge of Allegiance States all right just going over this one rule that we read each time and so on March 29th 2023 Governor Healey signed into law and act relative to extending certain state of emergency accommodations which among other things extends the expiration of the provisions pertaining to the open meeting law to March 31st 2025 specifically this extension allow allows public bodies to continue holding meetings remotely without a quorum of the public body physically present at a meeting location and to provide adequate alternative access to remote meetings the ACT does not make any new changes to the open meeting law other than extending the expiration date of the temporary Provisions regarding remote meetings from March 31st 2023 to March 31st 2025 pursuant to Mass General laws chapter 30A section 20 I am hereby informing all attendees that a video and audio recording is being made of the meeting and the meeting is being live streamed and run live on the city's Community TV channel this evening moving on to um agenda item two student showcase we don't have any um this evening um we're going to start in October um Miss Feliciano did anybody submit for public comment no okay great moving on to Communications and reports student reports um I don't see anyone from pooke high school north campus but are they on Zoom hold on a second Evan is trying just resend him yeah I know Evan was trying to get on we can come back to that we're just going to continue going when he's fully on just like give me like a heads up or something so moving on to superintendent Communications um I don't have anything is there anything that you needed to share um Mr SoDo no I I shared an update uh as I I I shared an update last week with the uh school committee um on some of the questions that had come up in the last meeting and I think that you wanted to have that on the agenda just in case question we're going to move that into October's meeting yep um for vice chair report I have nothing to report this evening um moving on to new business um alternate delegate to the annual masc conference for November 24 reason that this was put on the agenda is because the alternate was Dr cavera is there a motion to appoint another person uh Mr Sheen I'll appoint uh Dr Rivera colog now all right any discussion everybody remember our delegate is Miss Wilson this is for the alternate so we don't have anybody on Zoom right no because it's just Mr cmore so all those in favor say I hi hi any opposed any abstained great motion passes congratulations Dr Rivera cologne next is updates of committees move to table we have a second second any discussion all those in favor say I I I any opposed motion passes ongoing business um policy revision uh we have policy ba school committee operational goal baa evaluation of school committee operational procedures BB school committee legal status bbaa School Committee Member Authority remember these are the ones that were we already put in the recommendations were posted for feedback came back there's no feedback so is there a motion to vote to recommend that the student super intendent receiver adopts said policies I'd like to make a motion to take his package okay second that well the motion is for all of them the way the motion was written it was says adopt said policies ba ba thank you as revised so is are you sticking with the motion I'm gonna stay with motion thank you okay and we have a second by Miss tensley Williams any discussion all those in favor say I I I any opposed great motion passes so Mr superintendent receiver our hope is that you adopt said policies as revised moving on to ongoing business B Ward vacancy appointment as everybody received move to receive in front of their table yes so we have a motion move to receive second the legal opinion we have a second by Miss Wilson any discussion all those in favor say I I I any opposed great passes now process of filling Ward vacancy position actually it was also written in this legal opinion but I know that we had talked about for um Miss McGee Brena Murphy sorry I'm not sure if it's still Bren um Murphy ly Murphy ly my apologies um the city clerk did she provide her input mayor or um the uh the uh solicitors uh connected with her but just so you're aware and Devin pointed it out to me earlier today was um uh the appoint the actual appointing is done by the uh the the city clerk not the chair of the committee um but yeah so I did meet with the city clerk we went over the opinion um and she's on the same page and happy to um do the vote accordingly um in the opinion if you haven't read it the question was asked we got we're appointing two people if the first person is appointed can that person engage in an opinion it says yes the person should be sworn in immediately in the opinion it says the mayor swears the person in but to my understanding that's not accurate um uh but whatever the case that person will get sworn in and participate in the voting for the next candidate okay great so we all know what the process is going to be and I I think what's important is that um for the city council for us to let them know at the beginning of the meeting how the process is going to go as per the legal opinion um Miss Wilson so my only question is do we do it um by numerical order of the ward um because we know the process of swearing one in but do we flip a coin as to who which which person we vote for you know we receive information about and then vote I'm just wondering because we have the process of swearing them in but I mean there's various ways that it could be done it could also be done who submitted the the resignation first you know so w four technically submitted their resignation first or we could put both numbers in a hat and pull from the hat and see which W you know which W is going to go up first resignation idea is I like I like so go ahead Miss Wilson um I like um it based upon who resigned first I feel that that's um an appropriate Manner and I I like that suggestion and I feel that we should go with that so is that a motion that we're gonna yes I would like to make the motion that we process um during the joint meeting based upon who resigned first so that would be Ward four first okay is there a second I have a second by Mr Sheen is there any discussion so I would suggest um Madam Vice chair that you connect with the council president prior to the start of that meeting and make sure you two are on the same page when describing the the ground rules we'll do and what we'll also do is that once me and her talk then obviously we're going to let everybody know at that given point how the process is going to be so that as well those in the audience the only thing that I'm foreseeing is that at this moment the candidates will not will at that time after you pick your W four is when they're going to be provided with the the resume and the letter of intent of your W one positions so they're going to have to read fast Mr Shen public document can't we just give it to anyone and correct only to the W four because we wouldn't do it to the W one one I mean why couldn't we swear the ward one and immediately after they oh Miss Wilson why can't we swear um the ward one in after they're voted in so that they're they're ready to go I'm just wondering I I'm just not sure if the city council's happening immediate meeting at thereafter I know we're not going to have any action to take but then they'll be sworn in and ready to move forward as a member well what I was talking about was W four so that then they can vote to appoint the next one okay so they would have to have access to the W one applicants whoever gets chosen from Ward four because they're once they're appointed they're understand you now thank you I was disconnected so I apologize guess we'll just figure that all out or speed reading mayor so just for folks at home the other question that was asked by this body at our last meeting was if whether or not the folks being appointed into the ward seats had to live in the ward and the legal opinion is yes you have to live in the ward so we can't um uh vote to appoint folks to represent a war that they don't live in thank you all right so with all that said and done we're moving on to oh was he wasn't able to log in to the okay yeah but you didn't do the boot right we're in discussion for the motion on the table y yep I'm sorry can somebody please tell me what the motion we did that one already you were very quick with it and that was that was a discussion we were in discussion okay hold on a minute we went through Section B which was Ward vacancy appointment and it was to vote to receive the legal opinion Mr Sheen immediately asked mve the motion to receive the legal opinion then we went into section c after that vote which is process of filling Ward vacancy position that's when I said it's also kind of written in here and then that's where we started discussing it I know that you put in a motion Miss Wilson that uh to do it was to where we who was going to go first who's going to go first and we said Ward four would go for first because it would be based on the resignation date is that the one that we didn't do the vote yet on we just kept discussing Miss Feliciano did we did we do a full vote of that one no you did not okay so going on that motion where the first candidate to be appointed appointed would be from W four based on um the time of the resignation being submitted okay so that was Miss Wilson seconded by was it Miss Williams or was it Mr Sheen I believe it was Mr Sheen Mr Shen okay any further discussion on that motion no all those in favor I any opposed okay so motion passes now we're move right into our masc training on budget process including the development and of guidelines and [Laughter] priorities and I'm being told that we are not being broadcasted can we check into that what take a 5 minute recess and reconvene at 6:20 I have a motion with a second um we're going to take a five minute recess any all those in favor I any opposed okay we 65 p.m. um we're taking a recess we should return in 6:20 so Anthony e e e e e e e e e e e five four three two good evening and we're back again um roll call please miss Feliciano mayor Garcia here M fave here Mr she Miss tensy Williams present Dr Rivera cologne here Mr wellan here Mr colore Miss Wilson here great excellent so moving on um I'd like to welcome the executive director for um the Massachusetts Association of school committees Glenn coocher as well as our previous um assistant to the school committee um and our current field director yes Liz leond we're happy to have her back um so we're moving on as I mentioned before we went into our moment of recess uh we're moving on to the masc training budget process including the development of guidelines and priorities so I pass over the microphone to Mas that happen all have copies and I did bring extras will be shown to you through a a screen share that Irene is going to pull up some of you may recognize the format but uh see a lot of different information from what you have seen before and please please feel free to interrupt okay bless you again go okay and how do we change slides okay screen get a screen share I attribute this as payback all the friends I abused for being nerds who grew up to be computer people and made these things difficult to understand screen share doing screen share sorry I can't hear you so while you guys are trying to do that I'm going to ask Mr wahan to provide an update to his finance committee meeting that he had because I know you guys went over some things um that were part of the the draft plan or the capacity building plan Mr wahan thank you yeah we met at um the finance commit finance and operations commit met on September 16th um I'm gonna have Mr wahan just give his update because this is part of the what we're going to be discussing go ahead we had a full meeting um know uh our uh Finance director was there he sort of leted us through the um um agenda I know we just talked about um setting up future meetings we talked about a calendar mov forward so we're going to try to have two me per month probably um till the end of the year um specific questions just on um the maining money to be spent for uh fer funding um talked about fixing boilers just kind of the Hands-On approach of where the money's going I know we had um um some decent spend in for playgrounds um windows at um um windows at um McMahon windows at duny who that type of stuff so it was a positive meeting uh again we talked about just the um overall budget presentation how we want to um um um we're kind of looking for some guidance tonight from Glenn on just how to um work at the warrants thank you oh Mr SoDo yeah thank you for the update I just wanted to also name that um we did uh look at a list of any grants uh grants and gifts that were received um since the last meeting and and we reviewed any contracts or we we also provide Ed a list of any large contracts that were greater than $100,000 which was um one of the commitments that we had made in terms of involving the school committee more around finances those were two uh big things that happened that night in addition to looking at the full B budget process calendar for the upcoming school year thank you hey Mr coocher okay thank you very much uh being a school Committee Member comes as surpris to a lot of people when they learn their roles and responsibilities among them are uh some serious responsibilities related to budget you all know the basic responsibilities making policy hiring a superintendent supervising and evaluating the superintendent engaging in formulating the budget and monitoring the budget as the year goes on and being the employ lawyer of record for collective bargaining but can we there's the legal Citation for those of you who need it but trust me it's there I do want to say before I um continue superintendent provided me with this document which is your budget um this is an exemplary document a lot of the things that you see here reflect some of the things that good boards are supposed to do but which boards do not always do and some of our boards have had very bad media days because they found out that they've overex spended their budget that they approved collective bargaining agreements that they couldn't afford in the first place and that other cost factors uh people were not paying attention to the budget superintendent wasn't following the budget the business manager wasn't acting on the budget you're very for it and don't look for trouble where no trouble exists and and I think you will find this uh as final document for the budget as you will find in most districts so uh have a series of steps here you appoint the superintendent and you confirm the appointment of the school business officer very important reason why school committee as the elected body by the well to be the elected body elected by the people in a representative democracy as a fiduciary responsibility over finances your job is to watch the money and do the things necessary to make sure that the money is spent well used well and invested appropriately and the business officer is the person who largely has that responsibility with the superintendent hence you appoint the business officer Glen I have a quick question yes so when we're talking about the confirming of the appointment of school business officer now I'm thinking about when when we get back local control right at this moment we have Sean right Sean and then when you have whether it's an interim superintendent whatever that first day we would have to confirm the appointment of the school business officer it depends on whether or not the business officer has a contract if the com business officer has a contract uh the school committee will be required to approve subsequent contracts okay so if your business officer has a three-year contract and it's year one the business officer has two years left in the contract so we would just confirm the the remaining years of that contract really what got a contract and that contract I'm talking about when we exit receivership because now it becomes the the pointed by the state right now to so then when we do exit whenever that may be it's as if we'd have we would have to then confirm that yes we're going to continue with his current contract um however the reason it's called the reason it's called a contract is so that it can't be broken so you stay for the rest of the contract he stays for the rest and then you will have the option of renewing the contract or or uh or relying on the superintendent to uh make another recommendation and and going in a different direction okay it is fa remember just with has the authority of so every decision over the past year has been school so every policy that's been approved everything automatically become like it's the school committee their Authority as the has worked in that action that one of the nothing changes change it or with Personnel contracts dealt with part of the fiduciary responsibility is that you monitor revenue and spending that you have a spending plan that the money is put in the specific places so that you know where it is so that you can ensure that things are accurate and at some point during the year if it becomes necessary to move money around school committee will have the authority to Define how that money is moved around we'll talk about that in a little bit now your budget process is also full of policy and the school committee approves policies some of which are related to the budget some of which are not so budget and policy go hand inand but it's also important that school school committee members understand the elements of School Finance now you don't need to be terrified by this because school Finance is arithmetic it's not calculus it's not trigonometry it's arithmetic so you can understand it if people take the time to explain it to you and if you take the time during the budget process to be very thoughtful about it and as you can see school committee sets the uh they do they do a number of things related to the budget but first thing that is important about the budget is that you set your goals upon which the superintendent can base his goals and where the school district can develop a set of goals that they're going to use and then you need to make sure that your budget provides the financing to achieve those goals by putting the money in strategically if question Mr Wan oh okay we miss tensley William uh you said if the money needs to be moved around um school committee has the authority to do that or we need to know why it's being moved around who's doing here's how it works your budget has been placed into specific accounts and the school committee will then tell the superintendent here are the here are the cost centers that we want to monitor now I served on the school committee in Cambridge a long long time ago we had eight to 10 cost centers uh Administration teachers Specialists par professionals Consultants Fuel and Equipment Transportation etc etc we put the money into those large buckets and if those buckets need to be emptied and put somewhere else school committee must approve those midyear adjustments providing they've told the superintendent this is how we want to be notified and this is what we want to see uh if we have a mild winter you may have money left over in your fuel account and the superintendent may come back to you and say we've got extra money in the fuel account I would like to transfer it to supplies and equipment so we can buy more supplies now we don't have to buy them later uh in some cases they need to create extra positions in other cases Personnel leave the district and their jobs aren't replaced so sometimes there's money left over and the school committee has the authority to create the line items and monitor them and approve any changes thank you uh the day-to-day operations of how the school works by the way are as you know are in the hands of the superintendent and the superintendent really has an ethical responsibility to follow the guidance of the school committee so that uh they can put the money where it goes I'll give you an example one of our districts put $60,000 in the middle school budget specifically to cultivate athletic opportunities for females because the school committee wanted to create more opportunities for females to play at the high school level therefore they wanted to create a farm system where kids would learn the sports in grades six seven and eight so that they'd have a program into which more kids could could work and that was a assigned line item with language put in the budget saying this is where it goes so everybody knew that was where it was supposed to go that's a very simple explanation for for how some of that works Mr wallan thank you yeah we' we've um talked about the um uh transfer process we're looking to probably establish a uh a guideline or rules on how much money to how much of a how much money for a transfer has to back to the full full board for approval we don't want we don't want to really bog down the uh School uh ad Administration with minor minor transfer $1,000 $2,000 so we're probably looking to have a threshold of some sort so in the interest of efficiency you don't want to approve every $35 that's my point yeah that's our point us be those cost centers are very big numbers okay um I know one of the strengths for the the committee first of all we changed our the name of our committee it's the financ and um operations so I'm more in tune with the spending that's going on for the the physical um um bricks some order for the school so we're more uh we're more in tune with that um long range planning talked about that with Soto and our um Finance director um having a long-term plan involved um we know that the money from the um uh from the um um the student Opportunity Act that's not always going to be there we know the money from from the state from the federal government isn't always going to be there for us so we're looking to have a plan um some of the neighboring districts around here seem like they've been taking uh s money onetime revenue and they've been using that to fill gaps um within their budget which is sort of not good going forward so um this um finance committee isn't um we're kind of not going that route um I was reading an article on the city of Brockton they had a $14 million budget deficit um and I know like the school committee was chastised on that for for not being in tune with the budget not having a sense of where the money is going um I think there were some people lost their job the finance director lost their job I think the superintendent lost his job I think he was a veteran a superintendent and I know on his way out the door he said I'm not really a numbers guy well we got a numbers guy right here okay Mr SoDo so I so for a a district that's in receivership so-called we seem to have AA together as opposed to some of the neighboring suburbs and the bigger cities thank you I I agree with you you're in a pretty good place um among the things you want to be thinking about as you plan a budget uh what are you going to do with your programs the federal money has largely been exhausted people have collected bargaining agreements to fund there is the matter of inflation and uh some of you some of our districts are getting an infusion of new students who are migrating in that uh we weren't expecting all of those things can eat away at the budget and they're very difficult to plan for remember your school budget year runs from July July to June so your fiscal year ends in June your budget has to be sent over to the municipal side at some point they've got to make it uh an approval before the end of June at the latest but the state rarely has a budget done by the end of June and the federal government fiscal year doesn't start until October 1st so anybody who can figure out how to do a multiyear strategic financial plan that is accurate will be nominated for a Nobel Prize it's just it's it's a very very challenging job and and uh we don't envy the people that need to do it there's a risk to it also means that the school committee has to make some very difficult decisions do you raise class size to save positions or do you with the other way lower class size and do away with some of the other positions yes it's the the running battle that we see in many of our K to K to8 systems where you protect the music art drama and dance teachers and and uh lower and raise class size or do you lower class size and eliminate some of the other positions do you eliminate the POS the those positions in their entirety or do you leave a kernel of it left for example if you offered music three times a week stop offering music or do you cut it back to one time a week and play a teacher of there are very hard decisions to make and the school committee makes those decisions on often with the people who are affected sitting right here in the audience watching you and mentioning to you that they all voted for you because everybody voted for you and and uh are you with me or are you against me uh so depending upon whether you're the classroom teacher or the music teacher you think the superintendent is terrible or the superintendent's a genius depending upon what the recommendation is made it's what makes budgeting very difficult so now let's just get a quick look at first of all where the money comes from uh if you uh notice here one more click on that uh Massachusetts spends about1 19 billion dollar on its public and the bulk of the money as the blue section reflects comes from property taxes locally the green segment is the chapter 78 that the state gives to you and then the purple well actually it's purple on your paper and it's green on the slide light green I don't know why that is uh that sliver is from various other sources that come to you I want to say something about the other sources there are there's no question that whatever Chapter 70 money you get and whatever you raise from local property taxes uh comes directly to the city of Holio and you can spend them appropriately as you need them the federal money is a little different sometimes it's a general appropriation and sometimes it's very small specific for example title one uh is a is a good chunk of of where that third that third quadrant it's not a quadrant the third sliver comes from there's the Department of Agriculture that provides money for uh for schools there's special education money uh all kinds of other things that come in now here's a very important question some of our most student business managers are able to balance the local Appropriations and the state grants with the federal money or other grant money that comes in so that you can integrate that appropriately and legally and make it all work it's a real skill but I will tell you because I'm old enough to remember back in 1980 proposition two and a half meant that we in Cambridge had to lay off a third of our teachers because property taxes were dramatically slack there were a few people that we had in our district were very much uh they'd always show up to be seen Whenever there was a meeting they would be there uh if a school Committee Member was visiting a school one or two of them would make it a point to walk by so that you knew they were there but I never quite knew what they did and when proposition two and a half came they didn't leave I get half a dozen of them so I said to our business manager uh his name was Oliver Brown he's sort of a legend among businessman olly why are those people still here I had to sit in this room and lay off 250 teachers many of whom were my friends and neighbors and here are these people from the central office nobody knows what they do and the business manager said oh um we put them on title one and we don't give you the federal money you we don't we don't we don't have to we don't have to tell the school committee about the federal money that's not important well uh that's a very short part of a much longer and much funnier story which we're not going to get to but uh I would just say to you that that was the last time Cambridge stopped holding back the information on federal money with school committee and just say to you it's very very important that you have a good strategic discussion with the financial people so that you know all of the money that's coming in so that it can be used skillfully especially uh if you lose some of the special funding that you may be getting in receivership and end up uh you know in the same uh fix as everybody else so that's the three sources main sources of money that come to you now you have some influence over your local property taxes if in fact you need an override vote from proposition two and a half limits uh you may be able to work with your assessors and figure out how to increase your base and get something from that uh you can certainly Lobby your legislators for more money in Chapter 70 and I'm going to explain the Chapter 70 formula to you in a way that I think you'll be able to understand so that you can see uh Chapter 70 is actually simple in some respects but very complicated in others uh drive you know working a computer is complicated but knowing how the computer works is extra complicated and Chapter 70 is such so let's take a look at what the uh of what the uh I don't uh try another click and see what well you've got the hand out in front of you if if you're not able to make sense of that but go back let's take a look at the arrows and I'll read to you what the arrows are supposed to say starting in the summer your superintendent was probably talking to everybody about what needs to happen in fiscal year 2026 because 2025 has already been uh been well planned superintendent was likely to talk to the municipal side of government uh what are we thinking about talk to the school committee what are our goals what are we going to need to do figure out whether you have a collective bargaining agreement that needs to be funded and think about all all the things that you that might be the year when you want to do an elementary foreign language program or where you might want to start if it had if the state doesn't uh doesn't come through with 100% funding to make sure that everybody gets preschool uh you might want to create some alternative special education program new stuff whatever it might be that's the time to tell the superintendent so that the superintendent can then work with the business manager to propose to you a budget that will try to achieve your goals now that would be wonderful if if it was prior to proposition two and a half and the school committee could appropriate whatever it wanted and the and the city had to come up with it it was much easier then but but now it isn't so the superintendent has to use his best judgment in sharing with the school committee here's what I think the budget should look like now I would ask you this uh there are School committees where the entire committee acts as a committee of the whole to deal with the budget questions there are other school committees where the school committee where the school committee uh appoints a minority of members to be the budget committee it's very important that you pay attention to how that's structured because the superintendent then has the power of the initiative he put something out and said here is my recommendation and that has instant credibility because it's coming from the superintendent the school committee members may wish to say okay but we want to make some adjustments and we're doing it in the budget committee say if there are four of you in the budget committee well it's very hard for the school committee to make changes that are the result of consensus between the superintendent and the budget committee so frequently it's a committee of the whole with all members of the school committee included that start working on the budget itself I don't know how you plan on doing that but it's an important decision that you need to make so once that's done and it comes to the school committee the school committee will hold a public hearing and allow the community to come and speak to you on that issue uh it's a very important public meeting it needs to be advertised the law requires at least one so that people can come up before you and uh I I you know things change a little bit with covid we don't have as many people coming out at night to meetings as they used to but with all the questions that go into a budget most school districts would have every special interest in town talking to you about don't cut the music program don't cut the drama program we need a renovated Elementary School we need to keep this program we need to keep that program and you know that every one of your parents with all respect to the wonderful people in Holio are single issue constituents it's their child that means the most to them and the most difficult decisions to make are the the ones that affect your family your children your home your job your neighborhood and people are not objective about how they attend to protecting those particular assets so it makes it difficult well once the school committee has set the budget and told the superintendent how you want to monitor the budget then the superintendent will send the budget over over to the mayor and the city council they have some limited abilities to make alterations but uh there is a required minimum level of spending that the school committee needs to come up with and then your fiscal year begins on July 1st after the uh city council sends it back and the mayor sends it back approved now I'm going to make a quick statement here U the total budget that is composed of State funding is school district is 90 plus percent how much about 91 92% no no no no how much dollars dollars what was the question again sorry what's the annual budget of the Holio Public Schools um I'd say it's I I have it right here so we don't need to be General um it's about $128 million but that in that um yes that includes all in it's about $128 so the the city council and the mayor send you back $128 million well he takes a lot of it back toward city services but we don't need to get into that okay that's you you can adjust that budget during the year and move money around right you just can't spend more than than it's allowed so if it's $128 million and you want to move half a million from here to here you can do that by yourselves as the school committee but uh you can't give yourself an extra million say there it Isley Williams once the school budget is Set uh the committee can um we do that then we send it over to the mayor and the superintendent for them to okay it or not to once you finish your work with the budget it goes to the mayor and then to the city council yeah so mayor and then ultimately comes back to the mayor for approval for Signature well one right so once the council approves the budget that's what it is that's what it is but there's not there's not because what is it we do net School spending there isn't any on the local side that we add a supplement above the Chapter 70 funds so there isn't anything we can touch in the budget that the school board approved um but instead we have control over what Transportation Transportation Adult Ed and leases over three years that's really where a lot of the council side of the discussion goes you're right they approved the the the dollar amount and and then it gets signed Mr Shen I just want to be clear we do not and never have been able to develop a budget that we send to the city council and to the mayor with our needs we are given a number to work towards and that's what we have to work towards but we cannot create a budget that exceeds 100% because we're only going to get funded at 100 so I don't want people to think that we are sending something to the council that we think is necessarily AC adequate appropriate or Equitable for our district we are given a number and we work towards that number and have to make it work now the fact that your budget is legally adequate doesn't mean that it's really adequate right right talk a little bit about that U just that just in terms of the state budget process so you might know where you're in intervention can be most helpful uh the governor will propose a budget in January the House of Representatives is usually working on the state budget at some point uh in April the Senate gets the budget in from the house in and may uh in several of the past years the governor and the Senate leadership have agreed on how much money is going to be available able as a consensus Revenue figure to the extent that they're able to come up with something that that may be accurate sometimes it is and sometimes it ends up not to be then the legislature will develop a uh consensus budget through the conference committee and uh the conference committee report goes to the governor governor signs it and you now have your budget and I'm going to explain some of that to you so the challenge for the school committee you can see here is to sort of strike the balance of meeting the needs that the superintendent and staff have identified and meeting the objectives of your goals and to make sure that the money is spent appropriately it's a very challenging task uh we recommend that school districts get quarterly reports uh preferably qu uh quarterly reports I will tell you uh Plymouth has 10 school buildings uh in other words the administration building and elementary school there were 10 buildings each one of those buildings has 10 cost centers anytime one of those cost centers one of those 100 cost center gets changed they bring it to the school committee for its approval uh they like it and it seems to work but it's sort of like the Quaker Meeting you know no one leaves until we've reached consensus and the reason you're able to reach consensus is the culture is we want to reach consensus so uh it works for them might not work for you so whatever is is specific to you is is uh what you want to look at now if we can go a little bit ahead uh and go to the next one if you could okay in order to monitor your budget you not only review quarterly reports get them some districts have monthly reports but most districts have quarterly reports and they seem to be the the plan of choice uh the people's money cannot be spent without the approval of the people's representatives and those approvals are passed on to you through the warrants every bill that the school district pays is paid through a warrant and each warrant needs to be signed by the school committee or its design and that would be raise your hand because you're the design go ahead Finish First okay or the designate now you know you get a pile of warrants over the course of the year it's going to be this High you can't possibly read everything that's on a warrant uh payroll is a little bit different because you scan that and one person could always sign the payroll warrant because you never don't want payroll paid on payday you want to see a thousand people go from Dr Jackal to Mr Hyde don't have the checks ready on the end of the month uh but the uh the warrants are important you have the right to expect that the superintendent or the superintendent's agent the business manager is putting something in front of you that is truthful and accurate but but we do recommend that whoever has the authority to sign the warrants give them a quick check make sure that they look reasonable and make sure that if you have questions you ask them there are no inappropriate questions when it comes to asking about the warrants and there is that uh you know the very very famous uh episode of a school committee member who came to the meeting with hand outs for a major event that this member was involved with and said to the superintendent I'd like to make 50 copies of this on the Xerox machine and secretary said no we don't have a xerox machine and he said H I signed a warrant we spent $25,000 for a copy machine to make a long story short uh 575 $575,000 worth of equipment was faux purchased from a fake company using the tax ID numbers of the superintendent's wife Social Security account so um that superintendent became a guest of the Commonwealth but that was exposed because members of the school committee were reading the warrants and saying this does look right I know we used to we used to question a lot of things that we would see uh do we really need that many consultants do we really need that many people do we really need all this equipment why are we buying this now I thought we bought this last year ask questions that was the problem in our other community people weren't asking questions so we encourage you you don't want to read about yourselves in in uh in your local newspaper is being accused of having a budget deficit because you didn't pay attention to Bud go ahead Miss Wilson um a question that came up in our uh finance and operation thank you operations um was can we uh review the warrants electronically can you review them can we review them and sign them electronically so we don't need to actually go physically to the business office we're wondering is there any issue with doing that I think I think you can put an electronic signature as long as you have in good faith reviewed the document okay yeah because this is a um we do have it it's interesting we don't have policy DGA for authorized signatures as a district currently and that's something that we were um looking at creating and that uh the electronic signatures came up at our last subcommittee meeting Mr wahan okay so here's where I have a question on so you were just talking about policy right about authorized signatures I'm looking at the masc updated revised new policies from masc not from ours because I was wondering too where where is for signing of the warrants where when I read our policies it's just like very just Bland um and then to me I think of think of policies and procedures are like together in my world it's together like this is the policy this is the procedures to make sure that you meet whatever it is that you said the policies on so I was looking just now at some of the things that have been updated for Section D and we're going back to 2021 um from masc thanks to Mr Sheen Direct me to where to look and this is stuff that we never even adopted here um so so there's things that have been done but when we look at like the warrants this is something again that's part of our capacity building plan it is under September where we're revising and begin implementing protocol for reviewing warrants and payroll today's date is September 23rd obviously we ain't going to meet that and so one of my concerns is is that these are things that we should already be looking at versus now it's we got to refer here and then that's got to go here and then there and by the time you know it when is this going to happen um so policy procedure does that kind of combine or are we saying that this is the policy it's it's just a general statement a general policy and now you as the superintendent receiver develop the procedure for it or whomever develops a procedure so if somebody there's a whole school of thought about how much procedure goes into policy policy is clear sometimes procedure is is left out of policy and left to the superintendent except for those procedures which are by their nature so important that they rise to the level of Poli policy uh we're seeing that for example on the uh in some of the title n the feds have put out 1600 pages of procedures and and instructions uh we generally would not put procedures in the policy document but some of those procedures relate to uh alleged offender and their right to confront their alleged victim now those that is a major issue that we believe is so important and of of such great interest that it rises to the level of policy in that case even some of our lawyers have agreed that sometimes a procedure does also become policy mostly it does not and that that is the kind of detail actually that the authors of the education Reform Act uh wanted to relieve the school committee of having to worry about I just look at it as it's it's based for accountability purpose if you don't do right so it's the school committee develops their goals whatever you have to have a measure to hold one accountable for what they said they were going to do and I know the mayor had mentioned also a specific threshold I don't know how many months ago that was but here we are and again are we going to do it are we not going to do it is just going to be a is it just going to be like at some point if it's a high cost because it's all General it's very generalized and so I don't know to me I think sometimes we need that guidance where it's specific so that nobody veers to the right because it's it it's beneficial for them or veers to the left because it's beneficial for someone else and it's up to you to decide how much procedure you want to put into policy now we've had in the office we've had some real arguments about whether a procedure should go into policy or whether it should be left out and sometimes um uh sometimes I feel like uh I'm working for them instead of them working for me but that's a whole other story but to your point though it all it all comes down to so where the what the culture is and the preference so that we can that'll work that'll keep up with the day-to-day that the super superintendent needs to keep up with its obligations the systems we create that work for all of us that accommodate the goal of you know what I mean so I think we're going to have to build that as we go um but it's hard to say like what it's not policy want adop right now and and it's tough because it's true like I mean I have that with the council today certain things procedure versus policy what's uh you know what is uh you know a proper policy versus what's what's the word I'm looking for have strong oversight um micromanager micromanaging and those are things that we got to you know we got to talk about as a as a body and come up with the decisions Miss Wilson we do have DGA ready to be reviewed by the full school committee um and we do have it that any Finance subcomittee member can sign a war any warrant in the absence of an available sub um Committee Member the vice chair or chair of the school committee can review and approve that's our language um and that record of the approval will be made on the regular uh the next regular school school committee agenda so just so you know that that is um we can put that on um on the next agenda uh DGA so my question would be is there is it does it specify like when someone will sign like it'll be once a month it'll be it has to be done on a weekly basis we is there the discussion is no the discussion is being had at the PO at the subcommittee level as to with guidance from our business um officer um as to how often it's definitely not once a month we would not be able to work people would not want to do business with us if we were only signing and making payments once a month um I believe it would be on a weekly basis and and we would um be doing that so is that something that we're GNA put in the policy it not the time frame of when it should be done or just by saying minimally once uh once a week or once every two weeks whatever the case is I think that's micro I think that's micro I think it's micromanaging again with the procedure I think we just say who signs and I think that it's just the policy refers to authoriz signatures it doesn't it's the title of the policy is authorized signatures it's not warrants it's not warrant signatures it's just saying that we're who are we authorizing to sign these warrants not the procedure of how they're be when and how it's just who are we authorizing Mr Shen so I it's valid points that Miss lefave brings up but I also know that we've contra Ed with masc to do this policy work and to be done by June um according to the uh plan that we approved with desie so I and I know what each month says for deliverables but I also know that when we approved that with desie that if work was ongoing and being done there could be some alterations of those deliverables that are on there so it also yes I know that these policies are coming out but if you're also starting the review process with masc like you also don't want to do work twice um and I will say just with that policy and I'll bring it up at the next meeting but I don't think the mayor should be a double signature on warrants so they probably shouldn't be signing school committee ones when they sign them all again at City Hall um because that kind of eliminates the check and balance of the school committee signing it if the chair is able to sign twice um to approve them but um I just think like some of this stuff like yes it has to get done but it's also like the state knows that we're also Contracting with someone and I think it's it's that contract's that yeah I can follow up on the procurement process of it but I I know that the funding has been identified is there a contract like has anything been signed like there's a bunch of people who signed contracts in this room so is anything signed yeah okay going through the signature process what the name of the oh what what's the extra work but like who yeah who put this policy um we can start scheduling those meetings I I'm sure that my executive director would say we can start scheduling those meetings and going ahead with reviewing some policy while that's well Anthony's figuring out where that contract is but I guess like who like what is this ex like what is it I don't know what it is I who who would you talk to Amanda okay yeah well we were emailing to be fair and I did leave her a voicemail but I think there could be confusion about uh earlier conversation about the uh Community Advisory Board and a consultant maybe that maybe that's what Amanda is thinking about but I can follow up yeah because that would have to be a separate contract anyway that would be separate yeah okay just for your information we've uh given you a uh a path that items go before they become waren and get paid it involves requisitions and running things through the principles and going through the business office and a fourth step uh for the head of the business department and then a purchase order is issued and leads to an invoice and a purchase order is then sent out and check is paid this is a standard process for how things happen for those people who don't get behind the curtain a lot in the business office that's a stand standard practice for doing purchase depending upon the community that you're in purchase orders are executed expeditiously or they take six months and uh I've never really had a full explanation of why it happened but it was a big problem for us in my city seem to be any way we were able to deal with it except to ultimately pay the bills now um uh this repeats what we have already said stuff about warrants what's on the warrant and who gets to sign it so covered that also on the quarterly reports we've covered this set of items which reminds you that we recommend quarterly budget statements and uh that you set guidelines for when transfers need to be brought before oh yeah I'm sorry you're moving money from cost center to cost center so if you're moving money from fuel for the Jones School Smith school that's not that's not a controversial item if you're moving money from fuel to Personnel that's cost center to cost center and those that's where the school committee probably wants to get involved um I I just so that you know um we at masc put the word micromanagement on probation because uh oftentimes it's a it's a bullying term used to get school committee members to stop asking questions uh you know you you're micromanaging me you're micromanaging me so uh we put that and the word r o that word is on a is that word is on probation so now what I'm what I'm going to do is I'm going to um explain to you on television I can are there people at home okay I'm I used to live next door to a uh a Neurosurgical resident who operated out of the Mass General and I said to him one day Andy if something's not as complicated as we think it is we say it's not brain surgery what do you brain surgeon say and he said well we say it's not rocket science so we actually have had two people who actually worked for NASA on school committees in Massachusetts and I asked one of them who was in the north and over school committee what do you say and he said we say it's not the chapter 70 funding formula but let me explain the foundation budget for the city of Holio and this is the latest so it's going to be the fiscal year in which we are now present uh you notice this is a big grid and along the top of the grid you see 14 columns each of the 14 columns represents a grade level where a student may be so you can see from this chart is how many preschoolers are there in uh in Holio can you see that number on the top column 344 okay you have 344 preschoolers you have 401 full day kindergarteners 20 285 Elementary school students 13 28 middle school students and so on you also have 400 vocational students now work with me on just columns 1 through 7 along the left side of the page you have 11 different areas of expense that a district might incur you might say cost centers and and you notice that lines 1 through 11 uh are loaded with numbers so let's try to find out what it costs for the city of hoio to educate uh with its Administration the administrative costs are broken up into a per pupil expenditure some grapher some CPA lock themselves in a room and they came up with the average per pupil cost for every student classification and every expense so look at line three column six do you see 7, 39,46 that means that the cost of providing classroom teachers and Specialists for those high school kids comes up to about 7,030 7, 39,000 students and how do you get that number you re you divide 1464 high school students so you take excuse me you take 1464 students multiply it by the average per pupil cost and you get 7, 39,000 if you want to know what the average per pupil cost is divide 7, 39,000 by 1464 now I'm not saying that these numbers are perfectly accurate and correct but they are the numbers that we use because the law says that these are adequate and as you can see for every grade level that classification and every expense line we have the costs that are estimated by multiplying by the average per pupil cost now columns 8 9 10 11 12 and 13 are bonus columns because those are students who fall into more than one category so as you can see you have 227 special education students served in District 53 students served out of District you have 411 uh English language Learners uh at the lower grades 190 English language Learners at the upper grades 314 English language Learners invoke Tech and 4,764 students who are economically disadvantaged well we have average perable costs for them too and if you multiply all the numbers the bottom line total of all of it together you see it in yellow on the bottom 114 m374 878 that's your foundation budget for Hoke number down here okay it's basically a basically a Big Grid you can you can if you wanted to go to the Department of Education you could download the spreadsheet and you could play with the numbers uh just to show what would happen if you had more or less okay so you see that uh that is deemed to be adequate now if You' pick up the chart for wayth the reason I pick wayth is that they have almost the same number of students that you do but the average per pupil cost you see the the number on the bottom here it's 92545 802 that's their Foundation budget and their average per pupil cost underneath there is 15747 okay now now why is the foundation budget for woth so much lower than the foundation budget for H yoke well look at the difference in numbers of economically disadvantaged kids in Waymouth it's uh maybe 45% and Holio get more like 82% so the more economically disadvantaged children you have the higher your foundation budget will be uh sometimes the uh districts that have more migrants coming in and out will have a higher Foundation budget uh the I will tell you the special education numbers are not real they are assumed to be about 4% in District and 1% out of District because that was apparently the only way they could calculate it so now you want to understand that that based on this chart Holio has a tougher burden to bear in terms of paying for its students let's figure out exactly how they determine that go to page two for hoolio and if you would look at the column whoops actually you need to go to page three for jio I do bear with me okay here we are page three for Holio let's look at the indicators of wealth look at over here on on the left you see that total equalized valuation of property in Holo for the last year that we have data was2 b572 th000 and the total income earned by the residents of Holio was 8437514266 yeah 843 705 y okay so you see there's about $2 and5 billion dollar of real estate and $843,000 earned in income now pick up the same page from waymoth not thousand I'm sorry 2,572 f 2 billion 2 billion 572 million I'm sorry but basically 2.6 billion now compare that with wouth what's their Total Property valuation that they can get revenue from it's about 10 B 600,000 and how much money is earned by all the residents of Wayland who pay tax who pay income taxes 2 2.5 billion compared to 88 143 so you can see that Holio is going to need more state aid than wayth let's find out exactly how much more poio gets and if you could you want to go to the page that says Chapter 70 summary I have red arrows here you see that polio gets 29.9 million in chapter 78 excuse me I'm sorry I'm looking at wayth brain brain laps here okay so um jolio gets 101,000 101,1 191 in in state aid see the red arrow and basically 80.6 6% of its budget will come from the state and in wouth only 177% of their budget comes from the state why because they don't need it as much now do you think the people in whth think this is fair no every Community feels it gets screwed in comparison with its contiguous neighbors I can tell you people in Cambridge think that Somerville gets everything and we don't get anything walam has this argument with Lexington uh Springfield probably well East Long Meadow has this with Long Meadow uh Holy Oak and maybe chapy fight over this question whatever it is but it's a very interesting system that they came up with to figure out a fair way to give you state aid on the other hand of course they feel that they're making 80% of the payments they should make 80% of the rules we see the Golden Rule Whoever has the gold makes the rules so this is going to change when Holio becomes its own uh governing body I don't know that the numbers will change until the economy turns around around and and people build uh a stronger Holy Oak as we go forward in the future but uh that is the when you hear Chapter 70 being debated in the legislature there are all kinds of different proposals we had one proposal two years ago A legislature legislator offered a specific Amendment and wouldn't you know that who gets a 10% increase in Chapter 70 that person's District who gets a 10% loss in their District another District's uh another legislator's District so um we have argued that the best way to resolve all of this is to put a good inflation indicator for everybody and to um not only do that but to put more money in the pot so everybody gets more one other very important source of Revenue that we'll talk very briefly about is the special education circuit breaker that generates a lot of money for you uh it's an equal opportunity program because everybody has kids with special needs and the circuit breaker is fully funded so uh everybody gets circuit breaker money and uh We've advocated for that and people really turn out for that so the the the two best strategies uh let's look at a new uh and maybe an increase in Chapter 70 more money per pupil for example make which sort of corrupts the system not corrupts it but makes the the system a little less technically correct but it does provide uh more and and I can tell you I was elected to my school committee 50 years ago in 50 years there are three consistent themes that I can tell you about first of all the Red Sox never had enough pitching all right teacher morale has never been as low and there was never enough money in Chapter 70 and I I don't know that this I think if we drop back in here 50 years from now we'll see the same thing so that is the Readers Digest version of the foundation budget uh there are we could talk about this for like five hours and then it becomes physics Mr superintendent thank you Glenn that's all really good information and we share a lot of that in our budget document and I just want to lift an important point that uh School Committee Member Shen made is that everything that we just talked about is just a found Foundation budget but um which is often your minimum net School spending requirement but communities like wayth actually actually spend more than just the foundation budget they spend almost 10% above the net school funding requirement and you know to say the fair and adequate is you know it's kind of a stretch I understand that it's you know that's just the way that we're being funded through this formula but as an example we only get in our general fund budget about two uh2 million for out of District tuition but our cost in out of District tuition is uh closer to 12 O over1 million which is probably much different and I think another thing that another point that I want to make is that these enrollment numbers also include uh Charter enrollment so um we spend about $17 million on uh you know 17 million of of this funding goes to you know gets passed right on to Charter Schools I don't know what M waymouth's you know Charter School enrollment is or availability but um I just think as we look at this Foundation budget those are some really important factors to think about when you're thinking about a town like wayth and a town like holy o it's very important point to remember that the charter takes the average per pupil expenditure not the foundation budget average so if you live in a district that spends 25% above Foundation the charter school takes 125% of your money and there are three communities in Massachusetts came Cambridge being one of them that gets no Chapter 70 money because it all is taken and given to Charter Schools so Charter School Reform another subject for another time but I think it's something worth looking at so uh we pretty much touched on all of the things that uh we wanted to get to in the basic budget presentation you will see that some of the charts that we have here will show you the the growth of foundation budgeting uh the foundation budget by law cannot grow by by more than 4.5% a year so after we've had a couple of years of inflation before things dropped down uh the foundation budget did not grow as fast as the economy did and that's that's explained to you you can look at those at at your own convenience occasionally the state plays with the definition of who's economically disadvantaged so uh for example if you are eligible for a uh Federal anti-poverty program you were automatically eligible and the town got more money on the other hand if the federal government cut out the program and people lost eligibility they would uh no longer be in that column so you'd get less all of these things play into it and I would suggest you maintain a close contact with us we send out regular notices on all of this stuff uh as a comes by uh but the basic things that I wanted to make sure we left you with tonight are your fiduciary responsibilities your I think responsibility to uh continue to follow the kind of guidance that gives you and your community a clear expectation of what you have and to fight extra hard for the money that you need to provide the services that you must anybody have any question Mr Wan thank you thank you thank you for the presentation I appreciate it yeah um just to kind of filter back on some of the um some of the formulas you talk about um I know the um Finance director does provide the finance committee with a um call it a bu monthly Finance up and that's um the update report by cost center so we do receive those yeah okay so so we are keeping track of what's what's been coming up I know the student Opportunity Act has um assisted um Gateway cities like hoo in terms of the funding to make sure we're getting our fair share um that being the case you know the the data says that we're um one of the poorest communities in the state um and I know just the wealthier communities can afford to fund their educational system beyond the fun beyond the foundation budget so that's that's some of the um uh in inadequacies of the system thank you any other questions oh mayor Garcia uh not necessarily a question but just wanted to highlight What Glenn was talking about much earlier in his presentation regarding decisions and pressure that school bodies are going to get from anybody and everybody that's advocating for their interests and hopefully it's solely parents that are looking out for the interests of their child uh one pressure that we will get and there's no buffer it's not like on a city side where everyone can blame the mayor uh you know the the council can blame the mayor they can only cut they can't add of the budget and that's a budget that I that I present we have a process and I think that's what Glenn was alluding to you want to have a clear guideline and process that helps conclude a presented budget so that you might not like it but Folks at least appreciate how you got to it and it helps deescalate as much as possible um we and we do that but on this side it's 13 14 members 7 8 n 10 members 10 members here that uh get to decide how to move money around and how to put that what where we want to commit funds to and there is um you know we do have unions that will pressure us individually you know and and um you know I that one Community across the Commonwealth where you teachers went on strike um there there will be that level of pressure we have to like make sure that whatever we vote on and folks can vote either way that it's not going to break that dollar amount threshold of the budget and take away the need to keep up with with what we think is needed even though it's never adequate it's never adequate um but certainly you know the the narrative can can can be very different in the public eye if we're not careful and strategic and trans transparent and proactive with how we finalize the final budget whatever that agreement is so that is control like there's no can't say it's the receiver that anymore put the blame on superintendent will be in that driver seat deciding on like you know how to you know how we want to um get to a final version of the budget and move forward with decisions um there will be a lot of pressure um but we just have to make sure that we have a clear and transparent proactive process to help navigate this the system so that you know we can alleviate that as much as possible Mr Shen so will you let the committee prepare a budget of what it needs rather than a budget that meets your number that you give us well I think from the last time I was on a school board and you were here long time ago too the the finance committee was very busy working with the business manager and superintendent kind of doing that line item by line item when it comes to the school budget no but what I'm asking is will you let the committee develop a budget that meets The District's needs or are we still going to have to develop a budget that's based off a number that you hand us it's going to be I think we're it's going to be off the number okay so then we don't like then we then we don't have all of this power because it's still the City giving us a number and saying make it all work instead of presenting a budget to the city council and balancing the budget with the needs of the school district well currently I don't think it's it the the district and Mark me if I Wrong Soo like kind of tell us more or less what you think that number is going to be as far as the state gives us a number and then and then like historically in Holy Oak anything above that number is not entertained by right so will that be enter rained by the mayor's office to submit that to their budget to the city council a number above 100% no only because I know it'll be cut okay I just I but we can't talk about how we have all of this control when we are still given a number that isn't presented to the city I know but what I'm saying is is when when a union is looking for a 10% raise and we have to somehow you know it's the schools members are going to vote the way they want to vote like even if even if there is control and the mayor says hey we can't exceed this we can still this body is it's the vote of the body and that's the number I would I don't think I have the power to I think I I think that District voted number has to get brought forward in front of the council no no I mean we're handed a number we we're just being told we've been told for years and years and years that don't exceed 100% what I'm asking is can we and will you present that to the council as part of the budget will you present a budget to the Council of the needs of the H Public Schools or will you present a budget to the council question I wonder can I cut a budget so if the school because the school district presents a budget I think the I think what Mr Sheen is expressing is like can we submit a budget that is above net School spending that we believe meets the the needs of the community and have the city council vote on that um and I think historically the answer to that question has been no it has to be the minimum net School spending requirement because the community can't afford it means cutting services and other City departments I mean I don't that did I articulate that yep yeah so but what I'm saying this is that right although do you really have to right can the school committee regardless of what we say hey don't exceed this if the if the if the school board voted on a budget that's much higher than but I'm recommending and saying I mean the district vote is the vote right is it not I mean obviously we never want to be there it gets into the point where this then the city council would be point of order cut down are we following parliamentary procedures or are we allowed just to speak whenever we desire question I I'm just wondering so what I am going to say is I he was asking a question to the mayor as to can we present that budget the mayor's explaining to him so actually he's asking him a question I can't answer that question no I understand that but then the mayor then asked someone else so I'm just wondering because he's clarifying okay well Tech I'm just I'm just asking for clarification clarifying cuz I guess it was wasn't understood as to the presentation of the budget I think I'm kind of understanding who we want at the end to say that you're going to have to cut it so instead of it looking bad on the school committee let it look bad on the city Side let them cut us go ahead so I guess the the the question at hand is over the past numerous years we have not not developed a budget based upon our student needs to fulfill the needs of our student body which is at the Forefront of everything we do as a school committee we are student focused we've been asked to develop a budget based upon a number that's given what I'm hearing is that we potentially would like to fulfill Our obligation and develop a budget that is based upon our student need and present that to the city council I'm wondering why would we not be able to do that if we are charged with when we have the ability to develop a budget wouldn't we develop a budget that's based upon our student needs so can I just hold on so part of this whole capacity building plan is for the school committee to take hold and kind of take responsibility for what our respons responsibilities are which one of them is fiduciary responsibility right okay obviously when we're making decisions decisions that we're supposed to be making should be student based student focused go ahead develop that that that budget who's saying that you can't okay so they give you a number they decide that no you got to cut okay now you got to go back to it and you're going to have to figure it out but now you were directed to cut it because they're not going to meet the needs of the students but it wasn't to say that the school committee didn't address or identify what the needs are and this is what it's going to cost in order to meet those needs Mr Sheen not exactly what I was asking so when the budget is created by the mayor the mayor presents it to the city council and the city council then can cut anything they want they can't add from the budget and they have that window from when he presents it until um June what I'm asking is if the school committee presents a budget to the mayor will the mayor present in his budget and balance his budget that he presents to the city council with the number that we need rather than the number that we have always been told we have to hit that that's my ask is like will a budget get because in the end it's we can pass anything but the mayor is the one that puts the budget together for the city of Holio so if we ask for 150 million and he only puts in 100 million then there's obviously a disconnect um with that if 100 million is 100 and throwing fake numbers for anyone that watches afterwards with that but um so I'm asking is can we build a budget and will the mayor present a budget from the school department that reflects what the school committee feels the needs are right that that's my question question so Mr I don't know can I can I answer it I don't want to answer it right at this moment you can think about it and I mean this process is long process but we have for probably 50 years the city of Holio has functioned off an ability yeah and Liz can probably correct me depending on how long it was since she has 40 Years of history that the that the city of hok has handed the school department a number and said figure it out whereas we know that we can figure it out and say this is the needs and I I think that's what it is I'm just debating in my mind if even though that's what it is is that really what it you know what I mean so I and this is worst case scenario we we I know that we're we all for many years have been working together and figuring it out and making sure that things are balanced or whatnot but you know it's good to know it'd be good to know like what if right if can can I cut am I supposed to take what the district gives me and bring it to the council I mean so long as it's 100% do whatever you want create the budget just like you create the budget for the Board of Health and it's all in your budget everything else is figured out by I mean for us under that the council figures out all the other City departments and do their thing but for us it's all we we figure out like when you look in the city budget I mean I haven't looked at this year's but it's usually just school department like says net School spending not net school like you don't get all the line items from school department you just get usually four numbers that are listed there y Miss tensley Williams Mr Soto is there a way that this could honestly be worked out between us you and the mayor and we come up with a real figure that we can use because otherwise it's going to be changed it's not going to come up like say we come up with a figure then it's knocked out of the box can we come up with a real figure that maybe once in 50 years we could say Okay can that be done we can propose you know we can talk about proposing anything to as part of the budget process um I just at the end of the day I think the mayor then has to present a a a balanced budget to the city council and if if they are going if he is going to do that that means you know cutting other city services so like it's a I can't sit here and tell you how realistic that is that's not you know and that and I wouldn't want to be in his shoes right like that's you know um to have to decide you know cutting other City departments to fund the school department above net School spending I would absolutely love that but um so that's to do then that's what you think okay okay just being real okay thank you uh Mr Shen oh Mr wahan I did I'm sorry I didn't well she yeah I mean I mean we have the minimums but the city has the minimums too and how much how much revenue they can raise year to year so we're in the same Brickman as as a City okay we're we're talking about one pot but the city has one pot too because they can only raise revenue through certain mechanisms without uh Deb exclusion or uh override so it's still one one pot and again the the the mayor's budget has to go to the city council for approval too so you can't you can't leave out that um that part of it thank you um Mr Shen okay um I know that I'm going back to our capacity building plan in in August 2024 we were supposed to decide whether we were going to assign representatives to observe collective bargaining negotiations obviously we didn't succeed at completing that task so I'm looking at the policy for negotiation I don't know how to proceed with this like what are we going to wait for masc well now for it to get approved or whatever and then they've they get to that to that section I mean there's going to have to be a lot of changes then to the capacity building plan and I can see us just prolonging this whole process to where it's not going to be a school year um plan off of that you brought it up and it deals with capacity building I I will uh make a motion to refer the collective bargaining issue of the capacity building plan to the leadership subcommittee um to come up with a recommendation so that's to go to the leadership and accountability yep okay all right so section H negotiations there's a motion to no no no that's not what I my motion was to send the the collective bargaining point of the capacity building plan to and they can figure out a plan it wasn't a it wasn't anything with the policy not nothing with policy it's going to have to do with yep the plan you guys are going to discuss that on whether you're going to observe no we'll we'll come up with a recommendation for the committee that was the motion okay did you write that that motion the motion was to send to the leadership and accountability sub committee the um issue of collective bargaining representation from the um capacity building plan and I made the motion and i j j second it yeah any discussion all those in favor I any opposed okay motion passes unanimously okay well thank you Glenn thank you all right we're going to see you October 15th for the superintendent evaluation October 15th yep second it yeah it's in your book in your calendar okay we got a motion seconded with see no um you know what all those in favor I I meeting adjourned 8 o' have a good night