##VIDEO ID:FCKGRWJTkFw## e e moment of silence good morning I call to order this meeting of the pelis County School Board October 15 2024 during what is a very difficult time for our County while our superintendent and Schoolboard members will make remarks on the storms and schools and such towards the end of our agenda as usual we wanted to start this meeting by acknowledging what we have all been through and by thanking all of you who have stood the watch in our shelters in our instant command centers driving evacuees even while your families and homes were at risk or maybe even already damaged by Helen thank you palis County Schools was there is there for our community during very tough times and our school board thanks you while these first days back might feel like toddler steps during a time when we should otherwise be running at this point in the school year our public schools are the common fabric that support and bind us as a community and that value cannot be overstated and we like you are very proud and very grateful to be back in session we will begin today's meeting with a moment of silence followed by the Pledge of Allegiance led by by Vice chair Carol cook in the national anthem please stand and remain standing until the completion of the national anthem can you see the what so bright the Twilight last [Music] [Music] and through the [Music] was still [Music] [Applause] [Music] there the of [Music] [Applause] we're not sharing a video this morning so we'll move on to item 1.6 introduction of professional and Community organization Representatives Isabelle mascarin as our public information officer good morning Madame chair members of the board Mr Hendrick and staff there are no repres resentatives of community and professional organizations or the media here with us today thank you thank you amendments to the agenda Mr Hendrick any amendments Madam chair there are no amendments to the agenda board members seeing none uh I'll take a motion and second to adopt the agenda I'll make a motion a motion by Mrs long and a second by Mrs Meyer all those in favor say I I I any opposed the agenda passes 6 to Zer this is a good opportunity to note that Schoolboard Don Peters Schoolboard member Don Peters is not able to join us today so all votes will reflect six board members present and we wish you the very best Mrs Peters our special order agenda item 4.1 presentation of proclamation observing national school lunch week October 14th 18 2024 may I have a motion and second to approve this Proclamation I make a motion a motion from Mrs long and a second from Mrs Edmund Mr Hendrick would you please introduce yes thank you madam chair we will be serving school lunch this week uh and we're excited to do so so here uh to share the proclamation is our assistant director of food nutrition Samantha Marina Sam thank you all right aoy me hearties originally we were going to wear our pirate attire but unfortunately we lost it in Hurricane Helen at sea but it's okay because we are thrilled to be here today to recognize the celebration of national school lunch week A Time dedicated to recognizing the importance of healthy and nutritious meals for our students this year's theme school lunch Pirates find your treasure encourages students to discover a healthy school lunch that's fit for a pirate bringing a sense of adventure and encouraging your Scallywags to set sale in their cafeterias school lunches play a crucial role in our lives of our students providing essential nutrients needed for growth learning and overall well-being a balanced meal can improve concentrated concentration Boost energy needs and support academic performance when students eat well they learn well our dedicated crew works really hard to um to provide meals with that have high standards of quality and variety from fresh fruits and vegetables to whole grains and lean proteins we strive to provide balance options that cater to the diverse tastes and dietary needs of penel County students as we celebrate national school lunch week and serve up a fit a feast fit for a crew of hungry pirates with hearty recipes such as golden mac and cheese a pirates catch basket and Buccaneer beef tacos we encourage students to view school lunch as more than just a meal but as an exciting Journey filled with delicious school lunch Treasures waiting to be discovered so hoist your sales and set sail for our quest with nutritious Treasures thank you thank you uh Mrs long would you read the proclamation national school lunch week whereas the national school lunch program has served our nation admirably for more than 70 years through advanced practices and nutrition education and whereas the national school lunch program is dedicated to the health and well-being of our nation's children and whereas the national school lunch program has been joined Through The Years by many other excellent child feeding programs and there is evidence of continued need for nutrition education and awareness of the value of the school nutrition programs now therefore the school board of pelis County does hereby proclaim the week of October 14th through the 18th 202 24 as national school lunch week we encourage all residents to become aware and concerned about their children's nutritional habits in the hope of achieving a more healthful citizen citizen for today and to the Future sign the a well today's the what is today comments Sam thank you for being here and thank you for all you and your division have been going through the last several days cleaning out freezers refrigerators um many have been doing that in their homes um and you've been doing it for a 100,000 so thank you very much and and thank you for getting school lunch served hot tomorrow thank you thank you the next item on our agenda item 4.2 presentation excuse me we have to vote thank you um we have a motion in a second on the floor to approve item 4.1 all those in favor say I I any opposed passes 6 to zero 4.2 presentation of the Proclamation designating October 2024 is National principal month I have a motion in a second to approve this item motion from Mrs Caine and a second by Mrs cook Mr hendrik would you please introduce thank you madam chair we celebrate each October our principles in our schools and today they're having welcome back faculty meetings with everyone at as we speak and our area superintendent their supervisors are out supporting schools right now as well and so typically one of our area superintendent presents this Proclamation but today you get Stephanie Woodford instead uh herself a former area superintendent and longtime principal and she's going to speak to the value of principles in our schools thank you madam chair of board members today I'm honored to introduce the proclamation designating October 2024 as National principal month this Proclamation is a formal Rec recognition acknowledging and celebrating the crucial role School leaders play in pelis County Schools principles are a Cornerstone of the educational system guiding schools with vision commitment and an unwavering dedication to student achievement this month we not only celebrate their leadership but we also honor their tireless efforts in fostering strong relationships with students families and communities at no time has their unwavering leadership been more evident than these past three weeks through the challenging circumstances of the most recent storms Helen and Milton our principes LED recovery efforts ensured continuity for our school communities and worked around the clock to ensure the safety and well-being of all of our students and families as we recognize National principal month we celebrate their resilience their passion and their dedication to creating environments where all students succeed we thank our school leaders for their remarkable service and we thank you for supporting this Proclamation well sad Mrs edmin would you please read the proclamation National principal month whereas principles are educational Visionaries instructional and assessment leaders disciplinarians Community Builders budget and ists facility managers and administrators of legal and cont contractual obligations and whereas principles work collaboratively with teachers and parents to develop and Implement a clear mission High curriculum standards and performance goals and whereas principles create School environments that facilitate great teaching and learning and continuous School Improvement and where as the celebration of national principles month honors elementary middle and high school principles and recognizes the importance of principles in ensuring that every child has access to a high quality education now therefore the school board of pelis County hereby proclaims the month of October 2024 as National principal month signed this 15th day of October 2024 thank you any comments I think you covered it Mrs Woodford thank you for those remarks all those in favor of approving item 4.2 say I I any opposed passes 6 to zero public comments on agenda items Mrs ha do we have any speakers to agenda items today no Madam chair there are no speakers for agenda items thank you we don't have any unfinished business for the consent agenda may I have a motion in a second to approve the consent agenda motion by Mrs Edmund and a second by Mrs Meyer all those in favor say I I any opposed passes six to zero on our non-consent agenda today item 8.1 request approval of negotiated agreement with the Fraternal Order of Police may I have a motion in a second to approve this item I make a motion second motion by Mrs long and a second by Mrs Edmund Mr Hendrick would you please introduce thank you madam chair this is the final of our negotiated agreements with our different unions and we're excited to bring this to you today and Paula Texel our Chief Human Resources officer we'll give you the details Miss Texel good morning Madam chair school board members Mr Hendrick and staff yes I am very happy to be here today to request approval of the tenative agreement with our final group our Fraternal Order of Police fop employees in this group um that are covered by fop will receive a 3.75% salary increase will be retroactive of course to July 1st 2024 police dispatchers employed as of December 12th will also receive an additional one-time non-recurring supplement which will be paid out prior to Winter Break um as previously stated with our other bargaining groups the school board will pay the same amount of the increase in healthare cost 80% the board will pay 20% employees will cover and as well as the board will pay the approximately 300,000 for the increase in the F FRS contribution for all employees all increases that are approved today um again retroactive to July 1st um will receive uh the employees will receive their raises and their retro checks in their October 25th pay date so on behalf of the superintendent staff we are recommending that you approve this agreement with fop thank you thank you Mrs Texel are there any comments no with that we'll take a vote all those in favor of approving item 8.1 say I I any opposed passes 6 to Z thank you item 8.2 request approval of an increase to The Disaster Recovery Services contract for the necessary repairs need due to Hurricane Helen may I have a motion second to approve this item second motion by Mrs Kane and a second by Mrs Edmund Mr Hendrick would you please introduce thank you madam chair I'm gonna pass it to Mr herbick in just a moment but just a a brief overview this is as you just mentioned just for Hurricane Helen and we have contractors on retainer for crisis situations especially hurricanes most in our district and this particular contractor is one that we've had on container and uh the scope of the crisis and the scope of the damage was such that we're coming with this request although we did already do an emergency purchase order to get this work going because we needed to protect those two schools as much as possible so Mr herick is going to give you an overview of a little bit of where we are with this particular contractor and the status it was good that we had them here because they were also useful with Milton and he'll also provide a little bit of a rough update on how things are moving along at those schools but also know that we'll be be coming back to you in future meetings with additional items for Milton I want to let you know and the public know that all of these Mr Jefferson and team and risk management are working on FEMA reimbursements so this is money we put out first and then we collect back but it also slows down some of our capital budget because we have to pay out first before we can collect those dollars back so with that I'll pass it to Mr Herbert thank you Mr hendri and Madame chair and board members um so again uh this contract is in place and I know one question may come up is why originally was only $500,000 well we don't set money aside in this as much as four and a half or $5 million for um storm damage the 500,000 is really what we have always in place for things like a minor flood a ruptured pipe a small fire things like that which usually this contract more than um covers this on an annual basis and so when we are um impacted with a much larger event um it's um practice and not not unusual for us to come to the board asking to improve or um increase this contract so as Mr Hendrick said we already have contractors aboard underneath this contract who were ready to step forward really quickly once Helen hit and we had three uh we had impacts across the the district but there were really three campuses that were severely impacted that's Gulf beaches madira Beach as you know really well and art service center which hous an adult education program there as well had um some pretty serious flooding so ssar will be included in this as well a much much smaller scale uh the majority of this increase that we're asking for um is really going toward madira Beach and GF beaches and so the contractors um in place they it's it's really a three-step process um for this particular contract there's stabilization efforts which are underway and well underway um U for all three of these locations and stabilization really means that controlling the environmental conditions you're getting the water out you're dehumidifying and you're really preparing for that next step is when you're going to go in and start actually fixing now the damage the remediation process is step two and that's really the removal of the damaged items and you're tearing out drywall at that point you're taking out carpeting you're taking out anything else uh building wise structure-wise that was damaged and then the last piece of the process is restoration uh well they'll come in and do some work uh to restore the facility uh to make it ready for what we're going to install next this contract is not include everything that needs to be done um at these two schools especially GF beaches and madira Beach uh we do uh we are working with a um with a CM right now um and have not finalized that contract quite yet but we're working with them to sign a contract that a CM will then come in and be the project manager for the complete restoration so the project manager then will cover um the painting of the drywall the the in installation of the carpet the installation of the electrical panels and all the other things Roofing uh was a big need at all of these um schools as well so the CM will um cover those um parts of the project this really is for that initial stage of really clean up um making sure the the facility is environmentally stable and um some minor work um just to make sure that we're ready to go for the next step thank you school board members any questions or comments on this item Mrs edman thank you Mr herbick will this include the SAR service center it does okay it does thank you any others now and the one reason it wasn't included in the agenda most of Oldsmar is covered under the original 500,000 So yeah thank you we have a motion and second on the floor to approve item 8.2 all those in favor say I I any opposed passes six to zero items introduced by the superintendent Mr hendrik yes Madam chair I I don't have a lot of events to report on this time because we've not been open um so two hurricanes 12 days operating shelters 10 days of Miss School uh we certainly look forward to having our students back in school tomorrow the devastation to our own property the property of citizens in this community uh lives livelihoods and the emotional toll on students in the community is certainly real and I think that uh the stabilization of buildings and some of that is is sort of the concrete part of getting back there will be a long-term emotional toll for Citizens for employees for everyone serving in shelters all of those things and so we'll be here to help with that um but having school back in session brings some normaly it brings routine and it does help with mental health and so we're excited to have that back tomorrow as you know today all of our employees are back uh they're in their rooms they're putting them back together and we really built you know the the question of when to reopen around Health Safety and Security so is the air quality healthy in our schools is the water water quality healthy in the schools um are our safety systems up and running from security cameras to the fencing and the uh Panic buttons all of those things we need to make sure of that um and then the health side of things in terms of can we serve food um can we have students walk to the bus stops normally so today all of our employees are out making sure those things are running and they've been doing that on the air conditioning side now for a while very happy that last night we got power back to our last School uh Safety Harbor Middle School was the last one and so we wanted to cycle the air through all those buildings for 12 hours and flush out every uh pipe and and all of those types of things and so that's happening in uh over the course of the last couple of days um food nutrition has been working to get rid of previous items that were D you know uh spoiled bring in new ones and also get those things off of campus and so we had to wait for municipalities to come in and remove the trash uh we do have some contractors that come out and do that but not at every single building and so it was important to get all of that off of campuses today our bus drivers are running those routes as many of you probably experienced on the way in today there're still major intersections in our community that are not functioning with street lights and that's a problem um this morning we had a press conference Mrs hin joined me at penel Park High School and one of the reporters asked me can I guarantee that all those lights will be working tomorrow and my answer was a very clear no I cannot guarantee that they'll be working tomorrow that's not what we do um but we're going to make the best right it's time to get back to school and so uh we'll make the best of that and our bus drivers are out there navigating those challenges now I do want to just reiterate uh what Mrs Hine led the meeting with about our employees uh we have about a thousand or plus they cannot evacuate they can't go somewhere with their families they have to report to work or be on call to report to work and they've done that now 12 hurricane shelter days for our community and um some working the midnight shifts some working the daytime shifts some on call and never get called in but uh it is a toll for them as well and so one of the reasons why in addition to the health Safety and Security today was to also let people get back on a regular sleep Rhythm you know they were working shelter duty at 2 a.m. uh Sunday morning and they needed to get back and so we're looking forward to getting back uh I do want to thank the community for the outpouring of support from the first hurricane and this hurricane and in particular the pelis Education Foundation I don't want to steal their Thunder but they are raising hundreds of thousands of dollars that they're going to be sharing with the community they've already done great work with a couple of our schools that Mr herbick mentioned but they're looking to uh Supply classroom materials for teachers who lost things for students who lost things but they're also looking to help employees who've lost had personal loss and they have a process for that and they're going to be announcing that in the coming days our office of strategic Partnerships has also been coordinating Supply drives and anybody who has physical materials and resources whether that's closed to kids and getting donations to there or directing people to food pantries um it's been a big lift for all of our community but I want to thank everybody for that you can see more about that on our website uh for the board I want to thank you for your leadership during this time of remaining calm um being out there invisible I know many of you visited shelters you personally contacted employees and said thank you for your work you were there when we rebooted the two schools that we needed to uh reboot seems like a long time ago now and and many of you were out there helping with that so thank you to each of you for uh both being on the pulse but also allowing people to do their work and and moving forward with that I know many in the community uh are asking about makeup time and and all of that and uh we did address that a little bit this morning in the press conference uh we'll be bringing to the the board some recommendations on October 22nd um don't have every single detail worked out but a few that I want to share with you and and the public one is that the state requires a certain number of hours and minutes they do not require a certain number of days um and so we will be looking at the hours and the minutes to restore because we need to make sure our students are taught everything they're supposed to be taught this year it's not okay to say well we met the minimum but you missed out on 3 weeks of this or or this right that's important for our students having said that the State Testing window is the state testing window so uh we will you know do those Assessments in may we will not be going to school into June and things like that there are a couple days second semester that we'll be recommending our school days and not uh holidays anymore and we'll get you those details we'll also be recommending to extend the day um particularly in high school which has a a higher requirement of minutes because one of the things that you know we could do is there are districts around the state that only offer six periods and if you only offered six periods you're not out many minutes because you youve probably met those minimums we offer seven which means the periods are a little shorter but that means you also have to catch up on each one of those periods but it's because we believe in the Arts we believe in C technical education we want students to have a well-rounded education and as we make up these minutes we want to make sure that that well-rounded education is also made up and so you'll see that um I'm not going to be recommending to the board that we use the Thanksgiving days I think our community is weary and I think our community needs some time our our employees our students our families uh we do believe we can capture everything second semester in and uh capture all the hours that we need so look forward to more details on that next week and we'll share that with with the board um some of that can be uh done just through executive action other things We'll be asking the board to wave some policy Pro and uh provisions and I'll bring you some of those details as well and I think um both the board of the members as I've talked to you about it and uh our students and families will appreciate some of those concessions so uh that's the that's my update but I'm not going to leave without a superintendent standout today uh and this super superintendent standout is an easy one to choose and that is Mr Jeffrey Reddit the head plan operator at madira beach fundamental K8 School U Mr Reddit was there shortly after Helen and I don't know that he's left I know many of you have visited the campus and you've seen him there he has been amazing in helping all of the contractors restore that campus from the very very beginning all the way till today he's worked for penel County schools for 21 years he was actually the district support employee of the Year nominee and a state finalist uh four or five years ago and he's done just an amazing job so thank you Mr Reddit and all of our maintenance employees for what they've done the last three weeks has been a huge lift and certainly Mr Reddit has been at the front of that line thank you much thank you Mr hendrik items introduced by the Schoolboard attorney I have no report this morning thank you thank you items introduced by the board Mrs long yes I I want to give a big shout out to everyone that worked through the Hurricanes I had the opportunity to go to Walter Pell and see the command senders um Shan Joel was there and Clint herck Clint took me on a tour it is it was mindboggling you know we we were just watch the every day but they had so many computer uh you know red and green and this was light green and light red and they explained it all you you just don't know how much work goes into running a school system and getting everything going after it's been hit so hard um they served food every single day including Saturday and Sunday um some cold meals and some hot meals they had people coming in and out they were cleaning up the Walter P house center itself in the parking lot it it was just amazing and you guys all all of those people that were working there they need a shout out because it was unbelievable and some looked really tired when I went in the cafeteria some were snoozing against the wall and uh you know you can't blame them they've been going around the clock so a big thank you to everyone who did who was there and helped and um very calm uh even after all the the tragedy everyone was so calm but it is just if you ever let's hope we never go through this again but it is quite a sight to see after 40 some years in the school system that was a really impressive eye openening moment and I felt really just so proud of the school system so thank thank you Mr herbick I know you did you're the M commander and chief there right but wonderful just I'm so proud of all of you and and just for your service and your time cuz you weren't even home with your fam so that that's wonderful so thank you to all of you employees that were out there you're wonderful thank you Mrs long and Mrs hin for your comments I'd also like to recognize superintendent Hendrick for his great leadership and communication throughout this entire experience um so kudos to you and your team leadership in the middle of natural disasters as well as throughout the school year is extremely important and just from hearing from community members teachers ready to get back to work parents ready for their students or child to experience some normaly your leadership really came in handy at this time so thank you and your team we have several members here today as well as that you mentioned um administrators and area superintendent out preparing schools for tomorrow so thank you again and I just would like to say Be Kind this impacts everyone differently some people have lost everything so be kind thank you thank you madam chair um I just wanted to quickly uh Echo Miss Edmund's sentiments as well um we are so blessed to have Mr hendrik here in pelis County uh leading our district um and so thank you for your leadership and thank you to our executive leadership team um you know this again we we talked about this this has impacted every one uh we have members um on our executive leadership team that have experienced personal loss personal uh hardships throughout these last two storms um many again are principles people who are are doing this work right are experiencing these these hardships in their own personal lives as well so um thank you to everyone who's been working so hard and so diligently I also want to thank our faculty and staff who are back to work today I know it's difficult um I know many some may still not have power some are experiencing you know the loss of everything in their personal lives um and so we are here to support you um we are here to help in any way that we can and please do not hesitate to reach out if you need help or assistance because we're here to support you um and I'm looking forward to being back tomorrow myself as well and um I hope to visit some schools and and see everyone's smiling faces and hopefully have some sense of normaly here very soon so thank you again Mr hendrik and the entire executive leadership team for your for your hard work Mrs cook I was going to say very much the same as what Miss edman and um Miss Meer said um I want to add one piece to it we have an employee assistance program is that what it is I want to make sure that people are aware of that it is here for people who need it um people have been stressed out people are dealing with all kinds of emotions these are the people that can help they're there and um I think it is time for people to realize it and utilize it as well the other thing I want to say is during times like this a person's um personality who they are comes to the surface I am so proud of what I have seen with the people in pelis County I've also seen being a good leader in a time of horrible circumstances with so many things that you have to deal with and think about things that we don't even realize are going on and he has been that little duck that has just been floating while his legs are going like crazy underneath and I can say so has Miss Woodford so I mean you can just point around the room every single one of them has been doing that I want you all to remember that when you do his evaluation next year don't forget that because um we we sometimes tend to only look at what has happened recently so don't lose sight of this um and I am so extremely proud of everybody thank you Mrs Kane thank you so much I don't know there's much more to add to all the incredible sentiments that um my co-workers my my fellow board members have said this morning already and we appreciate all of those words each one of you is a leader in your own right and your support of the community means so much to those that are listening and those that are around and I thank the executive staff also for all of the tremendous amount of work I um through this got the opportunity to tour and go to um one of our shelters near my home that was being used as a special need shelter um as well as a shelter for the community and I really was so overwhelmed by the amount of employees that were not just working overtime they're working triple time and quadruple time and I want to thank the support staffs at these schools because they really were uh the meat of what was going on there and our like for instance our cafeteria staff not just serving one meal a day but three meals a day to the community working triple time all day and I got to tore the kitchen and be in the back and there were um they partnered so well and worked so collaboratively with our local municipalities bringing in our local um healthcare workers our fire our police and also our pet shelters and some of our shelters are also used for pet care and we had employees of the county in there taking care of the community's animals their cats their dogs and and other animals and it was just an incredible um an incredible lift by everyone involved in our support staff our maintenance staff that had to go in and and not only clean up after our community but after all of our community pets um and and everything that went into that and and no job is every job is so important to the success of our schools and so while it may have seemed TR to say they're in they're making you know French fries are making um cups of fruit for our community those th the time and the effort and the passion that went into their job was so important to each one of us and helped really move the wheels and keep us turning through this incredible uh time and so I want to thank our support staff for really being there working the overtime being uh doing every job no matter how small whether it's getting someone in a wheelchair to where they need to be through a large campus or serving a meal each one of those jobs was so meaningful to the people that they served and we are so grateful as the leaders to to see our staff really step up and to Echo what Miss Cook said you know it's in times of trouble you see What You're Made Of you see your character you see who you are and we have an incredible community in pelis County we're going to get through this we are going to rebuild everything that was uh impacted by these natural disasters and I know that if as long as we keep that sense of community together we're going to get through it and come out on top as we do so I want to thank each one of you and and thank you all thank you um I had the opportunity after Helen to hear Mr hendrik address the school communities that were impacted by those storms and answer a lot of questions in person because a lot of families were affected and then now again I think something that was really important that was said was that for families that have EXT uating circumstances I think I think we should address that clearly you know families that have exu and if I say something wrong or if you just want to jump in that's fine but if you have extenuating circumstances and you are relocated within or near pellis County and you need your bus transportation updated maybe you need to go to your neighborhood school instead of your application school maybe you need you know whatever you need to do as far as school and getting your children to and from school safely and maybe at a place that's closer to you we will help you with that so to reach out to your or if you have to miss if if you're not ready to go back to school it's okay it's okay let your teacher know let your principal know we are your partner in this and we will help you with that um I also think there's the piece so there's if you had to relocate within or near pel's County you could still get with our schools if you had to relocate outside of you know far away or even outside of the state those those kinds of pieces we we want to talk with you about that yes our Student Assignment office was open all day yesterday answering questions from families again today same thing with Transportation Mr herbick uh alluded to it as it's the first day of school tomorrow and so you show up at a bus stop we're going to give you a ride if you look like a penel County student only if you look like a penel County student okay um so we're get you know we'll do that and then we'll worry about the details of that once they get to school is this need to be temporary is it permanent whatever that is um and the same goes for our employees you know that we'll have employees that cannot get back to work this week and that's okay that's why we have substitutes and this is a large crisis but but these things happen in our lives throughout the year and so we have a way to address that and um we'll do that with everybody and and we'll do it with compassion and until everybody's back to some sense of stability speaking of having substitutes which is wonderful I couldn't believe it when I walked in the building this morning and I saw new employee onboarding signed down by the HR office and I went in there I stuck in there I are we really onboarding new employees this morning and yes we were so thank you we are still open for for uh jobs you can come you can come and join us but that was just wonderful it it was it was really really wonderful to see um like everyone I've seen an amazing local response right people helping their neighbors with their yards or their roofs or or whatever they needed help with and I've also seen it at a very local school level when you realize your school is struggling and I would just like to encourage people to continue to do that and if you're looking for a way to be of use I don't know about you all about a time like this you want to be of use um your your school is a great place to look so whether it's the pelis Education Foundation or maybe your school's PTA or even the staff there can help figure out hey who who needs help and how can we help them but we can do that and and people are doing it I think during you know during a time of chaos it seems like the only way to stay strong and sane is to help others um and it's wonderful to see people do that I wanted to acknowledge with students being back at bus stops tomorrow walking to and from bus stops and of course the traffic light situation just ask our community to please drive safely tomorrow and every day of course um you know this is phrase fog of war and it's a very real it's a very real phenomenon and that's what our community has been through our community has been through a major traumatic event whether you were feel fearful to lose your home fearful to lose your life those those kinds of things absolutely Institute this fog of War experience and we're all having it yet we we are also showing up and so in that time it's so important to be slow and to be safe and to be thoughtful and doublethink your actions and like Mrs Edmund said to also be kind and to have Grace people are going to make mistakes people are going to say the wrong things people you know but everyone is doing their best and so having that Grace to help all of us through this time uh is an important time to do that but please please please drive safe certainly um any other questions comments we will get to the academic calendar we promise thank you for addressing that in your remarks Mr hendrik anything else good thank you Mrs Woodford have you noted any requests I did not note any requests but I did want to share we had a little miracle during one of the storms and we delivered a baby at one of our shelters a little boy and so in the midst of you know chaos there was there was a bright light so just sharing that was just remarkable I hope not my kids my kids want to name our new puppy Milton I don't think I'm up for it we'll see okay thank you so much um so with that and seeing no other business I adjourn this meeting and we'll move to public participation Mrs H do we have any speakers today yes Madam chair there's one speaker thank you could you please call them our first speaker is Katie blackburg good morning good morning uh board member superintendent um Hendrick and staff I am my name is Katie blackburg and I am here this morning as a community member and a proud PCS parent I wanted to bring to your attention and highlight an amazing experience I got to have this weekend um as some of you know the standard apartment complex in clear waterer flooded as a result of Milton um the penel county sheriff department had to rescue 500 residents from that a hundred of those being children as I was driving by on my hunt for gas Friday morning I noticed so many of them across the street in the Best Buy parking lot and I called a friend who happens to be a teacher at Eisenhower Elementary which is a school not far from um the standard and I said what can we do these people are outside and she said those are our kids those are our families and so we were quickly able to um organize we're going to be back here Saturday morning and provide residents just manual labor help Donuts coffee just just some comfort in a time of Crisis we showed up Saturday morning and there were teachers there were staff there were um staff members that don't even work at the school anymore there to provide comfort and care to these families that they know so well and what started on Saturday as a very small community effort grew and grew and grew we watched people you know drive by and bring hot meals and water and supplies and it just manifested into something so big but the teachers the ones that led that charge so I know and then Sunday was even bigger with more things and churches bringing in and and Community effort all around and it was something so beautiful to see um it made me so proud to be a member of this community and pelis County schools and watching these teachers who had also lost you know power not sure dropped everything in their recovery efforts to converge and be there and be helpful and caring and I watched kids that had lost everything just lighted up to see their teachers and give them hugs so I know those residents and those families have um a long road to recovery but I am confident that they will have the support that they need at Eisenhower so I wanted to bring that to your attention this morning thank you there are no other speakers thank you thanks for being here e