##VIDEO ID:P8sCljZJKfQ## we good I'm off all right um welcome everybody um so I think we have a relatively brief uh agenda call this meeting to order um we have to do roll call and nobody's on nobody's online there so I think we are good to go um so the first order business uh we will defer to next month as we didn't have anybody do the meeting minutes um I will speak to that a little bit in my record creation share update so we we'll just create a a a process so that we assign somebody each month so that we don't come to the who's doing it who's doing it in the last hour um so uh we'll move straight to public comment right here public comment something anything that is not on agenda we're here for agenda items um okay um so I have two things uh for my Recreation share update discussion um so the first one is the uh is for the minutes um I think it just makes sense if we move to just rotating just one person a month doing the minutes you can use chat GPT if you want you can use whatever whatever you need as long as uh you can kind of like double check and and make sure that it's uh somewhat accurate um but uh if that makes sense to every everybody uh I think Jim can probably just kind of like make a list recording in progress Perfect all right so it is uh 6:33 and I call this virtual school committee meeting to order via roll call so we'll start in the top left corner of my screen Chuck yes Carla yes Sarah yes Aaron yes Sean yes here and Tom here so we are called to order a quick review of the agenda we have two items to quickly go through and I want to thank the committee for their flexibility in doing this meeting uh so we can especially execute the first item and get ourselves rolling the first item on the agenda is the recommendation and vote to appoint the interim Director of Finance uh we have the nominee here Mr little thank you for joining us Dr milesy you'll introduce that topic when we get there and the second one is the recommendation and vote of the budget transfers between cost centers for FY 24 end of year reconciliation which you all remember is a leftover from our last meeting to officially vote it so with that said uh Dr mileski will you uh do the introduction and the recommendation please great I'd like to bring forth the committee our nominee for the direct interim Director of Finance and operations role Mr Phil little haale who's joined us tonight uh in closing the packet you'll find Phil's cover letter and resume and i' just like to highlight a couple of things uh from his background that we think make him a excellent candidate for the role uh first as you'll see in his resume uh Phil has been a h CFO in Massachusetts con public schools for close to 15 years with time at as a CFO in Salem Boston Renaissance Charter and also most recently newbur Port um prior to his time in uh in the schools he has a pretty extensive background in finance and administration it is a CPA by trade as well I think given some of his qualifications you can see why we believe that Phil will be able to jump right into some of the critical work ahead for our district and right into our FY 26 budget process and we think his technical skills and experiences will be a major uh asset to our district and we'll be a definitely excited to welcome him to our team uh also his background and leading a variety of operational projects we think will be important for our district and uh he shared a couple of times with me he does love build project so I think that's a obviously Tim Le for us as well um we're thrilled to uh bring forth a candidate with his skill and experience and uh I'd also like to thank our members of the screening committee who SP spent time and energy uh and shared their perspectives as we went through this process uh Sean Brandt on the school committee Sharon angstrom Jess Kalan Kate finigan Jeffrey corm and jar Stanton who's an RPS parent and also has experience in the sector as well their perspectives were invaluable in helping us to uh move forward in the direction that we think is best for the district so I would uh add I don't know Tom if you want to uh first sort of move forward your comments or if you want me to give Phil the chance to introduce himself as well why don't we have Phil do some introductions and then we can uh see if there's any questions from the committee okay well again I thank you for the opportunity um I'm excited to be joining reading I think I've got a lot of experience that I can bring to the table here and hopefully I can make some contributions towards the district um you some of you may know my wife is actually a par professional in the district so I'm very familiar with the district and all the things that have been going on um got a lot of good programs going on and um did I just lose myself you did yeah you disappeared into space outer space there you go now you're back the camera slid up on the top of my sorry about that um so anyway I'm excited to be joining uh everybody there in Reading um I'm actually thrilled to be working with Tom again um had some experience with Tom we're both in Salem so you know I think one of the advantages I'm going to have hitting the ground is Tom knows me I know Tom um so we can get to work right away um get the budget up and get that going for fiscal year 26 and then start looking down the road for 27 and years beyond that in terms of trying to get the forecast out there see what we're going to need um and I did say yes I do like building projects I like being on those committees um I I'm I'm an operations guy at heart so to me it's a lot of operations in there but I think with the background of operations and my CPA it's a somewhat difficult combination to find in this world and I think I do pretty well on both sides so again I thank you for the opportunity and I'm looking forward to starting in uh two weeks great thanks Phil all right uh committee any questions or Sean do you want to start with any Impressions or takeaways from the interview process and your feedback here that would probably be beneficial for us as well please yeah I would just I mean I think Tom said it really well in terms of what what we were all enthusiastic about with regards to Phil I think um you know the thing that Shone through sort of most clearly were his technical skills in this area and um you know just really sort of a sophisticated understanding of how school districts are funded um how School District budgets are operated and planned and prepared and and uh you know he understands full well sort of the nuances of working in a town construct versus a city construct where much of his experience came from so uh we felt really good about Phil and and his background and his ability to uh succeed in this role right off the bat great thanks Sean okay any questions from anybody on the committee before we do that let's start with the motion Ain would you read the motion motion to appoint Phil littlehale is the interm Director of Finance any second second by check okay now any other questions or comments from the rest of the committee I just Tom go ahead just i' like to uh welcome uh Bill and just you know tell him we're I'm excited to to be able to work with him so thank you Bill well no thank you for uh for considering me and uh appointing me great Carla go ahead hi Phil um welcome and I'm looking forward to having you as another set of eyes and ears on the Kellum project so we're looking forward to that great can I interrupt one second that you are using the OPM aren't you on that project all yours correct okay I'll just Echo the the welcome then as well we're looking forward to having you come on and as we go through the budget process the multi-year forecast whatnot I'll be looking forward to get to know you more uh Point by point and uh thank you for putting your your your hat in the ring as it goes um and for I think as well taking the the interim role for the time being and we'll see what what what happens at the end of exactly yes yes for the time being but I will uh do my best to to work to get that title uh the first word taken off there you go okay Tom Tom I just want to Echo something I've said a couple of times too but I just like to thank Kate finnean for her work I think Kate in the last couple years is really behind the scenes uh done an amazing job on everything Finance in our in our uh in our district but also especially as we've had a couple of week Gap with uh you know Dr Pinto's transition and also I uh she is really excited about having uh Phil jump on our team I know Phil has also expressed his enthusiasm by having someone like Kate on his team to work collaboratively and I think between the two of them that's really solidifies the office for us but I'd just like to thank Kate for jumping in uh especially this week this month's the busiest month for her the end of the year report and jumping in a picking up everything else throwing her way in the transition so huge thank you to Kate she doesn't want any of the public recognition but definitely deserves it and uh is really really really effective in her role so a big thank you to her um and looking forward to having her with a with a teammate by your side great indeed and Phil I think you'll be happy when you get to meet Kate as well and go through that uh just a point of clarification ER did your motion say finance and operations or just Director of Finance just Director of Finance okay I think we have just a clarification Tom we want to be finance and operations for now correct okay so I'm going to Friendly amend to add and operations to the motion any objection to that no okay seeing uh any further discussion okay we'll move to the vote uh we'll do ver uh roll call vote as well since we're virtual so we'll start it again at the top uh Chuck yes Carla yes Sarah yes Aaron yes Sean yes and Tom yes it passes six to zero Phil welcome welcome aboard thank you great to have you looking forward to it I know Tom wants me to start yesterday but you know I have to finish up my interview report for Newbury board indeed understand okay so let's move on to the second item in our agenda um and you get to uh watch the rest of the the magic happen right while we're while we're here um and some of the the final uh transfers for the end of the year so let's just uh start with the motion there Aaron uh for the transfers um from our that's a carryover from our past meeting and and I'm itemizing these all them yep okay motion to transfer from regular day $147,450 from health services $28,995 15,980 from technology $ 38,5 36 transfer two Administration $5,000 597 special education $224,600 [Music] Chuck yes Carla yes Sarah yes Aaron yes Sean yeah and Tom yes and that passes six to zero as well that concludes our business today in this portion of the this this meeting so we'll take one final motion motion to adjourn motion by Aon is there SEC seconded by Carla all right moving forward Chuck yes Carla yes Sarah yes Aaron yes Sean yeah I think there was a yes the mute came out on off real quick but yes sorry all right and Tom yes uh we are here so for adjourned at 6:43 thank you everybody for your accommodation of this I very much appreciate it thanks