##VIDEO ID:6MbzpooqCD0## e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e can I just check has anybody checked with m if we have to wait for a minute or two short meeting anyway call this meeting to order roll call Mr Donnie here Miss Sandy here m m here Mr mm here miss Brogan stand for the flag Bud of Allegiance pursuant to the requirements of the open public meetings act an advanced notice has been given to the Star Ledger the record and the clerk of the village of Ridgewood in addition notices were posted in the office of the board of secretary and in all schools I'd like to uh go over the results of the election November 5th 2024 I'd like to uh make mention that one oneyear term the shielder Brogan got 9,639 votes we just give her a little in clap for two threeyear terms Mary L handy got 9,146 votes little hand clap and Mohammad mmud with 5,324 votes little hand clap so next we're going to swear in first start with Miss Brogan Maybe I got it Solly swear Solly swear or affirm that I or affirm that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the constitution of the state of New Jersey and the constitution of the state of New Jersey and I will bear true faith and I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same and aliance to the same and to the government's established and to the government's established in the United States and this state the United States and this state under the authority of the people under the authority of the people so help me God so help me God uh raise your right hand please I state your name I Shila Brogan do solemnly swear or affirm do solemnly swear and affirm that I that I possess the qualifications that I possess the qualifications the subcrib by law for the office of member of a board of education describ by by law for the office of Board of Education and that I am not disqualified and that I'm not disqualified as a voter pursuant to RS as voter pursuant to RS 19 colon 4-1 19 that's I got it nor disqualified due to conviction nor disqualified due to conviction of a crime or offense of a crime or offense listed in njs listed in listed in 18a 18a Poland 12-1 12-1 and I will faithfully and I will faithfully impartially and impartially and justly perform justly perform all the duties all the duties of that office of that office according to the best of my ability according to the best of my ability so help me go so help me go congratulations thank you ra your right hand please I state your name I Solly swear swear or affirm that I will support I will support the Constitution of the United States Constitution of the United States the Constitution of the state of New Jersey constition that I will bear true faith that I will bear true faith and Allegiance and allegiance to the same to the same and to the government established government established the United States United States and this state and this state under the authority of the people the authority of people me got I st your name Solly swear Solly swear or affirm orir that I possess I possess the qualifications qualifications by descri by law for the office of member the office of member of a board of education Board of Education that I am not disqualified have not disqualified as a voter pursuant voter pursuant to RS RS 19 19 call 4-11 nor disqualify due to or disqualify due to conviction of a crime conviction crime or offense or offense listed in listed in njs njs 18a 18 col 12-1 121 that will Faithfully that will Faithfully partially partially and justly performed justly performed all the duties all the duties set Office of the office according to the best of my ability best of my ability so help me go congratulations ra your right hand I stay your name I Mary handy solemnly swear to solemnly swear or affirm or affirm that I will support the Constitution that I will support the Constitution of the United States of the United States and the Constitution and the constitution of the state of New Jersey the state of New Jersey that I will bear true faith that I will bear true faith and Allegiance and allegiance to the same to the same and to the governments and to the government established in the United States established in the United States and this state and this and this day Under The Authority Under the authority of the people of the people so help me God so help me God I state your name I Mary Louise Andy do solemnly swear do solemnly swear for firm or firm that I that I possess the qualifications possess the qualifications prescribed by law prescribed by law for the office of a member the office of a member of a board of education of a board of education and that I am not qualified that I am not disqualified as a voter pursuant as a voter pursuant to RS to RS 19 19 col Poland for four D One D one nor disqualified nor disqualified due to due to conviction of a crime conviction of a crime or offense or offense listed in listed in njs njs 188 18a po Poland 12 12-1-1 that I will Faithfully that I will Faithfully and partially and impartially and justly perform and justly perform all the duties all of the duties of that office of this of that office according to the best of my ability according to the best of my ability so help me God so help me God congratulations thank you very much so now we will take nominations for board president so open the floor for nominations I would like to nominate uh Sheila Brogan for board president so Sheila bro been nominated by Mr mm here a second it doesn't need a second no sorry okay is there another nomination hearing none I quose a nomination for board president uh in favor Mr Donnie Miss Brogan miss mcau Mr mmu yes Miss bro oh sorry Miss Andy yes congratulations thank you nominated president and Mr Matthews just as a procedure question um for this role call shouldn't that be uh alphabetical because there was no president or vice president yet well honestly the names here were okay [Music] okay e I'm very grateful for your confidence thank you very much um and uh to the voters uh who have um you know again giving me the opportunity to serve this community um our next piece of business is the um nominations for vice president I would like to nominate Muhammad Mahmud we can take a vote then okay um Mr Donnie yes Miss handy yes Mr Miss mcau yes Mr mmud yes Miss Brogan yes congratulations M thank you appreciate the uh nominations s and the vote of confidence for everybody so we are should I have a request um since Miss Handy's family is here can we can we do a picture for her with the family absolutely because they sure especially the granddaughter yeah how nice no I think just with the family now maybe yeah I thought that at the end of the meeting we might get a picture of all the new board members for the website wasn't sure if they are going to stay so oh you want that out right there would be great let us not have a t on our new our new board member and her [Laughter] this your friend we can just can we just hold maybe we could do it by day like not have it mom she is hard okay righty that was nice good good thought s thank you thank you you could stay for the whole thing okay that was nice welcome Mary love yeah so well um go to the reorganization resolutions um and Adoption of the New Jersey school board's code ethics as we normally do uh we will read the code of ethics out loud each of us taking a section and um Mary would you like to start thanks ethics for school board members njsa 18 12-24 one a I will uphold and enforce all laws rules and regulations of the State Board of Education and court orders pertaining to schools desired changes shall be brought only through legal and ethical procedures I will make decisions in terms of the educational welfare of children and will seek to develop and maintain public schools that meet the individual needs of all children regardless of their ability race Creed sex or social standing I will confirm confine my board action to policymaking planning and appraisal and I will help to frame policies and plans only after the board has consulted those who will be affected by them I will carry out my responsibility not to administer the schools but together with my fellow board members to see that they are well-run I will recognize that Authority rests with the Board of Education and will make no personal promises nor take any private action that may compromise the board I will refuse to surrender my independent judgment to special interest or partisan political groups or to use the schools for personal gain or for the gain of friends I will hold confidential all matters pertaining to these schools which if disclosed would needlessly injure individuals or the school in all other matters I will provide accurate information and in cons in concert with my fellow board members interpret to the staff the aspirations of the community for its school I will vote to appoint the best qualified Personnel available after consideration of the recommendation of the chief administrative officer I will support and protect School Personnel in proper performance of their duties I will refer all complaints to the chief administrative officer and will act on the complaints at public meetings only after failure of an administrative solution great thank you um we all need to um sign this and I'll give it to uh Mr Matthews thank you okay and now um approval of the open public meetings act and board meeting dates um and are are the are the dates as listed as far as you know right now conflict pre and um does that meet with your expectations um from my perspective I just want to understand how from with these dates um what is the timeline for Budget when will the public get to see the budget when will we do the budget presentation before the um I think the preliminary budget adoption is March 24th so when are we doing budget presentations what are the dates for those budget presentations and uh do we have do we expect any other presentations at that time uh like would not like to make that meeting a 11 12:00 meeting where we are making other school related presentations or other uh non budget specific presentations in that meeting so if we can accommodate that like budget meeting should be probably dedicated to budget um and public should have information in advance and time to provide their comments so what is that timeline from this perspective that's what I want to this is your recommendation for the dates so if you'd like to we did discuss a little bit Yeah I'd be happy to speak to that so uh so my recommendation um and again happy to accommodate any requests or concerns from the board but my recommendation uh is that we focus that we have um one at least one primary meeting a month that works very well with our administrative processes because then we have the opportunity to have a robust committee structure which we've been working toward for the past past year or so so um uh so that that's the intention of the one regular meeting a month but there are some months where we have more business than usual the budget season is a little tricky because we don't get our budget figures until um until late February and then we have our process to prepare for the final budget presentation and adoption I think last year if I remember correctly what we did was we posted and please refresh my m but I believe what we did was we had the we had uh the meeting with we had the pre the budget presentation at the preliminary budget meeting but we worked very hard on our side of things to get the budget finalized for that meeting so although we have the preliminary budget we have the final budget there really if I remember correctly there really wasn't even much change in the presentation we did all the work that we could to be have it completed at that time if I also remember correctly I believe that we at the wishes of the board posted the budget Pres presentation for the public in advance I remembering that correctly does that sound right we did it with the um agenda so before we switched to the November election um we used to have budget presentation at uh GW and bf and uh we used to have budget presentations at every school's HSA meetings uh so that posting online is in lie of that right so the school Community which is uh where very active with the schools website they may get notifications but budget impacts everybody in town right so we need somehow uh some information that like when we have two meetings where one meeting the presentation is done and then at the next meeting we are voting then that gives them an opportunity to provide us feedback and it gives us board members time to think about that feedback or and the administration to maybe review that right sure so so the challenge with with this is just it states time frames so in the when you have an April election um and it's going up for a vote built in is you have significantly more time the state's budget figures come out regardless of whether you're an April election or November election the state budget numbers come out at the same time which I think is projected as February 27th the last Tuesday in February yeah so I believe it's and I believe that's February 27th this year so if we are if we're a November election and we are we're working with the um with the allowable 2% increase the TA tax levy as our standard model we have a very tight time frame so we only have the very tight window of time with which we can have our preliminary budget adoption and the figure doesn't come out till the 27th that's about four weeks to make the final changes to the budget because we are we we are going to make our budget based on certain assumptions about state aid figures but we won't know exactly what they are so we'll have we'll create some if then scenarios like if them if we get a reduction here's what we would do if we get an Inc increase here's what we'll do we'll try to set that up but once that number comes in we need to move very quickly to work with the board and to finalize our recommendations to you just to your point there has to be some back and forth so we'd use our committee structure for that to make sure that we have the right feedback from the right committees around the decisions that we would make and then we need to get that updated into our budget presentation and often there may be there may be decisions that it might impact the community I think that's a point that you're concerned about so we have to make sure that we also have time to work with any affected parties so in a worst case scenario we have a significant reduction we may have to enact some anticipated uh austerity measures which could mean potentially cutting positions we have to be very mindful to be very very um give people time to hear that information in the right sequence so this is really about a time crunch so having a meeting much prior to this is going to it's going to be take a considerable amount of work to get to a point where we all feel good about the decisions that we've made with the budget if there is a reduction even before even the week before March 24th and and I I I know that when we just uh had briefly talked about this the um you know that period between February 24th and March 24th besides our committee meetings that's an opportunity for board members also to get have a deeper dive um as we did last year if if needed on the budget so um those are usually scheduled to board members uh and two board members and then one board member um if if you'd like to participate in that um to give you a deeper dive and and a comfort level with the budget but we did present the budget to the public when we um prior to the meeting we had that budget information toi to the plinary budget questions that come up after the preliminary budget there is the April 7th meeting which would be the strategic planning report but also would leave room for any um further discussion discussion um you know any further discussion on the budget so but we have already adopt we would have already adopted the preliminary budget by then right your preliminary budget is your preliminary budget I mean it it's you don't usually make big changes but it it doesn't preclude you from making a change from the from your preliminary budget to your final budget yeah that that is if you discuss it at the preliminary meeting that item can be a change at the final budget adoption if there's no conversation about anything or a particular item is not discussed once the county approves your budget that item can't be changed so you have to have a conversation at the preliminary budget meeting so you want to do a staffing adjustment you got to have a conversation at the preliminary meeting if you don't have those conversations once it goes to the county and they approve it basically it's that's it it's final adoption is just approved right so it's more a a lip service if you're talking anything after that so that's why I want Community to have some chance to take a look at what we are presenting and provide us some feedback so when can that happen in this window when when do we have to submit it to the county by what date do we have to submit it to the county we don't have that calendar yet that has to go to the county they're saying mid January stuff's going to come out regarding software and the dates that has got to go to the county right now I checked up this morning they said mid January we'll have all that information it's not out right now public can that presentation be done as a superintendent coffee not a if not as a board meeting so that way people get the information of what what is being presented like somehow that's how we used to do that that Dr fishine used to go to different schools only after the only after the preliminary budget was presented then it becomes public information to the board I I don't think you can circumvent um having the board discuss the no I mean I I think I'm just gonna try try to frame frame the concern because I think I I think we're all speaking the same language here and again and I'm I'm not trying to push back on any concern I'm just just having worked within this model now for 10 years of of doing budgets th this this is just a very frustrating time frame to work in because all boards want to be transparent with their Community I'll tell you we had this exact conversation with my prior Board of my prior district and um and we actually did add like a preliminary preliminary meeting and it actually ended up being very underwhelming and even more frustrating because it was too tight of a Time crutch for us to be able to make informed decisions when we only had a few weeks anyway so I think that I thought our compromise last year was actually pretty solid um I don't know what format you want to do it in but I think releasing information to the public so that they can see like the actual like what we're actually proposing with the budget especially and everyone cares about like what's being added and what's being taken out right that's like that's really the big thing that everybody cares about and then of course obviously if there's any significant change to the tax levy right but but the to be clear to everyone's Point here the tax levy is struck at the preliminary budget meeting so we're not making changes to the the tax levy after that meeting just to be clear so I think the again like I said I think the most important thing is working with the board through committees to be in a place where we have a best we have a a model with a couple of different possibilities of what's going to happen in terms of the things that are on the table for being added things that might be on the table for being cut we get really comfortable with those things so that way whenever we get our final state aid number we can then kind of figure out what we want to do with all the figures that we have in front of us the sooner we do that then the sooner we can start getting out the messaging and I think one of the biggest concerns is of course if there are Cuts that's something that's always just very very hard then we can make sure that we're communicating to people why we're doing what we're doing and we can do that particularly with our with our most interested stakeholders board members you'll know kind of direction that we're heading in and of course we'll have an opportunity to speak to those things I do want to be transparent if we are going to if by that point we know we're going to move forward with something like to be able to say it if we're not going to move forward with something we can say that too but we do have a variety of channels that we can have those Communications through so I would not want to circumvent the board so I would have to be working closely with the board to try to figure out a strategy for which we would start to share that information so uh my my but but nevertheless we would have to get the board in a place where you're comfortable with this certainly we don't want you to won't be walking in kind of trying to make decisions at the time of the preliminary budget hearing so I think that releasing information to the public in a in a in a digestible way that's that's transparent and clear about what the tax levy is proposed to be what we're what we might have to be cutting what we might be able to be adding um getting that information out in the week in that week before gives people time to process over the weekend and then they can come with their thoughts and opinions to the preliminary budget meeting and to Mr Matthew's point we do have an opportunity to make changes at the preliminary budget meeting um but I would hope that we'd identify what those concerns are well in advance oh so if I summarize we are saying board members will be meeting in committee structures or one-on-one with Mr Matthews to understand the budget and public will get to know by Thursday or Friday before the meeting and they would have a weekend to digest their information before before we vot just yes yeah did we release only on Thursday or or Friday I I don't recall don't think that I mean I'm again I'm open to releasing information sooner I mean it what we're not talking about here is that actually my intentions are I actually my intentions are to have the budget framed and projected thoroughly through February like I said so I want to be having Mo most of these conversations about what are and having what the board members is all comfortable with what are we put again what are we putting in what are we taking out what are we proposing for for tax levy um but I'd like to have that largely thought through in advance of February then we get our numbers hopefully they're not we're not shocked by our numbers unless we're positively shocked that'd be great but probably won't be positively shocked but we'll have a frame framework for how to move at that point in time it's up to again it's up to the board when you're comfortable starting to release that information to the public I'd like to have things pretty much set up for you um in terms of a presentation in terms of the actual numbers um in terms of at least the decisions that are made I mean Mr Matthews has a lot of Mr Matthews and team have a lot of work to do in getting the exact numbers crunched down because the software we have to input the budget into is very fickle but in terms of knowing what's in what's out and what the tax levy is we can get that figured out I think pretty far in pretty well in advance but getting to a place where we have the budget presentation where the numbers are all right too I don't think that it's reasonable to say that we would be able to have that um vetted through the board and through our Pro our processes much more than a week before March 24th so if we wanted to have like a meeting right before that my concern is that if we just can't get done what we need to get done in that amount of time again this is my experience I've tried to do this before then the the presentation lacks specificity and then people feel like we're not being forthright about where we are yeah so so but again if you if you think that like like a Wednesday release of a budget AR presentation I I'm pretty confident that we could be in a comfortable place the week before I I feel like we did because by the time the board reviewed it I think we were I think we were done with that presentation by the Wednesday the week before so and if if everyone I mean we we see I I don't remember it was um released that early but um you can look back and see I know it was released uh at least by Friday of that week so um but again I think it it we need to see where you are as of um you know the end of February when our state aid uh but you'll have you'll have all the outlines and options already there by the beginning of March that's right so then is fine-tuning it and putting your presentation together making sure all numbers are right yeah I would say if you did want to add another public meeting like if that was something that we wanted to do to give people more time before the vote I wouldn't I would ask that we don't try to do that a full week in advance that's just going to be too much of a we lose an entire week of being able to work in already four weeks I would I would really only say I'd only I'd only really be I I would not recommend that we do that sooner than than the Thursday before I think we have an opportunity though at the February 24th meeting um to begin to look at some of the structure of the budget right yeah without assumptions w that's that is in the past that's what we have done we have done it on the assumption that state eight is flat you you know you don't know and extraordinary eight is flat and here here's the picture that we have yeah yeah but it's not the preliminary budget it's it's is just really the beginnings of a public discussion of the budget actually at that meeting on the 25th there going to be actually a gap review mean you're going to have more expenses than Revenue so it'll be a negative it's not going to be obviously not going to be a balanced budget um we we will effort to balance the budget on flat funding right so um again 25th is the day we get our state a yes we can actually give you know give you a PR preliminary budget um based on flat funding no State a 2% tax increase actually a reduction in extraordinary a because our trend has been we haven't been hitting that number so that number is going to be a reduction we will look at the budget of fund balance that we talked about at the last meeting of $2.7 million yeah so that that that number will be in year so yeah we we can we can have that for you uh prior you know whenever right so that I mean that would be at least the start of the discussion in February 24th gives us the model we're working with and then when you get the state aid figure we fill we fill in all the blanks of course if our state a Aid is cut then you know the reality is you will I'm assuming will already have sort of a list of um possibilities where we you might be able to find money we have to plan for that too yeah so we could then kind of have that very general discussion understanding that it would be subject to change based on what would happen on so we have to plan for flag and for reduction in state but we could we could at least it kind of flush out what the parameters are is what you're saying so that people can start thinking about what they care about and and have conversations right Matthew safies some of your concerns and Mr Matthews in your Circles of BS have you heard any so far about any possible Cuts this year or just this is the one year Mr Donnie that I'm really not plugged in like I'm like I'm usually plugged in I mean I've been talking all over the state and this this year I I I don't I don't have the same data okay no one knows everyone's in the dark okay thank you confirm the same uh with with my channels to the superintendent groups and the associations that we're a part of that the state has been very clandestine about what they're going to do but they they are saying um either you know it's going to be somewhere between a platter or a slight decrease there's been a lot of hubub and turmoil about the rebalancing of school districts uh and funding and a lot of districts have been losing and losing and losing um and some districts have been been actually ending up pos positive like we have so uh it's really I think I think there's just a lot of sensitivity around how they're going to approach this budget it's also an election year so there's just a lot of factors on the table and I think those are all reasons why they're just keeping this very tight to the best and the legislature is beginning to take comments on the um on the formula and what could what changes may be um part of the formula so I did ask um Dr Schwarz and um and um Mr Matthews um if if in fact we could think about make making some comments on this to the state about the funding formula and its impact and one is this the big unknown every year I mean we need consistency we need to understand the formula and it needs to be again that transparent as you can be um special education um issues are um the census model is pro is a problem for some districts but throughout the state the census model in terms of how they fund special education is problematic um rather than doing as they used to do in tiers so you have tier one tier two tier three special education uh costs and then you're you're really funded about with your costs in consideration transportation and the way the um the formula was um developed in put into place in 208 um you know there have been some changes and how we look at security Now isn't just buzzing in systems there's more to security there's mental health um issues that are now part of security so all of those kinds of uh changes um need to need to be brought forward to our legislators to take a look at how is this formula really going to be structured going forward um and the state is supposed to every three years evaluate the waiting system of of your Elementary you know how much it cost to educate um an elementary student a middle school student a high school student um and then wait uh those costs for um uh students that needed yeah English as a second language special education so there are some um things I I I think it deserves some comment from districts like us um that have benefited from the restructuring but as we go forward when that restructuring ends how do how do we um continue to um not be guessing every year about what our funding is it should be a clear picture so anyway that that's the Hope on that one are there any other um area dates um that you uh do you see any conflicts at this point I know it's it's hard to it's a minor holiday but the first night of Hanukkah is December 15 and we have a meeting I I don't know if that's it's not a major holiday but is a family holiday oh it it's the first night of Haka okay thank you for pointing that out so the eth the 8th of December would be the Monday before that right 8 715 yay still got it yeah so um let's look at moving that to the eth yeah yeah I'm I'll change my recommendation let's move that to December 8th Please Mr Mr Matthews if you can just memorialize that thank you so much okay so this come uh last year when we made a change we just we just looked at it again and brought it to the second meeting and finalized it then yeah so we'll um we'll let that change happen percolate on these dates make sure that you have no major conflict of anything I know last year we had a conflict and we did move a meeting to Thursday um which is not the norm for us but we did that because I think we we're going to have two members out so just take a look at that and we'll bring this back on for the 27th of the at our next meeting Okay Okay resolution calls for uh for filing these dates within seven days of the adoption I know but why did we were able to not do it last year I think we just I think we just did it in I think we ignored it yeah so I we can strike that portion from the resolution for the time being um make these tensive dates we can put them on our website and then then just change them before we advertise them but we can't have a meeting on 27th without advertising and why would we spend ex right if yeah let's advertise this and if there's a change we we can always because we have to advertise 27th meeting anyway and yeah it wouldn't make sense to spend money we do a Le year I don't know I I I I pretty distinctly remember that we were that it was not proper last year oh so so I think I think we I think if we can finalize it now we should at least tentatively finalize it now right and then if if we have to make a change later we can always make a change later but I'd rather get the advertisement done okay so if no one has any so I'm G just again I'm changing the recommendation if you can all make a change on your record and we reading the change in the record you I'll reading the record now that resolution uh recommended resolution Administration so it's A2 approval of the open public meetings act and board meeting dates um the date listed for our December regular meeting on the original agenda read December 15 2025 I hereby Al change that recommendation ask Mr Matthews that you make a change into the record that I'm recommending not December 15th but December 8th and all the dates I believe are good with the board members is that correct yes they appear to be okay and if there's if we identify a future conflict later we can always just adjust but let's get this advertised okay thank you for that is there a motion I make a motion as M bro there second second Miss mcau uh roll call Mr Donnie yes Miss hany yes Miss mcau yes Mr mmud yes M broy yes motion pass and then um adoption of Robert Rule of Order adoption of board policy regulations and bylaws and designation of official newspapers um you did see that the um legislature had approved that we can um if if the Star Ledger actually goes uh All Digital yep that we are able to do that um I think it's through the end of March at this point and then I guess they'll revisit it depending upon that so I move um what's that a b that's b b uh 34 and five okay motion for three four and five M Broan is a second M um roll call Mr Donnie yes M Andy yes m m m yes Mr MCM yes Mr Rogan yes move annual appointments we can not on this yes sure please um just real quick adjustment uh first of all thank you Miss handy for your watchful ey earlier I did catch uh an error that got by us um under item four it says title four coordinator that should be Title Nine coordinator so that's I ex not IV all right yes so again that is the appointment of the Title Nine coordinator so again if we can make an adjustment to the recommendation Mr Matthews I'll read the change into the record um under Section resolutions under Section B annual appointments item number four it says appointments title four coordinator that should say Title Nine coordinator or in Roman numerals iix coordinator that should also be changed within the body of the resolution it should read The Ridgewood Board of Education upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools approves Jame Jamie kangi Murphy cangelosi Murphy excuse me assistant superintendent of secondary education personnel as the title 9 I coordinator for the 2025 school year okay there on just to be clear on two and three where we identify uh that the director of special programs will be the coordinator at this point since we don't have a director of special programs it would fall to um Dr penw yeah correct okay so are we ready to uh yep I move B okay second I'll seconded motion Mr M with Sandy uh roll call M Mr Donnie um before I vote I just want to put just my comment on the record record um we started adding this since last year I think I'm not I'm going to vote for it I'm not very comfortable I'm going to vote for it because I trust sir Matthews but um this whole moving the meetings to once a month and doing the and all the bill payments in the middle why do we need board meetings that's why on that but I'll vote for them it's just defeats the the whole purpose of board meetings and board sorry sry which which part the bill the ability to pay the bills between the board meetings yeah we are voting on that authorizations the B first yeah appointment oh okay I just heard that annual so it was annual authorizations not annual so your yes yeah any which one are you concerned about the uh payment B what no it's C oh c we're not there yet yeah I realiz miss miss handy yes M mcy MCM yes M Broan yes now it's C it's annual authorization yes so so I'm requesting those comments to be moved from that whatever I said was for c not for B you're saying this is new here we not be here C no we started is last year where when we moved these once a month meetings because that when we are meeting only once a month there are maybe like net 30 payments invoices so it's it's basically where it says the best interest of the board to pay promptly it covers everything so and once you pay it then you're ratifying it you're not it's a formality vote after that once the payment is already made so but uh so are you do you need a response do you want me to give you a response to that yeah sure okay so so I understand the con like the the apparent connection between the the timing that this came out last time and the the meeting once a month um but we haven't really had first of all we've been kind of operating with like one primary meeting a month um we've had plenty of months thatth there was only one meeting but there's plenty of meetings where we do have two or we have important amount of business as as was recommended in the in in in this year but the problem is that we actually are subject to a prompt payment law in New Jersey and uh when we owe vendors money we need to pay them so it's actually very common in school districts that they would authorize the business administrator to approve payments between meetings that does not mean that the vote doesn't matter at that point because the board can take action in the following meeting they do not have to authorize that payment in which case we would have to take we would have to take further action from there it's different if it's actually paid right the money is actually put out but um we're very meticulous and mindful um as as any any any any mindful Administration would be that we're not we're not going to be making payments um on things that are not within our direct purview anything that is going to be a significant payment that the board would take Natural interest in is going to come before the board or it's going to be subject to a bid or it's going to be subject to competive of Contracting so the bid threshold prevents us from doing anything uh be below below the uh the 40 4 4,000 right so those items will come to you but those other items we we um keep the district running smoothly I mean we we to be clear before this resolution came on the district was already making payment on on things that were below the bid threshold this just is a formal authorization of that if the board wanted to move to a model which would be a change for how we operate that no bill is paid until a board resolution is approved then we would we would have a significant we we become significantly um we'd have to significantly change our processes because the the bills are not the the the the bills here have never been paid only after the board approves the bills list Mr Matthews did you has there anything else you want to share about that no that that is correct I mean anything over like say 44,000 for the most part would definitely would have at the board meeting there's a lot of miscellaneous bills that need to be paid like on in the in like you know we have a farmer came in over the weekend and did work at GW that bill will come and we'll have to push it out guy came to GW on 23rd P material for eight hours you did one hour that bill is going to come to us it's going to be like less than 300 bucks we just going to push it out the door right so if if we are talking about those type of bills then there can be a a limit or that can be mentioned here that if you're talking about somebody coming in for an emergency work uh but but this basically covers everything so that's why I'm saying that I'm going to vote Yes because of how you operate and my trust but as a procedure I don't understand the need for a board vote on if if the procedure if our working requires us to make those payments then we should not have a process for board to vote on those right so if people are coming in and we are required to make those payments then maybe we don't need that board vote because we had to make a payment we made a payment is part of the business sure right so that that's where my conflict is that when we say the the superintendent and board difference the if it's administrative it's operate it's not if those are part of the operational work so that it looks like a formality vote to me yeah and I think it is and again I think we can do a little more homework to answer that a little bit more articulately but um the way that I've always seen the process is that the board doesn't want to become a bottleneck per se like I mean if if if you're if you're pouring over every single purchase um every single bill that's paid before it's paid as though you're the approver of the bill then in effect you're kind of putting yourself in a position to have to run the district and the reality is that that me and my team are the ones who need to review all of those items and you're in a position where the bills list and for the public who's listening the bills list is reviewed by the board on a monthly basis and it is approved by the board um that doesn't mean that the board is responsible for knowing every single purchase and checking and vetting every single purchase but it's about it's it's an exercise in oversight and management and vetting and then to an extent that there's questions we want to be always make sure that there are answers and that you have an appropriate amount of resources ready to explain so um obviously if there's any illegal purchasing or anything that's wrong that's a whole other problem um but you're not really put in a position as board members to actually be able to vet those to to be able to vet every single one of those purchases um in the same way that I can't every single thing that happens in the district before it happens as well so we'll get you a more sophisticated answer for sure but but the spirit of it is to make sure that we that we can operate the district smoothly between meetings and honestly even if we had two meetings a month I would it still be more comfortable having the resolution Mr M I was kind of the same thing the board still has the authorized payment of all bills through through the formal budget and resolution process so I know some of it is after the effect but we still need to have that authorization by the board that you to approve the bills you have you have seen them and reviewed them and and we do have your authorization formally to the resolution right so maybe maybe that resolution should say that board has reviewed the bill or something it's not like authorizing the payments we we may just have to look at the language of the resolution yeah sure let me take a note of that Al even same question on number two I mean is it a blanket transfer Authority as well because I thought the amounts come back to for approval so is there a threshold amount that so there there's a report that's given out every month called a149 regarding a transfer report that that's reviewed and there are from and the two amount that the threshold can't exceed over 10% of the Total Line for the period so um money money money is moved around because you know things are for whatever reason some lines may not be adequate or over budget or under budget so within a certain fund and a certain say function money does get moved around but the the the threshold by the by by the state is 10% from to a particular line and and that one is looked at by County also like if if they're moving more than a certain amount then they have to get County Business administrat approval that's more regulated and only C certain by count that has always been there that's you know for me uh reviewing the bills is really reviewing the bills to make sure that what we've discussed and decided at a board meeting actually is happening so we discuss curriculum are we are we in the in the summer are we doing the textbooks that we um decided upon and um the agreements that we've made with special for special education placements so that's all on the bills so you know to me that's a sense of what we say we're doing we are actually doing when we look at the bills right so if that's the spirit then resolution should reflect that okay um move annual authorization motion made by Miss Brogan is a second second second by Mr mmud um roll call Mr Donnie yes yes uh Miss handy yes Miss M yes yes Mr mmud yes Miss Brogan yes okay let me see theous pass comments from the public if there are any is there's no one back in we do have uh see we do have a hand raised uh Amy you're on with the board hi thank you so much can you hear me yes we can if you could just give your full name and your um municipality residence um absolutely so uh my name is Amy mcbridge I live on to 32 Stylin Avenue um I grew up in Bridgewood I am a professional soccer trainer in Ridgewood I have two sons um also that are athletes in Ridgewood and I'm also a former Marine I come to you with a very unique perspective having studied chemical and bi biological exposures on our men and women who served in Iraq and Afghanistan my background gives me a deep understanding of the long-term consequences of toxic chemical exposures and it's why I come to you guys tonight is I'm deeply concerned about the two turf fields that the Board of Education um has under their uh you know not through the council but through them um and that would be rwood high school's mainfield and Stevens field um these fields are contaminated and I know everyone's been talking about the past but these specific two fields are contaminating the soil water and surrounding areas with these forever chemicals linked to cancer and I know you guys have heard all of this um but it persists in the environment accumulates in the human body and every flood from these fields which from when I played we didn't have turf fields but since I've been back and a trainer for 17 years these fields have flooded multiple times a year um every single time it floods these fields introduce more toxins into our waterways putting the health and safety of your students their families and this community in danger and my big question is despite all of this no testing has been done to my shock like I had no idea I thought you guys were testing all of this after the floods to assess the extent of the contamination to me this is like borderline criminal um studies from Mount Sinai and Columbia University clearly link past exposure to serious health risk the these are not abstract findings they are well documented peer-review data showing real harm and as the Board of Education how do you allow this to continue and this raises a critical question is the water in our schools even drinkable or is it also laced with P fats as well what are you doing to ensure that the students have safe safe clean drinking water every single day these are basic questions that really demand answers the community especially the students have a right to know what they are being exposed to as a board of education you're entrusted with their safety and well-being ignoring these risks is a betrayal of that trust these children deserve better they deserve to know the spaces that they play on and the water that they drink are safe and not filled with chemicals that will harm them for years to come what I hope would do immediately is demand a comprehensive testing of the soil water and surrounding areas starting right now and then after every single flood transparency is essential and it's not if there's contamination it's how much now like how much damage has been done over the years with no oversight which is crazy um it's it's crazy to me um that this hasn't been done again as someone who's seen the devastating effect of chemical exposures I know the consequences will not appear overnight but they will quietly devastate lives years from now with the studies and knowledge that we have in action is simply unacceptable these students and their families are counting on you on us as coaches and trainers to act responsibly transparently and urgently um and that's really what I came here to say is that these students don't consent to you know do doing their Wellness classes on these past Laden fields which you know and then not including the student athlete to then go on to play on these turf fields these kids don't even have a choice they have no idea what's going on and we do so we have this moral responsibility to the families and these kids and I'm just wondering why through all these years nothing has been done to really truly address this or at least test the soil and the water thank you thank you Christina um million you're on for the with the board hi Christina Millian Ridgewood resident um I'd like to revisit the notes from the last Boe meeting on December 16th where a for former board member mentioned the village of ridgewood's request for $160,000 from the Boe to fund a softball NightLight uh softball nightlights for a non- booe field and I understand this year is ridgewood's um qack monitoring year the quality single accountability Continuum which is my understanding it monitors School District performance in areas like fiscal responsibility and governance and I was hoping that you could just clarify whether allocating funds to a non booe asset such as nightlights might have implications for this evaluation and would such an allocation raise concerns with the state I'm all for funding female sports as a woman who benefited from it myself and extracurricular activities are very important but I will say that if there's a surplus of money to consider nightlights for a non booe asset I'd like to kindly remind you of some issues within our schools that need immediate attention and investment for One Security I know that taking a holistic look at security and protocols were mentioned at past coffee talks and Boe meetings and it would be great to get an update on that who's leading that Security review workstream um what progress has been made what areas can we strengthen security and investment now and What needs further discussion one thing that comes top of mind to me is the opportunity to hire retired plain clothed uh police officers for elementary school security in particular I think that would be a very worthwhile investment and those salaries I know rest within the Boe budget um I think someone just mentioned posos you know posos filters at schools we still lack posos filters in all water fountains across our schools but high levels of posos are particularly harmful for kids and you know that's cited in the quarterly reports we get mail to us from Ridgewood water there's a rodent issue happening at Haws Haw parents were only made aware of the rodent issue at the school after students reported mouse droppings in their classroom before the holidays but reports as recently as of today says it's still an issue in the class classrooms so we have received no District CS about this sanitation issue or how long our kids have been exposed to it and we have no comms on remediation plans and the timeline so I'm asking tonight that the district physician be engaged to review the health risks of mouse droppings especially for kids with developing immune systems this is a serious matter that I feel demands attention and parents deserve clear guidance and reassurance about the safety of our kids in our classrooms and the fourth Point i' like to make is about special needs while I'm not special needs parent I find it deeply concerning to hear from parents at nearly every meeting who come to that Podium or dial in with heartfelt concerns often in tears their issues deserve immediate attention funding and prioritization and these issues directly affect the health safety and well-being of all of our students and should take priority so if there is $160,000 available in the Boe budget for a non Boe asset I urge you all to prioritize investing that money directly into our students and our schools and I would really like it if you address my questions tonight thank you thank you Suzanne you're on with the F you're on with the board yes hi um Susan Ruan I'm a rwood resident I want to be by congratulating um the board members that were reelected as well as congratulating my next door neighbor Miss handy for her new position on the board um I would like um to begin with the bylaws I believe that's what they were called were or the code of ethics um that the board read and it was regarding treating all children equal um regardless of race income and special needs and I know a lot of parents have complained about the special needs education and it is one of those things that um I have a son who special needs and I always thought of it um to do the best I can for him um and I know it's only appropriate education that the board is supposed to give with the rich po Public Schools however the word appropriate is is such a strong word and I sometimes don't feel like the board the regual public schools are appropriately giving education to the students um as for I want to piggyback a little bit on Christine's comments about the $160,000 um for lights that the Village Council is asking where with public schools to to give um again6 $60,000 goes a long way for helping um special needs children and after last the last meeting where parent after parent got up and explained the for um shortfalls for their children I can't understand how the public school can give um that much money for lights and still have still have to improve on their special needs um and this is lastly it is for my son who attends the steps program he had asked um I thank the superintendent for taking initiatives for the bus stop um my son had pointed out that the intersection of Franklin and Oak is a little bit unsafe um and that I think is something that needs to be addressed with the village as well but the light only allows one light gives 30 minutes um for cars and then the light to that's on Franklin and the light for Oak only gives 15 I mean 30 seconds for Franklin and 15 seconds for um Oak and 15 seconds is really a short period of time for people to cross and for cars to um try to um make turns and some people are not patient and will pull out as people are in the crosswalk so again that that's something that needs to be discussed and I think it's bigger than the Board of Education it does need to go to the Village but I just wanted to bring it up especially since my son always talks about it when I drop him off thank you again bye see any more comments um Dr Schwarz do you have any you wanna sure I'm not sure that I can answer everyone's concerns or questions right here and right now but I certainly want to give some acknowledgement um first of all Amy I'm sorry I think I missed your last name but I appreciate you good commenting with us and first of all thank you first and foremost for your service to our country um appreciate your comments and your questions and your concerns uh we have done we had some we have had a variety of convers ations um internally about a lot of those concerns um again I'm not really set up right now to give you a detailed response but um but with something that uh you know we're very concerned about those fields flooding and uh we certainly appreciate you coming and sharing those concerns with us uh Miss Millian U shared a variety of concerns um I think both both speakers mentioned uh the requests from the village for the board to assist with a lighting project um we do not have any recommendations or positions on that at this time um we appreciate uh certainly the levels of concerns we appreciate the awareness about um posos filtered fountains in the schools we have we have added them and we look we're looking to possibly expand them if needed we know that Ridgewood water uh provides our water and is making an effort to have a holistic solution um we were aware about some rodent issues uh it is sort of that something we experienced this time of year these are old buildings um and when it gets cold out the they the Little Critters do seek a place that's warm so we've been very proactive we have issues here at the at this old building as well um so it is an unfortunate reality that we live in uh to my knowledge we don't have any kind of circumstance where it is rampant and classrooms are absolutely covered or anything like that we might be afraid of um but I would just encourage if anyone hears anything just make sure you report it to your school right away um our facilities department has been very very Swift in getting our Animal Control here we did a lot of work over the break knowing that buildings were going to be empty so there's a lot of work done to try to try to mitigate that as well and it's not limited just to Haw uh that is sort of something that happens this time of year but uh but again uh if anyone has any information that concerns them please feel free to reach out my know Miss corus has done a lot of work just connecting with folks who had concerns as well um Miss R thanks so much for coming out thanks for saying hi to everybody um appreciate your thoughts as well again I think you mentioned the lights as well the lighting project and those funds um really appreciate that as far as your concerns about the bus about the uh the um Franklin and Oak intersection it's certain something we can connect with the village about to to take a look to see if that's something we should be concerned about um I know that that's probably very underwhelming but uh just taking a just trying to pay respect to those response just uh kind of off the cuff uh that's that's what I can do right now so thanks for being with us the Franklin Oak Street pedestrian uh Crossing time uh to the police's police attention to to just evaluate it and see um if there are any issues that they are seeing on a regular basis um often they will do a study on that so um right I think uh if if I know the details I think suzan attends um the citizen safety committee meeting so she has probably already brought it to their attention I think she's asking for our push from our side not just link to their attention it's probably already brought to their ATT not to my knowledge she has she does come but I don't remember that being one of them could have been would have missed it um but certainly that's the intention would be for the board to to just mention it to our police um consent items um and we've got two attendance at conferences attachment a and ccum instruction for uh field trips might we just take those together happy to move a and b you Mo I'll move it yeah second motion M second by move okay roll call Mr Donnie yes M me Miss handy yes m m yes M mm yes M Rogan yes um it brings us to comments from the public but before we do that I just um wanted to remind the board that um last year at our January meeting we did approve uh some goals board goals and if I might just uh review those with you and I think that we made uh good prog on our goals and um I would suggest that between now and our next meeting um should you have any uh goals for the board uh to get them to me so that we can discuss them but last year our goals were to reestablish the annual School Board election starting with November 2024 election which allowed for the two board members being in a three-year cycle 212 um that was completed last year um work closely with the superintendent to develop the 2425 school budget that meets the needs of our students in the district and is mindful of the property tax impact in the budget development process consideration should be given to piloting a intral sports program so um my understanding is the discussions on intral Sports were rolled over to our Wellness um and we did work I think cooperatively on developing our 2425 budget did you w to um say that's well that's in the dist we moveed that to the district goals which is on the administration side yeah and the third one was prioritize investigating and identifying a flood mitigation solution for our Sports Fields ensuring collaboration between the district and the village and as you know um the uh Army uh core of engineers is now involved with that um and I don't have an update on that um do you have any current information um of meeting dates or anything at this point um no I don't have any uh immed nothing that immediately available but I do know that you know this just to manage expectations revoking even getting approval and and Congressional funding for the Army Corps to do this work um just really puts us on like a 15-year Road for a solution so this is not going to be something that um is going to impact us anytime immediately soon we have been quite lucky this this year with um yeah lack of lack of uh rainstorms in the for us in terms of the fields this fall and even into this winter now even with some of our rainstorms we have not um had any issues uh with flooding but that is a to be determined with each storm I know uh so but um has the um the the flag walls whatever you're calling those skate the yeah they're wind screens wind scre that's so so we did I mean we're we're making some some attempts at at um at putting money towards uh Sil mitigation really we can't adjust the water flow but we're hopeful that um we're we're still we still have to finalize the logistics of having a cover for the field which we looked at having field covers proved to be quite challenging so we're still pursuing that but there's a lot of logistics to physically moving covers onto the field storing the covers but um but the the wind screen seemed to be a logical potenti mitigation strategy and that if the silt is an issue it's a two-sided screen and um we're hopeful that that will play some role in the same way that like a um not necessarily that it's going to filter out the the uh the silt from the water but in the same way that um like if you ever see a snow fence the way that can impact the flow and it can cause like a it can kind of disrupt the net the flow of the silt perhaps it could disrupt it significantly enough we're also looking at sge is that sedge planting is that what they're called along the the the um we're working with our environmental Club as well to to using some of the inputs from the Columbia students that were here to look at doing some plantings of some some natural grasses that might also further uh displace the silt so now is not the time to plant obviously but those are the types of at least inm strategies we're trying to use when can we expect the report from The Architects on in the event that all of our efforts don't to save the fields that we have an alternate place so that we don't lose a season so oh I'm sorry thank you I should have mentioned that so so the so we did get a draft of the initial facilities assessment um we and I we may have gotten the draft of the of the field study as well but we have determined unofficially initially that we that and this is actually pretty significant that we will be able to take action to uh to this year um make some adjustments to the VF config BF field configuration so that way even just as a natural grass field it could be an overlap an over flow field so um so we're having an analysis of a variety of things that can be done but at minimum it seems like we would be able to with relatively manageable cost be able to at least have a natural tur field over there that is regulation size Mr Matthews yeah so I did receive a proposal from EI on December 24th and I I met with them and I talked to them today regarding proposal for Engineering Services to provide a field flood study so I'm going to um move on this proposal because I think that we have to exhaust all remedies to see that we are looking at all possibilities to mitigate the situation over at the high school so I do have their proposal I I did talk to him about it today and uh I I will talk to you further about moving this thing forward so we can get that study done I tell you Mr Mr Matthews is bringing up the fact that um another firm other than our architect kind of approached us with some with some strategies that they think might be helpful for our situation so so we'll bring that to the board for discussion have kind of like multip yeah we're going at this from multiple angles yeah excellent okay but before we I mean before we contract with them we get an idea what ideas they have that our Architects may not have thought about yeah we would bring that to to to the to the particularly the facilities committee first and I did have an initial we did have an initial meeting um so I I got a preview of it but I think it's something for to discuss as a board before we you won't see a recommendation before at least the committee of the board has a chance to look at it great so as I said if there are specific goals that you would like um the board to work on um get them uh to me I think one of the goals uh since we already started this process uh the he hold special at internal audit and recommendations that what needs to be done done there that should be a board goal I don't know how to word it exactly but uh basically we had our that came to us that there should be an audit uh we said we'll do an internal audit first or we'll do data collection first and then we will um see uh what type of audit is needed so that way we are not spending money in hiring somebody without data analysis so that data analysis part was done that presentation was done parents provided some input so what are our next steps that should be a pretty significant board goal this year so that what what came out of that and what would be our next step as a board the Strategic plan I mean you can look at it from a couple angles I think that if your questions directed at me yes oh yes yes so so I think you can look at it through a couple angles I think that you know there's a governance function to that to that that presentation and you know over the life of this board we'll have another presentation because we're going to make it an annual event so um and there certainly is some follow that we would like to do with that so I think that's fine if the board wants to make that a function of a goal because you've had constituents reach out to you and it's something that we put together and Dr F we put a considerable amount of time in so you could have a stronger sense as to how things are going in that space and what the trends are so I think it works as a as a as a board goal if that's something you want to do just again my opinion um but I think that um but we we have administrative actions that are going to flow from that as well I think we have that memorialized in our we may have that memorialized in our district goals as well but I I see that as a board goal also that at least we need we need a communication goal on that to to Circle back with our constituents we need a goal to just keep asking you questions on what's happening there so right so that's true from board perspective you got to have some goals right so I don't know there's a lot happening in the district this year and that's why I ask whether in fact you need board goal there's a lot happening with their strategic plan with that involvement so you know overlap yeah but again A lot of times a board goal really becomes a district goal how's how's this different from um the field goal you last year we had a goal for Fields how's that different there was a lot happening in the district last year also and that's also a lot administrative the board did not do anything really it's mostly administrative that are there so how is it different well that's what I want to be careful of when it becomes that the board really doesn't do anything it's really just another job for the district to do but if if in fact our goal is to monitor you know progress in special education to meet uh the needs of all students that might and then we would receive U I think from board perspective I think we owe an answer to the residents who came and spoke SP at board meetings so we we heard them we told them that okay we'll do something then we made a presentation which was not what they were expecting they came and they spoke uh passionately about it and now if we say okay we'll make it a once a year presentation and we'll provide them answer at next year's presentation I don't think we have heard them so so Bo goal to me is that we we owe them an answer so I think that just kind of to follow up on what you're saying what I'm hearing is that um talking about making it a priority for the board like when we did the fields and I would I would argue frankly that we need to continue that as a priority um from the board perspective because it is a a CommunityWide problem and I do agree um that the the special education Community um has been asking for certain things and I think we have gone a very long way and as I said to Dr fenick I thought she did an excellent job on that presentation um but it was clear that there were other things that we needed to dive into and so um that is Administrative it's not board but to the extent that we acknowledge as a board that it's a priority for us to and like you said monitoring I think that Bridges the Gap and hopefully doesn't add too much more work to the administrative side so that you have not only your District goals but your board goals so that would be maybe the kind of language that we could play with between now and February to see if we wanted to adopt it and I I hope there I don't know if there's any other big issues like that um because like you said there's a million things going on in this District but um it's something to think about I appreciate that and if if I if I may just just add one other thing I think something that might kind of reconcile this is the fact that um it's not as though there are district goals and then there's board goals and they have to be completely separate things but they also don't have to be exactly the same thing right I think the the idea is that the board has a role primarily in in goal setting in strategy and in governance right and then all of those things have an administrative implication right there not there's not I mean we we all work together you just you all have you're as elected officials you all have a different part of the job right and then and then I kind of bridge the gap of coming onto your side with governance and and and and understanding you and your thoughts and helping to to coordinate all of us and then certainly to make sure that the district is aligned to that with the team that we have here so what I would say is to Mr Donnie's point about there's kind of like a follow-up kind of comment right something that I'm observing just and I was just talking about this with the team so I was actually just Mr Matthews and I Wasing about this literally at the beginning of the meeting as I took some time to reflect over the break something that I feel like the administr that that I especially now that we have this new org structure in place something that I've been wanting to be better at and I think I think this will help the board as well is closing the loop so like we have so many i i i this giant list I've been dumping it on the team over the last week this giant list of things that I've just had on like notes on and on file that like we got to close a loop on this we got to close the loop on this like we had some public comment today about some matters like concerns about Turf like we have to when people have concerns we also there we do need time to be able to work things out but we also just need to give people an answer sometimes um I was even we we actually have policy on responding to public concern you know and a lot of it is like we do we do owe people a response like even in writing too so I think maybe maybe something we can focus on and and I just I'll leave it to you to to figure out how you want to organize it but maybe something we could focus on is is at the governance level is having like a like a system I mean we have a variety of systems so the administration's here to help I know this is very much what Miss corus works on all the time but like really inventorying what those outstanding concerns are and setting timelines to close loops on those items and actually giving people formal responses even if it might be an agree to disagree kind of situation I think that that would be really helpful but I do think it's very helpful also so as not to just create work that's extraneous from the what we're agreeing what we're starting to really come together on as what's important for the district around the Strategic plan but to focus on those main things so our strategic plan is a major District goal strategy is a major purview of the board so uh and that's why we are including board members throughout in our processes as well so I think that that would make a lot of sense to me to have a board goal around that um the data capture that we try to do and the visualizations that we put together are are they're powerful tool I think because they they bridge the gap between the work that we're doing and the governance role that you have so I think that like focusing on what we like maybe what we're doing with those presentations and what we do after those presentations again I don't know what that looks like I leave it to you all to decide but um we have we're going to make the the special education address an annual event but we're still going to have the state of the schools annual event which is going to have some pretty heavy overlap so there's chance to touch base there as well we're also going to do District goals every year which is going to tie everything back in but rather than having all these different functions District goals school goals state of the schools address Special Education address njsla data presentation uh strategic plan all of those things should really be different lenses by which we look at the same core effort that we're that we're trying to engage in so whatever whatever if you could focus your lens on as a board what are your key things that matter to you within those processes that that fit solidly in your role as board members um that wouldn't be burdensome to us it would actually be very I think it' be really helpful so Dr shes I think um you already addressed I had created a list of of things where there was the loop had to be closed and I was going to bring them starting today every uh the end of the meeting to during discussion and I thought not meeting and I'll start from the next meeting so because I I just wanted some closure there lot of open items right so but I I skipped it well if you if you want to just P him to me I'm i' I'm like a collector of the unclosed loops right now or just double check your list with his list first exactly yes but but I mean I think we'll need a little bit of time I mean somebody who's got a lot of items on this unclosed list is hasn't even take started his role yet Mr Ross over here so uh but yeah but no but I would rather have a master list and again this is why for those of you who who who know how we run the district it's why we're very particular I'm very particular at least about and the team is team is very particular as well about keeping systems like we use Trello behind the scenes so that even if we can't move on something we don't lose it right I get that part right on the on that special at presentation I'm personally not very clear that what was our concrete action or findings for improvement I I'm a firm believer that there's even if we are close to perfect there's always room for improvement 100% so that's the clop I want to close at what are the areas of improvement and action items for that and we had District goal for this year there's no we already put it on those we don't have any more District goals to add so that's where I'm saying that that should be a board goal to to basically follow up on that to to understand what came out of that presentation what is our next next action item if we are saying that everything is good uh I don't think that was the summarization of the presentation no and there's if you go back to the presentation actually there were a wide variety of action items that we identify right but those were not I could not understand those as actionable so that's and I think some of it is we and M Dr penwick and I talked about this a lot because you know especially is a very technical world and there still was a lot of tech vocabulary in there so boiling it down to like we are going to do X Y and Z I think we can do we we even talked about that that like we want to do a little better with that for the Public's sake but the next the next natural intersection of that is our planning for professional development next year and our planning for the structures in next year so Dr F do you want to talk about that because because you you as board members will see this coming up and in my uh District goal presentation because even though we didn't necessar and again I should P I'll P the district goals right now I could tell you but given while you're pulling that do you want me to com talk there were um at the end of the presentation there were four priority areas and the first was aligning instruction and assessment so when Dr Schwarz talks about professional development that's areas where we will heighten the area of special education it won't just be conversation in the General Ed realm it will be how our our scores what does our instruction look like what does our curriculum look like to meet the needs of all Learners if you you know if you take a classroom and you dissected into thirds you have a third that are low and and need some support you have a third that probably already knew the information and a third that will learn through that level of instruction when you teach to the Middle with the general curriculum but we know we need more work to be done on the edges right we need to be educating looking at how we're designing it what the curriculum is and what the assessment will be for for everyone universally designed so that takes professional development so there will be aspects of instruction just targeted goals just towards that um we talked about family engagement and we've already begun making changes in how the invitations go out uh surveying families and students um getting that information one um piece that was brought back to us was after the meeting could we be sending surveys so we're working on that um I know that the cpeg has already after the presentation gone through and um asked for people to who watched it uh or viewed it on recording to share what are their you know additional Reflections feedback regarding those priority areas and other priority areas so we have um I have a responsibility and my team has a responsibility uh not only to the board not only to the families to the state to the federal government to continue constantly looking at those areas um I'm happy to partner with you to give you progress um but don't think it ended I if I presented for all that time and and anyone walked away thinking we were done um right so that that's the perfect thank you so much uh Dr fck for that because those are two clear board goals here one is aligning the curriculum and assessments so that's part of the curriculum committee meeting that we should bring up at every curriculum committee meeting that what's happening on that so board should be the board committees which are part of the curriculum and assessment committee they should be following up on that at every monthly meeting it doesn't have to come at the board meetings but at the committee meeting so it's a board goal there so who are two board members will be next year on that committee should follow up on that and then the second one is family engagement so the communication committee from the board that should be following up every month on that that okay what are we working on on the family communication part and family engagement part but that so these two clearly tie so those were the two action items and they become our board goals because board there there are board committees for those two things just like field connects to facilities committee so these two would be curriculum and instruction and family engagement those two should be as someone who is um intimately involved in the Strategic plan both Brian myself were just commenting those are exactly two of the pillars of the Strategic plan so just so you know there's a lot of attention to both of those areas it's fine even the whole facility has overlap everything we do has overlap I just as I think so I I say like a lot of the times when I speak um Mary and Dr Schwarz work like as my hey CH GPD can you refine this and make it more succin so so that's what m yeah so M Mary said that right that it's it's prioritizing it it's it's it's and showcasing that this is a priority for the board so that's what how Mar summarized that yeah I I think and you can frame some of those as supporting it through supporting supporting initiatives that F supporting administrative initiatives that include something like that right yeah okay so um anybody wants to word Smith those just send them along and then we'll we can discuss it one thing about the board um meetings is I I think we we should look at our presentations too and what is it that we really want in a presentation to the board and what are your ideas what would you like to hear feedback on what you know is there a curriculum area where next year we would like to you know understand the progress made in implementing a new program or whatever so if if you have thoughts on that um also share those because we'll try to keep those presentations I'd like I'd love to see meaningful presentations that highlight uh um the work that's happening on the board uh in the district that the board's really been involved in understanding the initiate you know and initiating it budgeting for it but then how is it monitored and implemented and so if you want to give some thought to some of the things you'd like to see as um board presentations in the beginning of the meetings um not to make the meetings longer but to make the meetings meaningful okay Al righty thank you for that um I'll expect my email to be filled with good thoughts right before we go to public comment um I just wanted to mention because someone asked me to mention it today um um on March 11th no yes March 11th um the League of Women Voters is going to be hosting a panel um titled I don't want to go to a four-year College alternate career paths or alter internet paths and um that'll be advertised and there's going to be a lot of involvement but I was actually specifically asked to mention it today so put it on your calendar that's March 11th because yeah the cpeg uh Gala is the 9th so it's two days after that but just we're gonna just keep mentioning every month so thank you and from my side I I said I'm not going to follow up there's at least one followup that's time time sensitive because there are eighth graders who were deciding between graduate high school versus uh going to some other high schools um did we were we able to identify the um the finances related to hockey ice hockey we did yes we the athletic department did a uh full analysis of the board's contribu the total costs and the board's contributions and the enrollment of all sports so we actually have a meeting tomorrow morning I believe we're going to be going over that uh to ensure that we have equity and funding um so um I I we have to have our meeting I've reviewed those numbers I'm going to report like to report them out to the to the board okay to be clear but yeah know we have movement on that space and just to be clear hockey is not the only uh only sport that's come forward with some concerns about about their funding as well so we're just trying to we're just going to really level set with everybody ideally we'd like to be able to share this information publicly so people can have confidence in the decision we're making so what so that's fine I'm not asking you to reveal that now what I had heard was that hockey was the only sport that was was authorized at the as a state level uh tournaments and state level sport where students are paying that that type of money others may be clubs so yeah no so so so to be clear um hockey is a very expensive sport so what the analysis that we're doing is we're looking at what what is the total cost how does that break down to the cost per student and then what is the what is the district's contribution to that and then how and then what what remains left for the students so I can't remember off the top of my head here how that contribution compares to other contributions but it is quite High because it is one of the most expensive again I want to be able to give clear figures and I'm working shooting from the hip here right now because you just asked me but I do want to be clear there was also a rumor that they're the only ones who pay for their coach there's no differentiation between who pays for what there's a total cost for running the program transportation fees equipment coaching everything and then there is the board's contribution to cover those costs and then there is the student contribution to cover those costs there's no they they don't go into different buckets to pay for different things okay thank you and thanks to the lot lot of work has been going into this analysis so so hats off to the team working hard on this and just a reminder that um jamy has uh rehearsals have started and uh janur will be on I think the dress rehearsal is the 5th of uh February U then uh the performances are on the 6th 7th and 8th of February so sorry so the first thing I need to correct is that the uh cpad Gala is the 13th of March not the 9th so that was a mistake I made um and the second thing is the friends of Music concert yeah is this Friday night um I know it's short notice the 10th um and that's always a really great event and that supports um enhancements to our music department throughout uh and you get to see some really really talented people um who live among us and we don't even know at half the time so yeah if you have time to do that great okay um comments from the public Mr Molton Peter Molton you're on the with the board congratulations to our new and uh uh reelected board members so um I thought it would be a good time to bring up a topic I brought up a couple times I believe of uh consideration of adding members to our Board of possibly a seven or nine member board uh in the future and not sure if this is something that's come up in uh in discussion but it's uh it has come up I believe in some evaluations of size of uh communities of size of ours and the size of their boards um and spreading of responsibilities so I wanted to address that again today thank you thank you Suzanne you're on the on with the board yes um hello Susan Ruan um again Richwood resident and just want to um two topics one is the intersection of Franklin and Oak I never brought it up at a CPAC meeting however a CPAC member brought it up at the meeting about um that particular intersection and I know I pointed out to her at the time that the light was very short between the two between the two um between the two um roads and and I you know and it was just something that pointed out was the one it's on the corner of I'm trying to remember East Coast bger blah blah blah she said that she was walking across the street and car started beeping at her while she was in the intersection and stuff so it was brought up at the CPAC meeting prior um and the next is in regards to the special needs um I was a little discouraged to hear that it'll be a discussion once a year in regards to special needs and if that's the case I would like to have a monitoring system on how many goals um students with special needs are actually being met and how many kids who are in the special in the special needs Community are getting closer to grade level in their um with their IEPs because ultimately education is what the parent wants for their child and they want their child to be as as typical as possible or as independent as possible as an adult so if there's going to be a monitoring system I think there should be an expectation that kids are getting closer and closer to grade level with in the special needs community and that I don't think is really unrealistic and so there should be a monitoring system on how many kids are in the special needs community meeting their goals and and exceeding the goals and how many are getting closer to what what parents want is an education um and that was pretty much it thank you thank you Christina you're on with the board again Christina Millian Ridgewood resident I just wanted to go back about uh to the rodent issue at Haw so I just want to level set with you the how some parents found out was because kids sat in the on the carpet for reading and it's in the carpet and then we were supposedly told that it was going to be handled over break and then we have reports that it hasn't been handled because kids came home and started talking about it today and I also want to go back to that December 16th Boe meeting President Brogan around the I don't know it was like a really long meeting like 10:30 p.m. meeting Mark you said quote significant issues in terms of cleaning and inconsistent custodians at Haws so first of all that was news to lots of parents we have had no communication on that and I honestly do not think it's acceptable that I have to hear about this new update at 10:30 at night on a school night and as a parent of elementary school kids I think it's a big ass to ask that they stay up for that I don't have scope on how long this has been an issue how large it is or not um remediation and how long that remediation will take but I do think that it's unacceptable not that anyone in the Boe has stated that um and it's an issue and it's a it's a sanitation issue so I just want to level set on what's going on here it's not like the kids came in and found mice you know and a and the droppings in a corner it's in the carpets that's concerning and I also want to flag that with winter coming recess is inside and kids are eating snacks inside inside the classrooms where this poop is so I just want to be really clear here that I'm not trying to ere exaggerate an issue it's a concern we've had no communication about this thank you thank you whoever's is it Zoom I can't see the second word hi this is Jacqueline hone I wanted to call in and ask once again it's actually been a year since I in or over a year now since I asked the board to please request the board's phys position on the use and existing turf fields the chemicals pollutants found within and how that is impacting the health of our children and field users I brought that to the Board of Education in October of 2023 I believe at in January the there was a board member that requested the physician's position and we were told that we were going to get it and we haven't and the communication goals have basically been me just asking for this repeatedly now for over a year and I still don't have the answer which prompted me to do an Oprah EST for email Communications between the superintendent and the board physician not a route that I want to take but I think a year I don't know what the answer is like how long should a resident wait to get an answer especially on something so important and when the infill of this material continues to be spread widely amongst all the fields and now there's talk about more fields so my Oprah email my my Oprah of these emails resulted in over 13,000 pages and me being told that it can't be fulfilled because of the work that it's going to take to fulfill my oah request 13,000 Pages most certainly does not sound like a green light that Turf is okay for children's health so in transparency and in good faith and in line with communication goals would the superintendent just finish giving us this answer will you just release the information what was the physician's position there was a meeting where the superintendent said the physician had given his position and I'm still waiting we still don't have it it's not made public does the board have it can the board answer me tonight and say you have it I don't know I don't I don't have that information all this field planning is a huge concern because you're planning without this critical information the fields plan should include testing of the soil and the surrounding properties where these fields are going to continue to be used all the reports all the data the mount siai letter all the studies were provided to both the superintendent the board and the village of Ridgewood and no one is addressing the fact that this material contains canc are causing health risks to children and park users and we still don't have I know that there's an answer but that answer hasn't been given to the public yet and I really want to know tonight please can someone answer me as to when we can have that answer made public thank you thank you that that was it yes I'm closing public comment now so may I respond M broken thanks so much so um so first of all I just thanks for the comments um I just want to remind everybody too that certainly everyone's welcome to come and speak with the board it's a open public meeting it's an official meeting of the board public has a right to comment but we're Limited in the extent to which we can engage because this is a formal meeting of the board there's it's obviously not a discussion I can't ask clarifying questions um and so it's just there's limitations there but I do make myself available on a monthly basis at the superintendent coffees those are also recorded those are also live streamed you can also participate in those virtually um and it's much easier especially with some of these trickier topics to engage in more of a back and forth conversation uh often when we're talking about topics that are of concern to folks um and we're talking about it here in the context of a board meeting this is just a commment in general um people have a point that they want to make and I think it's important that people have the right to make that point I respect the points that they make but again I I'm I can't um especially with some of the more tricky tricky uh ways that some of the questions are phrased or some of the topics which are rather complicated a simple statement is not going to satisfy the issue um nor is it necessarily going to satisfy the person who's bringing the concern so I certainly welcome anyone to come for for more of a robust dialogue about a discussion certainly recommend people come to the superintendent coffees you can see the recordings of the superintendent coffees online we don't edit them we don't obscure them they are there as they are that said just a couple of things that I did want to respond to really quick um first of all just to be clear Mr Molt's question that is not a superintendent question to answer the seats on the board so I'm just going to cruise right past that but it's nice to have you out thanks for joining us um appreciate the clarification from Mrs Ruan um and then I I I really liked what you were saying about monitoring Pro monitoring systems and monitoring grade level proficiency that's exactly what we're proposing so Mr R if you want to join us in again coffee we can talk more about what that means but there is going to be a convergence here we want to make sure that we take time to look at the performance of different students in different categories and groups but there is a universal strategy that we're building that ideally is going to help all kids regardless of what their classification or status or identity is um so that's what we're working toward we look forward to sharing more about that and including you in a part of it um I appreciate the clarifications Miss million about the rodent issues I think I think at this point uh your level of concern we definitely want to have somebody reach out to your team so we'll talk to the school again we'll get some follow-up information it sounds like you have some more recent information as well but we will have somebody contact you to get what information you have and we'll make sure that we are addressing that fully and completely um certainly as you're conveying it um and I don't have any I don't have I don't have enough concrete knowledge to say otherwise at what you're describing yes would be completely unacceptable the idea of Rod and droppings all throughout carpets that would be completely unacceptable um and then Mrs hone I know you've had some concerns we have done work with our physician I don't think we've actually formally asked the physician to write a position paper uh that would represent the district's official position on turf fields so I think that might be where there's a little bit of confusion we've had a variety of conversations about this topic and we worked with the board attorney as well we've reviewed a variety of academic studies including the concerns that were put forth uh by the by H by um some of the folks at Mount Si as well which is their information's on their website and we've crafted some language which we're just in the process of just in the final stages of finalizing which we'll be adding to our uh to our handbook to just clarify procedures for safer for safe use of or safer at least use of those fields and to be clear there's no one there's no debate about there being some materials that are part of artificial fields that are unhealth that would be unsafe to consume there would be there there are things that of course that we want to be mindful that we're engaging in safe practices around it is hard to pin down in fact and I would be happy to read anything that anybody has that we were trying to find anything that would indicate that there is any specific causal effect uh that we could document and would justify us taking some sort of action in a scientific study about students participating in athletic sports on on artificial fields we there there is not conclusive study on that topic um and that's what we so basically our position is moving forward right now is to keep our eyes open keep paying attention and make sure that we're promoting safe practices with our students but we are not in a position where we see evidence that we should be decommissioning Fields as though they are an immediate harm to student safety so wanted to be I wanted to say something concrete to that uh because I think that you know that that definitely there's been some time El laps there has been some work done um I'll leave it to a conversation with the board if we think that beyond that if there's a need for some sort of a position statement to just kind of try to get some state of uh current Clarity on the issue but for the time being appreciate everybody's engagement um I know the conversations aren't always com a but it's a great Community when people are comfortable to come and share their thoughts and we can engage in this kind of dialogue so thank you everyone um thank you Dr sh so from the I I don't uh know if the position statement is the right word but my question would be a procedural question that if we as a board if um a group of residents brought to our attention a sent a letter that was specifically sent by Mount siai to Ridgewood so when they sent that letter to us right so they this letter is addressed to Ridgewood Village Council or Board of Education they may not know the difference between two different entities so they are sending a letter to and the residents are bringing that to our attention and we have so that letter about medical language or um concerns about health impacts for as a board or Administration our attorney cannot advise us whether that is correct or not from the help perspective technicalities on the health perspective attorney's advising us that okay if that is correct then what do we need to put in the language for the manual and all that stuff right but from our information perspective um I think that's what we requested as a board or at least I requested at that time that okay what is the validity of this document from our physicians perspective so I see our district physician as the professional who can guide us unless you think that there will be some other professional who can guide us so if residents brought something to our attention and we are just looking to validate it or get inputs on that who would provide that input to us so I think I think if I'm I think what I'm hearing in your question is the board is looking for clarity as to the extent to which the claims in the mount sin letter are valid the yeah or yeah whether that we have a letter from out sin we have a a paper from them are we going to just discard it that it's not concerning or are we going to say okay these are val concern so so so so let me speak to the letter real quick so the the letter from Mount Si is basic someone took so there is a statement on the Mount Si website right now about about students using turf fields and it basically is the content of the letter so I don't know what the exact origins of the why the why the that was Dr Evans I think what what prompted that letter to be sent specifically to us but the fact is that that it's a general statement and an information statement that they have and again I've read it numerous times at this point and it basically raises awareness about some things that are pretty well known that crumb rubber infill frequently contains and likely contains materials in it that could be harmful to human health I don't think anybody here is claiming that these things are necessarily good for the environment but the reality is that there's a difference between it being on the field being on the ground and in in a as it's supposed to be installed per se and the extent to which it causes harm to students in the same way that when we when we treat grass fields we're there's there's plenty of things that we do that aren't necess best for the environment um but just because there is toxic substances in a specific thing or when I say it's toxic substance that's a subjective term just because there are substance that could be toxic if introduced to the human body as in like you're eating it that would be problematic but there are toxic substances all around us you know we have asbestos in a lot of these old buildings if it's not Disturbed it's not a problem I get that but all I'm asking is so from I'm asking procedural question I at this point I think and because that's was my understanding that we have a an opinion or paper that was submitted to the board record at a board public meeting yeah um and I'm just looking as a board member to get a a written comment on that so who will provide that so so so so so that was my question too is are is the board looking for a specific statement from the district physician because the district's Physicians is that the matter is inconclusive meaning that meaning that the because the question is is there is there are students being harmed or any are human beings being harmed by playing on a on a turfield that's that's the that's right so I'm not looking for a statement of on either way I'm looking as me personally I'm looking for to us at a board meeting we have a professional on staff I'm looking for their opinion on that yeah I mean we could have the physician come into a meeting as well if we want to yeah or or a whatever is easier for them right I think I'm sorry I did not mean to cut you off go ahead you want to finish right so all all I'm saying is it's just like uh Dr fenick said that she is specialist and special head and she knows the laws and regulations and we take her guidance actually I'm not sure I agree with that because I'm not sure where do we what good does that do right I don't think anybody is denying the information in Mount sin I've never heard that claim once said I think there's definitely agreement this material the material itself s but now we as a school district just like every other school district are faced with a challenge what do we do with that information are we going to revert all these fields back to Natural Turf and are these all these students sacrifice playtime flooding muddy Fields Etc are we gonna continue like that's the question we need to be focused on so I don't know I don't know what the question is so the question so I don't know what the question is mamm at this time because the question can be making a position statement that we will not stall those type of fields in future or a position statement can be if um new fields are being installed in the village for that we can make an opinion on that and pass a resolution on that so I don't know what the question is right the question right now is the are we accepting so are you saying that we are just saying that the letter or opinion that was presented here we are accepting that as a truth 100% And then we are not taking any action on that I don't think that I don't think that we've actually as a board come together and we've had a request by you know numerous times by members of the community we've been given information that um the Providence of it is still not entirely clear but um we've not as a board made a resolution that we wanted necessarily an opinion and frankly and I've said this before I have great respect respect for our district physician but we're talking about really complicated when you really get into it complicated environmental biological research and I really think that we're asking for much more than one individual can give us at this point in time and more importantly the board has not asked for it yet okay so so if you want that I think you need to make a motion that's fine so that maybe um uh I think we I was in under an that we asked for it and Dr schwar said he talked to him and maybe it's the word smithing of whether it's a written recommendation versus oral recommendation and uh it's maybe a Too Late by one year but if we need a resolution I can make a resolution and you can go on record um to to vote no on that that you don't care about U any record letter that is coming from aai or anybody else right so that basically I'm saying that we have residents brought something to our attention I'm asking for more professional information and uh you can make a motion that we don't need it uh we know more right I care a great deal about the health and safety of our kids in our community I want to make that absolutely clear um but I think I think really you have to take into account what Muhammad said which is that we have very complicated big issues that are that this piece of information is One Piece piece of right so we don't have enough information in front of us right now nor have we had the discussions you know to even begin to discuss what do we do do we like you said you want to make a I'm I'm going too far a field here so my point being that we like every other school district have an obligation to our students in a myriad of ways and we really need to look at the entire situation what do we do with our Sports programs what do we do what do we have the money to support all these different things and I'm just throwing stuff out really you know kind of in a a very general way and so we can't we can't take a shortcut right there's no shortcut so so we have to so but your question your question is one piece that at the end of the day it doesn't help us get to where we need to go which is to to make the Judgment calls on a case-by Case basis as they're presented to us you know in light of all the information which is what Muhammad is saying and I think that this one piece which I understand is very important to to a lot of people okay is not enough for us to um it it it's not enough for us to go and kind of just make these broad statements okay my question is op I think uh I think my question is not that complicated my question is a concern was raised to us what is are we as a procedure as a board are we going to just ignore that concern or are we going to get validation on that opinion I so so I don't disagree with the concern I 100% agree that this material has harmful chemicals lots of research has shown that I don't think anybody here agrees with that in an ideal world would I love to play on natural Turf 100% I my kids play my kids play soccer I take my own kids at night sometimes on to maple field we play on we shoot the ball around on the soccer s on the turf field and we're on there but I have loved that to be grass natural grass 100% now this is Mary's point right is like this is a bigger question that we have to think about as a district is what do we do so what is our question is it our question is do we that Turf is better to play or do we have any health uh if that if you are saying that that letter is you agree with that what is our fiduciary responsibility there I mean the first question I want is is there that I wonder maybe the researchers out there that I haven't seen is kids all over the country are playing on artificial term so do we have research showing that this them stepping on this material and occasional content does that lead to their that's how that information will come from professional and that's the question you think our district doctor will have that information I feel like that's more of a national research so I cannot make that determination he can I'm saying that let's we have a professional give that to the professional he may come back and he may just state that I'm not qualified to comment on that if I can just jump in just so we've had numerous com so we had numerous conversations on the topic we've read there the pro the thing is there are not a lot of studies on the topic and the studies that are out there are inconclusive me there there there is there is there is the body of research on how how these fields would be impacting students by playing on them is not robust that's what the the mount sin letter says Mount sin letter also then offers tips for safer play on artificial turf surfaces and that's what we're basing our practice around the research does not show causality it does not show clear with any kind of clarity that playing on the fields causes any type of problems at this time I'm not saying that it doesn't I don't I'm not omnicient this everything I'm saying right now is is represent of the conversations I've had with a board physician so if the board would like to have the physician out he said he would come he's come before talk about topics like this we can have them out if we want to have him formalize a actual position statement and write this for us he can certainly do that as well but the bottom line is that what we're talking about is a what is effectively a piece of property it's like a tool that has a use and the question is what how do we use the tool safely and if there's no safe use I think we can all agree if we if we have we saw empirically on paper that something was not safe to use we would would not use it right we would do everything we could to tear it up if if if it came down to that but but the but the level of the body of research and I've read the the several of the studies especially the more recent ones um and and it's just and they continue to say that it's in that there's there's no clear conclusion so a follow up on that that if if that letter says that these are the recommendations and that we all agreed for to put those recommendations in writing where are we with that and that is the piece that we're just we're just finalizing the last bit of language I just got to a point where we ran out of time at the end of the year last year we have it drafted we want to just check with the with Council to make sure because we're we're being pretty candid with the language just want to make sure that we're doing that what we're writing is appropriate and and because we want to be transparent about what our what our position is with it so it's so it's we're talking about particularly recommendations for safe use okay and by the way we know we may have BPA materials in our cookware in our pots and pans that are cooking for our students plastic water bottles I mean there's so much material that has harmful material that in itself innately is harmful so there are two parts now passing you know negative health risks to our students or not I think if it's determined yes absolutely with certainty then absolutely we should be the first to to stop that at any cost so if those BPA materials 10 years ago then then it's a different thing if you're using still if we are still using it we should get rid of it I don't know if we are but pots and pans still have BPA material today if if we are aware of it we should get it of it anything that we are aware of it we should take action that's a little bit of simpler because you can get an alternative that won't sacrifice your cooking program right for as an example right this is that's the bigger issue now that's the bigger issues PP it's clearcut for plastic and cooking if you if you switch now to Natural you are sacrificing and again like I said from the beginning I am 100% for an ideal world that's I'm not talking about switching I'm not I've voted twice to repair the fields I'm not talking about switching right there were two within my three or four years there were two times when the vote came there was I even voted to rein so see field or JM field uh St Fields came after I came on the board for resurfacing I voted then two floods where we had to spend money to fix it I voted for that so I'm not talking about replacing it I'm just talking about we should be aware of the con the consequences and the uh health impact so that way when we are advocating for a new field or when we are planning any new um so that's uh trade in comes in that do when we are investing money on the new one I think what we're right now is we are finishing up on those um uh safe uses of of the field that's the Target right now um Mary L anything you want to add or you don't have to just taking it all in okay great great so this is the first meeting of mny so yes right right I know thought we'd be done by n um yeah I will uh um we'll end the meeting now we'll adjourn I move to adjourn the meeting do I have a second all in favor hi hi have a lovely evening what's left of it and um we will be back on January 27th