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 e e okay um good evening it's six o'clock on Thursday March 21st we're going to open the meeting and call call the meeting to order the roll call please Mrs Smith Miss BR here Mr sman here M poliani Mr cantino here Mr kuss miss pet here Dr Ross here Mr Sweeny here Mr Zimmerman here we have a quum okay we are going it recommend that the board enter into closed session for the purposes of discussing legal personnel and student matters may have that in form of a motion please show moved moved by Mr Zimmerman second by Mr cantino all in favor I I opposed we are in Clos 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 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 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 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 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 e e e e okay I apologize for the late start um we had a student maned to take care of it is recommended that the board return to open session may I have that in the form of a motion please so mooved so moveed by Mr cantino second second by m pellet all in favor I I we are back and open we have a new roll call please Mr Smith M BR here Mr smag here M Pani Mr fantino here Mr kuss miss pet here Dr Ross here Mr Sweeney here Mr Zimmerman M here may I please rise join me aliance Al to the flag of the United States of America and to the rep stands Nation God indivisible liy and justice for all thank you Jen you do will you do the reading of the meeting notices please the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of the public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of the ACT burning Township report of education has caused notice of this meeting to be published and adequate notice has been provided and notice of this meeting has been properly posted in accordance with the New Jersey open public meeting law the next worst session meeting meeting will be held on Thursday April 11th and the next public meeting the budget hearing will be held on Thursday April 25th Jen Mrs Co is letter G the approval of minutes uh the minutes of the closed work session and minutes listed below are here for approval I have that in form of a motion please move by Mrs uh pellet second second by m Brock may I have a roll call vote please miss BR yes Mr saguia yes Miss Pani yes Mr fantino yes obain we noted Mr miss pet yes Dr Ross yes Mr Sweeny yes motion carries okay president's report have a a few notes subject matters that I'll be talking about good evening everybody Happy Spring today is World Down syndrome day and this week in many of our schools we are recognizing neurodiversity week I also want to mention how much enjoyment I had watching our boys basketball team play this season congratulations to them and their coaches for a very successful season I also want to congratulate the girls wrestling team and the indoor track team for their very successful season further I want to congratulate all of our winter sports teams and their coaches for the seasons they had good luck to our spring athletes in their upcoming Seasons which begin on Monday the VGHS play Freaky Friday was awesome as was Glen Meadows Frozen Jr we have some very talented students and dedicated teachers staff and parents i' also would like to talk about the forensic audit the audit was recently completed and uh about the recently completed audit I would like to thank Mr resment for massively managing The Forum that was held here on March 7th it was commonly known that one of the goals for the independent forensic audit was to move forward in restoring some confidence in the management of the schools while I think it has helped a little the hiring of Mr Slam by Mr Rogers and the board of education has moved thus light years ahead towards restoring confidence three of the major takeaways from my perspective of this report are as follows administrative stability is an essential aspect in appropriately managing a school district seven different business administrators from 6:30 through 10:23 was a travesty that can never happen again the shortage of qualified business administrators in the state contributed this to this as well I feel that we now have the right administrative team in place to move the Veron School District back towards what it was this includes Mr Rogers Mr slam miss miss deor Mr gagi asro and Dr Shep please excuse this analy but we have the right horses on our team to properly move this wagon another takeaway is that we have is we need to have trust in the administrative decision process however this board of education needs to verify and or confirm information provided to them a professional team oriented working relationship between the administrative team and the board of education is imperative to a successful School District this kind of relationship is in the process of being developed it takes time yes it is incumbent upon this board of education to investigate confirm verify and question the information and detail it receives to properly govern according to our obligations to our students and the members of our community no question is a silly question recently a Community member had some questions about some legal bills that will be paid this month I had not yet reviewed the bills so I was not aware of the amount of the three three bills to three different firms so thank you to that Community member I will not mention the community member's name because I do not want that person to be offended but they're welcome to take the credit if they choose to for bringing it to our attention board members also must be open-minded and reflective of all perspectives and insights from our community Comm we are just regular people trying to help run a good a good school system we have teachers on our board we have Steel Workers forensic Auditors insurance people it people and now a doctor of Education our community contains a very diverse group of people who Pro possess skill sets that could be useful in our governing the schools my last take away is that the spending spree that resulted from multiple covid related grants and stabilization Aid was a mistake a major concern of administration during that time was the learning loss that occurred due to the remote and intermittent schooling that occurred from March 2020 through most of the following school year the learning loss was real it is real Educators may never accurately measure how much of a loss occurred and the long-term impact to our society the approach was to provide intensive summer schooling and additional teachings in the schools to provide a more intense learning atmosphere whether this helped or not I believe only future testing will bear out the prior Board of educations which included myself should have been more prudent with the stabilization Aid that than we were trust and documentation from the administration shows now to be something missing then other board members are welcome to give their perspectives and their comments regarding the forensic audit when they so choose please let me know I will schedule and includ I will schedule it I will include time in future agendas or later this evening if you'd like one followup from last week's board meeting there was a question about whether the former board president expanded the scope of the forensic audit I talked to the uh former president and she assured me that she has not and I believe it there's a a question about Oprah requests and I want to talk about the process there appears to be some confusion regarding the oer request process our business administrator has many job titles one of those titles is the official custodian of Records in that role he is responsible for handling or management of all Oprah requests all Oprah requests are filed with the custodian of Records he has seven business days in which to respond sometimes the records requested may contain information that may be confidential for a myriad of reasons for example student records employee records or the like that information needs to be blackened out or reacted to protect the rights of individuals often times the conso the custodian of Records involves our attorney to assist in determining what documents or information Falls within or outside of the opal law if a request is not provided to the people making the request it is because the attorney and our custodian of records has determined that the request is outside the scope of Oprah this board of education is not involved in that determination as Board of Education members in Vernon we receive a weekly update on the status of all opah requests from which we can ask any questions that we so choose of the codian of Records this is the extent of the board of education's involvement in opland another thing is this is a more of a personal matter that I that do not see as an issue my wife Morin Sweeney is a kindergarten teacher in Ceda Mountain School accordingly since Mr Rogers is her ultimate boss I am conflicted in evaluating him as a superintendent this is common knowledge I disclosed this information when I ran for the Board of Education in November of 2022 apparently over 4,700 voters and taxpayers were okay with that conflict I also disclosed the conflict when I ran for the Board of Education eight previous times in those eight previous times the voters of Vernon seemed to be okay with that conflict as well off the top of my head I can name at least five Board of Education presidents who had the same exact conflict this conflict of interest is not a Scarlet Letter prevented me from properly presiding at Board of Education meetings or assisting in governing the school district a recent New Jersey ethics commission decision ruled that conflicted board members should not be UNC Comm committees and presidents should not be ex official members of those committees when this decision came to our attention we made the adjustments necessary to comply that is it conflict of interest does not exist when information is exchanged I can talk about finances I can vote on the budget I can hire certified Personnel I cannot participate in negotiations I don't I cannot provide an evaluation of our superintendent I don't I have been on the board for approximately 27 years I am certified by the New Jersey school boards Association as a master board member which basically means that I have attended lots of seminars and webinars to educate myself in the role of a board member take the role seriously I believe that taxpayers in ver and voters in Vernon have confidence in me and trust me to make the decisions that I can make that have the best interest of the children and residents of Vern next topic is New Jersey school boards Association the New Jersey school boards Association is an advocacy group that represents all school boards in the state of New Jersey they provide educational opportunities and lobbying efforts on behalf of school board's interests they do not represent the people of the community our former Bo president is now a Regional School Board Association representative Regional Representatives have been instructed to invo to avoid dealing directly with private citizens with within their regions this is to avoid situations which may cause harm to the districts that they represent if community members have issues with school board members or Boards of educations they should direct their concerns to the Department of Education they have a website that is extremely helpful for this that is the end of my comments I'd like to open up the meeting for the public for agenda items only and students would like to say anything motion to open no we need a motion no the meeting is open to the public does anybody have anything that they like to say well please come to the mic and just identify yourself and what town you live in okay nobody in in the uh public how about online uh we have Jesse paladini Mrs paladini yes um before I ask uh before I make the statement that I have I just want to address a couple of things that you said Mr Sweeney first you said that having seven different business administrators was a travesty that was your travesty then then you said that Oprah custodians have seven days to provide Oprah requests and that is true but unfortunately Oprah custodians seem to always forget that the Oprah law says some documents are immediately available and those documents should be presented immediately everybody knows the Oprah law about attorney review and redaction and all that stuff so I'm not entirely sure what your um entire speech was about um you said you are conflicted and we all know that you are conflicted um but you said that voters were okay with that conflict it's not a matter of whether or not voters are okay with the conflict I voted for you multiple times but that doesn't mean that when you are sitting on the board you act in matters in which you have a conflict you say it's not a Scarlet Letter last meeting you said you disagreed with me when I said that as a conflicted member you should not be discussing the forensic audit you said you disagreed yet you invited resident Sean Clarkin to meet with you to discuss the forensic audit not meet with the board not meet with the finance committee but to meet with you to discuss the forensic audit and I believe that is a latent conflict so that's all I want to say about the conflict issue because really it's ridiculous what you're saying Mr Sweeney what I really want to say is that I'm looking at the agenda for tonight's board meeting and I'm just so so very disappointed at the thousands and thousands of dollars that you are spending to send people on conferences and conventions Vincent gagi asro he he's going to multiple conferences Russell Rogers affirmative action certification $939 28 cents to send a teacher on the girls wrestling state championship in Atlantic City and there are many many items here you you can spend all these thousands of dollars in spending teachers and administrators sending teachers and administrators on conferences and conventions but you won't spend $6,000 to accommodate students for a summer SAT prep course all I could say is you just keep taking and taking and taking away from the students and giving and giving and giving to the administrators and for conferences and conventions thank you anybody else um yes we have Carolyn Inc carnado this is Inc carnado hi there good evening how are you tonight can you hear me good thank you how are you okay good I I just couldn't tell if you could hear me um I just had a question about something on the agenda related to it looks like we have four employees going to job fairs I guess to recruit I'm I'm assuming faculty I know in our budget presentation last week um Mr slam and I know he's not there tonight but he had mentioned that if we didn't receive that $1.1 million increase in state aid which was unexpected unfortunately we we may have lost faculty or we would have had some to make some awful Cuts can you speak to how many uh new faculty members you are looking to recruit at these job fairs Mr I don't know exactly but we're looking for and I've said this at many board meetings if we have physics teachers or World language teachers it would be much appreciated uh to feel right now what we're doing is covering them with six periods and other programs we would love uh live teachers and we're actively recruiting to try to get the best teachers we can for our students to teach in those areas oh they're basically specific um subject areas that you're looking to fill uh areas that we've yes we've had trouble in in the past as well and currently okay yes okay okay that okay that's great and then um do you ex like if if we don't get the same amount of state aid next year I mean we could keep these teachers I mean these teachers you can recruit them at a job fair and and keep them in a year I mean and listen that's why we're going out to the job fairs because usually the the students at the job fairs are the ones right out of college we can bring them in uh early early on the guide to to probably hire two or three if need be in in in in a as they enter the field of Education uh but some of these high some of these high demand jobs um we're looking for uh people with assert so that so our students can have live teachers next year in some of these classes now I know Spanish is is a uh virtual class is there another one another class that's also virtual uh no but a lot of the classes this year as people are or out for various reasons are covered with six periods and that puts a toll on our teaching staff I see okay thank you very much you're welcome else nope okay um both Mee public and Mr Rogers I believe oh I'm sorry um last Monday and Tuesday the Juniors did NJ GPA testing um the high school had their showing of the musical Freaky Friday which I L um winter sports had a very successful season and I'm looking forward to seeing how successful the spring sours are um spring pep rally and spirit week is next week so the high school's very excited and next week we have an assembly for Rachel's Talent which is about Rachel Scott who was the first person to be killed in colum mass shooting sorry if I'm misr pronouncing that um it was about it's about uh Rachel's Legacy that she left behind and she believed in living in a kindness world so we're gonna try to portray that and keep that going to the future with the high school include the board meetings oh yeah you want that um and we're also going to introduce the for club which stands for friends for Rachel and it's the piece of the program that will be in the assembly and I hope that everyone is looking forward to a springing break thank you yeah informational matters and reports have been waiting a long time for for a lot of this information um even even just yesterday I started my night attending steam night at the preschool and I watched preschoolers anxious cut up boxes and make all different types of inventions uh I saw uh I think a Mario Kart a flying house a bus and it was very exciting to see that the stem program and after that I got to attend the uh pop concert at the high school uh it was truly a pre pleasure to listen to the students play I enjoyed the symphonic orchestra the the the uh the jazz band and it was you could see that the students uh and their love of Music throughout the night and it was a truly enjoyable experience um we're pleased to announce that the Glen Meadow students as a District's artist of the month in March their artwork is being displayed at the board office if anyone comes to the board office it's right as you walk in the front door uh we're pleased to announce that bths students will have their artwork display on the municipal building as well during the M of month of March I have a lot to go here because I'm really excited about a lot of what we've done here and this is only about a quarter of the superintendent report um the New Jersey school boards Association and suss school boards Association honored Austin Wagner as the Vernon Township High School's unsung hero on March 4th congratulation Austin for this pre prestigious honor the model un competed at St Peters University in Jersey City representing the Swiss Confederation in the Republic of Malta congratulations to Brianna Eustace and Reese Moore who won the best delegation for Security Council in place first I saw them at the concert last night as well uh the senior citizen prom and musical freaky fridy took play on place on March 6 with over 210 senior citizens and ATT attendance it is it is quite the event and and I love attending it when I can other performances were held on March 7th 8th and 9th uh the winter sports scenes had a phenomenal season Viking Pride was alive and well as a girls basketball team won their division for first time since 1978 the boys basketball team made it to the final round to the states for the first time in school history uh the girls wrestling team which we funded uh them be able to go to the States because usually we don't have wrestlers go to the states I think that's what Mrs paladini talked about before um first time in school history the girls wrestling team broke the record for the most State medals in school history the indoor track team broke seven school records and one County record and the girl ski team were state champions and went undefeated so there there's a lot there's a lot to to go to and and celebrate here in Vernon with with our students in our schools a mini college fair will be held at the high school on March 26 from 9: to 11 GL Meadow students performed Frozen Jr it was a great performance I was I was able to attend for parents and students on March 13th 14th 15th and 16th uh then uction Ceremonies for the trian music Honor Society National Junior Honors Society and National Junior art honest Society will take place on March 26th 27th and 28th I believe tonight was the art societ art National Honors Society that we missed as we were in Clos session uh earlier family literacy night took place on March 5th at Lansbury Hollow um at Rolling Hills students and families enjoyed various activities at Ma at math night on March 14th thank you Mrs munchow and all the teachers who who made that a wonderful event a Cedar Mountain family literacy night was held on March 5th the theme was Bingo for books um like I said these there's many events happening in in the community and uh it's it's truly the best part about being a superintendant is is attending uh seeing the students in their classes and attending these events and seeing students uh have success and be proud and happy about what they're doing in in their schools so that that's my report on the uh informational matters next is recommendations it's recommended that the board approved the following appointments uh changes leaves mentoring resignations Etc and in this large chart it may take you some time to to look through it in addition to all those uh recommendations Strauss esy also went through and gave recommendations to the board to approve the following policies and regulations for a first reading these were the same policies and regulations that were presented at the last meeting as well for a preview there's quite a long list that's why I I'm trying to give a preview before first reading of second as well letter C it is recommended that the board approve the following policy regulations for a second reading and follow final approval letter D it is recommended that a board approved permitting the following student to attend Vernon Township Public Schools according to the Board of Education policy 5111 child and employee of the district be permitted to attend Cedar Mountain privacy uh a child of Employee of the district be permitted to attend Cedar Mountain Primary School as a kindergarten for the 2024 25 school year it is a recommended that the board approve permitting the following student to attend verit tent Public Schools according to Board of Education policy 5111 another student student uh ID number child of an employee of the district be permitted to attend Cedar Mountain Primary School scho as a kindergartner for the 20242 school year letter F it is recommended that a board approved professional development uh travel conferences conventions and workshops that comply with these provisions and there's again another uh table uh for training and a lot of these trainings are necessary to have the right people in place so that we're able to meet our policy and follow policies and regulations for the state of New Jersey and some of these in the first chart are the title to Grant funded uh trainings a lot of is at a necessity in as people have moved into different positions to make sure that uh uh certain positions are are covered and congratulations again on the uh girls wrestling state championship it is recommended that the board approved the harassment intimidation and bullying school safety and Drug T testing reports and now we're ready for a motion a motion please for superintendent recommendations move by Mr P second second by Mr cantino questions or comments I have one so far d and e is just the differences between the two D is not yet registered and has doesn't have a student number yet correct okay okay Russ yes a question on uh on the staff moves number one item number one but also goes with um your con the conventions it looks like it's the same uh teacher uh is this a new teacher new hire or yes it's an appointment it's an interm replacement and if you see it's a uh a Wilson Reading instructure instructor so training needs to be provided in order to provide that level of service all right so my my question then is if it's intern why are we training someone that's going to leave in order to provide the services that are necessary for students I mean it would it couldn't we have hired or trained a teacher that we have on staff for this because we invest in ourselves yes one of the first things that we do in a in a replacement leave is look to see if anyone internally can cover do it wasn't possible to cover with someone internally so we went externally posted for the phys with the proper certificate uh no one applied not a lot of people have this certificate so we found someone who's willing to do the training uh and that's what you see what you see this this is for the full Wilson like I think there's like two Wilsons right not the full this is the uh yes okay so that would that that would that's sufficient for what still need okay yes correct and and then I had a question I've seen um in this particular case she's starting on step one or whatever um but I saw a couple other Appo appoes here and we have the first 19 days why why are some do we pay a 19 day at I guess I'm I'm assuming that's the the sub rate right I I believe there's a certain number of days we can pay at a sub rate and after that we have to put them on the guide and some of these teachers May have been in this position for more than those days as a as a substitute okay so they're just continuing on right okay I believe so if there's specifics I could answer the math or look into it with the HR as well okay yeah the other one I saw was it was number one um the rest of them seemed like they all had a um they all had the 19 days oh yes what we've been doing a lot is as we have different leaves and The Replacements it's I'm looking for uh we we'll find uh people who are qualifi for other leads that happen so a lot of times they're shuffled around to different positions throughout the year as the need arises okay and is is that contractual that they for 19 days or is that uh again I I could probably reach out to our HR manager it is quite a complex rule that keeps changing but uh she she made sure that they they to to that okay and then I I had some questions about the policy I can give somebody else a chance if anyone else has questions I just have one question this is the this is letter F the professional development it's my understanding that and I think you alluded to this if you could just expand the legal one affirmative action certification program this is like a required compliance training for staff members is that right and you you mentioned people are shifting around and so we need some they need that training that legal one affirmative action the one that you're scheduled for that that that is our that's our our newer new new to us HR supervisor this year and uh she's she's in a role where she's expanded uh like any anything you can imagine HR Y is happening now and I think there's uh there's a lot of training that could help us improve as a district to make sure that we make the correct uh decision in the HR department which one of the major ones is you that that you've seen and we want to back up is the the affirmative action CER certification program we want to make sure that if there is some s of a type of an affirmative action case that there's uh multiple people that can be involved to make sure that it's that we're legally compliant great so we did not have anyone compliant uh with that before at all I would have to check into it I think there's recent training and uh we're just making sure that we're all we're all covered with the uh affirmative action certification and have to talk again HR or HR manager would you follow up on that please I just a couple of policies uh 232 Joe's book here I have it on page number one um so that 232 I had a question on a section A one and on uh section B two what's the number again uh it's it says C I might have wrote down the wrong policy hold on it's R I'm sorry it's r226 Equity school and classroom practice above it it says see see a policy y alert which is a mandatory policy correct I just had I I didn't understand why we're taking out legal guardian um because it doesn't seem like that would be doesn't seem appropriate like a parent can can uh um put a complaint in right these are for complaint procedures but then we have we If the child does not have a parent available at the time we would not accept what page are you looking at on this uh Charles it's um r226 I'm on there but would uh A1 A1 Yeah a different page again A A lot of these are uh in yeah that's where I'm at uh first highlight in R it's also on the second page on the I would have to follow up with stra estimate this because there's specific reasons that they they redacted all this this wasn't uh done by all staff but uh if I was asked this at the last meeting or tonight I I will definitely follow up on that and ask strae the reason why okay and then I had one for 5570 this was uh and I'm sorry my uh all over the place here voic smans ship yes it was I I just had a could we I think it was very vague about what kind of disciplinary actions uh and and I saw in other policies we mentioned it could be including of of this you know doesn't specifically say what what the actions would be but it would include you know suspension or um I think this was this one actually was for a teacher so it would be I guess suspend well I guess it can get suspended too right adely so and I have I'm sorry what was a question on that one if we could if they would if we would add disciplinary actions into it because it was vague it just said actions would be taken you mean you want to know specifically what action or you want to know I mean it's our policy why would we put it in there what what kind of action we would take aha yes because it's our policy inally vag yeah yeah that is not a mandatory we we can put whatever we wanted that okay you want to pull that and uh work on yeah I can give it to yeah I'll send over to you tomorrow Russ and then and then the other one was and I think I have the number wrong again but it's 5841 now this one you might not be able to answer because it's about secret societies so but the the only thing I had with that was it says there approval of of a list by the superintendent and I I just feel like that's something that should be reviewed once a year maybe because if we have a new superintendent come in somebody could have approved it or this the the secret society could have have changed I don't know if we have any I think they're more for frats and kind do not have a secret society list that the super the current superintendent has approved as of yet okay so but if we did have a list and it did come up there I I think we could put that in a policy where it seem you know Silly if the superintendent knows then it's not a secret society right yeah who who decision St and then we had uh uh g520 we took out and I I there's no G's no oh six uh 6520 maybe is that yes 65 and we took out the section where it said 15 and more had to be involved right I know I know the reasoning for that okay yeah yeah but I'm just afraid what in the future if we are charged for for something well if we would we would go back to change the policy what's happening now is years ago it used to require uh a lot of work on our end in the board office to coordinate a lot of these retirement plans now there's there's such a variety of retirement plans it's and it's very easy for our our Board office and payroll to handle uh them that we we we want to open up the ability for people to invest in in more than just what we offer as a school and it was going to be where we just going to say we're going to say like one at a time like what to invest instead of doing that I think we were we were letting certain uh retirement uh opportunities not be available to people people and I think in the past it was just because it was very tedious in payroll and the discussion we had with payroll was to to eliminate that no I think it's great I think when you open it up and you explained it to me before right I I just thought maybe we should have an in there Clause where it said if there is a cost later on we could change this you know instead of having to wait for a policy to do change you know if what if what if a there is a cost and we have employees and asking for it we don't have time make a policy or it's not actually wouldn't be right to make a policy right as somebody asks us to do it so if there is a course later on I thought we could add something just like that where we can it could change because of the cost yeah that that's I just don't know like when when do you we're kind of doing this backwards okay we should be discussing these more at a work session and working them out at the work session we have a motion so these will have to who made who made the motion on this these recommendations might have been and who seconded all right so technically you two have to agree to change the motion because there are a couple of policies that we probably should remove from a first reading yeah and then would you agree to those removing so if and then we we we move you know so I'm sorry we did discuss these though at a Charles didn't no we didn't they were for review only right I was gonna bring them up last week these are my not from last week and and we didn't talk about it they were they were for I asked about the policies and they were said they were for uh for review and we would have the first reading and and the follow because this is the first reading so we are I think I thought that we are supposed to talk about them during the first reading right and then the second reading is when we approve them no or is no they're approved as a first reading and we can change them again but anytime we change them there'll be a new first reading okay we used to we used to sit here and literally change them remember yeah IED to give I tried to give a little more time in the whole policy review because what happened was the first reading came so quickly we had a lot of discussion and within the next board meeting I got approval I tried to put I'm trying to now put a a preview on at the work session so that we could have more discussion ahead of time so possibly we could review and and change some of them before the first reading so I was trying to add another level to the policy review okay well I'm fine with pulling my motion if if that's necessary for just identify thank you thank you we just want to identify what exactly ones that we're going to be pulling from the motion was it um that first one that I thank you we move 2260 I believe 5570 was the sportsmanship 5570 and 5750 no no no I'm sorry 5841 5841 and 6520 yes yes I'm sorry to cut you but you have any more that no that was it yeah and I I could do it at the workstation next time we appreciate I would appreciate that because that's where we should be dialoguing more about these things I'm doing a little we can talk about yeah you can bring up a policy at any time if you go look at your policies right now and you see something you're allowed to bring it up right so we can also just move ahead and then you could bring it up again but so thank you all right so motion to I foret this goes amend um the original motion right okay or you agree to amend your original motion I do okay and Carl agrees to second that yes okay any questions or comments about that a roll call vote please Mrs Smith Mr sman yes M goani yes Mr cantino yes Miss Pet yes Dr Roth yes Mr Sweeny yes M yes motion thank you and I appreciate your comment nice child I do thank you this hard Shuffle to the pages but thank for theut um are you g to do Mr slam's report yes I am uh discussion discussion and informational items use of buildings and grounds we're making use of our facilities we had a great start of the uh spring season and it got cold awful quick this week uh letter B are the field trips letter two are the recommendations it's recommended that the board approves the following Financial reports list of checks 92156 through 92 364 for March 2024 in the amount of an attachment F1 $1,652 5 list of hand checks for February 20 2024 in the amount of $ 4,557 28637 attachment F2 transfers February 2024 attachment F3 purchase orders for February 2024 in the amount of $375,500 reports it's recommended that the board accept the preliminary board secretary's report and the board treasur report for the month of February 2024 and those are attachments F5 and F6 they have quite a bit of view in the charts um letter C it is recommended that the board approved the transportation as listed below letter D it is recommended that the board approve the buron Township School District's Allied Health Career and Technical education program in HOSA way way on to 5K trail run fundraiser on April 7th 2024 at 9:00 am. expect you all to be there it is anticipated that there will be 200 to 250 participants all proceeds from this fent will benefit the hosta club by enabling travel to competitions far and away and funding scholarships for future health professionals thank you Mr bear and HOSA letter e it is recommended that the board approve the amendment for the upgrade of rise and cell equipment on the Vernon Township High School roof letter F it is recommended that the board approve a perfect reflection photo booth LLC rental agreement for the junior prom on May 18 2024 in the amount of $300 letter G it is recommended that the board approve the change order for the Walnut Ridge School filtration project with EI Associates in the amount of $5,000 letter H it is recommended that a border okay that one's going to be moved to the next so letter H is going to be moved to the next agenda letter I it is recommended that the board approve to accept the restricted total donation of $1,257 from the Cedar Mountain sea this donation will be utilized to create Unity on field day providing arts and crafts and Field Day shirts for all students I want to thank the SAA for all their involvement in fundraising that they do for us it is much appreciated letter J it is recommended that a board approve tuition payments to Newton public schools in the amount of $9,99 total to be paid uh for February through June there's a student number letter K it is recommended that the board approve true blue BSI LLC to conduct smarter residency verification services from the Vernon Township School District for the remainder of the 2023 24 school year I was going to put a not to exceed $220,000 it is recommended that the board approve the submission of the application to apply and accept the funds for the rural technology fund grant program in the amount up to $2,500 for Cedar Mountain Primary School letter M it is recommended that the board approve the submission of the application to apply and accept the funds for the spark good local grants from Walmart in the amount of $2,100 for the purchase of brain poop Jr for Cedar Mound Primary School letter N it is recommended that the board approv transportation to include the joint resolutions for participation with the susus county regional cooperative for the 2024-25 school year to include the following special educ routes public Roots non-public rootes field trips and Athletics oh it's a lot motion please all the recommendations all right to move move by m pet Thank You by Mr cantino questions and comments anybody sorry I have a a comment here you don't know this but you're the check issue to you so you have to abstain okay on is it F1 Jennifer it is okay so on that you don't want to vote for a check for yourself no the reimbursement for my background check yes yes that that was one comment the other comment was um thank you to the sca for that donation and uh These are nice uh grants that they're getting H uh the community as a whole is stepping up to help raise money uh for different projects throughout the the buildings I much appreciate it well I see them I see them as I lead the board office as they're doing their ger walk fundraisers and everything that the the parents and families in Sea are putting a lot of energy and effort to raise money for the students do we need a board representative for this 5K run because I know a couple of people who could do it I'm I'm kidding I know one all right that's all I have anybody else just real quick um is the is the true view um the smarter residency verification Services is that a new uh a new thing that we're doing or is that something you were just renewing no it's a new thing to do we haven't spent any money yet but we've uh it's come to our attention that some people are attending school that are aren't in District and we just want to make sure that we're careful when When approaching them because there's there's different reasons for not being in Vernon um and some of them are out of the control of of the people so we're trying to be sensitive but we'd also like to investigate um if people are not living in burnning and ped schools thank you did you that of course um you said that you don't want that to exceed $20,000 or is that yes I'm aiming high right there I wanted to see if there was if you thought that the problem was excessive enough that it reached that type of threshold I think that if we if we invest if if we did a certain am certain type of investigation I would discuss it with the board before uh before putting the purchase order in but I I don't want to I don't want to put it low enough that we we wouldn't consider certain uh measures to to do a broader investigation of the district as a whole for example if if there was like required surveillance that would be expensive right and then sometimes they'll do an overall check just to make sure that maybe a grade level or or you know a large population and that wouldn't be that expensive but if it was you know if we had several hundred or thousand students it could be but that would be discussed with the board before that decision thank you Mr Rogers anybody else roll call please Mr Smith Mrs colani yes Mr cantino yes M pet yes Dr Ross Yes abstain as noted Mr Sweeny yes Miss BR yes Mr smag yes motion carries very good okay thank you Mr Rogers gonna open the meeting to the public anybody would like to make public comments on any matters at all please come to the podium and state your name and what town you're from please hello uh Scott Castle from Glenwood um I just had a couple of questions or kind of clarifications for me on the budget and I know it's been talked about in previous meetings but I wasn't able to attend so hopefully I'm not repeating too many things um I know Mr slam isn't here as well so I'll just throw it out there but um I think you know I'm coming from the private sector so I know it's different on the public sector side but I work in a large company I have a lot of uh major projects that I'm responsible for so have to do a lot of budgeting and um you know when inevitably things come up it's never ever good news as we know with budgets it's always something that's that's costing some money um when we Monitor and we see that happens we have a process that we follow and I'm just not sure how that how a private sector um process would work on a public sector side and I'm not sure where the differences are but but for you know for me what we we don't immediately jump to I'm going to go to the client now and ask them for more money because we've got these problems I have to do a deep analysis of why don't we have the money you know what's going on with the budget where can we cut all of that it seems like and it may just be the perception but on the public side it seems like our first uh option that we jump to is we've got to raise taxes because we need this much money to run this schools and we've got to do that I don't see any big backup on why do we need the money where did we evaluate that we can cut costs um and what I have to do on my end is I have to painstakingly go through line by line uh propose a cut in that line or explain why I can't and also a percentage of the cut and sometimes it's fractions of a percent but they're large budgets so they all kind of add up so I have to do that for each item that's there and I have to assign a severity level to it as well because they're impactful uh you know just like here when you make Cuts it's going to be impactful so what what is the impact of that and what is the severity level so we go through that whole exercise and then we'll total up all the severity levels and we'll have what we see now as you know what what options do we have out there um and what can we do to cut you know various various uh costs out of this to get back on budget I think where I'm missing it here is I didn't see in the budget presentation where we looked at what we were cutting so for me we the the process that we follow after we do all of the evaluation on the line by line is we take it uh in sections and the first section that we always attack is Administrative costs and over overhead costs and things like that what can we cut from there on each one of those lines and how impactful will it be can we streamline some processes um can we combine some roles um do we have people in place that you know maybe they were in place to get things started but you don't need this High super high level person now to just maintain it you can have a lower level uh resource kind of handling that none of it's fun I'm not saying it's a it's a great thing to do but when you have budget problems that's that's what you have to do um to get to that to to get to that level so um you know I didn't see on the slides that were um in the budget and maybe I missed it you know that's that's fine just feel free to tell me but I didn't see where we went through all the administrative costs and where could we cut or where could we propose to cut even if it's not accept but where did we look at cutting as opposed to just raising our taxes every time the work that I think I saw was more work was put into how can we get around the 2% cap so we can raise the taxes more to make this you know make this work and I think you know as a town as a well as a board we should say we have this much money coming in from taxes we're expecting this much money this is how much we can spend not come at it as this is how much we want to spend how much do we have to raise taxes to to make it to that and that's I'm definitely oversimplifying everything with that but I think we have to look at it on you know on both ends of it as opposed to just strictly raising taxes because I think that's where public is you know I I know there's not a ton of people that are here but I know when my wife and I walk around the neighborhood we EV inevitably be talking about you know schools and the taxes and all of that um so I think a lot of people are just they're not seeing why is the first option always to raise the taxes and I can say for me personally I can swallow um tax increases if I know work was put in to try to make some Cuts or Some Cuts were maybe made but uh along with that we still aren't making what we need to so we're going to have to raise taxes I mean it's obvious with inflation and everything things go up and there's unexpected expenses um but I think you know maybe I it just needed another slide to say all this work was done and we just don't know about it but I didn't see any of that like I saw we've got to raise the taxes um and the other piece of this that I'll I'll throw out there is one of the slides that really just it it drives me insane is and and I guess you do have to State it but it's the slide that shows how much state aid we used to get compared to how much we're getting now everybody on understands we got cut and there were times when we got I think more state aid than we were supposed to like it was an error on the state's part or whatever but even while that was happening uh you know our our school scores are low and I don't think we're trending correctly at least from the last meeting we had with the school scores we weren't trending up we were striving to Let's hopefully get to an average in the state which is not where we want to be let's be at the very average um so I think just throwing money at it when we did have more money coming from the state just throwing money at it was not the answer uh you know and sticking with the plan is is not working so I think you know it's hard to swallow um more and more tax increases when we're not seeing a benefit from it and we're not seeing any Cuts anywhere being made I mean I think Mrs paladini I think said it on the phone that you know the the conferences and the training and while it is important maybe it's a lower priority than some of these other things that have happened I don't I I think the administrative costs have to be looked at first not jump to again the taxes or the constant threat of you know we might have to get rid of more teachers which should be one of the last things or the late bus is out which should be one of the last things I would think that some of the training if it's not required should be out to get those buses back because I think the anything that affects the students is really what you want to avoid out of all costs if it if it's hurting administratively that's a lot better than if we're hurting the students where you know sometime I think even like a late bus is hurting morale of students which is very impactful to me is you know I think that sending a message to the students that well we don't have the money for this but I'm going to you know take a course um so I I guess I wrote a whole bunch of things here because I was typing very quickly but um really that was pretty much to wrap it up um you know I I think that I don't know if it's a separate meeting or what but I think a a deep look at where did we look to cut and and to me the the budget should come up with with proposed cuts that should then be voted on by the board this is what we can do these are the rep cussions if we do it or we just have to raise all the taxes or we have to do this you know whatever it is there should be options that are out there not just one slideshow saying you know this is what we got to do we have to raise all the taxes on on everybody so I think that's that's hurting the you know you had mentioned earlier about trying to rebuild some board confidence and all of that and I think that goes a lot a long way towards it um yeah so that's pretty much it for me I think just so I'm not fully negative just one thing I'll add in is I do think think some of the comments from some of the newer members are really good I think we're questioning some charges which even if they go through it's good to questioning it I'll I'll single out um Mr smaga I think he asked a lot of good questions that helped me understand and I think it just it gets that point across as opposed to you know just stamping everything to to get it done Mr Castle I didn't think anything was negative at all no no not at all I didn't want it to come out negative I that that was my perspective thank you for your comments without Mr slam here yeah last last month last week's budget was a preliminary budget that was sent to the county the next couple of meetings we're going to be going over okay uh Mr and well last year La last year was the point where we lost a lot of our our our money in our in our budget and a decrease in an amount and we last year was the time that we went through a lot of different line items I didn't say we saying we should do it every year but we do talk about where we could afford to maybe uh you know we hit some items that we didn't want to hit that you see were brought up all the time as well but uh We've made that amount of cuts and most of those cuts were made in in Staffing and over the last several years it's been uh both uh both administrative and and teaching which I which we feel are probably the most important uh for for the students yeah so it's not like like this year it's like the cuts were made so drastic the year before um what our main goal was trying to maintain what we had but we did at the same point re-evaluate and brought different groups in at different times to talk about their budgets and where Cuts could be made but Mr slam could took talk more specifically to that because he had the the uh the detailed discussions with every every party involved we we will relay this information to him and your the processes that you go through and we'll try to have him be more specific and more and demonstrate more what what he's been doing at the next couple of meetings yeah because I I do think that helps a lot like if if you show that hey we did look at this and and it was going to be this painful or you know this is an option but it is this pain I think that helps the public kind of see what's going on because I'm sure there is work that goes on to to come up with and they were ugly discussions especially last year and there were things considered as well now like I like I said if if we didn't get that $1.1 million and excess state aid um there were going to be drastic Cuts again probably the things that we didn't want to cut yeah in otherwise we got 1.1 million more than we were anticipating and that helped tremendously yeah and you know I hate to bring it back to state aid but uh with the 1.1 million like we were cut 7 million um you're getting tax the same and that money is going elsewhere instead of diverted that's what you know with this changing the state aid funding um I just inherited the end of it when it's the last year of trying to do it and I think like last year was probably the one of the hardest years that we could ever have with a budget we're hoping to maintain this year and get a good idea of where we're at where we where other Cuts can be made but more importantly what other things could we can we add if we make those cuts we have this discussions with the building administrators and uh and teachers and skit meetings and uh we have various discussions but there like I said they're not easy decisions because we cut some things that we didn't want to cut and and I think you brought some of them up earlier and class size is not nearly what we would like it to yeah and that's why the the teacher's being cut is the last straw well we like I could go through some where we really tightened in a lot of other areas as well but I don't want to like like I said minimize like for us the toughest Cuts were with the teachers and we and you've heard people earlier this year with class sizes of 28 in some of the lower grades and and 30 in some of the higher grades there it's still a concern for us uh as far as Staffing and and and reducing class sizes possible yeah and I and I the other thing I'll throw in there real quick is I think I think you know different ideas like with the where the mayor came up with the shared services with the Board of Ed I mean those kind of things are kind of that out of the box thinking that honestly I I would have thought a mayor prior to this mayor would have thought of that in the past I mean I think it's a great idea and I think you know those kind of of um thoughts that come up should just be thrown out there to see if they if they make sense there's a lot listen want to give Mr slam the opportunity at the next board meeting to talk about in a short time here a lot of the different options and a lot of the things we've explored to help to help with the budget as well the new mayor has been an open mind it's been wonderful in that regard for sure but we did do shared services with the previous mayor so you know remember Mrs Mitchell did the GU but yeah so it did start under the well it started a thousand years ago but true but I mean we just did that recent um to a lot more cooperation it seems like now he's really we have an agreement now we're going through to try to reach an agreement with so that we could utilize our services even more efficiently than we have now thank you very much pleas it's not negative at any way shape or form anybody else in the audience hi pleas heart Mr Sweeney last week Charles addressed as a question about responding to the public asking questions and then you or Mr Rogers would say I'll get back to you um something I felt for a while and I was I couldn't be here last week so I watched it on YouTube the next day I did appreciate Charles bringing that up and my question I didn't understand I'm looking for clarification is did you say that in order for that to be on the agenda we needed a referendum I don't recall what the subject was it was a PO you said we had to change our policy I said I suggest that we change our our agenda so we would have a order the agenda yeah we would do like old news first so we can address previous questions yes I that's that's exactly what I said we to change our policy well so my question is the two people that address the public tra typically the way it's supposed to be is you or Mr Rogers so why would anything be changed why can't that be part of your when you speak to to be able and there's nothing right now it's just something that sat in the back of my head like there has been many of times I've heard said I'll get back on that and it's not necessarily that was specific to the person asking the question it was something the general public could have benefited from and I'm just wondering why it would have to be a policy change where it couldn't just be part of your your time well I did address one during my president's comment and I'm sorry that was so long but I mean one of the board members suggested it it's not a bad suggestion and I think it's a good idea that way we don't overlook it so that so that it's not overlooked and and I and I think it's a good idea as well we I just put that on the agenda for next we have actually our policy actually lists the order of board meetings right have a my secretary will be pulling up the uh that that a uh policy number to present to the board well and and I mean this is even better I brought up a question and you're answering that it's going to be a policy it's going to be in the agenda and that's really what um I was looking for is to just make sure that you understand that um we are kind of waiting for answers to things that weren't specific to a student that a parent would only be talking to about that it was kind of like overall and it's not anything right now and thank you for addressing what you you have felt you needed to address in your speech Mrs Hart if if you don't get an answer please feel free as a follow-up question as well because I I'd be more than happy it with a followup question answer those okay there's there's quite a long list I think I get to about 90% on the list but I might might miss five or 10% and I want to make sure if it's not answered and you're not happy please ask again because I well if it was my question I would okay um I'm just speaking more of a general just person of the public okay thank you Mrs hard anybody else in the public online any um yes we have uh quite a few online okay okay um first we have rosan Roy Rosanna Roy yeah hi can you hear me yes thank you okay hi it's it's roou um actually we it's fine uh we had talked previously Mr Sweeney I think about the universal prek funding um and what that kind of where we were with that um I have small children in the district and I'm very interested in the outcome of the universal prek funding I know susex Wantage got over $2 million for it um I Heard recently that it was not approved and I was wondering if anyone here could speak to why it wasn't improved what we're trying to do to get funding kind of anything about that Universal pre- situation I'm gonna ask Mr Rogers to respond to that uh yes uh we we as soon as we didn't find out it was approved the first question was why uh we have a meeting set up I believe uh within the they reached out to us to set up a meeting with us to discuss our application we also have a follow-up meeting with the superintendent of the County as well um we'll be able to submit one I believe it's by July for next year um the funding was a little bit has been it's taking a while to come out um if it was approved it would they said initially last year it was approved for November they didn't get the funding for January it's something that's very important to us and we're going to follow up on and we'll report back to it um again this is uh as I talked to the board this is one of my goals for next year uh to to try to get this uh this uh preschool uh funding um so that that's where we're at we we didn't sit on it we're trying to approve we're trying to uh get it approved um I think as when we first mentioned it in the board meeting I think Ray was Mr slam was very excited about it and I said I'm not as excited until we actually get the funding um and when we find out why why or what the what the issue was we'll report that out to the board and we'll see and we're very optimistic about getting the funding next year but again I don't want to give false promises so when is this meeting I believe it's a April 10th April 10th April 10th so we hopefully will know sometime after that yes and then I'm sorry one follow-up question when you say next year are you talking about 2025 or the next academic year so you said something about well it's July 2425 we're doing it this July um the problem is the state gives a lot of deadlines and promises for when funny is going to be available this I think uh last year they said it would be available in November and it wasn't available until until uh January so I don't want to give any promises on the deadlines that the state gives because they change often uh but this is this is of great importance to us and we think it's important for the district and it's something that's going to be a top priority uh to follow up when we meet with him in in April sure and then um I guess kind of a corer you might not know the answer to this because it might fully depend on funding I don't know but once if once knock on wood it does get approved we do get funded is there any thought as to how many students would be accepted and what the process would be for admission I know some districts doable process you're lucky I have the preschool principal with me right here who'll be able to answer hello Mr GLE asro um yes so right now uh if we apply in the summer and we are granted the funding uh we'll find we're supposed to find out in around September uh I've talked to other districts and they have not found out until somewhere mid to end November normally uh once we do get the funding it would be implemented in January uh so then uh at that point what most districts are doing I've I've C around to a lot of them is a lottery so uh what we're thinking is if we find out we receive funding uh we will send out a survey to see who is interested in actually attending the program uh and then use those names to do a lottery at a public forum so that it will be out in the open in front of everyone very transparent um and we can take it from there great thanks so much for all that um information and I really I'm I'm very excited about this as a parent in the district we all know the cost of child care and early childhood education is insane so be we love this we are as well to provide uh a preschool education if if available um and we're trying to get to our universe as quick as we possible as quickly as possible to offer it to as many people in the community um I'm curious to see if we were being very aggressive to try to provide preschool to as many students as we possible possibly could and that might be the reason but uh again we won't find out till uh second week in April all right well I look forward to hearing any updates thank you Mrs r thank you all righty we have William Higgins Mr Higgins hello everybody hello Mr Higgins yeah I I had a few questions for Mr slam obviously he's not there so I'll hold on those but my initial uh my initial comments have to do with I'm so proud of some of the people that got up and spoke I know that Scott and Jesse and Denise and especially Denise she's looking more comfortable and asking outstanding questions and some of the uh comments that were made I'm very proud of because I've spoken to all those people over the over the the years and uh and and they're right on on the Target so I appreciate that and I hope that more and more of the public gets involved which leads me to another point and I'm trying to appeal for once again for like the third year in a row to the board members to wake up get involved ask questions we have uh Charles saglia who's really taken the uh taken the lead position and he's asking serious question I'm sitting and listening and waiting for other people to get involved they're not that's the whole role of a board member to ask questions and and get all the information to make decisions it's just not happening some of you are new on your job others are not and uh you're the ones we're counting on so hopefully that changes the uh other questions were for uh for Mr slam and I think we asked a question about why four employers are going to job fairs that's covered that was a question I had and uh we all know that 80 82% of the uh the budget is Personnel cost and I guess uh I'll follow up on somebody else's comment when questions are asked many times we're promised answers we don't always get answers back so I'll ask uh our superintendent have any other uh vtea members suggested that they would forego part or all of their raise for the coming year like you did last year I would I would never ask the members that question no I asked them public so I'm asking you if any of them have responded to you no comment I'm not going to talk to them I don't know whether they they talk to you or not Mr hiams I asked you if they spoke with you that's all no and I wouldn't ask them that question either I didn't say you asked them I asked them publicly I'm asking you if they responded saying count me in and I'll uh I'll give up X number of dollars if you ask them I would expect them to answer to you I no well no I know Mr ens all right respond to you no nobody nobody came to the him the other thing is there is a number of policies that were discussed this evening it's a laundry list that you presented it's almost impossible to read all of that and if I were a board member getting ready for the meeting I would say this is very difficult and then you read through them and it says mandated mandated mandated so as Mr Seagle has said let's concentrate on the ones that are not mandated and if there are policies that affect our children on a day in day out basis and it affects their behavior or employees Behavior they're the ones to concentrate on and I hope that's the case and that's that's where you uh you do concentrate and Mr Higgins that's why I've I've added like another board meeting where we actually view them first before the first reading because I felt in in the in the past we were we were rushing through them and I'm trying to give more people more uh give more people time to look at them to ask questions before we have a first reading okay so that has happened or it's about to happen no last last uh meeting we we had these available for for to a preview okay because there's a lot of reading there there's a lot of details in those and when whenever an incident or an event happens and somebody says well we have to follow this policy no one really understands the policy until event happens then you have to go back and look at the policy yes and it takes it takes a great deal of time to look them over so I I'm trying to give more time so that we can have discussion to to make an informed decision excellent secondly there was a vote this evening to uh include free tuition for two more teachers children that's correct okay previously on a number of occasions I asked how many teachers have children attending our schools at zero cost to them it's a heck of a benefit that people don't get whenever you work in Private Industry or even in other school districts so here somebody lives out of town bringing their children in and we had a difference on the cost per student my cost per student was $225,000 Mr slam's cost because he was using a different base on the budget was 18,700 so you take either number that's a heck of a benefit so I'll ask the question again how many children are in the district as children of uh employees attending here at no cost I I will get back to you on that I will get back to the community on that at the next board meeting okay because I've asked and I've never gotten an answer Joe and you're the one that said you'd get back to me in the past as well I I have a chart so we're close we added to so I'll have to um I can give a roundabout uh approximation or we could wait for the chart to be exact how close it's it's approximately I think it was it was 11 and it may be up to 13 right now um I'm not 100% sure but uh I think I've I've I've had a table that I've uh shared with people at different different times okay that would be good that would be a good old business to go over at the next build next business meeting Mr Higgins and and I and I'll look to get you that number good thank you very much the uh other thing is uh I have a suggestion on on what M what Scott said previously if you can tie performance to to compensation like like takes place in a Private Industry why don't we uh take a look at the scale of where our VTE members are paid in in percentage of the state and then we take a look at where our students perform and see the difference between the two and if the performance is lower than the salary then the salary comes down to the performance level until it goes up which leads us to the uh negotiating committee whoever's on the negotiating committee controls what happens in this District 80 82% are are benefits and and salaries so that's the key area that's where it happens will you ever on the negotiating committee Mr Higgins I was on for uh six years of the six years that I was on the board yes and that did that go over well back then I'll tell you what happened Joe is we had an agreement with the vtea whenever chapter 44 expired they wanted to have a one-year agreement because they wanted their agreement to coincide with the expiration of the six years of the introduction of chapter 44 so I said I would agree to that as a member of the negotiating committee so long as the other members agreed on other things that we would negotiate and stand firm on so we entered the next contract negotiation I invested 26 meetings Joe 26 some of them lasting six hours long and we had an agreement myself and the negotiating committee to stand firm on some issues one member of that negotiating committee folded changed his mind and he convinced one of the other members to change their mind so I was committed to make it happen and other members were not and as a result I lost in the negotiating committee it went to the general committee and it passed uh as a as a new contract that's what happens when people are not committed and that's why the people on the board who were on the negotiating committee have to take it seriously you hold the most important part of this uh entire budget and you have to do a good job and you have to be committed so it was a lot of hours a lot of times a lot of meetings and uh I was committed very disappointed that the other members didn't follow through so to answer your question Joe I think that's a pretty pretty good answer yeah it is a good answer thank you and uh I appreciate everybody giving me the time to speak thank you very much thank you anybody else next uh we have Carolyn Inc carnado Mrs incarn hi thank you for taking um my comments again I wanted to especially give a shout out to uh Charles saglia I'm echoing others uh the comments of others his questions are thoughtful and they're insightful this agenda is well over 200 Pages there is so much information in here um and it is difficult for anyone to sit and read through all of the pages um and he was able to zero in on his questions and I am very grateful for you know for his questions and for his you know his diligence to to review these policies those were his questions I realized I guess that he was that you wanted him to look at it in the work session and discuss it but for those of us in the public I just you know I can speak for myself I just have hope that um when an agenda is is put in front of um you know members of the board that they won't just vote Yes and rubber stamp everything you know Charles you know I'm really really grateful to him that he is starting to um initiate some of the conversations on these policies especially um my other comment I wanted to make and Mr Sweeny you mentioned this earlier in your comments um the legal fees for three firms tonight that are being approved in the check register exceed $10,000 $10,000 a month for legal fees is an enormous expense I realize Mr slam and this is probably a question for him but how much do we budget um each year for legal fees because I didn't see a line item for legal fees in the budget so it's got to be included somewhere else but if we're budgeting $120,000 because this is $10,000 this month for legal fees you know there's something you know there we might want to have to take a look at that okay I'll get back to you on that I don't know uh how much did we budget for legal fees for the current year or for the the budget that we're well well we're in 2324 so it would be nice to know if we're over or under whatever we've put aside for legal fees I mean this month the loan is over 10,000 um all right I I app I appreciate that you know that when you add in you know we have another check for the flex school again this month so we're at 24 $23,000 just for legal fees in the flex School I realize nobody wants to talk about that but we are still making that checkout every month so um I just wanted to comment on that there's a lot of money going out the check register is all the way at the back of the agenda that's well over 200 pages but it's there for everyone to see where the money's going so that's you know I appreciate you getting back to me with the uh budget for the legal fees thank you so much Mr Sweeney thank you Mr V carnado thank you uh who's next we have uh no last name just Neil would you like me to give them in permission uh well I'll give him the floor but Neil you have to identify your first and last name and what section of town you're from Anil hi it's it's how are you this evening fine I'm sorry we need to have your full name and the section of town you're from or the and the town that you live in hello yeah well that was the gentleman speaking hello uh Mrs Anil can you give us your first and last name yeah it's an lson and there's a long delay I apologize I hear that there is some terrible problems in the in the town all you have the floor Mrs lson okay there's like a 45 second play yes it's me the name is an Larson okay okay Mrs Larson you can go ahead yeah okay first first thing I wanted to say is I wanted to congratulate Mr Castle it was his name he did a heck of a job speaking on behalf of the taxpayers and the parents and that is exactly I have gone ahead multiple times I guess it's not gonna work yeah I forget it yeah she probably getting an echo right oh I don't know do we want to give somebody else the floor sure and see if you can okay we'll go to uh Martin peringer Mr peringer hello can you hear me yes okay uh I have spoken in front of the poe for uh since 1995 so for quite a few years and things have changed quite a bit over the time lately I have spoken last because I was basic with the Robotics and I just made some short reports before spoke I was often cut short it's 4 minutes and 30 down the line you got to wrap it up and now I see 8 minutes 10 minutes 12 minutes plus we are back to have doing it in a Q&A format now I don't have no problem either way I just want to know as I'm going to become more involved again do I have five minutes 10 minutes 15 minutes can ask questions or do I just hope that someone in the future somebody will make a comment to what I say so if somebody could explain that to me please okay in the audience right now Mr perer there are four people and they have I I figured that there would be plenty of time for them to comment and there was no need to limit it to five minutes online there's approximately seven people who had their hand raised yes so I didn't feel that time was uh imperative it's I mean the reason I'm asking is some of the time I've spoken on teacher motivation I've spoken on uh on things like for example the recording the meetings and making a text speech to texting which you guys are doing and I count as one of my V victories I just want to know if I sit down and I prepare something what do I prepare for my presentation I would try to limit it to five minutes that that's a general rule of thumb okay all right and we are it's okay to ask questions again we'll try to provide the answers as best we can all right thank you then I'm withum my five minutes and you will hear more from me in the near future thank you Mr parer you're welcome Al righty we have Jesse paladini Mrs paladini hi again um I want to Echo previous sentiments about board member Charles saglia he is excellent with his questioning and it is really refreshing to have a conscientious um board member like him um also like his wife very much whose class I took over for um during one of her maternity leaves so thank you Mr samaga um I also want to thank Scott Cassel I believe it is I don't know him but he uh makes some excellent comments and I thank him for his involvement I just want to very quickly say that when asked asked about whether those conferences and so on were required it really did not um you really did not address that question so we still don't know whether they are required or just preferred my guess is that they are just preferred um I want to ask the question what is Atlantic tomorrow office no details required just what is it um Mr R I think it's on page 143 it's just an odd name I wondered what it was that a certain amount of money was going to um we'll I'll get back to you on that Atlantic tomorrow yes Atlantic tomorrow office I believe uh Mrs Smith says it's it's our copy machines across the entire district oh oh oh okay all right that sounds uh reasonable rooster T's what is that $1,982 185 for I know it's for I know they sell t-shirts I don't know specifically what that bill is well I I was wondering what specifically it was for that's a lot of money for t-shirts and I'm just wondering that's all I mean I know the t-shirts are made for incoming kindergarten classes and cute little things like that which are lovely but I was just wondering what specifically and how do you choose that one particular vendor I know there are a number of vendors here in Vernon who um create that type of t-shirt so if you don't know right now um if you'd get back to me I would just appreciate that okay okay I have that written down sure thank you last but not least I'm wondering what shared service did the prior mayor do I'm not familiar with any but what shared service did a prior mayor do I believe it was g g gasoline gasoline yes um Mrs pet you have the go ahead yeah I believe it was gasoline I don't know the particulars um Mrs uh Mitchell took over for Mr um odonnell we share Town bu gasoline and we use we use the gasoline that the town provides and we pay for what we use yes I'm I'm aware that the town has the gasoline pumps okay I'll I'll check on that with them tomorrow um I guess that's everything and I just want to say that I know that mayor Rossi is working very hard on shared services and I think that's wonderful and I also want to thank Mr Rogers for working with mayor Rossi the mayor has very good things to say about you Mr Rogers so thank you and that's it thank you you're welcome and all right lastly we have Anna Garcia Mrs Garcia can you hear me yes good evening um I just I just wanted to say a couple of things I want to piggyback on the first gentleman who Scott who spoke very brilliantly about things that should be looked into very proud of him um the only thing I wanted to say that does get me extremely upset is the excitement that we have for our Sports and our performing arts and our band I have that excitement too I think it's wonderful that these children have these opportunities and we should be excited because some of these things these kids live for this to do this but I wish as much excitement would be put towards after school buses being returned State grades being improved nobody has excitement or enthusiasm on stuff like that and it should be equally looked into and be as important as all these other things that's all thank you thank you very much Mrs Garcia and that's it that is everybody okay I'm going to close the meeting to the public item n open board member for would anybody like to say anything a member of the board and representative I have a couple things um okay first of all I didn't mean at all to Discount what mayor Rossy is doing I think it's fabulous uh I just wanted to technically correct that we had we had at least done one shared service that I knew of but uh it's absolutely true that we had struggled a long time and not gotten anywhere so so it's great that we're making progress now um and then I did also want to say that what Mr kessle kessle I don't know how to pronounce his name um brought up ties into the concern I've been you know trying to figure out of address which is that I don't think we're communicating well what is taking place because you know the finance committee and and the administration did go line by line through the budget and yet people don't know that so so I feel like we're missing some key piece of communication where we're not walking people through the effort that is going on and the discussion you know that's taking place on cuts that we've you know that you've contemplated and and board questions about those cuts and and so forth I think we just we have to figure something out like maybe it's FAQs maybe it's a some you know some better more detailed finance committee I know Mr Zimmerman's not here report but um we're just not communicating things that we're doing and it looks like we're not doing them and that's that's not good for anybody I don't think um know if anybody wants to comment on that before I move to my next thing I was contemplating having a full board meeting the line by line review yeah for the finance committee that's kind of redundant I'm sorry but you'll be knowledgeable and help us help those who don't know well I mean it's basically presented you know we it's presented by Mr slam and Mr Rogers and then the finance committee discusses the line but but we should maybe be doing that whole thing in public I don't know what the you know we we decided uh what was it a year ago we decided we were going to be a board of committees and we were going to do a lot more work in the Committees and that you know that would enable people to dig into the various topics and really make make uh more detailed you know kind of discussion of each topic and then as a result our board meetings got short and now everybody's wondering wait why aren't they talking about anything at the public board meeting but it's not that it's not being talked about it's being talked about in the Committees and then you know so so I don't know how we bridge this well the work sessions are more public they have more public interest and seems to be better attended well there's no attendance at committee meetings right so I think we have to either give I mean this just my opinion it's up for discussion but maybe we need to give more detailed report I mean everybody you know their eyes plays over when I talk my curriculum reports are too long but but in order to inform people those those conversations have to be brought to the public somehow whether it's whether it's at the work you know work uh sessions or whether it's some other way like a written you know bulleted Point thing or I I don't know but we we're missing an opportunity here to explain ourselves and then later it h it hurts you know it hurts everybody the district as a whole I think that who care you know really who cares what you know people think of us but it's the district that suffers because we're not doing a good job communicating what what's going on we need to be more yeah somehow I don't I'm not saying I know how I'm just saying I see the disconnect and we have to figure it out because it's talk to Mr slam see if he has some ideas and uh I'll send that something okay I have more have anything I have more wait I have more no about that oh about that okay don't close um so uh we talked a little bit about safety about U I know the conc we approve some things with safety and concussion that kind of reminded me um first of all I just want to say the police were at the high school today I got a couple calls and uh I was actually really happy to hear that they were checking the teen driving safety situation I don't you got an email did you get an email I did I didn't hadn't checked my email yet so I got calls from people like why are the police are police and then I found out why they were there and I thought that was was really great I don't know if that came about that happens every year there more checks in the spring as well and we will not inform the board before we do the check after please don't inform the board um no I thought that was great is better yeah it's important that we do that we need our you know we need everybody to be transported safely so that is great I know it's probably not popular with uh some of the kids but you know that's yes exactly get over it but that reminded me that um we've had and I know this isn't entirely School related right but we're a ski town right we have ski mountain and we've had um recently I don't know how much people are aware the trend has been for kids to go snowboarding skiing and it's not cool to wear a helmet anymore and we've had a couple of pretty you know pretty bad uh situations as a result of that and I'm not going to mention the name but one young man had a badf and he um he made I guess some sort of social media post on one of those platforms about that and saying if he had it to do over again he would wear you know he would wear a helmet and everybody should wear a helmet and it went around for a bit and I was really happy to hear that because I know it's it the peer pressure is actually the opposite it's to not wear a helmet and I thought as we're looking at this concussion policy and you know and I know you know kids obviously don't ski in school but maybe we could get in front of this for next ski season and and sort of work a little bit on informing our kids what you know how important this is because it it's it's pretty bad on that mountain right now there's so many kids going snowboarding with no helmets and we're heading into the Summer where they go around on their bikes with no helmets and I don't even know if there is a law about it but if we could sort of I don't know do something educationally or some kind of assembly or I don't know what the answer is but you know we are we are uh we've had several kids who've gotten concussions uh from that kind of behavior and if we can do something as a district to prevent it and educate our kids on how important it is to wear a hel it's it feels so obvious right but we really need to um I mean it would really be nice if weily need to it's not our but I think it's important for the safety of our students um I'm gonna comment on that not only is the helmet safety for concussions but at the base of your neck if you don't have a helmet on you have a spinal injury and my son's witnessed their best friend have a spinal injury and became a par par oh really wow so it's more than just yeah concussion yeah okay well I I what made me think of it was the concussion policy but but to your point it's just injuries in general that we could possibly prevent if we can just prevent a couple by educating kids that just one yeah one whatever however many we can I just I think it would be um good so I just throwing that out there as something maybe we can look at kind of promoting um among our students thank you I think that's it I I like to comment on um the conference and Convention training I agreed with it but I'm I just have to comment I I have been farming myself I don't have a farm but I gra I have raised my vegetables in my yard organically since I'm a mother and they say climate change hogwash I don't go along with that not one ioda nothing has changed in all the years that I've been doing gardening and I don't and I don't see the validity of that and there's another one um uh open science units to address the climate change I don't agree with it you're entitled to your opinion everybody is entitled to their you're to voice it too poto yes um I just wanted to say something I'm really look for looking forward to working towards as a board is our board goal is because I feel that especially just since the time I've been sworn into my new term we have so many new members and we've encountered so many situations and I really want to make it clear to the public that we are very very pressed on bringing back the late buses we care about it just as much as you do and if we had our board goals clearly laid out or if we did it quickly I guess um it would be more obvious to people that we care as much as they do about it I feel like because we don't have a clear trajectory sometimes it's not clear to the public that we care about the same things that they do um also we're just we're very excited to work with mayor Rossy on the shared services agreement as well um and again something we could lay out in our board goals so that's just something I wanted to contribute has a date been set for that yes yes it has when is it is it April 16 April 16th I think it is is that the work session it's an added training I think it Tuesday I think he was talking about Saturday I'm sorry April 11th is the work session okay yeah okay training session for us to work on our goals there might be more than one more meeting in a yeah i' I've been creating a list of all sorts of things I'd like for us to focus on and I really look forward to that meeting forgive me if my speech is a little bit shaky I'm just a bit tired anybody else Charles I'm sorry Melissa did you have some yeah um yeah I mean uh first I think I just wanted to thank everyone for uh for their comments today uh about me um but and also going on that I want to pick it back a little bit on what Jen says um we do have other board members you know I'm happy people recognize me um but we do have board members in our committees and and what Jen's saying I think we really should take Serious um you know we have we have a work session we had um and and uh we had a couple committees that didn't get to meet right and I know we had some new committee members and we're we're just getting through it but it should be our goal and objective to to get those committee those meetings in prior to that work session and like Jen was saying we can give a little bit more detailed report because that's what people are looking for they want to know why we made that decision or or or how how we're coming up with this so um you know I I think Jen has a good good suggestion and maybe we can bring that we can work on that in our work session next time it's another thing I have neglected to we have to reorganize the Committees because Carrie Carol is on board now and I haven't assigned it Ray and I haven't assign that we'll have to get together and uh switch it up so to speak not not drastic then um I just wanted I I mean I don't want to take away from anyone else in the sports but I get to watch a lot of the boys wrestling so um I just wanted to mention there was also a couple uh we had two two um two region qualif yes so well listen one of one of which he's very proud of nice so well now the time to men and then um the the other thing was this this college fear I I should have BR this up a a little before but I um um that is that during the week it sounds like it's like 9 to 11 during the day right that's the that's the minute like another one at night it'll be held at the high school during the school day I believe March 26 yeah the mini College Fair 9 to 11 a.m. the one at night leave classes to go there I believe they uh I I talked to the guidance counselor about that specific schedule they've adapted schedules based on those times and there may be certain maybe uh I know the unit lunch of an hour is within that time so it's trying to have the minimum the least amount of impact on the rest of the book fear you can go down and spend your money and some of the teachers last year anyway some of the teachers brought their kids down I don't know if that's do that again but I think that was just like a one-off basis right it wasn't wasn't like everyone did it just some teachers did it yeah because I it's great when we we get involved because I we had I know my daughter went through uh one of our English teachers um very popular English teacher he uh used to bring them to Boston they went to oh yeah North East and a couple up there and and I know my son didn't my older son didn't go here but he did attend the college um the college uh Fair here and you know the college fair is where he found his his school so and um it's those opportunities that sometimes kids don't know about I mean I get a thousand pieces of meil in the in the school my my my next son is not even looking at any of them right so these college fears are really what they do and you know and they can go back to their teachers and hopefully or guidance counsel and say hey I like this school how do I get in there you know and and we can guide the way maybe we have the answer right here when is there a nighttime college fair I thought there was one in the fall yeah in the fall fall and then they do have the uh what is it instant day inant there's instant decision that we that we've worked on over the last coup years they're doing a lot for students could colleges will be visiting they'll send a blast out to the students and they can come and submit their uh all the information that the colleges need and they can tell them that day whether they've been accept it wow but listen and then here here I'm talking on behalf of someone else the guidance counsil is at the high school are excellent resources so parents if you have specific questions um please please reach out to your uh students uh guidance counselors they've done an excellent job in uh the progress they've made uh with with college acceptance Etc over the last several years and uh they'd be willing to work with you uh even as a parent myself uh a 20-year-old and 25-year-old going through this process it's it's a lot easier uh a lot of times you'll tell them something and when someone else tells them they're like hey Mom Dad someone just told me this I'm like yeah that's what I've been telling you for the last five years true so it's nice to hear other voices and to get support from other people in in the schools as well yeah and by the way if anybody is the parent of like I guess it would be a junior right um the the guidance counselors did that um remember they had the uh admissions counselors from a couple schools and they did a virtual thing and that's a that lives on our site so you can wa you can watch that with your student I think at any time dsc.com go to guidance department and I think the video really cool I wish I had those three years ago myself yes same here thank you anybody else yeah I just wanted to add that uh listen M Mr slam would be very very excited to answer a lot of your detailed questions about the budget process um we it's been also very exciting to work with the mayor and others to explore a lot of ideas and cost- saving measures and I would love for him the next time he's here to share a lot of the uh progress we've made already but uh but it's still it's still an uphill climb as after what happened last year and that's a struggle and at Le some of these things are our priority but like I said with the preschool as well I can't give anyone false promises unless we're sure we have what we need in order to bring things back um do we have Personnel issues we close okay I'm sorry everybody we have to go okay so want to close the open board member Forum section then we're going to take a motion to move to a second executive session no action will be taken as a result of what we discussed in the executive session so anybody know there's nothing else will be happening so motion to go into closed please so moved moved by Mr secondino second by Miss pellet all in favor I so we're gonna be moving to close thank you very much everybody e