Regular Meeting

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[56] SPEAKER_38: Test, test 1, 2, 3.

[614] Nancy Thomas: No, it's May 30th. Could I get a copy of the agenda, please? OK, roll call, please.

[679] SPEAKER_18: Member Rodriguez. Member Crocker.

[683] Nancy Thomas: Absent.

[685] SPEAKER_18: Member Preciado. Student member Van Rossum.

[689] Nancy Thomas: Absent. Okay next we have public comment on closed session items and I have several speaker cards. First Chris Shevings please.

[707] SPEAKER_22: Good evening, I'm Chris Sheving. I'm a first grade teacher at Music Elementary School. I've been teaching in Newark for 28 years and I'm also the secretary of Newark Teachers Association. I've been on the last three bargaining teams for the NTA. The NTA bargaining team's goals are to preserve and preserve the working conditions and improve the working conditions of our members. It's also for compensation and benefits for our teachers that will provide incentives to recruit and retain individual members. And it is to stay competitive with our surrounding school districts. Bargaining teams that I've been on, We've been more than willing to work with the school districts. We've made many concessions so that we get a fair contract. We're not out there for personal gain. We're there to help stabilize and improve the most important work that's being done in our schools, the work in the classroom. Our team has been working for close to a year and a half on this contract. We sunshined in March of 2016. We've made progress on many items in this contract, but we are encouraging you to help us bring a closure so that we can have a fair contract going out at the end of this school year. Thank you.

[819] Nancy Thomas: Next, Mr. Timothy Merritt.

[826] SPEAKER_32: Good evening, and thank you for this opportunity to address the board and the district leadership. My name's Timothy Merritt. I'm a sixth grade teacher at Birch Grove Intermediate, a change of career teacher. I worked in the retail industry for many years. And I come as a teacher because I want to be a teacher. I see new teachers coming into this industry, and they do not have an opportunity to continue and make a living. They can't pay their rent. They can't have hope of buying a house in Newark. I'm lucky enough that I have those things already. And as I said, a second career. I look over here at the vision of Provident School District. Partnership with the community. model of world class education that develops capabilities of every student. And I think that stalling on the contract is not supporting that vision. Teachers need to know, they need to end their year knowing that they're supported and that they are going to be able to be successful in their classroom and that district supports them in that. The feeling right now is that teachers aren't as important as the money. And we have to find a balance. And I believe that NTA has been negotiating in good faith. And I would hope that a contract decision will be reached very shortly. Thank you.

[938] Nancy Thomas: Thank you. Ms. Rachel Bloom?

[950] Rachel Bloom: My name is Rachel Bloom. A lot of you know me. I've come up before and yelled and complained about the sub-shortage, and I've also been up here, and I got a Teacher of the Year Award for GRAMS, so you see me up here in a lot of different ways. And I wanted to let you know a little bit more about me. This might surprise you, but I'm single. I'm 36. No kids, no pets. I rent an apartment here in the Bay Area. My younger brother is married. His one-year anniversary was just this weekend. Two years ago, he got engaged. And that's when I knew, like, I'm going to need to save some money for a present and a bridesmaid dress and the plane trip to go down to the wedding. and the hotel, and so that's when I started opening up my extra room to Airbnb. So now I let a stranger live in the house with me so I can live.

[1011] SPEAKER_28: So I'd like you to consider that. Sometimes I think about my future. I want to have a partner or kids. It's just me. So how am I gonna live? Will I be able to afford a house? I feel like I work really hard and I deserve some happiness too and some consistency in my life and I'd like that to happen. You know that we're losing about 20% of our teachers, 50% of the special ed teachers.

[1049] Rachel Bloom: If we're gonna have people come and work in the district, new young people, we need to make sure that they have a competitive salary They're going to have car loans, student loans, and the rent is very high in the Bay Area. So I urge you to accept NTA's offer. It's reasonable, and the cost of living in the Bay Area is ridiculous. Thank you. Thank you.

[1076] Nancy Thomas: Next, Matsumoto.

[1081] SPEAKER_21: All right. Hi, guys. My name is Sam Matsumoto. I'm a fifth year visual art educator at Newark Memorial High School. I've been lucky enough to have my entire teaching career here in Newark. I love my job. I get to work with amazing students. I get to teach art. I get to teach art history and photography. Right now, we're painting murals in the school garden. So if you haven't been to Memorial, check those out. That's amazing. And it's the students, right? That's why we're all here. We're here for the students. That's why you guys put in the long hours. That's why I put in the long hours. I'm at school. You can find me. I joke with my students. I live at school. I'm there till 6. I'm there till 7. I'm there till 8. I'm there till 9. And I'm not unique. The other teachers around me, we're advising clubs. We're coaching sports. Sometimes I'm the last car to leave, but oftentimes I'm not. There are just thousands and thousands of donated hours from the teachers to make this whole thing work. And we do it out of love for the students. in considering a fair contract, what is going to be best for our students? What's going to help our students long-term? Not just a little band-aid fix this year or to make up for the years. We're always scrambling, it seems like, to catch up. And I'm really scared. I'm scared for what next year is going to look like. So usually around March, April, that's when you figure out who's leaving, who's staying. Normally you get, you know, the retirement, the generic emails, like, oh, you know, I'm moving on to this, this, and this. But when you have teachers of the year leaving, when you see the teacher leaders around you leaving, that's what encourages me to stay. When I think I can grow here, when I can be better here, when people are going to push me to be a better educator and be a better person in the community. But when I see people who I respect leaving, that's really scary to me. So it's scary to me to think that the students with IEPs aren't necessarily going to have high quality educators. We can't get people to fill some current positions. If 20% of my students were absent one day, that would mess up my lesson plan. If 20% of the students left the district, that would be really concerning. If 50% of your students weren't in your class one day, that'd be really concerning. 50% of the students left the district so I know I'm short on time so it's just the urgency of it, it seems the word that I keep hearing floating around is exodus. It's exodus of teachers, because we just can't afford to work here. I come from Berkeley every day because I love my job, but I don't know if that's going to be worth it. And especially the ones around my years, the ones where we're like, we got to stay or we got to go. It's a tough call. And I've had many of those conversations this year. So I just want you to have a good faith bargaining session, and bring a fair contract to end here. Thank you. Thank you.

[1266] Nancy Thomas: Tom Martin Edwards.

[1270] SPEAKER_07: Hello. So we're not here for happy reasons. So I guess we should just get down to business. We're all scared for Newark Unified. 20% of our teachers have already resigned. Another 50% of our special ed teachers have resigned. This is so far. We still have a month to go. The number of teachers who are likely to join them because of things like a paltry offer from the district in a new contract is going to be staggering. Newark Teachers Association demands a fair contract. Please don't forget that every opening that Newark Unified has also has a competitive opening across the bridge in New Haven and in Fremont. I myself, there are three openings for things that I'm credentialed for that are closer to my home than here, and it's because I love Newark that I'm here. Otherwise, I mean, honestly, I could walk to the school that I'd be teaching at. If the board hopes to make Newark a destination district, it needs to invest in its teachers that are here, and it needs to invest in future teachers. If one in five classrooms next year, which seems to be the number that we're looking at, has a new and inexperienced teacher, or God help us, even worse, a sub with some sort of emergency credential, then the district can't really hope to keep the Newark families it has, let alone attract any of the new ones that are coming into the Bay Shores and other neighborhoods where parents expect more. than what they seem to be getting, or what they can only hope to be getting, with 20% of their teachers leaving every other year. Honestly, in short, if you're not willing to pay for qualified teachers to stay, then how can you expect us to stay? Every teacher that I talk to is always asking, are you gonna stay? Are you staying next year? Are you gonna be here next year? And it makes me worry that a lot of them are just waiting for the confirmation that it's okay for them to leave, too. That scares me. If you can't keep quality teachers, then how can you expect Newark to honestly be anything else than just sort of the unfortunate little brother to Fremont? If we're not willing to be a destination district, then, I mean, let's go out and say we're not willing to pay for quality education. If we want quality education and we want quality educators, we have to pay for them. 25 minutes away from here, we can get positions that will pay us $20,000 hand over fist. Across the bridge, walking distance from this building, I can get another $10,000 a year. Newark Unified has to come to the table in good faith. Otherwise, honestly, I worry for this district. I worry for the kids that are gonna be left with no teacher here next year.

[1439] Richelle Piechowski: Thank you.

[1445] Nancy Thomas: David Hernandez.

[1453] SPEAKER_24: Good evening members of the board, superintendent, and members of the community. I'm David Hernandez. I'm the executive director of the Newark Teachers Association. I want you to really hear deeply to the story that you're hearing. It's not just a story that's being made up to get you to move. It's a reality. It's a fact that we are having to deal throughout California as well in the Bay Area. We're looking at teachers. It's a buyer's market out there. Educators are looking around to see what they can get better. They talked about the bridges across. I'm the executive director for New Haven. New Haven itself, as high as they get paid, goes to Fremont. They're looking at ways to retain their educators in that particular district. think about it their salaries are way higher than yours right now. You've heard the percentages of people 20% resigned 50% of special education. I don't think something like that of this mass exodus which is the key word exodus is something that's going to bode well from this community that expects high expectations of not only you as school board members high expectations of the educators that teach their children. So I think it's imperative for you to look closely in your priority in regards to your budget of how you are going to make this happen to stop the so-called exodus of Newark. Now it may not sound real because the end of the year is not here, but people are waiting. They have until July 1st to notify this district whether they're going to move on to another district. And I would not like to be here, standing at another school board meeting, maybe in August, saying, I told you so. What are you going to do now? You can barely find enough subs now. How are you going to fill these classrooms at the beginning of the year? The people that are here right now are your devoted employees. They give a lot of time and effort into this system. And just like the gentlemen before me said about world-class education, you're not going to have a world-class education when you have a revolving door in Newark. You need stability here. And I think it's just really important for you to open your eyes, open your ears, and open your heart, and open your purse strings, to say, what are we going to do to retain the educators here in Newark? Because if you don't have your educators, you don't have a program. And if you don't have a good program, our students are going to suffer. And when the students start suffering, you're going to have a community that's going to be up in arms. They're not going to come after me. They're going to come after a school board. and they're going to say, what have you done? How have you let this happen? So I'm hoping that you would reconsider and look where you're at in regards to the bargaining and to settle this situation now. Thank you. Thank you.

[1622] Nancy Thomas: Brian Blattel.

[1625] SPEAKER_09: Good evening, board. Good evening, cabinet. President Sanchez. My name is Brian Blutell. I've been teaching in this district for 27 years. And the one word I can describe how I feel right now is sad. I'm really sad at what's happening in this district. I've stayed in this district because I like this district, and I could have left. I could have spent a few years here, and I could have gone elsewhere. I live in Dublin. I live across the hill. And the commute from there to here wasn't too bad. It's gotten a nightmare now. And we have a lot of people that live not in this community, but they live in the Livermore Valley. We have people that live across the bay. We have people that live in the Sacramento area valley. And this commute has gotten horrible. So I want you to think about how it is for these people to show up at work. You know, it's been a long day, and then facing that long drive home. You know, I mean, there's times where I think, do I really want to go home? Do I want to set up a cot in my room and sleep here? Some Fridays, it's that bad. It's hard. I mean, things have not gotten easier. And I think Newark has to think about the future. And you know, you're going to hear, the board's going to hear, you're going to hear budget reports about how bad things are. and how much money we don't have and how we can't afford to pay a decent wage for people to try to get them to stay in this district. But I really urge the board to make some tough decisions. You know, we need to look at the long term and make some decisions on how we can make it work. We have some situations now where we have decreasing enrollment. I understand that. But we have We have little schools. We have schools that don't have big populations. So I think we need to really kind of look at things and think, where can we start making some savings here? Because we have to maintain our teachers. We have to maintain a constant teaching staff who do it right for our students. Now, so I don't, you know, this sadness I have, I want that lifted. I serve on the bargaining team. I've done that. I've been serving on bargaining teams since probably 2001. I do it because I think it's important. I think it's important for our students. It's important for our teachers. So I really urge you to make some wise choices and good decisions for Newark's future. Thank you for this time.

[1794] Nancy Thomas: Thank you. Chris Bobb.

[1803] SPEAKER_17: Good evening Board, Superintendent Sanchez, staff, Chris Baugh, bargaining chair of the Newark Teachers Association. Everything that you've heard tonight is absolutely true. None of us get into teaching for the money, but when we survey our members, they say the number one reason for why they would leave Newark Unified is because of the surrounding districts have higher competitive salaries. They tell us If Newark's not going to get it done, I'm going to go to a district that values me. They don't feel valued anymore. I know that the district is in the position of, well, we have the current enrollment and the budget situation is murky, but we've got to take a risk. Is it acceptable to the board in this community that 50% of our special ed teachers have already resigned? That 20% of our employees overall And when we survey them, it's not because they say that working conditions in this district stink. It's because if I'm going to put in the same amount of work, I'm going to go where I feel valued. And unfortunately, value comes with a price sometimes. You've heard other people talk about the exodus and who's gonna leave, who's gonna stay. We have teachers every day that I talk to, they're asking each other, are you one of the ones that's thinking about leaving? What kind of a morale are we creating with that? Do you really want a district where teachers are asking themselves every day, is this your last year here, are you gonna go where? That's where we are, that's where we are, folks. I'm challenging the board to accept NTA's latest offer that we made today. It's fair. The district can afford it. We can find a way to make it work. We've shown our willingness to move. Since I've been here, and you guys know, especially member Rodriguez, member Palmas, you know, I've been doing this for 12 years. I've been on NTA board for 10 years. We've shown that we're willing to work with you. We won't find a way to make this work. But I'm going to tell you something. If you're wondering, well, who's the next person that's going to leave? If we don't get this deal done, we're looking at them. Thank you.

[1961] Nancy Thomas: Well, thank you all very much. With that, we will, unless there's someone else that wants to address the board, we will recess to closed session. Thank you.

[2225] SPEAKER_41: Thanks. to resume with open or start open session. We apologize for being late, however, we did give a late start to closed session. And so if we could stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, please.

[6540] Nancy Thomas: I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible,

[6554] SPEAKER_41: and liberty and justice for all. Thank you. During closed session, we discussed item 2.1, which was conference with labor negotiator. No action was taken, so none to report. Moving on to 5.1, we need approval of the agenda. There's one item on the agenda today, which is 7.1, the budget study session number five. So do I have a motion to approve the agenda? I'll second. Moved by Member Rodriguez, seconded by Member Thomas. Thank you. So at the conclusion of this open session, we will reconvene closed session to further discuss 2.1. Thank you. Go ahead and vote, please. Great, four ayes. Thank you. On to comment on non-adjunct item, Ms. Cindy Parks.

[6630] Cindy Parks: Before you went into negotiations, I can kind of split my speaking time, but I didn't get picked up on time. Okay, first of all, at the last meeting, I brought up a couple of things regarding the warrants and fiscal solvency. And one of the things that really concerns me is the contracts that you used to get quarterly. Mr. Richard's office used to supply you with a list of any contract that was $10,000 or more, so at least you had a grasp of what was being negotiated, what was being signed, and you knew what this district was doing, what business was being conducted. And maybe You know, you wouldn't be interested in it as far as knowing exactly what was being done, but you were being given the contracts. You're fiscally responsible for what goes on here, and it was something that you used to get. And I have copies of the report, the memo that you used to get, that I will... hand out so that you can all see what I'm talking about. My other concern because you're not getting well to go along with that you're not getting those so you're not seeing it and that's something that you're responsible for and I don't know why it all of a sudden stopped. Then other one of my concerns I just did a public records request and asked for or an item that I had seen previously this board used to get was an overtime report. You're in a fiscal crisis right now. You have to cut $4 million. I'm not telling you something you don't know. You need to cut $4 million. Some of this types of stuff are just, if you were running your own home, you would be looking at where are we overspending? Where are we doing these types of things? Have you seen an overtime report lately? I did that with my public records request. I got the last two years worth. Do you know this year is not even finished and you have two employees that have made over $50,000 in overtime? Two employees that made over $50,000 in overtime. could that money have been better spent on maybe a clerk to help them to where what they're making because it is a department that, and I'm gonna give you the report, I already printed it out for you, to where maybe a clerk could have been hired. You need to spend wiser. You're not spending very wisely, you're not watching what's being spent. One of the contracts that was signed was for Hanover Research. You have a report that was supposed to be for ELD that was for the LCAP. That report, they only surveyed 29 teachers. And of the 29, only 27 of them filled out the survey. That costs $20,000. Where is that even being applied in your LCAP? You have an A to G, transitioning to A to G. Could any of you explain what you think that the high school needs to do to transition to A to G? Did you need to spend 20 grand? $80,000 has been spent in the last two years, or a very close two, for Hanover Research to come up with surveys on how to design an LCAP, to take the parent survey, the parent and student surveys, and they only, they didn't even take all of the surveys from the parents and the students. They used 80% of what the students said and only 70% of what the parents said. I mean, where is this information even being utilized to help the students' success? I mean, I just feel like you have a match and you've got cash and you're just burning it. And I just bring all of this to your attention to just say, please pay attention to some of the expenses that are going on. My last concern is the uniform complaint process in this district. There've been a couple of issues that have been brought to my attention. One of them in this very boardroom, the grandmother that had an issue over at Kennedy. And I was so disturbed by that, not understanding why that wasn't perceived as a uniform complaint. And I started looking at some of your websites and I don't see the language explaining to parents what a uniform complaint is. So in order for a parent to even know to even file something under a uniform complaint, but there are so strict guidelines, I don't see that there's the language on the websites. I don't see it, it's an old handbook that's listed on the website for the high school, but I don't see anything that it tells a parent how to, the process, what even triggers it to be underneath those guidelines. And that's a big concern to me is that, Things are being handled, and there is a Senate bill that goes into effect in July regarding Title IX. And just to make sure that this Senate Bill 1375 is adhered to, I'm just bringing that to your attention also.

[6902] SPEAKER_41: Please wrap up, Ms. Parker.

[6904] Cindy Parks: I'm finished. Thank you. Yes, thank you. Again, please watch the money.

[6909] SPEAKER_41: Mr. Marek Yarbrough.

[6917] SPEAKER_08: Eric Yarbrough with Lincoln. We went on a tour of the Snow School, the CBOC members, and one of the staff there wanted to bring it to our attention that there was a room that you could literally roll a ball on the floor, roll to the center of the room. And we proved it, and we went there. There was a basketball in the room, and we looked at the room and set the ball down at the edge of the room, and it rolled to the middle of the room. Something is going on in that floor. The director of maintenance was there. He saw it. I raised it to his supervisor in a CBOC meeting with one of the board members that was present. And the last I know is that nobody has taken a look to see what's going on with this room. And apparently, there's two rooms that have the same situation. I don't know what the solution is. I don't know whether it's a safety issue or not. But I think you guys should take a look. If you have a room that you literally the janitorial staff has pools and puddles of water running to the middle and down through the walls. When they sweep the floor, they have to be careful how they do it so they don't end up damaging things. And who knows why it's sinking, but it's clearly not the way that it was built. And you guys are getting to the end of your budget where you're spending some of this capital money. This is something that you really need to keep an eye on and see whether it needs to be spent there. Thank you.

[7004] SPEAKER_41: Thanks, sir. If you can take a look at that, the room issue, we'll investigate. On to 7.1, which is the fifth study session. Mr. Richards, would you like us down there, or are you okay up here? What's your pleasure?

[7027] SPEAKER_35: I do want to share kind of a preface to this conversation. In the presentation tonight, you're going to see a lot of things on the table. And I want you to know that even though all these things haven't been decided, we do have to look at everything. There's things that aren't on the table that will be added. There's things that are on the table that might be taken off or expanded. But it doesn't mean the decision has been made yet. But where this all comes from is trying to rectify a structural deficit that we have to work towards as one of our goals to stop deficit spending. So when you see the examples that you'll see tonight as potential cuts, reductions, changes to impact the budget, it's going to be hard to see, but know that we have to look at everything in order to get back to where we need to be for appropriate staffing. I think I want that to be set up front and this is not something we take lightly but it is something we have to look at and I can tell you everything has to be on the table at this point. Thank you.

[7126] SPEAKER_42: Thank you.

[7238] SPEAKER_38: Good evening from the study session five. Tonight, we're gonna wrap up a little bit of trailing items from the May revise that are left over from study session four, and then we're going to get down into a much deeper discussion with regard to the deficit and deficit reduction possibilities. So picking up where we left off with the May revise, This is a little bit of highlight of some of the information that was already in study session four, but just finalizing some things when the school services dartboard came out the next day after we had our last board meeting. The COLA is projected to be at 156. That is unchanged from the last report and the funding gap is at 43.97. That is also unchanged since last report. So the projection's basically unchanged from where we were at the end of study session four. They're still projecting 100% gap closure in 2021. The one piece of good news for cashflow purposes is that the deferral of current year local control funding formula has been eliminated in the May revise. And so far in the draft versions of the budget coming out of the two houses of the legislature, it's still eliminated. So that's good news. One-time funding. Originally, we were projected to get about $46 per ADA, and it was going to come next school year. The governor has proposed changing it to $170 per ADA, which on the face looked like good news, because that would push us to almost $1 million. However, 100%, so not just the new money, but even the old $46 from the January budget. 100% of it is now deferred to May 2019, and a little additional piece of news from the last presentation, it's now a conditional appropriation. Or in other words, it only happens if Prop 98 stays at or above where it currently is projected. For every dollar that it goes down statewide in Prop 98, the one-time funding will go down to match it. It's basically going to be used as a closing bridge to close the year of 17-18 on Prop 98 dollars in May of 2019. when after the fact, the remaining taxes have been collected. One of the things we talked about last time was the suspension of Prop 98, specifically Test 3B of Prop 98. Well, here's an interesting new tidbit about Prop 98. Test 3B is not part of the original proposition. The original proposition had Test 1 and Test 2. It was later amended with a Test 3 that became part of the proposition. But test three B was something that was added by the legislature and it was added specifically to deal with the idea of test three creating a situation. where the payback to get to level of Test 2 came back faster than the state was comfortable with in comparison with the rest of the state budget. Well, that little element, Test 3B, was only passed by the legislature as an amendment. It wasn't done through the proposition process as a proposition amendment. Therefore, they don't have to have a two-thirds majority to suspend it, and it's quite likely that it will indeed get suspended, so they'll just defer off those payments for the five-year window that Governor Brown is proposing. that is going to be quite possibly what is going to happen. So our local control funding formula, these numbers are unchanged from our last report. So year over year, we're looking at a decline in revenue of about $700,000 in local control funding formula, assuming that the projections of the underlying calculation projections and our attendance rates stay flat. which puts us in a situation with an average deficit of 4.34 million. Again, that's based on the attendance rate of 96.24, which is what we had this current school year. If we get back up to our average, which our average of the last three prior school years was 97.13, it's a difference of $480,000 a year. In the 17-18 year, it would only work out to be 330,000 because that uptick would actually cause 17-18 to become the turnaround year as opposed to 18-19. And so in that turnaround year, you grow in ADA, but you don't grow in dollars for the first part until you surpass your prior year funding level from the second prior year. So we would go through that turn in the 17-18 school year. Yes. It was a very wet winter all across the district. Our absence rate is up. We have one school in particular that was up quite a bit that is double checking their numbers, but it's one of the smallest sites in the district, so it's not going to make a significant difference. But actually, all across the board at all grade levels, we were down some. But as we know, we also had the wettest winter we have had in many, many years. And so we did have a larger number of students out with illness during the course of winter this year. From the last board meeting, as we looked at scenario one, scenario two, and scenario three, just sort of a brief recap, we basically said, look at what we can implement in the first year, utilize one-time money as needed to get us through the first year, but then make sure we have the full implementation ready to get the full deficit by 18-19, and then make sure that Fund 17 ended this process still having its $1.5 million in it that is from the board policy that established Fund 17 in the first place. So now we get into savings that we've identified and things that we can put into place that we know of for 17-18, and then a whole litany of discussion. We have several slides in a row of possibilities that can be discussed over various years for implementation. We currently have some vacancies that we can freeze. The operations and safety supervisor is retiring. So that position is proposed to be frozen. The attendance case manager position, half of that position is funded out of the grant, half of it is not. So we're looking at freezing that position as well and taking the half saving. Increasing the bus driver position, reducing 11 special education aid positions. The special department is still evaluating all of their numbers. This appears to be the number of positions that we can hone in on at this time. One counselor position at Newark Memorial.

[7629] Nancy Thomas: Yes? So you're saying that's a $125,000 cost? How come it's so high?

[7641] SPEAKER_38: Well, that's combined salary and all the driven costs on it as well. It's not just the salary.

[7646] Nancy Thomas: What would be some of the driven costs?

[7649] SPEAKER_38: It's PERS, Social Security, it's classified positions, so it has PERS, Social Security, Medicare, Workers' Comp, Post-Retirement Health, all the things we have to calculate as driven costs. About 28.5% are classified as employed. And about 15.5% are certificated.

[7669] Nancy Thomas: Okay, but there's a section on the, on the, salary that was done with the Open Records Act that says other compensation. What is other compensation? Benefits were all separate. And it was a big number for that position, I know, too. It was a big number. If you could check on that, it may be 62,000 is too high. Oh, no.

[7718] SPEAKER_38: The 69 is calculating the salary of the position with a vacancy at step 15, or at step 15, column 1, of the salary schedule of that position. OK. And although it's a classified position, it has a salary schedule that looks like a teacher's salary schedule. It has 28 steps. And so we place the vacancy.

[7740] SPEAKER_41: Yes, so 62.9 is the total cost.

[7743] SPEAKER_38: No, that's 0.5. The salary of the position at step 15 is somewhere in the vicinity of $94,000 and then the driven cost. But again, a new person wouldn't be that price, but it's a vacancy right now, so it's budgeted at the middle step. Reduction of travel and conference budgets, $29,600. Cutting all the books and supply budgets by 20% is $180,000. A reduction in consulting services, $203,500. Contracts that we've identified in unspent, unencumbered dollars that we can just kill from the budget. A reduction to the Tier 2 administrative credential clearing support. Currently, the district pays that on behalf of some of our administrators. We're looking potentially to close or consolidate schools. Reduction of the substitute budget. Looking at reducing or eliminating certain clerical and custodial unless it's for an extended period of time, such as multiple days in a row. And also looking at moving a teacher PD so that it only falls on non-school days, so we're not pulling teachers out of the classroom. during their teaching day. We're looking at reducing and eliminating unfunded overtime. It's a subject matter that we have looked at. By unfunded, what I'm referring to there is we do have some overtime that we have to do because of facility use permits. And other funding sources occasionally will pay for extra time or extra days for various things. And so to the extent that it's paid from an outside source, we do not propose that it be eliminated. Because then we'd also have to eliminate the revenue source. Potentially returning K-3 class sizes to 29 to 1. That's actually currently in our teacher's contract. The board can take that action prior to the beginning of the school year. It's about a 900 to a million dollar savings. About 800 of that comes in the form of LCFF support. Then secondary core, if we were to move it to 35 to 1 to match the elective class size currently, it would be a reduction of approximately 8 FTE or about $700,000. Two furlough days across the district would be $529,200. Reducing an additional counselor position, which would make two, would be another $117,600. Reducing the dean positions is about $245,000. A high school assistant principal, about $141,000. Reducing secondary clerical to 11 months the current positions would be about $28,000 and reducing McGregor clerical to by one FTE to accomplish or reflecting their relative school size to other school sizes in the district and implementing the solar program the first year savings that came from the previous solar presentation of $135,000 puts us at a total of if we just did everything that was on that list $5,031,000

[7930] Ray Rodriguez: Yes, Mr. Regan is. Not to piggyback on what was said, but why wouldn't overtime be on a list of potential savings?

[7943] SPEAKER_38: It was already found there. I didn't see it. It was the second item on the books.

[7950] SPEAKER_41: Right. One more slide.

[7952] SPEAKER_38: One more slide.

[7953] Ray Rodriguez: There it is, 68,800. Yeah, I'm not happy to find out from the public that we haven't received reports. But according to the figures that we got, it was well over 100,000. Is this for a full year?

[7971] SPEAKER_38: It is for a full year as I mentioned when we came to this item on the slide I did not include overtime that is funded from outside sources such as custodial overtime for facilities because we have revenue that covers that from the outside. Thank you. Of course, we've talked in the past that we don't want to just look at potential cuts. The question came up about possible revenue sources. I do currently have staff pulling information together with regard to print shop rates and whether or not we should be looking at an adjustment to those rates. The board actually already took action previously on the child care center rates. We are also reviewing facility use. There was a change to the City Center Act about a year and a half ago. We're taking a look at our existing facility use rates and matching them up to the new format that the state has come up with for doing those calculations to see whether or not we would generate an increase. I'm fairly confident we will because we haven't adjusted our facility use rates in 13 years. So we have some potential there. The other possibility of course is doing a parcel tax and identifying things that we would tie to parcel tax revenue, perhaps bringing back reduction of class sizes or reducing combination classes, athletic training, athletic transportation, library clerks, counselors or other positions that we would specifically tie to the parcel tax language and to take a look around because we do get compared to our neighbors from time to time in various situations. I looked at three neighboring districts with regard to parcel taxes. So Fremont, our neighbor across the way, does have a $73 per parcel parcel tax. If we had a $73 per parcel tax in Newark, it would generate $944,015. I rounded it off, but about $944,000 a year. New Haven does not have a parcel tax. They tried to get one twice. Both times, it failed by just a small amount. The most recent one by 28 votes. They went for $180, so that may give us an idea of what number might be a little too high for the community, but if we had one of that size, it'd be $2.3 million. Hayward just had a parcel tax done through mail-in ballot, increasing it from $58 to $88 a parcel. $88 a parcel in Newark would generate about $1.13 million.

[8108] Nancy Thomas: So Fremont and Hayward already had parcel taxes, so this is kind of like a continuation?

[8114] SPEAKER_38: Fremont's was a continuation at the exact same rate. Hayward's was an increase from $58 to $88 per parcel.

[8121] Nancy Thomas: I think it's much easier to renew one, even with a small increase, than it is to get one from scratch. Right.

[8131] SPEAKER_38: That could very well be. I've not been in a district that passed a parcel tax while I was there. I was in one where we did review one when I was at West Contra Costa Unified and it did pass. When we went after one at Mount Diablo Unified, ours failed. However, our bond passed and our failure rate on the parcel tax and our passage rate on the bond were identical. About 59.5% in both cases. So it kind of depends on the overall view of the community. It also depends on how high you set the number. That will, and part of what happens when you do the polling and it sort of information gathering on the front end of a parcel tax campaign is sizing up the level of load that a community can bear, and that would be what you would have a consultant. That's not that I want to test the poison word, consultancy, but you normally have to have a consultant for that type of work on the front end of a parcel tax campaign.

[8185] Ray Rodriguez: Mr. Rodriguez. Trying to measure G, we did have people come in and give us different percentage of scenarios. And the fossil tax, according to them, would generate close to 50%. So that's why we decided to go with what we did. So looking at Hayward's, if we were able to do something similar to that, probably less for possible because it would be the initial one. What is 1% again? I'm thinking that would be around 2% across the district based on if we're looking at salary.

[8225] SPEAKER_38: Salary and benefits, 1% across the district is approximately $503,000, so yeah, that'd be about 2.2%. Thank you. All right, we're back basically to the open discussion section. I flew through the numbers really quickly, mainly because I wanted there to be plenty of time for board discussion. So I'm happy to bounce back and forth between the slides, answer any questions that the board has at this time. Because the next steps are all related to just the budget calendar. Mr. Prescott.

[8257] SPEAKER_40: Yeah, so I have a question. With respect to some of the potential identified costs, was this kind of with the cabinet level or was this like asking each department like where they were at? Or like, so for example, yeah, like some of those.

[8277] SPEAKER_35: How do we come up with those? Yeah. Both the combination of talking with cabinet and looking at examples that were provided from FCMAT and what other districts have done. I've also talked with other superintendents within the county and I'm sure Mr. Richards has talked with his colleagues in CBO situations These are all just kind of the buckets of money that we have to look at. Anytime you're looking at this type of expenditure in the harvest part of what's up there, it's positions. No, I get it. It's more of an understanding. Yeah, so, but no, did we go out and ask people that work in buildings? No, because just the question alone caused panic. Just bringing the question up of, you know, what vacancies do you have? And, you know, why would I show up to ask that? I think it just causes panic. So no, we didn't, I didn't do it in school sites. I don't know what your experience was, but I wouldn't talk to you.

[8331] SPEAKER_40: And the context of the reason I ask is only because, like, say for like, hey, the target is, and you're right, that might be the approach you think about, or the decision, but the target is that from this site, based off of, and to be equitable with other sites, it's, we need to cut approximately around this amount, and then that might be, these positions, or it might be some sort of creative way that maybe a different position, or I guess it's more of that. But you're right, it does bring the tension of like, well, is it my position or your position?

[8364] SPEAKER_35: Right. Yeah, we have to look at it by job category. We have to look at it, you know, great big picture, at least initially.

[8370] SPEAKER_41: It seems like the heavy impact is coming at the secondary level. It's not a good start. The impact starts to be greater at the elementary level.

[8382] SPEAKER_38: With regard to, one of the things that we do have to look at is when you look at the staffing level, for example, of the schools. At your elementary schools, you have 1.5 clerical people approximately per school. You have one principal, you have no other administrators. Whereas at secondary, you do have additional positions covering various and sundry departmental areas. When we looked at the things that we potentially freeze for next year in each of the cases of those things for next year Those are all currently vacant positions. That's the reason why they can be frozen immediately because they don't impact anybody who's currently employed The first the first slide this slide here all of these positions The ones that are on here, with the possible exception, I'm not sure on the exact count on eights because that number kept changing and I finally had to stop changing the slide and get it to a fixed number to stop it so I could get the presentation finished. But we, for the most part, we're talking about positions here that are currently vacant or have resignations coming in over the course of, between now and the end of the year. If we needed to make $5 million in cuts, we know we need to make $4 million.

[8453] Nancy Thomas: But if we needed to make $5 million in cuts, I saw a couple of big-ticket items there that required negotiations. One was the 35-to-1 class sizes.

[8469] SPEAKER_38: Secondary class sizes would require negotiations, that is correct.

[8472] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, and that's how much?

[8473] SPEAKER_38: That's $700,000 for low days. For low days, it actually can be implemented. It's difficult, but it can be done.

[8481] Nancy Thomas: So, but negotiation is the class size, it's secondary. The other thing that would be really important if we were going to do it to save $800,000 would be the school closure item. And that couldn't be implemented because we said we wanted these cuts over this coming two years. That has to be done. The planning has to be done this year, this coming year, right? To be implemented in the following year in order to meet what the board said we wanted to do.

[8519] SPEAKER_38: In any of these cases, yes, whether the board said implement it now, which would be quite challenging with that particular example, or use this year's planning, this upcoming year's planning and implement for 18-19, but yes, we need to get to the 4.3 by 18-19 because the one-time money will run out in 18-19.

[8539] Nancy Thomas: I mean, so this is kind of, means if we want to get that $880,000 close consolidate schools, that means doing a real difficult job and doing it over this next year because it needs to be implemented the following year.

[8560] SPEAKER_33: Before March 15th.

[8562] Nancy Thomas: Before March 15th. Why?

[8565] SPEAKER_38: Because that's what we're supposed to do.

[8568] Nancy Thomas: Well, I'm not talking about positions. I'm talking about the ability to consolidate in schools.

[8572] SPEAKER_35: But there would be some position reductions in that.

[8576] Nancy Thomas: Yeah. Well, let's assume there's going to be some resignations after 15. I don't know how many people we're talking about.

[8583] SPEAKER_41: I can't think about that. There would be some.

[8586] SPEAKER_38: If you recall, back in study session one, we talked about what the types of things and the savings are that generate from school closures when we gave an example. but some of the positions are certificated and therefore they have to have March 15th notices, some are classified.

[8600] Nancy Thomas: Wow, because that's, if this board does say that's one of the areas we want to get savings and then move forward on the negotiations for the other savings, we can just say hey everything else has to happen because that's how much we have to cut.

[8621] SPEAKER_41: Well, I mean, it seems like everything is on that table, right? Because if, to remove something off these slides, or this proverbial table, we have to put something on here. Because you're at zero sum for that zero, for that five, you know, $5 million of cuts. So if we're going to remove that, close some of these schools off the discussion, then we've got to make something in the House on that, which is equivalent to that amount.

[8647] Nancy Thomas: Exactly. And so, assuming there's not anything they can or haven't thought of to bring back on it.

[8653] SPEAKER_41: Or we gamble and say, you know, let's take school closures off the table and hope and pray that the pressure tax passes and that's our $808,000. There's that game too.

[8667] SPEAKER_40: How do you close a school without getting any input from the community and just making the decision? I mean, if that was my school, just like any other parent, six months, eight months, that's... I can support that.

[8691] Ray Rodriguez: Well, you don't have to close the school. It also says, consolidate schools. And that would be a lower amount.

[8699] Nancy Thomas: But I mean, part of us saying go ahead with this list would be to cast staff with some pretty quick planning that we can approve. Or planning for a process that we can say, yeah, we like your process, go ahead and implement it.

[8721] SPEAKER_35: And I think that's kind of what we're looking for what are the things that you want us to look deeper at, and then we'll come back with more explicit how we would recommend it. Closing and consolidate, there's lots of ways to look at that. Consolidation, for example, two small schools go to one, you have some savings in staffing. Let's say we have two elementaries. We would say you have some savings with the principal and some staff. Not a lot of savings, there's a little bit of myth to that. I think we had calculated prior. that could collapse into consolidating two schools in that scenario. What was it, 300,000, you'd say?

[8757] SPEAKER_38: It's about 440. At 430 to 450, that's why 880 is roughly the equivalent of two small closures, or it could be a form of consolidation.

[8767] SPEAKER_35: Just under the equivalent of 1% raise, to put it in context.

[8771] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, so being able to get $880,000 in profit is a little difficult.

[8775] SPEAKER_35: Consolidate four schools, maybe.

[8777] SPEAKER_41: So a few sessions ago, we gave direction as far as relaxing Article 2, slash 32.5, where it's sort of a slow, gradual, and hopefully in time, growth tax, funding forming, et cetera, governor's election. What I'm seeing so far is From this slide, if we chop it at 880, the consolidated schools, and we take everything above that, plus the previous slide, the previous slide doesn't have any staff layoffs. They're just not putting current positions, right? So then we're dealing with close to a million dollars of potential savings just for this first year. I think, you know, when we committed to giving guidance to staff, well, let's do 2.5, a million dollar saving, right now, right here, I think that's pretty good.

[8829] Nancy Thomas: That's what we've been able to do. Right, but we're talking, 880 would be in two years, not this year.

[8837] SPEAKER_41: Right, in regards, I think, like I said, we drew the line. So you're saying, like, for now? For now, I think, of course, right now, the action, not necessarily action, but the discussion now is, considering everything above 880 and into the previous slide, There isn't any kind of notice that needs to be given. These are all relatively, I don't want to say soft, but they're relatively easy. They're never easy, right? But they're not stuck to a deadline. They're not giving people pink slips.

[8864] SPEAKER_40: And it's also different because it's not telling a person, see you later, it's just not filling the person's needs.

[8870] SPEAKER_41: It appears that's not the current vacancy, so you have to check on that, especially at this issue, to make sure that that's all vacancies.

[8877] Nancy Thomas: One of the good things about that, one of the good things about, you know, everything about the 880 this year is that we can test whether the cuts happen, because we've done this before, and the cuts don't stick. So after a year, you know, this time next year, we'll be able to say, oh, did we really, Well, the next slide. Did we really cut books and supplies by 20%? Did we really cut out the consulting services? Did we really do these things? Or did travel?

[8909] SPEAKER_41: And that falls on us when we analyze the first, second, and final budget report. We have to be sure that we focus on that.

[8916] Nancy Thomas: But that's the area last time that we had the biggest impact. Well, we decided we wouldn't talk about that.

[8924] SPEAKER_41: and I know that's just by not getting any positions and if we don't approve the positions then they can't be right and it goes to the next page well the one counselor with can we do that

[8944] Ray Rodriguez: That's a vacancy, right, that you should retire on.

[8948] SPEAKER_41: Yeah, and then I think about 880, that's $400,000. Right. That's a million dollars of savings, that I think you've done a great job of identifying for yourself.

[8958] Nancy Thomas: Yeah. And those would be ongoing, right, most of those? Until we get rid of that.

[8965] SPEAKER_40: Sort of, so a question applies, that increases with cost, like the books doesn't cost the same every single year, right, so that's,

[8972] SPEAKER_35: What we didn't put on is reduction in force and layoffs. We didn't put that up there yet. I don't know if we will, if we have to. But at some point, you don't come out of the deficit that we're coming out of without having that discussion, maybe not this year. But certainly by the end of next year, it lessens the forecast and enrollment turns. I don't see to some degree, we should inform where they might be looking at it.

[8996] Ray Rodriguez: We have to have that discussion probably tomorrow.

[8999] SPEAKER_41: We're not officially reducing force, per se, but we are, in essence, doing it.

[9003] Ray Rodriguez: Right. We're not filling it in.

[9004] SPEAKER_35: In essence, you're reducing force. Right. But some of those things, too. Books and supplies, I struggle with that. I really struggle with that, especially when we're looking at trying to really map and you know, correct the sequence and scope of our standards and really get the high school or APG ready. But, you know, it has to be up there because it's in the mix for it.

[9034] Ray Rodriguez: How'd you come up with 20%? Why not do 10%? How'd you come up with 20%?

[9038] SPEAKER_35: Just because we were trying to get to the numbers, right?

[9043] Ray Rodriguez: We were actually just trying to get to the numbers. I mean, you can come up with 20% for everything else. Yeah, you could, yeah. So how'd you come up with 20% for that instead of paying for it?

[9050] SPEAKER_35: Because we had already, we added 10% and 5%, just random numbers to try to get to the numbers.

[9055] SPEAKER_33: Okay, I'm just wondering.

[9056] SPEAKER_35: To match what the board asked us to do prior.

[9059] Nancy Thomas: You say reduced travel conference budgets, 21,600 is what percentage of what? I asked, and clarify if I'm wrong,

[9067] SPEAKER_35: I had asked, how much do we spend specifically on out-of-state travel?

[9071] SPEAKER_38: Is that the number? It's 100% of the out-of-state and 20% of the in-state.

[9075] SPEAKER_35: So I thought it would be higher. I didn't see it until it came out. I thought the travel would be more like professional travel.

[9082] Nancy Thomas: But if it's only 20% of the in-state that you're cutting, why are we not looking at more travel rather than more books?

[9088] SPEAKER_35: And that's exactly what we can do.

[9090] SPEAKER_41: But it's Congress. So Title II for the feds allocates money specifically for Congress.

[9096] Nancy Thomas: So is that mostly Title II money?

[9100] SPEAKER_38: The 21,600 is specifically from the numbers that you're seeing here for these numbers come out of one of five areas. It's either unrestricted general fund, it's local control funding formula, supplemental and concentration because that's unrestricted. or it's special education or routine restricted maintenance because those two funding sources receive their money primarily from the general fund. So it's those funding sources. Federal funds are not included in this calculation at all.

[9128] SPEAKER_35: So here's the other side of that. Because they're restricted. Is that we also have a lot of new teachers and professional development is one of the things that will keep teachers here. and professional development in the numbers we heard earlier tonight, if we've lost 20% resignations in the district and 50% of our SPED teachers, we're gonna need some professional development. Maybe it's not traveling. Maybe it is here on site, but that's something we gotta look at. I think that's the longest term solution there will be fixing the calendar and having more non-student contact days for professional development built in. So we don't have to have subs as much.

[9166] Nancy Thomas: I mean, I think part of what I bring people in to do professional development here rather than sending people to San Diego and other places.

[9175] SPEAKER_35: Yes, but with one difference where we would train our people to become trainers. So eventually we train ourselves, not to always have a consultant come in for one to shot deal, but With that caveat, yes, but I think part of what we're after is... Well, no, but $21,000, how much of that was out of state?

[9193] SPEAKER_41: I don't think it's that, it's bigger because... But not out of general fund, that's the difference.

[9208] SPEAKER_35: It is bigger, but not out of general fund. That's the problem.

[9211] Nancy Thomas: The way I understood the $21,600 is a small portion was out-of-state travel. So 100% of it is out-of-state travel. No, $5,000 was out-of-state travel.

[9218] SPEAKER_38: $16,600 was approximately 20% of it. OK, so $16,600 is 20%. So multiply that by 5, that's over $100,000 you're spending on travel.

[9222] Nancy Thomas: That's $80,000. $80,000. OK, $80,000 was one general fund. No, but that helps support the books and supplies, because then you can reduce that.

[9238] SPEAKER_35: Yeah, that's all I'm saying. But just to be clear, even though some of these are small amounts, they're also symbolic. It's important that in these times that I'm not traveling all over the country on general fund money. When I went to Long Beach, it was paid for by CCEE. They pay for lodging, they pay for travel, they pay for meals. That is easier to say to the public than, oh, we're still going to send you know, all the principles to AVID training. That's another good example. AVID training costs about $30,000 a year to maintain, and you're required to go to those trainings. So some of it, even though it's a small number, it's symbolic to our teachers to know that, well, if I got to feel it, and if we're having it, because the other slide talked about class size. You know, if we have to adjust that, then, you know.

[9317] Ray Rodriguez: Well, the negotiated piece, I think, really, we've got to take that off for now and do what we can.

[9322] SPEAKER_41: But that's the work that needs to be done.

[9326] Nancy Thomas: When you said everything about the line, were you including these? No.

[9329] SPEAKER_40: This is the next.

[9329] SPEAKER_38: This is the next.

[9332] SPEAKER_41: Anything above the line is not hiring current vacancies. That's really just the freeze part of it. The freeze part. This is the negotiated part now, other than K-3 class size, right?

[9346] Nancy Thomas: No, there's only one negotiated, isn't there?

[9350] SPEAKER_33: No, there's two.

[9352] Nancy Thomas: I thought we didn't have to negotiate furlough days.

[9355] SPEAKER_38: They can be implemented, but you have to negotiate the effect.

[9362] SPEAKER_41: So we can work on, I guess, working with this for next year. Yeah. This is something easier.

[9369] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, right. Because we've already approved next year's calendar, so we can't really do anything until negotiating for the following year, right?

[9377] SPEAKER_35: And we will start the calendar committee early next year, and I think we'll have some better solutions.

[9383] SPEAKER_38: If I could ask a clarifying question of where items 1 and 2 on this slide are non-negotiable items. Right.

[9392] Ray Rodriguez: So how much can we do now? Right now?

[9396] SPEAKER_41: Only three million to go. Well, we can do the K-3 now. Yeah, we can do the K-3 now. But it's whether we have the will to do it or not, right? Everything else above that seems relatively benign compared to that.

[9426] Nancy Thomas: Right now, we're staying at 24 to 1. And we're talking about going, assuming we're going to do K-3 class size 29 to 1, but not do it in phases. I mean, one of the things that parents don't like is combined classes. Could we kind of look at the situation going into next year and see if we can increase some of the class sizes toward 29 to 1 if it means not having to have consolidated I mean combining classes, yeah. Well, no, it would be saving. It's like right now, you know, the 25th kid, student I mean, 25th student has to go to another school or has to go into a combination class. It's a jigsaw at the elementary level because our schools are so small, so If we can absorb a few more kids up to 29 in one class, you know what I'm saying? You know what I'm saying.

[9502] SPEAKER_35: I think the big challenge, I think, is that there's going to be two or three things that have not been done before that are going to cause significant public outcry. And if I could just... No, we're in a study session. We've got to hold a point of order for this. I just think that, and I'm not looking to blame or accuse or anything. I just think that what we're hoping to find out today is, hey, you know, like was said earlier, well, maybe books, we need to stay away from that, but can we offset that somewhere else? Can we look at a combination of right-sizing the increase in class size, because the challenge that we're all having here at this table right now is we have negotiations in the back of our mind that we can't discuss out here, and that's not appropriate. So that makes it more challenging, I think. But I think there is a way to kind of look at, is there some combinations that might make some sense? You want us to explore more? I think the idea of like, do we have to go to the full increase in class size, or can we go just close to it to get the right number? Like, go back, or go forward one slide, would you? These are small, but they're ongoing and they're long-term. And all of the stuff in the freeze, in that freeze category, is also ongoing and long-term savings. I mean, until, and the way it comes back is through enrollment. So I guess the other part of the challenge we have is, yes, we have to make some hard cuts over the next two years but in that process we also need to start figuring out how do we begin building back and how do we begin growing enrollment because that's the only way to get back the staffing. That's the challenge is we've come into a situation where we're a bit overstaffed as to the size of our district and the good news is we have a little bit of a cushion with some one-time money to soften it over two years and I think that's The good news is we don't have to do it all now, like Oakland had to do. But at the same time, the things that I worry about is professional development for teachers and especially special education. That's really important. But it has to be high quality and job embedded. I worry about books and supplies for kids and stuff that's in the classroom. Class size, it's a tough one to swallow too. what I would say is this can's been kicked down the road and we're almost out of road. We have one more year, we have a little bit of a cushion, and then in that second year out, we're there. There's no more road, we can't kick it down, there's no more one-time money. The rules, you know, we're against the wall here, and I think that one of the things that I have to say is I've been, I think our union partners are trying to work with us, we're trying to work with them in good faith, We just don't have a lot of good options. You guys don't have a lot of good choices. This isn't the problem. You have dilemmas. I don't know how to frame it better.

[9701] Ray Rodriguez: I had a question. Can we, can the board make a decision that if we lose any decisions similar to the ones that are on here, then we're not going to replace you. We can make that decision. Yeah, the freeze is we could, that could be actionable. And then the other thing is to kind of Can you discuss with us what positions, where people have left that we haven't filled? And then I'll say the exam.

[9732] SPEAKER_35: That's what we had in the first slide, right? Those are the vacant positions. Go back to the previous slide.

[9738] SPEAKER_41: Right, exactly.

[9742] SPEAKER_35: There's not many, it's a small amount, but they're vacant.

[9747] Ray Rodriguez: No, but when you total it up, it's... And it has an impact on those divisions. And these, when you, on the $322,000, that's a specialty, that's, okay, so that's positions that... Are vacant. Are vacant, and you set it up with a board and say that we are, right? Yeah. So, again, since you're talking about kicking the ball down the track all these years, what is it that we can do now? Because a lot of this, we have to talk about it and we can't do it until next year. What is it that we can do now?

[9792] SPEAKER_41: The $1.3 million.

[9793] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, everything above the $880,000 and then on the next slide. We can do that right now.

[9799] SPEAKER_40: We can't do it now because this is We can put that on the agenda, next agenda and vote on it and do that.

[9820] SPEAKER_41: And technically, we can do the K-3 class size now, so maybe not all the way up to 29, maybe jump up to... Yeah, but that wouldn't take effect, so... Well, it's mostly a... We can do that.

[9831] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, we can start that. Okay. So, yeah. At least start it. If we have staff bring us... Say we want to start it, and how would you... We're at 1.5, but we can do that between now and August.

[9845] SPEAKER_40: So I was comfortable with the above the 80 line. Above the 80 plus? Yes. Plus those two things? To just, because it's that other piece we'd have to flesh out in terms of the summary.

[9856] SPEAKER_41: And the 1.1, I'm happy so far. I think in the span of two and a half, three years, I don't know that we have.

[9861] Ray Rodriguez: And then some of this stuff. We can get that under 1.1 so we know what we're talking about.

[9867] SPEAKER_35: Let's capture this in the notes. Let's back up.

[9870] SPEAKER_40: This is just a framework.

[9872] SPEAKER_35: What I'm hearing is you want more detail on these areas. Yeah.

[9879] SPEAKER_40: But not the personal savings ones. Because these are... Not these. So if you go to... So those are pretty straightforward.

[9899] SPEAKER_41: Okay, we're at 1,069,600 before we get to the 808,000.

[9931] SPEAKER_38: 1,248,400.

[9931] Nancy Thomas: I would hope that you would look at central office positions. This doesn't show any central office positions.

[9943] SPEAKER_35: Oh, I think they're already in there, aren't they? Are they in there or not?

[9950] SPEAKER_36: Yeah, the central office positions.

[9953] SPEAKER_35: The central office has been reduced approximately to 14%. Other categories were like 5 and 7. Can you recap what those percentages are in the job category? What were those numbers? There was a, I know we had reduced over the last few years, or the last year or so, 14% of admin. We'll get that for you.

[9975] SPEAKER_36: Well, at the board meeting, it would be nice to have that. We've reduced 14% of central office administration over the last two years. And I think Certificated was right around 2.6, and Classified was at 4.2. So we're well above what we've had in years.

[9992] Nancy Thomas: So we have to make that visible, because people will be looking at that. Sure.

[9997] SPEAKER_36: And I have that for you. I'll take that on the chart.

[10000] SPEAKER_40: The teacher professional development on law school, is that, to me, that piece

[10005] SPEAKER_35: But it's also a mixed bag, so I think the other thing I would caution you is many of those positions, including central office, are funded not out of general fund. So that doesn't help us. Like we were to cut one that was funded from mental health, that doesn't help us. So we have to sort that too, but I think it's still worth giving you that information.

[10029] SPEAKER_40: No, I was just thinking because of your comment about thinking about how you do professional development and then... Right. I mean, I see that we have to do it. We have to do some deep cuts. But I'm just curious.

[10044] SPEAKER_41: It's just having those PD days and non-student days so that you're not doing subs for 20 teachers during teaching day. Because we have, right now, we have six non-student days or four non-student days. So it's important to know, since you are having a reduction in staff, is what are the ramifications of that? So we can be at the front of that.

[10081] Ray Rodriguez: Instead of trying to catch up, so we can put whatever things we can put in place to help with.

[10089] SPEAKER_35: Okay, we will talk about some talking points and fact sheets.

[10097] Nancy Thomas: Okay. You're talking about PD on non-school days and then you're taking away or trying to negotiate away a couple of furlough days. No, three of those are work days. There's only, aren't there?

[10118] SPEAKER_41: There's six non-student days.

[10120] Nancy Thomas: Three, yeah, so there's three and three, so four of these could be a combination of work and non-work. But you're also getting rid of professional development days. Well, no.

[10137] SPEAKER_33: Over two years, we'd look at it differently.

[10141] SPEAKER_40: I guess it's about the framework. It's like, we understand everything is important, but it's like by doing this, we're taking an extra step in terms of helping mitigate the fact that we're going to have to discuss later in terms of more staff reduction. So I mean it's like, All of it is important, but it's, like, we have to figure out, like, this is really, like, a shared cut in terms of... I'm sorry.

[10171] SPEAKER_33: System-wide.

[10173] SPEAKER_42: To be fair, it has to be system-wide.

[10181] SPEAKER_35: What else? I mean, it's heavy. I mean, even what is easy to identify, at least on paper now, is difficult, and then what's coming next is more difficult.

[10193] Ray Rodriguez: I mean, it still affects people, doesn't it?

[10195] SPEAKER_35: Yeah, it does affect people, it does.

[10196] SPEAKER_40: If we do that 1.1 up front, was that also part of the calculation to be compounded?

[10209] SPEAKER_35: for years yeah anything that would go you talk about races so then it helps us yeah

[10233] Nancy Thomas: If we can pinpoint that at the next meeting, that would be very helpful.

[10238] SPEAKER_35: Yeah. OK. I want to go back to the, I want to just go through it one more time so we're clear. Starting here, start with the freezes. I'm hearing, let's put a plan together for that whole page. Right? I have, actually I have my own notes here, so. I have one of those printed out as a notes page somewhere. This whole page plus go to the next one. So page eight plus.

[10269] SPEAKER_38: So all of page seven, page eight, except for the last item. Right. And the first two items on page nine.

[10278] Nancy Thomas: And maybe a little bit out of the K-3 class subject, huh? No, we could use it. It's worth a study to look at. Yeah. Or I mean, but it can, yeah.

[10291] SPEAKER_35: Well, we could further study all the other ones anyway. We'd have to further study all of them, but.

[10295] SPEAKER_41: I mean, yeah, because I mean, what happens when you're at a school site where there's just 26 of them, you know what I'm saying? You're right. We're trying to hurry it, right? The number just comes out wherever.

[10306] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, you give the flexibility and all the numbers.

[10308] SPEAKER_41: There's two kids, right? Yeah. What do you do with those two kids? Do you combo? Yeah.

[10331] SPEAKER_35: OK. Page 9. So what did we agree on, page 9?

[10335] SPEAKER_41: First two items of page 9, and then look into numbers.

[10339] SPEAKER_35: Explore the others? Yeah. OK.

[10341] SPEAKER_40: That's general concepts.

[10348] SPEAKER_41: We didn't agree on them. But I also would like clarification on what Mr. Mitchell has mentioned. What are the rules?

[10356] SPEAKER_35: What's the trigger point? We gotta, everything's still gonna stay on the table, we're just gonna put those things first and get more clarity on the other items that we're not... So, I mean, we could put action item, and then you map out what that specific action is at that point.

[10372] Ray Rodriguez: But this is all in the future.

[10382] SPEAKER_40: This is in the future, yeah. Yeah, so, but like, they implement solar... This is in year two. They said they could do it as soon as...

[10388] Ray Rodriguez: Yeah, but it wouldn't, the savings wouldn't be there for you, I think.

[10391] SPEAKER_40: No, the savings would be as soon as you put in the infrastructure. So we just need to get that on the agenda.

[10399] Nancy Thomas: You know what I worry about with something like implementing solar right away is the impact on the CBO and MOT and I mean, they're the ones that have got to have a role.

[10414] SPEAKER_35: Would we have to pay for that at a general fund? Could that be out of a different fund?

[10418] SPEAKER_38: The implementation of solar is being, if we go with the program that was brought to the board previously, they pay for all of the installation and What we pay them is they become our new electricity supplier for the sites that go solar. And so the savings is just based on the reduced price of the electric bill for those sites as calculated for the first year.

[10441] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about your time and the time of your staff to talk to the people because there's got to be talking to the people that are doing the solar project. whenever you add, you know, projects like that it just takes such a big chunk of time and maybe that $185,000 to defer a year so that in this next year of walking through all the cuts we don't have to have your staff overloaded.

[10473] SPEAKER_40: That's going to be at the next... I mean, you're right, that's a hard decision, but then if that means then one other FTE for that, so I think you can say to the community, hey, we put in solar and it saves the teacher.

[10488] Ray Rodriguez: So that's going to be at the next board meeting, right?

[10490] SPEAKER_35: We're going to have to... We have to do another one of these 30 sessions.

[10492] Ray Rodriguez: No, I mean the implement solar, we need to... We could. We could, yeah.

[10497] Nancy Thomas: Well, but my whole point about do we have the mass power to interact with the people that are doing that? We have big moves on the horizon with if we consolidate schools, it falls on MOT inordinately high.

[10517] Ray Rodriguez: Well, let's have it on the agenda and we'll have a nice discussion.

[10520] SPEAKER_40: So the only thing that they would put that would be the long-term discussions in terms of strategic planning of where they are those sites have to be on there for 20 years. That was a commitment, right?

[10535] SPEAKER_35: The budgets of the counties due at the end of June.

[10539] SPEAKER_38: First budget public hearing is at the next school board meeting one week from today.

[10543] SPEAKER_35: 5-9, so we got to schedule another one of these soon.

[10548] SPEAKER_33: There's no way around it. We need another course of study session.

[10553] SPEAKER_35: We need enough time to put things together like you asked. How much time do you need? I don't know, at least another hour, hour and a half maybe.

[10562] SPEAKER_40: Oh no, I meant like how much time, like 200 days. You said we have to reschedule this again.

[10565] SPEAKER_35: Yeah, I'd like to, I mean, sometime next week. I think that gives us a week to triple things. You have a regular board meeting next week, Saturday?

[10573] SPEAKER_38: So just to help everyone understand, the first draft of the budget, including everything that's been identified tonight, is coming to the next board meeting for a public hearing. So I will take the information that you have given me today. I will begin drafting with my statute. We've already begun drafting, but we don't have to finish. We've got three days, basically, to crank the budget out with this piece in it, with a draft of the multi-year with the effects of the decisions that have been made so far. And then we'll be able to take a look at it. And we can have an additional session on top. We'll be having a public hearing anyway on the budget, so it's already gonna be part of it. It's just how long the budget will be.

[10613] SPEAKER_41: So this would just change the budget hearing, as far as?

[10617] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, our approval is at the end of June, and that's when we actually approve these changes.

[10630] SPEAKER_40: When we approve the budget.

[10636] SPEAKER_35: The next one that would be natural to have would be probably on next Tuesday, to have at least some time with this, and then plan one more in addition to that.

[10646] SPEAKER_40: We should plan for two more. If we don't need them we cancel them. So we set it up.

[10652] SPEAKER_33: Each one before the board meeting right?

[10654] SPEAKER_35: Right and then maybe one later that week or the following week.

[10658] Nancy Thomas: I'm out of town after the board meeting until Sunday.

[10666] SPEAKER_35: Well we're gonna and also Brian's gonna need some direction on this year's budget to finish this year out as well. So that's important. So let's think about We can wrestle with that. But I think if you guys could at least give me a couple potential dates, then Patty and I can get that properly agendized and out.

[10686] SPEAKER_41: So we have one June 6th, right? Yeah, after I'm located.

[10706] SPEAKER_35: If we hold the Tuesday, the second Tuesday doesn't work for you, right?

[10716] SPEAKER_40: I mean if you're okay with it.

[10719] SPEAKER_35: The more that we could have here, I think the healthier it is for us.

[10722] SPEAKER_41: I know, let's plan on after the meeting next week, and if you have to go at that time, you have to go, and then there's four of us at least, and stay probably however long you can. So that's essential.

[10733] SPEAKER_40: But then we have another one. You said you can't do that one, right?

[10738] SPEAKER_41: So after the next one, do we need another one before the budget adoption, Mr. Richards?

[10743] SPEAKER_38: Yeah, it would depend on if after the sixth, the board has any additional questions or has additional things they want us to put into the NYP to modify the document from the 6th before the 27th. And... The 14th, Wednesday?

[10758] SPEAKER_35: No, Tuesday. Wednesday, the 14th, I wish.

[10761] SPEAKER_40: The 13th was more important than Tuesday. No, remember the 2nd before Tuesday is okay.

[10770] Ray Rodriguez: Oh, okay. Oh, that's the same, that's the same.

[10773] SPEAKER_35: Thursday, the 15th, Wednesday?

[10774] SPEAKER_41: I think it's pretty much the same.

[10778] SPEAKER_35: The 14th is the junior high, but that's at 3 p.m. And then Bridgepoint Graduation is at 7 p.m. We can do it in between those two. Between 4 and 7 p.m.

[10788] SPEAKER_33: there's a window.

[10789] Nancy Thomas: I thought there was one on Tuesday that's usually held on Wednesday.

[10794] SPEAKER_40: The 15th... Let's see what happens after Tuesday. Mr. Richards, after the...

[10807] SPEAKER_41: the hearing, and then the slow session on Wednesday to see if we can schedule one. Before the tournament. Before the tournament. In between.

[10815] SPEAKER_40: I mean, that makes sense. I think I'm trying to get you. What time is the tournament? We have a couple weeks out, so we can chat a little bit. So, like, we can start some tentative dates right now, so that we can plan out our time. If it's only an hour, I think it'll work.

[10830] Ray Rodriguez: Between there. What about the 12th?

[10832] SPEAKER_40: When is the 12th?

[10836] SPEAKER_35: I think it's a crazy idea. I can't believe I'm saying it.

[10842] Nancy Thomas: We'll do it after graduation. Yeah, after graduation, we have a whole week and a half, don't we, before the graduation?

[10846] SPEAKER_33: No, I mean the day of graduation, Saturday. Saturday. Tomorrow's graduation. Yeah. Yeah, that's it.

[10850] SPEAKER_40: I won't even deal with meetings after graduation. OK. OK.

[10854] Ray Rodriguez: Where are we going?

[10854] SPEAKER_40: I don't know.

[10855] Ray Rodriguez: We're going to watch graduation.

[10859] SPEAKER_33: Oh, OK. Well, let's.

[10865] SPEAKER_35: We know we'll have at least part one on Tuesday.

[10869] SPEAKER_33: 27?

[10869] Ray Rodriguez: Well, how about between, like you said before? The junior high ends around, let's say, 5. But we can have an hour there. It would be a lot. Maybe an hour and a half.

[10884] SPEAKER_40: If it isn't complete, we can do it that way. That's fine.

[10887] SPEAKER_33: We could do five to almost right up to seven. Wednesday. We could do that, right?

[10893] SPEAKER_40: Wednesday at 14. I mean, getting off at 5 p.m. and doing it by 6 is, we're getting off early. Which is okay, because you guys, we're doing it without member Thomas on a Tuesday, so it's okay with me if you guys need me. It's hard. It's hard.

[10914] SPEAKER_41: So are we not okay with just waiting until next Tuesday to see if we even need the second meeting?

[10921] Nancy Thomas: Yeah, we may not need it.

[10922] SPEAKER_41: We're expecting a lot of brain cells to determine if we need the second meeting or not. We may not even need it. We've given him direction for... You know clearly where we're going, right? As far as the first two slides plus items. Obviously, we want to deal with cuts that can happen immediately, but that doesn't... you know, Intel doesn't tell huge personnel impact.

[10945] Nancy Thomas: But how much approval do you need for, in order for you to create the multi-year projection that gets us... He doesn't need any of this.

[10953] SPEAKER_41: I mean, he can just come on June 27th and say, here's a budget, approve or not. Approval or not.

[10959] Nancy Thomas: No, but I mean, what he has to build into the multi-year projection is some of these big ticket items that we haven't...

[10969] SPEAKER_38: If you recall at the last study session I mentioned one of the things that the county is allowing some of the districts to do, which is identify all the ones that are going into effect for the budget year. identify the dollar amount the board is committing to for the out years. You don't have to have the specificity for the out year, the multi-year projection. So I can tie it to the numbers that we've identified that closes the deficit in the use fund 17 where it is. We'll do it in the form of a resolution with the dollar amount and the details of what it will be can continue to come forward to the board throughout the course of the summer and into the autumn into the first interim report.

[11015] SPEAKER_35: I think we should really look at doing a larger chunk of time on Tuesday. I mean, if we've got to stay until midnight, we stay until midnight. Pack your lunch. Here's the other piece that's coming next week that will inform this work. We should have had the thick medical report this week. We'll have it next week, is what I've been told. That will help inform this work. I think that we agendize it, but it's going to go late. And we already have it on our calendar. We pitch in for pizza, we stay, and we, I think, and if we don't eat all the time, we don't use it. Let's get through the business, let's plan a big meeting that night, because I really think a billion's a good step, but there's other pieces still hanging in the air we can't discuss, so that's probably a safe way to get us all here, and I think it's important because of the nature of it to get as many of us here as possible, so that's my recommendation. That's okay, yeah, but I think still four is better than three. So, is that okay with everyone?

[11081] SPEAKER_41: Do we have any questions or discussions? Do we have a speaker? No, fine, we're good. Ms.

[11086] SPEAKER_38: Parks. Speaker on the item that's already, we're past the public speaking.

[11091] SPEAKER_41: I mean, it's 7.1 on the item itself.

[11094] Marie dela Cruz: I'm speaking on the item itself. You gave your presentation last week.

[11099] SPEAKER_41: But we're done discussing.

[11101] Cindy Parks: Thank you. There were a couple of things that were very intriguing about this presentation. Unfortunately, since we didn't have it ahead of time, otherwise maybe I could have asked questions before. The $880,000, I know that this has been a topic of discussion during previous budget cuts. in other years and it always was around $100,000, well usually about $200,000 lose the cost of the cuts because they look at you lose the principal and maybe some office staff and custodial staff. The issue that when you're looking at $800,000 to consolidate, I really have some severe, just to share as a member of the public, some severe concerns as far as whether The public is going to buy this. I mean, just before warning, I think you would expect a packed room. And I just am concerned about the cost. You know, it's easy to throw a number up on a PowerPoint presentation. If, as one of your constituents, I would ask that you would ask for a breakdown of that so you actually see where that money is coming. uh, to look at the capacity levels of your schools. How are you going to take and close the school and now all of a sudden you're going to dribble them across the board? Um, you know, where are you going to put the kids? You, they talked previously about having with the liaison committee. Well, I remember on the agenda it said a capacity. We never ever heard capacity at the sites. Where do you even know that your kids can be accommodated? Are you going to, You say you're going to close the school and now you're going to put 10 portables on a couple of properties? How are you going to do it? I mean, where's the dollars and cents to all of this? How much is this going to cost you to all of a sudden now have to house all these kids? I think you're looking at the number and you're being blindsided by, hey, that's an easy game. Let's do that. You're not looking at all the ramifications. Are you going to close music because that was one of the smaller schools and you took your kids from Whiteford and now you're transferring them over there? You're redoing bathrooms, you're redoing playgrounds, you're putting playground equipment on all these new sites, and now you're going to close the school? I mean, you have to answer to the public here. We've spent $63 million or approved a bond for $63 million, 53 of those have been spent. to redo these schools and now you're going to close the school or you're going to, I mean, then what? Is it going to be what Mr. Richards had said before? You close the school and a charter school can come in? I mean, there's a lot of ramifications to all of this. Class size reduction, you're going to jump up to 29 to 1. You didn't even have a breakdown of maybe go to 27. It hasn't been at over 27 to 1 in probably 15 years. Instead of having like a step type of a costing, you're all of a sudden jumping to 29 to 1, and this is going to heavily affect the community. Where are you even notifying the community that this is on, this is what's being discussed? I mean, $4 million is a lot to cut out of your budget, I understand that, but where are you actually communicating with the community that these are some of the things that are you know, you're talking about doing. I just think that you're blindsiding the community that, okay, well now we're gonna, we'll close the school, we'll consolidate, whatever. And like I said, you're looking at numbers, you're not looking at what exactly this means. And I would really encourage you not to just blindly jump and say, that's our golden ticket item. Thank you.

[11305] SPEAKER_41: And we will be able to close session. This is 2.1.

No minutes available.