Study Session Meeting

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[21] SPEAKER_25: Thank you. We'll move shortly to the table in a minute, but we do have a speaker on the study session, so Mr. Kerry Knoop.

[39] Cary Knoop: Good evening, board. First of all, let me say that I appreciate for everybody to step up who wants to be a member of the board. And I have great respect for everybody who does that. But having said that, when you're in the political arena, I think you should also be open to criticism. And so criticism is hopefully not taken personally, but it is criticism about the body. The district is in a crisis. And to me, that means that it's all hands on deck. Now, the superintendent. a good superintendent and I think we have a good superintendent in my opinion, supports of course the vision and direction of the board. But my problem is that I don't see vision and direction from the board. I find the board too passive in this crisis. We all need to work on getting solutions, a hands off solution of saying we're royalty who signs the paper at the end and we don't really want to know any of the contents, we just want to approve or disapprove I don't think that's what the people of Newark want. It's democracy. You're heading democratically elected or appointed, and there's some responsibilities there. Find out what you can contribute as a board. There's possibilities. You can have an ad hoc subcommittee, which is not subject to open meetings laws. You can have two members work closely the district to get an understanding of program-level problems and program-level things that you might want to cut. After that, I'm sure the public wants to know your individual input. Where is your input? Where is it? I want sports. I want academics. You know, you're elected, so you need to tell people where your bias is and not bias in terms of pet project. I would assume that, you know, once you're elected, you don't look at pet product. You look at the whole thing. And so I urge the board to do more. What really worried me in the last workshop was when the superintendent of Newark offered spreadsheets, information with functional codes, program level data, and it was rejected by several members. In my opinion, that's wrong. You need to do as much as you can, study it, and then express vision. Again, I hope this is, nobody sees this as a personal criticism. You know, in the political space, you have to disagree with each other, but you can still agree to disagree. But anyway, that's just my perspective. I think it's all hands on deck, even the board. So do more and express your visions and views in front of the public. Thank you.

[222] SPEAKER_25: Thank you, Ms. Cindy Parks.

[230] Cindy Parks: I echo Mr. Newt's comments in that this is your first opportunity tonight to actually be, I guess, well, I guess my first question would be, I'd like to know when you all got the letter from the superintendent, the county superintendent, or excuse me, the county business office. When did you get the letter regarding them accepting your budget but only qualified with certain conditions? I'd love for you to be able to answer that publicly as far as when you all board members saw that letter. Also, there were $1.3 million, approximately $1.3 million in frozen jobs. And I'd like to know whether they were actually cut from the 17-18 budget. If all of these positions are actually cut, those dollar amounts there are not listed, those positions are not line items in the budget. The 68.8 that's noted to reduce slash eliminate overtime, Is that an amount that's non-reimbursable or is that the total amount of OT? I know that before the board used to get a document that listed overtime or they gave you time periods, it gave you how much was being paid in overtime and it also gave you then the amount that's reimbursed or non-reimbursable, however it was pegged. So that you knew if you were paying a custodian overtime, that was going to be reimbursed through the fees that you accumulated. How much is extra pay? I've not heard any discussion about extra pay. So if you have a part-time employee and they work more than their part-time hours, that's not considered overtime. So that's not your OT. So are you tracking those hours to make sure that that doesn't infringe on the budget, on your expectations, on your salary? So again, not overtime. This is for the part-time employees that are working more hours but not entitled to overtime. I can see your mind going, Frankie. And then I received the master, the high school master schedule. And there are many classes that are not full. There are some that I'm not even sure what their maximum, why their maximum is, say, 20 or 25, as opposed to the 31. So not only are these classes not being targeted to the full amount per contract, they're not full. So they're not all the way to the 31, and even if they are to the 31, they're not full. And just a little side note, I was very happy to see that the Ohlone Connections is actually at 29, so they are, as opposed to 14, I think they were last year. Thank you.

[391] SPEAKER_25: Thank you. Ms. Crocker, did you want to speak?

[393] SPEAKER_33: Can I give a point of information, or would you prefer not to? You can do it. In terms of the Spreadsheet, we were given that ahead of time. And the reason we rejected having it is so there would be enough for the people that were there. The board members had all seen the spreadsheet. We had gone through a system part. So we had read it. We had looked at it. And we were leaving the paper there for the public.

[415] SPEAKER_25: Thank you. So do you want us at the table, right, for this session? Do you have any answers to my questions?

[419] SPEAKER_33: Do you have any agenda? I mean, all I did is make a statement about it.

[426] SPEAKER_25: Would you like us to be at the table or up here?

[427] Mark Triplett: Yeah, it's good to be up here.

[429] SPEAKER_25: Thank you. Thank you.

[506] SPEAKER_35: Thank you.

[536] SPEAKER_24: Okay, very well then we'll go ahead and begin as we go to our second study session of the new fiscal year as we're looking into 18-19 budget. So first let's address the question with regard to what did the county letter say. Back in September when the county responded to our initial budget they came back and said we are going to issue a conditional approval and here are the three conditions with which we will approve your 17-18 budget. Condition one, you need to engage the district stakeholders and identify at least 2.8 million dollars in potential budget reductions for fiscal 18-19 by expenditure category. Number two, take formal board action to adopt a resolution outlining those budget reductions and committing the district to make those reductions prior to fiscal 18-19 and submit the adopted resolution to ACOE by October the 8th. So we are now in step two over the course of tonight between the budget study session and the action items to come on the board agenda later on tonight in the second of these three steps. Over the past two weeks we've had six input sessions that are going to be summarized for you a little bit later in the presentation with regard to getting our public input and engaging our district stakeholders We had a total attendance of just under 100 at those six meetings. So we did have a wide spectrum across the district as it was done at various locations throughout the district. Now, the first thing that happened, well, not the first thing that happened, but something that happened right after school started is we got our first piece of good news in 15 years. Our enrollment is actually up. We're up 60 students from last year within the district schools. Last year we had 5,845 on C-Beds Day of which five were in NPS schools, so a net total of 5840 for our schools. As of yesterday, we are at 5,904 of which four are in non-public schools, so we're at 5,900 even as a district. So we're up 60 students from last year. And because we built this year's budget, assuming a decline from last year, we're net up in revenue projection as of right now, just under $500,000 in the current school year. So our projected deficit goes down by that amount. Now for fiscal 18-19, those projections, we then, the demographers came in at about 60% of what they had projected. They projected we would gain 100. I projected we'd basically be flat and actually declined slightly in my baseline projection. So we're looking at about 60 percent, give or take, of the projected increase that we actually realized. So we took that 60 percent factor and projected it forward against their projections for the next two years as well, figuring we can't rely on them to be 100 percent because we're not gaining as much growth as the projection indicates. So we use that same factor and rolled it forward to the next two years to figure out how many projected students we would have and then subtracted from the revenue that it would generate, the cost of the additional teachers we would need to serve that many students. And so the net gain for 18-19 is about $777,000. And for 19-20, it's $899,000. So over the three years, it drives our average deficit down from $4.34 million to $3.61 million. So yes? I don't know about that. If I wait, I might get a question. That's fine.

[753] Nancy Thomas: Okay, I'm just wondering when you project the number of teachers, do you use kind of what the average is that we have or do you use the, you know, maximum in the class?

[766] SPEAKER_24: I'm projecting based on utilizing, because I have to look at all the grade levels and they all have different class size levels, the overall average of 27 took the projected increase in students divided by 27 to project how many additional teachers we would need just so that I could get a ballpark and we already had we had already projected some gain in the next two years and we had built some FTE into the multi-year projection anyway this is the additional FTE over and above that we would need to serve the newer number that was tacked on as a subtraction against the revenue so that we would make sure we weren't over booking and just assuming we'd get all this revenue and have no new expenses well that's not realistic when we know we have an increase of students. And so we've projected some expenses against that revenue to bring up the net.

[812] SPEAKER_19: Yes. Take a moment and talk a little bit about, again, the conversation you had today with Jeff Potter from the county relative to recasting and redoing the projections to arrive at this new, smaller number. Slow down just a little bit so that it's clear for the audience.

[833] SPEAKER_24: As I was recalculating the local control funding formula for the three years with the updates to the enrollment projection, and I had my first run of where the numbers were, I gave Jeff a call. Because our number was always, Jeff Potter is the county CBO at Alameda County Office of Ed. And he was the one who came and gave the presentation to the board a couple months ago. And so I talked to Jeff about where the numbers were coming in now, and given that, The board had said all along, we want to actually tackle the operating deficit and get to the full 4.3. So we were well above the county's number which was only 2.8 million because the county only can require us to do the absolute minimum in each year. And so I told him, I walked through the numbers with him and said, this is where we're at with our actual enrollment as of today and we're two days away from CBED's day. And he said, okay, I can live with you going with this because you're still above my number of the 2.8 anyway. So it's fine if you want to target to 3.6 instead of 4.3, because the numbers are realistic, because we actually do have some enrollment gain.

[903] SPEAKER_19: So just to be really clear, the number that we've been talking about with the community that was formerly 4.3 million, now on this reading calculation and conversation with the county, now is 3.6, which is 700,000.

[918] SPEAKER_24: About a $700,000 difference on the average per year. As you look, we have a $500,000 difference, a $775,000 difference, and a $900,000 difference. So you add those three together and divide them by three, it's about $700,000.

[929] SPEAKER_21: I just want to make sure I understand this piece. So essentially, each year, is it incorporating 60 units? Sorry, 60 students? Or is it adding? Are you projecting adding? and then added FTE on top of that. That's the piece that I'm working on.

[950] SPEAKER_24: Okay. So, for each of the years, and I can bring up the LCFF spreadsheet, but I don't have it as part of this PowerPoint because it's a very complicated spreadsheet. But what it's projecting is, okay, the demographer said we were going to gain 100 this year, and we actually gained 60 students, okay. For next year, they're projecting an additional gain of, and it's very close, actually. It's almost another exact 100. And so, we took their projection, and multiplied what they projected the gain would be by 0.6 because that was how close accurate we were in the current year. I did that for the year-over-year gain for 18-19 and the year-over-gain for 19-20 over 18-19 and rebuilt the projection accordingly.

[990] SPEAKER_21: Okay, so this is assuming that we get increased enrollment from the demography.

[997] SPEAKER_24: Yes, but we were projecting increased enrollment based on the growth from the developments as a smaller level anyway based off their prior prior reports level, which was much farther off from what reality was.

[1010] SPEAKER_21: This one came in much closer. You put new FTE to address those students, and that's calculated within this?

[1021] SPEAKER_24: Yeah, that's the net of that number.

[1026] Ray Rodriguez: Yes, Ray? So 60 students would equal two FTEs approximately, is that correct?

[1033] SPEAKER_24: It would. It works out to be 2.4, we were doing 2.2 to 2.4. And whenever you're dealing in FTE, we have to round to the next .2 because you can't have a less than that section.

[1045] Ray Rodriguez: And what money figure do you attach to every FTE?

[1048] SPEAKER_24: Average teacher cost, we haven't recalculated for the new school year but last year we were just shy of $100,000 so I just used 100,000 as a benchmark. Okay, thank you. And that's not just salary of course, that's salary plus all driven costs.

[1063] Ray Rodriguez: And you don't include if we would need an additional support person, like a classified person. That's not included. You just use FTE and use each your own.

[1075] SPEAKER_24: Well, again, in general education, FTE generally doesn't require an additional support level staff like an instructional aid type person because you don't have those in general education classrooms. These are general education projections. Right. Got it.

[1087] Nancy Thomas: Thank you. What is the percentage you're using for the salary, the benefits? for a teacher? What percentage? Not STRS, but STRS plus everything then.

[1099] SPEAKER_24: Yes. So it's a combination of a whole bunch of numbers. And I don't have them wrapped around the top of my head. But STRS is at 14.43%. They have Medicare at 1.45. Workers' Comp is 2.75. SUI is 0.05. And post-retirement health allocation is also 2.75.

[1122] Nancy Thomas: So when I looked at the actuals and at one point it had STRS and then the certificated benefits, I thought it was 20%. Is that probably a good figure, Tony?

[1136] SPEAKER_24: It's close. It's slightly higher than that now because we just said we have every year there's a 1.85% increase over the prior year in STRS. However, it went down slightly on the unemployment. Our unemployment rate went down this year by about half a percent.

[1154] Nancy Thomas: So if we're looking at a stipend, for example, we could probably multiply by 1.24 or something like that.

[1163] SPEAKER_24: Give or take, depending on if the stipend is paid to a classified or a certificated employee, I guess. It would be about 22, 2022. So just to refresh everyone's memories about the items that we're active upon in May, And I started adding some function codes on here because we're gonna have to transfer if we utilize These as ongoing I'll have to transfer them over into function code to match up with the lines of the big spreadsheet that you're about to see in a few minutes, but just to Refresh everyone's memory on what happened in May. We did freeze three positions the operations and safety supervisor 0.5 of the attendance case manager and the bus driver position We also reduced 11 special education assistant positions, one counselor position. We reduced travel and conference budgets, books and supply budgets, the consulting services budgets, the tier two administrative support, or tier two administrator support, it's the credential clearing for administration. A reduction to the substitute budget and a reduction to the unfunded overtime budget. And the question that came up earlier, Was it just the unfunded overtime or all overtime? That number just reflects the amount of reduction that was approved for the unfunded overtime. If it's got an outside funding source, it gets categorized with the funding source. It's not part of just the general unrestricted overtime.

[1255] SPEAKER_33: Yes. Ms. Crawford. We have unrestricted here. Come 17-18 this year, when they reach the top of the budget, all work stops in that area. Is that correct? There's an automatic when the budget amount is taken, for example. If we have a budget of, well, we're not going to take somebody and put somebody hired in to do a tier two administrative support.

[1281] SPEAKER_24: That actually is an outside agency type expense. It's not something that's in-house.

[1287] SPEAKER_33: But we're talking about doing the same work. So wherever it's put in the budget doesn't make any difference. It's what work it's doing. that we need this work to be eliminated because we feel it's not as important as other. And if we pay for it some other way, then we're not eliminating. We're just moving stuff around.

[1307] SPEAKER_24: Yes, in theory. However, what these reductions were, were all specifically unrestricted general fund expenditures. So We did not look at what consulting services are in the restricted general fund when we were building these numbers. We were looking at the unrestricted numbers. So if it's in a categorical fund or if a categorical fund can pay for it and it's built into that categorical fund's budget in the new year, then that would not be reflected here because we weren't looking at the restricted general fund at the time that we built this list.

[1337] SPEAKER_33: When you look at the bus driver, having that $40,000 per bus driver, that means that he's doing general budget work. So if there's a restricted source of money to pay for a bus driver and we hire someone to do that, or we have overtime for somebody else who is not just a bus driver but they have the ability to do it, or we hire someone from outside, that's taking care of the restricted money. But the $40,000 that we're saving on that particular position, that work is not going to be popped up someplace else. Is that correct? Because we can cut it out of here, but if it pops up in some other form, because we can put it with a budget code number some other place.

[1380] SPEAKER_19: So sort of the issue of can we offset and pay for it another way, or are we really cutting it out of the system? Correct. That's kind of the question.

[1388] SPEAKER_24: So for the three positions, the first three positions that are on this screen that say free, the positions are not gone. They weren't eliminated. They were frozen, and they haven't been filled. Correct. So they're in there, and they're in the budget. But we're not utilizing them. So we're generating savings for every month that goes by that we don't actually fill the position. But we did not actually bring an action to eliminate the positions. They are just on freeze at this time. The ones that were actually reduced from the budget, those positions are out of the budget. And if we bring additional positions back.

[1417] SPEAKER_33: And the work is not being done. Correct. Anyplace else, the work is not being done.

[1421] SPEAKER_24: So that is a true... Or it's been absorbed into other elements of the district. I mean, we have multiple, for example, the counselors. We have multiple counselors at the high school. Every student still has an assigned counselor, it's just the ratios are different.

[1433] Nancy Thomas: I understand that. So when you freeze, like for the attendance case manager, Do you go and use a figure for an incoming level person in that position? Because in this case, the person that left may have been higher up on the salary scale.

[1451] SPEAKER_24: In this case, we froze it at where the budget was. So we freeze it based on it. When we build a new year budget, so this year it was a vacant position when it came in. All vacant positions are budgeted at their average cost of the employees that are there in that position. In this case, it's a vacant position that only has one person, so it's probably at the middle. I'd have to double check, but usually we pull the middle range of the salary scale.

[1477] Nancy Thomas: I would like to see you check on that one, if you will, because I think there's some salary information on Transparent America, Transparent California, I mean, I don't know if it corresponds.

[1490] SPEAKER_24: Well, and keep in mind, these are not just salaries. This includes all driven costs as well for all of these positions. It's the entire cost of the position, not just the cost of salary.

[1498] Nancy Thomas: Well, then I even have a bigger question on that.

[1502] SPEAKER_24: And again, 0.5, so it's half the position. I know. The other half is in the categorical program. I know. OK. Let's go past this. This chart is- Let's hold it up before we go into the- OK.

[1516] SPEAKER_19: Because we're going to hand out a copy to everyone. I think one thing I want to say for the audience and for anyone who's watching from home, just to be really explicit, it's important for people to know that the cuts we're looking at in conversation relative for tonight and between now and December 15th when we do first interim, is to take effect next school year. There was some misinformation that people were afraid that if we made the decision either tonight or December 15th, if this was going to happen immediately, that's not the case. All the cuts that we're discussing would be taking place for next school year, not out of this school year. There might be some savings we move this year, but as far as cutting from the budget, we're talking about next school year.

[1561] Nancy Thomas: So none of those were taken out of the budget this year?

[1564] SPEAKER_24: No, the previous actions, okay? The previous items the board already acted upon. The reductions to those budgets are already built into the current year.

[1574] Nancy Thomas: And that's the 1.2 million and even though there's some there that are in the budget, they'll be savings because we're not spending money. I got you.

[1584] SPEAKER_24: Yes. But where the board actually reduced budgets in those other expenditure items, Those prior actions that were done in May were part of the budget adoption in June. So one of the items, for example, that you don't see on here is a, well, it's not on there, actually, on the handout that's coming around. There's a board action that got taken right after the adoption of the budget. It's still not in there yet because we haven't produced the first revised budget of the new year, and that's the $100,000 transfer to Adult Ed. So when we get down to transfers to other agencies, Because we had to abbreviate the title to get it to fit into the box, that also includes inter-fund transfers to other funds. It's just that the largest transfer is to another agency, so that dominated the title, because 969,000 of that 1.1 million is ROP. So with regard to the input sessions, there were six of them, as I mentioned earlier, between the 20th and the 30th. Two at Schilling, one at the junior high, one at Music, Lincoln, and Kennedy. I want to thank all of the people who took time out of their evenings and or mornings to attend those sessions so that we could get a variety of input. We took all of the information and I can't say we with myself in here because I was actually out sick for two days last week. Kim took all of the information that everyone put together and we'll give Kim her credit to put together what all the recommendations were and then took that information, which was built on percentages of the grand total of the budget, and then recast it against what that is in percentages of the individual function budgets to come up with a projected total of reduction based on the community input. Now the community input got us to about 3.25 million, which is a little bit higher than the goal of 3.1 at the time, and of course is certainly higher than what the goal would be now. So the handouts that you have, delineate what's in option A and option B. And Mr. Sanchez created these two options, one of which being we've implemented the prior freeze and all the various reductions related to that freeze, and it's about 1.48 or 1.248 million. And so if we take that, we have left to reduce approximately 2.37 million, 2,369, there's 368 and change. And on the other hand, the board could decide to scrap everything that was done in building the current year budget and just say, okay, these are going to be the new ones going forward. And if we took the same proportion to the 3,617,000, what would that number be by function? So we pulled all of that information out there together. And the reality may be that we'll end up somewhere in the middle of those two. We may keep some of the prior items. The board may keep all the items. It really is the will of the board on delineating those out. But as we look, it works out to be about a 4% reduction, 4.1 in school site instruction, just shy of 5 in school site instructional leadership, about 4 in district-wide instructional support, 4.7 in pupil services, about a half of a percent in, or actually a 20th of a percent in ancillary community and enterprise services, almost nothing. District office is about nine and I'll take one brief moment for those that were on the superintendent's advisory council. There is one difference on this particular line. When I was going through the background of these numbers with Kim, we discovered that we had a minus where a plus belonged and it inverted a calculation because it was a minus of a minus. And so Lincoln's district office number was on the previous version of this spreadsheet at 3.18. It actually should have been 1.38. It reversed the number. So the overall percentage of it against its total budget changed from 11 to 9 as a result of that inversion. But in total, there were no other changes on the percentages. Infotech, it's about six-tenths of a percent. Facilities and Maintenance, just shy of 10. And the transfers, about two and a quarter. Now, the first, as I mentioned just a few minutes ago, the board's actually already taken an action with regard to the transfers to the Adult Ed Fund to the tune of $100,000. So we can already go with the previous board action and indicate we've already done more than what that projected amount is for that particular line item. So, rather than the AT&T, and that just reduces what else we have to do by about $82,000 to $70,000 to $80,000 depending on which column we go with. So... I have a question.

[1870] SPEAKER_33: Yes, Ms. Parker. On the IncoTech, you have got, well that's of 1%. 61, it would take 61%.

[1877] SPEAKER_24: 0.61%.

[1877] SPEAKER_33: Of 1%. OK. The numbers we have here are based on percentage, not.

[1885] SPEAKER_24: So 0.0061 and 0.61 of a percent are the same thing. Exactly. I just converted it to decimals. Right. So that when you try to look at this versus this, it may be confusing. Yes. Yeah. I'm sorry about that. OK. These were printed prior to when we converted that to a percentage during my discussion with Pat.

[1902] SPEAKER_21: And the school, like school site instruction, for example, currently 1.69, is that 1.69% or what is that?

[1910] SPEAKER_24: It's 1.69% of the entire general fund budget, not of that line item, which is why we had to convert percentages of the entire general fund to percentages of line items to come up with the numbers. And that was part of what Kim did in devising that column that's immediately before the dollar amount. Question. Yes.

[1926] SPEAKER_33: When we look at the original 1.2 million that we cut out. Yes. And we look at these percentages, are those included in, for example, we had a lot of district office that was taken out of the original 1.2%. Then are we talking, they're talking about 9% in addition to that, is that correct? Because we're talking about the 3.2.

[1947] SPEAKER_24: Yeah, these are, well, in option A, okay, in option A, it would be reductions in addition to whatever's been done whatever was done prior to the adoption of the current year budget. Correct. Any actions done since the adoption of the current year budget are not reflected in any of these numbers at all. So, but anything that was done prior to the adoption of the budget.

[1968] SPEAKER_33: Special ed is the only one that's not. Special ed would be the one that would be.

[1972] Nancy Thomas: I'm sorry.

[1972] SPEAKER_33: Adult ed. Adult ed, yes. Adult ed, yeah.

[1975] Nancy Thomas: But those frozen positions are still in the budget, so.

[1981] SPEAKER_24: Those three, those three frozen positions are still in the budget, yes. Yeah, so. All of the other. The three frozen, one is in, well, by function code, the three positions would be the operations supervisor is in the facilities and maintenance function in the 8,000s, the bus driver and the attendance case manager are both in the pupil services functions, because they're both in functions that start with a three.

[2019] SPEAKER_25: million, 6.5 million, 1.223 million for the last two columns.

[2024] SPEAKER_24: Yeah. Oh and what those two last two columns are just, let me explain it, it might answer your question. The calculation of the percentage against the the line items of each of those budgets by function to get to the community input number and then we took pro-rata Because we were higher than and lower than respectively in option A and option B, we took those percentages of each Collins Grand total and reflected them out so that it would stay proportionate to what the percentages were from the community input.

[2056] SPEAKER_25: So as far as option A and option B, whichever option we go with or whatnot, how do we reconcile 1.22 in school site instruction without going through the negotiations process. Do we have the capacity to reduce it by that much without, you know, being part of the CDA?

[2078] SPEAKER_19: Let me try to, come to the next slide and then let's go back. Let me share, actually go one more. I want to get to the, there was a slide about, the input from the advisory council? It's right there.

[2094] SPEAKER_24: That is the slide. OK. I just changed the title to Next Steps because you have more things than just the advisory council. OK.

[2099] SPEAKER_19: So a couple of things that I'll actually go back to the first one because I want to highlight a couple of things in that spreadsheet. What this does tell us, and I can share this in a different way, there was a lot of interest of trying to stay away from school site level, classroom level reductions. And there was a lot of interest in taking more reductions out of central office. And there was a lot of agreement around not touching technology. So the items that the community kind of said to us in our process is stay away from schools, sites, stay away from technology. Those are things we kind of don't want you to cut too deep on. And look at the other stuff is kind of where it landed. And certainly district office being the heaviest interest of where to reduce. So part of the conversation is, you know, So option A is kind of this idea of do we keep all the freezes as is, and do we just cut that difference now, or do we want to recast all of it and take the full 4 point, or sorry, 3.6 million now and look at that proportionally based on what the community said, or is there an option C that the board creates here tonight and saying we probably want to tweak this down or shift those things around or, you know, the 100,000 that we had saved or that was a difference that we know we already took action on out of adult ed. I'd rather add that back and make the reduction less at school site, knowing that the will of the community. So one of the other things that's important to know is the sheet that I just handed out is just a sample of the input sheet we used at the budget study sessions. And in the final resolution, we did ask permission to, whatever the final decision is, and kind of direction from the board, it'll show up in these same categories in the resolution so the community can see, okay, here's kind of what we said, here's what was important to us, and here's where the board aligns with what we said. So that'll be in the resolution. But let's go to the next slide. I think it helps answer part of what Tom was asking about. So some of the input and recommendations from the advisory council are let's maintain this budget advisory council for the next two years and kind of stay with us through the transition, maybe expand membership a little bit and keep that together to help me go forward and really try to work through some of these problem areas and try to look at other things, including not just reductions, but ideas on generating revenue and cost savings. On December 15th, we want to be prepared to identify in writing what the impact of cuts will be on students, families, and programming. So in other words, we know that tonight there will be a resolution of a commitment to we're going to make these reductions. But between now and December 15th, we're going to have to get down to some real detail. And the way to go forward, I believe, is to take that back to divisions, take it back to staff, have them wrestle with it. Let's flesh out what, how, we have to be able to answer those questions on what is going to be the impact. And what are we losing? Are we going to be able to keep it? Is somebody else going to be able to do that job? Is it going away? And we're not going to do it anymore. And how do we communicate that? Because that's going to be really important. They want us to continue to seek long and short term cost savings measures. You know, things like solar, water wells, four day school week. There's a lot of ideas that came out just in the conversation. California, that's a different thing. But there's some ideas that they're interested in talking more about. Continue to look at revenue building measures, you know, maybe there's other grants, or I know we're looking at Facilitron as a test drive to try to generate some revenue for the district in using our facilities. And continue to expand and leverage our community partners, city, county, state, Silicon Valley. We'll go into that a little bit more later. And looking at other funds, kind of in the same spirit of what Member Crocker brought up. If we can pay for something out of a different fund that helps us not cut so deep in general fund, how do we figure that out? And how do we build that in a way that still aligns with what those sometimes restricted funds are allowable or not allowable? And create some options for the board to consider. But I think the real piece here is really we have to, and again I'll say it was really important to the committee that, because they were hearing also from the community and many people attended more than one session. It's important to communicate these are reductions that will take real effect in the 18-19 school year, not this year. So that's kind of the feedback from the committee and the guidance that they asked me to take notes on and bring forward. But now we can go back to the other slide and I think talk about... So what we have here is more of a kind of symbolic patterns and themes that the board asked me to kind of glean from the community. And from the people that responded, this is kind of the pattern we see. And the good news is that we don't have the 4.3 million. Now we're at 3.6 because we did ask permission to recalculate that.

[2422] Nancy Thomas: And the county allowed that. Wouldn't that change these numbers if we already know those savings exist? It may take money off of the school site instruction side, for example.

[2438] SPEAKER_33: That's option A is recalculated with the new amount that we have to get.

[2445] Nancy Thomas: Oh, is that what you're talking about with option A?

[2449] SPEAKER_24: So option A assumes that all of the prior actions remain. And this is what's left, the 2.36 over and above the 1.25 the board already took action

[2460] Nancy Thomas: Oh, so you've already calculated that adjustment in based on the increased revenue this year?

[2467] SPEAKER_24: Yes. So option A and option B at one point totaled 3.1 and 4.34. We've adjusted those downward to what the targets are now, 2.37 and 3.62, reflecting the fact that we do have ongoing revenue from our increase in enrollment.

[2488] SPEAKER_33: Yes. In school site instruction, there is a base that we need because we've got increased enrollment. What is that number? You have a projected number of students that are going to be here for 18-19. What is going to be the cost? Because we can't really manipulate that cost other than increase the class size. So what is going to be the actual cost if we do as we're doing right now? what is going to be the actual cost?

[2515] SPEAKER_24: So the actual cost of the increase for covering the increased number of students beyond the FTE that we had already built in because we had already calculated part of that increase in students into next year is an additional one FTE for next year and a total combined of 2.2 FTE the following year.

[2533] SPEAKER_33: So another 100,000 would be added to the cost of 40 million, would be 721,000. It would be. However, as I mentioned,

[2544] SPEAKER_24: when we were looking at the, if I go back to the beginning, to this slide here. I've already factored the $100,000 additional cost in and so our actual projected reduction or reduction of the deficit would have been $876,000 per next year instead of $776,000. I took that $100,000 off the top because I knew I had to add one more FTE than what I already had in the multi-year projection. And for the following year out, it's an additional 2.2. So I took $220,000 off of a number that was $1,119,000. So I've already factored that in and figuring out the average so that we don't end up cutting where we have to turn around and add back in. I've already factored that into the numbers so that we don't double count it.

[2586] SPEAKER_33: You have here adopted budget. The school site instruction is $40,621,038. Correct. Is that based on the new ratio that we have, the new class size?

[2597] SPEAKER_24: No, that's the current year budget. But then all of those numbers on the far left are the current year budget.

[2604] SPEAKER_33: OK, so it does not take into account the fact that we are already staffing our classrooms at a higher ratio?

[2614] SPEAKER_24: Well, it takes into account everything we knew as of the adoption of the current year budget. We're using that as the baseline to calculate the percentage numbers so that we have, we have to have something to anchor it to. So from there, going forward, the amount of reduction doesn't actually get applied to the baseline number. It gets applied to the second year of the multi-year projection. But I had to have something more concrete to face it on because the multi-year projection is not out there by individual account line code. It's an object level, not a function level. So to be able to get a proportion.

[2646] SPEAKER_33: We have decided to put this into a function category to make it easier for people to understand. Yes. Then we have to keep on talking about these function groups.

[2653] Marie dela Cruz: Which is how we are.

[2654] SPEAKER_33: OK. So for this year, how much is it going to cost us for school site instruction this year?

[2660] SPEAKER_24: If we leave everything the same and if everybody spends every penny in their budgets, we'll spend exactly $40 million, 6.1.

[2665] SPEAKER_33: And that includes then the fact that we have a higher ratio in the classroom.

[2671] SPEAKER_24: We have not, okay, I understand now where you're going with your question. We have not modified the current year budget. It's at its adopted number. We have not made the adjustments yet for the changes in the face of the teacher population or the rest of the staffing for the district yet because we just paid the first payroll on Friday. So we'll be making all those adjustments at first interim. So the number may go down slightly because we do have a large number of newer teachers compared to prior years, but I can't give you what that number is off the top of my head.

[2705] SPEAKER_33: Okay, so if we look at a board option as being something that we want to do and we're saying we've got to have the teachers in the classroom, this is the contractual ratio that we have, this is the staffing we have, then that should be an untouchable amount. That's part of the structural cost of doing business. We are a service business. That should not be changed because we can't increase the class size and we can't arbitrarily take 10 people and say you've lost your job?

[2732] SPEAKER_24: Well, we're currently at certain grade levels below what that would be. As you know, we took the action at the adoption of the budget where we could, in theory, put K-3 at 29 to 1. We're not actually at 29 to 1. We're capped at 25 right now, and many of our classes are under that. So overall average, we're actually still at 24 to 1. We're still at where we pretty much traditionally been. We just have that little bit of flexibility for overages without having to trigger overage fees at those rate levels.

[2763] Nancy Thomas: Is there any reason why we have to wait for first interim? Can't you, you know, now that you've done the payroll and our enrollment is pretty stable, can't you redo some of those budget numbers? We're working on it.

[2780] SPEAKER_24: But first interim is everything as of the end of October. We're trying to get everything in there for the first interim numbers. That's three and a half weeks from now.

[2789] Nancy Thomas: The board won't have to wait till December to know how these adjustments are, because we're going to be making cuts. And it would do well that we would know how these numbers have changed, because it'll change how much we have to cut in certain functional areas.

[2808] SPEAKER_24: And as we have more information, we'll be bringing that forward. The superintendent and I have not talked about when the next budget study session is going to be yet. I would assume the board will make some decision either tonight or at a future board meeting on how many more we're going to have between now and December the 15th. But yes, as we get more information, we're going to be continually updating. We'll be locking down CVEDS. CVEDS day is Wednesday, which is tomorrow. And so that's when the official census day is. But it actually takes until December to get CVEDS reconciled, because all the districts in the state reconciling against each other and you end up with various weird little things that happen to your CVETS numbers over the course of those couple of months. But we'll be continually revising the projections and chewing up everything for projected expenses through October 31st over the course of the next several weeks. And then as soon as the October payroll runs, then we recast again as the official recast for first interim. And that's like the week before Halloween.

[2870] SPEAKER_19: If I could clarify kind of some of the guidance and thinking going forward is whether it's option A, option B, or option C that board kind of finalizes as generally the categories where they want to see us bring back specific recommended reductions. I think it's important to have a staff step in there where we can take it back to staff at divisions and say, here's the number we'd like you to target, see what you can do, and bring to us issues that we may not have seen that were unintended. For example, in the freeze, there was a bus driver. And that may be, as I look closer at that situation, I might be more willing to reduce a supervisor than a bus driver because that's going to impact kids and field trips and some of those things. So there's some of those unforeseen things that we may want to have some staff weigh in on and make more of a formal recommendation. So whatever scenario is for, I think that's a necessary step for us to take some, lean on the expertise of people in the SPED department, people in Ed Services, HR, all of those divisions.

[2939] SPEAKER_19: And if I'm wrong, correct me. The number the county cares about is the number at the bottom. If we come back on December 15th and we have some movement within the categories for the, what is this called, fund? Functions. They're not going to care as long as that bottom line number stays the same. But I think that now that you'll see the full Excel spreadsheet of the budget and both the expenditure and revenue side, it's on our front page now. So there's no secret it's out there. I really do think that October 4th tomorrow, once the board has given us direction and kind of proportionality, to say, okay, we commit to this number. We want you to start looking at that. Bring us back your best thinking. And we have to go through a few cycles with the board and make some probably more frequent study sets between now and December 15th. But I wanted you to have that structure in mind. And that was really a strong recommendation. my conversations with the committee just to make sure that everyone's seeing what's happening and where it's morphing and so that with really the goal of when we do, when the board finally takes the final action in December, that first interim, there shouldn't be a lot of surprises by that point.

[3015] SPEAKER_25: So my preference is for option A because when we had this discussion a few months ago, I think the table agreed that we should do the cuts gradually in two years. And I think that with the bottom line code 2.36 or the road 3, 2.39, that satisfies the county's requirements, right, because they're giving us that $500,000 credit because we're in pre-enrollment for your conversation with them. So I think that's a good starting point for us. And then with the agility, the other 1.248 at a later time

[3056] Nancy Thomas: I don't recall that we had made that decision, had we? Didn't we say we wanted to make the cuts in 17-18? Because the sooner we made the cuts, the faster we would not have to dig into our reserves.

[3072] SPEAKER_25: Remember when we had the discussion, I think it was in the summertime or pre-summer, you know, there were three scenarios, make all the cuts now, up front, do it very slowly or do it kind of gradually, right? And I think it was option B that we kind of gave direction for the superintendent to apply.

[3087] Nancy Thomas: But I thought that was that we do it gradually, meaning we wouldn't do it this year, we would do it.

[3092] SPEAKER_25: Well, no, we couldn't do it this year regardless.

[3094] Nancy Thomas: Well, I know, but I mean, I think that was, I don't recall us saying that, well, either way, Sooner we can do it, the better, I think.

[3106] SPEAKER_33: Well, the 2.37, if we went for option A and did not mess around with any of the categories, because essentially, as we look and see how realistic this is, we can manipulate the categories later. What we're looking for is the bottom 2.368. That's the thing the county's looking for, and that's the thing by October 5th, we have to say, we are committed to spend no more than this.

[3128] SPEAKER_21: So I understand. I guess here's one little. of my frustration in terms of, so we know we have to do a certain amount, but I guess what I was looking for was more the, exactly, so those conversations, like you guys coming to us and saying, you know, based on the community input we're recommending approximately $1 million from school site instruction, $190,000 from school site instruction leadership, like those frameworks, kind of those buckets, and then we can consider that. If we do the 2.4, and this is a question that I have, why are we doing 2.4 if we're talking about 2.8, I guess?

[3172] SPEAKER_19: Let me clarify that. Both options are the full $3.6 million. One option just says, we're going to hold true to freezes, and we're going to keep that in. We're not going to mess with that. And we're going to take the difference proportionally based on public input. Option B is still $3.6 million, just distributed based on the public input. So it's the same amount, but I think that in either scenario, just know in the back of your mind, I really do believe we need to take it back to staff. Give us your best thinking. What are the implications for schools? What's going to affect families before we go down that road and have some room to move between categories? But for right now, one is not a lower number than the other. Now, that could be option C. It could be we want to do the minimum required by the county, which is $2.8 million, as it says in the letter. And that would give us the direction to recast everything based on that. So those are kind of your options. So option C would be let's do the minimum for the county. And we could do that. Well, it's really at the local pool. I think that what I wanted to put in front of you is the patterns and themes from the community are represented in these proportions. And if you guys wanted to move stuff back and forth, and I think that I don't think anyone's going to argue with me that the interest was to stay away from classrooms, technology as much as possible.

[3259] Ray Rodriguez: I had a question. Yes. We had approximately 100 people participate in our community meetings. Right. And, you know, when you figure 6,000 children and you figure maybe 1.5 parent per child or something, so we had, you know, we had what, 3,000 total and we had 100. I love community meetings and I love community input and I think it was important and I enjoyed each one of the sessions being, you know, pretty full and dialogue going back and forth. My question is, we had other ways of receiving input from the community other than the get-togethers that we had, whether it's on district websites, site councils, you know, PTA, you know, So where are we on that as far as what we got from other than the people that were... And I've incorporated that, and it doesn't count in the 98, similar input about that.

[3336] SPEAKER_19: There was other comments in there that I didn't include, but all the numerical ones, are still represented here. But I think that's something that we need to do going forward after tonight is how do we really give a clearer way for parents to have a more specific way to give input. And it's kind of mixed. I mean, sometimes people think, well, that's the board's job. That's why they're elected. And then sometimes people think that, no, this is really, like if you look at the Schilling example, they voted together as a group, all 30 people. It's turned into one sheet that said, cut here and cut here. And you see that represented in the data.

[3376] SPEAKER_24: So I think that... I might also add, especially at Lincoln and Music, we actually had a lot more than four or five people in each of those. I was at both of those sessions. Just not everybody chose to turn in forms. So we did have a couple of dozen at each of those locations.

[3392] SPEAKER_19: So communication is a big issue going forward. I think we need to continue. Yeah, the more effort. I agree with that. The more net we throw out, the more.

[3400] Ray Rodriguez: Okay, and then I had a, on the money part, I think it's definitely important that we do at least, you know, let's say 2.4 with the understanding that we're going to continue to have budget study sessions and look at additional ways and to, not only to, you know, look at staffing and, but also look at ways that we can increase revenue. So if we chose that number and didn't have, didn't continue to have budget sections, then to me that would be a problem. I think these are going very well and I think that we need to continue to have these as we move forward. But it's obvious we have to at least cut 2.4.

[3448] SPEAKER_19: 2.8 I believe the letter says, 2.8, is that right? I thought it was adjusted because of the increase. Is that true? That might be true. Is it 2.4 now with the recasting?

[3458] SPEAKER_24: Well, it's the county's number of 2.8 and I told him we were looking at the 3.6 because that's what our ongoing structural deficit was, is getting, tackling the full 3.6. I'm still planning to take credit for the 1.25 unless the board redacts that action. that has already been taken, we're going to split that up by function code and count it in the numbers that we set up to count. Unless the board chooses option B, it says that we're going to reverse the previous action.

[3490] Nancy Thomas: But I would like to know about the freeze impact on students, the bus driver. We haven't had a bus driver for a long time. How are we?

[3499] SPEAKER_19: We're paying for a sub. piecemealing it together, and we're trying to get things to still go forward. Without that position, it's been hard to fill, it's hard to hire. And we've been kind of limping along, using the sub here and there.

[3514] Nancy Thomas: So the impact on the kids, because we haven't been able to get a full-time bus driver anyway.

[3524] SPEAKER_19: Well, it's been mitigated to some degree, because we have one person that's willing to help us with that. But eliminating it entirely will have implications. And I worry about that. Because I think about science camp. I think about field trips that are legitimate, that schools will raise money for.

[3543] SPEAKER_33: But those are ones that are paid for by restricted funds. And so essentially, I think the general budget does not sponsor the field trip.

[3552] SPEAKER_19: They do in athletics. There are some there that I believe are.

[3556] SPEAKER_33: Some of them are in the general fund. Some are in the auxiliary.

[3561] SPEAKER_25: I think what can be helpful for the next steps, and what I know my personal opinion is, or my personal preference is option A, uphold the current freeze, because that's already taken, right? And we've learned to live with that freeze for the past five months now. Uphold that, add the 2.3 reduction to get us to 3.6 total as planned. But I think what would be helpful moving forward is within each of those categories, how do those numbers manifest itself? Like what does that mean when we're aiming to take 1.2, 3.0 from school size instruction? What does that mean? Is that instructional materials? Is that, you know, increased class size? What does that mean? So break that down per item, right, of what that reflects. And then once we get that, then maybe we can move around and play within those categories as long as we keep that 2.3, 6.0.

[3616] SPEAKER_19: And I think that's good advice. I think what I'm thinking about, like in this bus driver analogy, I'd like to be able to go talk with staff, see what they recommend, and if not that position, then I can bring another position forward in its place. So I have another vacancy in the supervisor role, you know, if I really, if I have that choice, I'm going to say let's cut this position, let's keep that, make it whole, and that's where we're getting the savings from. But I need to have some time between tomorrow and December 15th to have staff begin doing their work and their recommendations.

[3650] SPEAKER_33: I think there needs to be a set time frame in which they do that. Because we need to have it early enough to be able to make our decision. And I think the staff is definitely the one that knows where it can be cut without impacting the kids. They know much better than I do. If you talk about the general schedule that you have at the high school, the people that are working with the schedule know what's going on. I mean, you read those things and they're very complicated. And you look at one teacher and you see that there are three different places where one teacher has kids. And so you have to total all those. You can't look and say, they only have 21 kids. Well, they've got two other groups of identified groups of students that are in that same class period. So that's something that is site-specific and they should know. But we give them a set amount of time. I'm concerned that by taking 5% of the school site instruction, we're going to have a problem unless our increased enrollment takes the bite out of that. In other words, our increased enrollment, we have a higher number of kids in the classroom. We have done something already in terms of saying that we're going to fill these classes. In some cases, they filled. In some cases, they didn't. But it's definitely higher than they were last year.

[3722] Nancy Thomas: Or there was a big item under school site instruction that required negotiations. So I'm wondering if we can negotiate a big part of that $1.23 million.

[3739] SPEAKER_21: So here's my framework. So I'm OK with, I think, 2.37, option A, but option A in terms of the total amount. The parliament, and this is where a little bit kind of my thoughts are that I thought here is where we were going to dive into like what does that look like? So for example, like if we as a board agreed, I mean I'm not saying that we do, but like I remember when we talked about like ROP, right, how much is that? That's a million dollars, right? If we said like we were going to take, all of our would be a million dollars, then that means school site instruction would only be $200,000. But we haven't had those types of conversations and that's where I'm not comfortable with saying 2.4 or option A because option A already outlines We're doing 1.2 million. So, like, if we're trying to stay away from classrooms, like, this might be an option, right? For example.

[3797] SPEAKER_25: I think so much I mentioned that earlier where as long as we stay, we keep fidelity to that number.

[3802] SPEAKER_21: But that's not what the letter says. It says we have to do it by expenditure category. And that's the thing where, like.

[3808] SPEAKER_19: Yeah, when we do that permission report by function code now.

[3812] SPEAKER_24: So whether it's by function or whether it's by object, the county doesn't care as long as the total is right. And they also said that we can make any changes that we need to between now and first interim. So whatever we commit to, we can make modifications to that commitment as long as we don't, as long as by first interim, we are also able to certify positive, which is what they're saying.

[3835] SPEAKER_21: that there's probably a third, fourth, fifth meeting that we've already had these discussions in terms of like what is the meat? Like we can say, we all agree to cutting 2.4 million, but until I see like, I can't, I'm trying to figure it out. I can support as a general matter, because we have to, cutting the 2.4 million, but if you're going to tell me my vote to do that means 10 teachers versus professional development, or whatever it is, right? And I don't know if I'm comfortable with that because at that level we haven't discussed it.

[3868] SPEAKER_19: And that part about voting last night though, I think that's part of why I think we need staff to report back to the board in a study session in a quick time frame, as Jan pointed out, so that you can get to the bottom of that. Part of the questions I want to ask staff is, where would you make this recommendation cut? And if that is your recommendation, what's the implication of it for the kids and for the families? What are we losing? What are the unintended consequences? Because it's complicated. Even transfer other funds, if you say ROP, that's going to impact kids directly. It's going to impact our schedule. A chunk of kids directly. So that's still close to the classroom. It's just what it shows up here in the function code.

[3907] SPEAKER_21: But are we going to say that we're doing the 2.4 million? Sorry, I'm running late, but 2.37 million. And this is our framework of like, when we're submitting to the county, we're going to say, because it says by expenditure category or by function code, we're saying we're going to cut 2.4. I have a feeling that we can't just say, hey, we're committing to cut 2.4 million generally. We're going to have to say as a. We're going to.

[3934] SPEAKER_33: We're saying. That's what they're saying we can do. They're saying we can do exactly that.

[3938] SPEAKER_21: They're saying. We just have to put numbers there.

[3940] SPEAKER_19: I want to hear that from staff. That's right. So let me explain first then I can correct you. So what we're saying is, what I would recommend is that we say we're going to cut this, whatever number you want to put in there with the understanding that staff's going to give us recommendations and implications so we can make a final decision on December 15th about all the detail but for now we want to honor the public input and kind of look in those areas first and try to stay and with maybe the caveat if you find savings take it off of school site first as a priority one and then Priority two would be technology. Those are the two areas they want to stay away from. So if we are able to find savings or another way to make a reduction or not make a reduction, we try to lighten the load there first to honor the spirit of what the public has told us. That's kind of the best way that I would frame it as far as what I'm thinking.

[4001] SPEAKER_25: Yes, I'm. So what I'm hearing is we're going to report or send to the county that composite average of the categories that we're cutting. So that satisfies the object or function code that the county wants. And from now to December, we have the authorization to make adjustments at this time. Within the categories.

[4018] SPEAKER_21: Well, I guess with that still. Between the categories. Between the categories. See, another piece that I feel like we haven't dived into. Like, again, I'm OK.

[4024] SPEAKER_25: We haven't because the community meeting's just finished.

[4027] SPEAKER_21: So that if it's for the purposes of conversation, then why don't we, if we do option C, we start with $1 million for ROP. We can always change it, right? But then we start with $1 million for ROP, and then that means we're only reducing $233,000 from school site instruction, right? That's the hard part.

[4046] SPEAKER_19: Let me help with that. Let's frame it a different way. Part of why I think it's important, and why I thought it was important to ask to keep these in the resolution, is I think it's important for the community to see that, okay, they're listening to what we said, they're looking at things proportionally to what we said, and will the final answer be there? We're yet to know. We don't know that yet, but I think that, because that could have been decided, I would have saved the hassle of doing the community integration. So I think that if you're going to take the input, I think you want to honor that. And I think that right now, this is kind of what they said. Even though it's a small sample, I think there's the other part of it, is how do we expand that circle and get more input now that we're getting closer to approximating things. And we still have to talk with our union partners about things that we can't talk about in this forum. But I think all those conversations need to happen.

[4100] SPEAKER_19: really be nice to have some of that complete before Thanksgiving break. To give you kind of an idea, because then the board's got to sit with it. And the board's got to have an Excel spreadsheet. And the board's got to really look line by line at the recommendations. I think by the first board meeting. Because what it would look like for just for like as administrator. So who's in charge of school site instruction? OK. Miss Salinas. Here's your whole Excel spreadsheet for that budget with supplies, materials, and positions. work with your staff to give us the best recommendations to hit that number. And then we'll come back and we'll have some negotiation back and forth with the board. And maybe we chunk it up by, I don't know how we want to do it as a study session, but that's the next thing is we have to schedule, you know, maybe it's a study session a week. I don't know. We have to kind of wrap it up to be able to hit that target.

[4150] Nancy Thomas: You know, are you going to be asking staff to go toward, you know, roughly the percentages that are there?

[4160] SPEAKER_19: I want them to go to exactly the percentage of dollar amounts that are there. And then let the board make the final decision.

[4165] Nancy Thomas: Okay, but, you know, I'm reminded of when I was working at an industry, and we had a department that always overspent. And they built the next year's budget based on this year's spending. So when they told my department to cut, you don't want to get it yet. Ah, we did it. And then the other department that overspent got a benefit because they just got the same percentage. When things got a little bit better, they got the same percentage. So my thought is about making sure that we don't have, we haven't overlooked areas where we can cut without hurting students. You know, at some level. And just because it's the same percentage at that level as it is at like the K3 level. K3 doesn't have any wiggle room. And another level might have more wiggle room. And maybe there has been. I'm looking at things that we had cut. Or that, not that we cut. I'm looking at things that we added over the last three or four years when we had big one-time expenditures. So we added these things, and some of them are ongoing. And we need to look, I think, at those things very critically to see, gee, we didn't need it four years ago. We added it. Do we need it now? And what if we took that away? And then when things get better, maybe we could put it back. But we function perfectly well without that three or four years ago. Those are the kinds of things I would hope that we can talk to you about, either individually or as an ad hoc group of two of us. or are you open to that?

[4278] SPEAKER_19: Absolutely. A couple things I think that will help. One is exactly what I want to do with the staff. I think it's important to at least try to get to those numbers, give us your best thinking, but also tell us if we didn't have to cut that deep, what's the first thing you would add back? We kind of need to have that answer to the question. The other piece that I think we need to go back and revisit is a prior FCMAT report that gave recommendations on things we were supposed to cut in the near term and see what was completed and what is not completed and kind of look at following that and look at the current PICBAT report and there's some recommendations in there that they wanted us to do that we would have to do that are just good recommendations. So those are two other factors I think that we ought to look at. I think part of the spirit of it is how do we ensure that they actually get cut? Let's answer that. and I think for now the details matter.

[4339] Nancy Thomas: Can we go back to that first list?

[4341] Ray Rodriguez: Can I just, before, just give me one second on this one, if you don't mind. And I promise I won't mention it again. You know, we spend a lot of time talking about the bus driver, which is a $40,000 item in a $4 million deficit, which to me is frustrating, right? And it's, to me, transportation in Newark has always been an issue as far as, especially at the elementary school sites. I know at the high school they kind of do their own thing and bring in a lot of times because of the, you know, monies they get from the club there. But the site one, when it comes to the elementary, because it's a science camp, The whole process is frustrating, and I don't want to get into that, but as much as the money, I personally would like to just eliminate the $40,000 for the bus driver and not even talk about it again, because it shows a positive on our part. We have additional students, so we have extra money. So, you know, I'd like to see that $40,000 taken out of that.

[4406] SPEAKER_33: I've already done it with 1.2 million. That's part of the 1.2 million that we took out. Right. I would like to advocate something else. Go ahead. And that is we're talking about option A and B. If we go to the community input as being the percentage we stay with, that gives a larger bite that all departments have to get that we need. And that way, and then you're saying, what would you put back as your first one? Everyone is cutting deeper than they need to cut. And then we can put back. So that gives us $600,000, $550,000. And if we end up doing that, we have a fund 17 of which we're going to be taking $2 million something out of this year of the fund. Is that correct? What is the budget amount that's coming out? 4.3 million. Okay. So to replace part of that. The 1.2 million doesn't get into that for this year's budget. The 1.2 million we've cut out.

[4467] SPEAKER_21: We're cutting the 1.2 and we're using the 4.3.

[4471] SPEAKER_33: So we're doing, we are reducing by 1.2 million, it's still going to cost us 4.3.

[4476] SPEAKER_24: Yes, however, of the 1.2, about a million is in the budget, I mean about a million was already cut in the budget in about two and it changes yet because the frozen positions are still in the budget. I know it's a little bit of a hard concept. But essentially they have not. The eliminated expenses are gone. Right.

[4494] SPEAKER_33: So when the final balance comes at the end of the school year, we have not spent that 1.2 million. It will be there in the balance. Yes.

[4501] Nancy Thomas: Okay. That's not. Can we go back to that first slide?

[4506] SPEAKER_21: I know we have to go to, in terms of discussion, like what are the proposed or action steps we're going to take? Maybe we're going to have to table this and then add it at the end or I don't know how we're going to figure that out.

[4518] SPEAKER_25: I'd like to see that chart of, like I said, how does those percentage manifest itself before we go for it?

[4523] SPEAKER_19: Do we have a deadline tonight?

[4529] SPEAKER_25: Resolution commits the overall number of functions.

[4534] SPEAKER_21: No, it has to have within this.

[4535] SPEAKER_24: We either have to have it by function category or object category.

[4539] SPEAKER_25: You said we can adopt those percentages as presented and then make adjustments.

[4543] SPEAKER_24: That is correct. With the understanding of an adjustment. Right.

[4547] Nancy Thomas: That is correct. So if you could go back to the first slide, Bill. The very first slide. No, the next one, those. Can you provide the board some detail on the Friday update or something about what's behind those numbers. Like reduce travel conference budgets by $21,600 out of how much? Can we get some detail on some of these so-called reductions that we've already made? Because maybe there's conferences that we you know, the board would like to know more about and say, gee, maybe we can cut that more, you know what I'm saying?

[4594] Ray Rodriguez: How much is that?

[4595] SPEAKER_21: And I do want to say that I appreciate the community input and that this is a good framework and I wasn't trying to, you're right, we went through the whole process for that, but for me, that's a big important piece of the data, but for example, Like if that meant for me to say, okay, you know, the transfer to other agencies, like that means saving 10 teachers. So I took away from there as a framework. even though that wasn't your percentage, I can live with that. That's me personally, but that, like, I have no problem going to the community and saying, look, you can blame me for eliminating ROP, but then that meant smaller school sizes, class sizes for your kids, right? Like, those types of, I guess that's the part that I have even as a framework, because then, to me, it gives off the impression that, If I were to go back, if I'm facilities and maintenance, I just need to cut 9.9%, but it could be less, but that would be the cap, as opposed to just thinking about, like, based off of our analysis that Member Thomas mentioned, what if there's specific programs that, you know what, because of its inefficiency, we could probably cut 1.2 million, and that's double the person.

[4671] SPEAKER_19: That's the only piece that is true. Let me try to help with that. the way through the forest that I think is going to be safest. Try to stay as close to the community recommendations for now. And going forward, we have to have a really transparent way of working through this in a public setting, in study sessions, so that this is able to happen, so that you can have that conversation. Because I promise you, everything on this list is going to have a group of people that are going to call every one of you and say, don't cut it. Every single, no matter what we do, you're going to hear that. And the only safety that I think you're going to be provided is the more you listen to the community, and the more that we have more opportunities for input, and have more of a public conversation about, you know, why it went down the way it went down. I think that gives you a lot of coverage, and I think that's why that's really number one in the recommendation in the letter from Alameda County. they really do talk about engaging the stakeholders. And we've started, but we've not done a deep enough engagement. You know, 100 people is not really a big enough sample in my ideal. But at least we're starting, and I think we still have some time to make these adjustments. So I think part of where we are is what number do we put in the resolution? What proportion can we safe it out? And we can put it in the letter to the county. We will probably adjust these again by the first interim based on further stakeholder input and further because that's going to matter. It's really going to matter. I don't know all the implications like someone close to the ground like a staff member knows. I just don't. There's some real unintended things that we're not even aware of yet. I think our best way to do this is really transparently with everybody, everything on the table. That's my thing.

[4786] SPEAKER_21: That's really a great idea in terms of the framework. It's just hard for me to then kind of go out and say, okay, like, so, like, can we do, I guess it'd be option C, because it'd be option A, district office, like, the board committed that we won't take, not that it's a lot, but as a statement, benefits, any travel, conferences, like, you know, as a way to be like, Like, it's not going to save the budget, but it gives us to say, look, like, we're doing this because we care and not because there's any particular interest. You know what I mean? Like, that's the piece that I feel like we haven't been able to analyze.

[4824] SPEAKER_19: And that needs to be a public conversation. I agree. What I'm saying, I think, is there's still time to do that. We have to carve it out, though.

[4830] Nancy Thomas: And I hope, though, you'll give board members an opportunity to sit down with you and dialogue about what some of our thinking is and push back at us or at least give us the opportunity to give you some some input because for now we haven't had any opportunity and why not do it individually we can do that individually or we can do that and I want to do that I just want to make sure I have staff input first because they're going to be closer to work and I'll be able to give you better thinking because I personally can't go into every category and make the best decision compared to what I think staff would recommend

[4868] SPEAKER_19: So I just need to get that in first, and then if I can get something to you before Thanksgiving, and we can sit down and look at that, one-on-one, or two-by-two, or however you want to do it, I'm open to that. Absolutely.

[4880] SPEAKER_25: So we're at $6.25. Do you feel comfortable with $6.25? I have a question for that person.

[4884] SPEAKER_19: Which number? I need a number and then how you want to do it.

[4888] SPEAKER_33: Yes. All right. Let's say we take community input, the $3.254. It's the amount that we take off. Those are the numbers that are put into the budget. We send that to the county. And we find we don't have to do as much. What's going to happen if we don't take, if we add to some of these categories and so the amount that we reduce is less? Is there going to be a problem with that?

[4913] SPEAKER_24: No, so long as at first interim, we are balanced and we're able to serve by 5%. So the balance is the important thing. In the end, the county wants the board to commit to making the level of reductions that we are going to have to make with some framework for staff on where we're making those adjustments. And then at first interim, we're going to be certifying the new multi-year projection. And that multi-year projection we're committing to the county is going to certify positive. So we're going to take, when we get to first interim, there are a lot of things that will change. We will lock down the actual CVETS number and we'll recast the projection on enrollment. We will also have an adjustment because there's some one-time funding in the current year that we know we're getting that we didn't know at budget adoption. We know that there's some other changes with regard to just programmatic things and other funding sources that have come up and some minor changes on the restricted side as well that have happened since budgeted adoption. And we have the rollover of the ending fund balance of last year, which came in about between 675 and 750,000 higher than we projected. So all of those will factor in. at first interim. So the county knows more adjustments are coming. We've had that conversation and they've had it with every district in the county because we're not the only district that's facing these resolutions.

[4986] SPEAKER_33: So if we take the community input, it is heavier than we need to do in all the categories. That gives every bucket of functions a larger amount to take out.

[4999] SPEAKER_19: Just to be clear, this sheet has adjusted for the new number of 3.6.

[5006] SPEAKER_33: recasting based on the right right so 3.2 right 3.2 would be what we would reduce in addition to the 1.2 48 correct so we absolutely

[5026] SPEAKER_19: So option A would be a total of $3,617,353. Option B would also be $3,617,353. It just, we broke it out because I wanted to capture the freeze in there.

[5039] SPEAKER_33: But the community input was done based on the fact that we had 1.248 already taken out. And that was the goal they were, we said to them to go through. We'd have to reduce 3.2.

[5049] SPEAKER_24: We said that. We did. Well, we had said 3.1 and they came in high. Right.

[5053] SPEAKER_33: Okay. So, but even if, you know, well, so then I guess it's a push. It doesn't make much difference, you're saying. Any of these, any of these final line on option A, B or community input, it's all the same.

[5066] SPEAKER_19: I think, yeah, the question really is to the board, do you want to go for the, is the bottom number of the resolution 3.6, or is it the 2.4 that's adjusted from the county letter?

[5080] SPEAKER_24: The bottom line of the resolution will still be 3.6 either way. It will be the same, it's the same. Yes, I agree with you.

[5085] SPEAKER_25: What I'm going to do, we want the resolution.

[5087] SPEAKER_24: We want to keep the 1.2 credit, sorry, we're going to take that. So what I'm going to, if you get back, and I'm sorry Pat, we probably should have got it by this time. I've already gone through and started identifying with the things that the board's already done, what function codes do they fall in. I'm going to drop all of those numbers of the 1.248 in on top of the 2.3 if the board selects option A. And if the board selects option B, then option B will be, or whatever new number the board comes up with, that's how the resolution is going to be worded.

[5117] Nancy Thomas: The way I see it option A is a safe option because it if we have difficulty getting to option B you know to the effect that to the extent that we can work on option A and then have more cuts that get us closer to option B, we're ahead. We're saving money.

[5138] SPEAKER_25: Option B, we're backtracking. That's true. Because by doing option B, we're saying, okay, let's reverse the 1.2 after they already took. But then let's decide now to cut 3.6 total versus option A. Okay, we've already taken that stuff, 1.2. Oh, no, I misunderstood. Let's move forward to 2.4.

[5153] Nancy Thomas: I misunderstood. I thought that that was, never mind. Yeah. Okay.

[5157] SPEAKER_33: That's why I'm saying if you knew the input, it's, you take more out.

[5160] SPEAKER_25: I mean, to me, it was a no-brainer.

[5163] SPEAKER_19: Another way to say it would be option A, with the understanding that the superintendent, when opportunities present themselves, will lighten the cuts at school site level and technology for the priorities given from the community. Because then as I was, we started working with staff and we started seeing, you know, there's some savings here, we'd like to stay away from that. That helps us bring those recommendations forward to you. in a better way, so I think there's a way you guys can give me that direction so that, you know, I'm still following the spirit of what the community wanted and in the recommendations we bring forward, we can honor that. Yeah.

[5200] Ray Rodriguez: That agenda item should go real quick because we've already basically said what we're going to do. Yeah. Option A.

[5213] SPEAKER_19: We got to build a resolution and hand it out to everybody, so that's why.

[5219] SPEAKER_33: I still think it was better. We're going for, yeah, asking for bigger cuts.

[5222] Nancy Thomas: I want option A. Yeah, option B is a non-starter. I was thinking of something else. I think you have consensus. Okay.

[5232] SPEAKER_35: All right, we're over time already.

No minutes available.