Special Meeting

No content available.

[144] Phuong Nguyen: Good evening and welcome to the April 27th Newark Unified School District Board of Education special meeting. We're holding in-person board meetings. at our district boardroom and are following the states and Alameda County safety guidelines for public gatherings. Please refrain from attending in-person meetings if you have COVID related symptoms. If you're not able to attend the meeting in person, you may observe the meeting via the NUSD YouTube channel or live stream transmission on Comcast channel 26. There is also Spanish translation available via Zoom. In regards to public comment, the public will have the opportunity to address the board regarding non-agendized matters and agendized items with a live audio-only comment via Zoom with an advance notice requested by email at publiccomment at newarkunified.org, a written comment by submitting a speaking card via email at publiccomment at newarkunified.org, or with live in-person comments by submitting a speaker card with the executive assistant. Roll call, please, Ms. Gutierrez.

[216] SPEAKER_19: Board member Marquez. Present. Board member Hill. Here. Board member Zeng. Here. Vice president Grindahl.

[226] Phuong Nguyen: Here.

[227] SPEAKER_19: President Nguyen. Here. Student board member absent.

[232] Phuong Nguyen: Thank you. On to item 2.1, approval of the agenda. May I get a motion to approve the agenda as is? Motion made by Member Marquez. I'll second. Seconded by Member Grindel. Roll call. How do you vote, Member Marquez? Yes. How do you vote, Member Zhang? Yes. How do you vote, Member Hill? Yes. How do you vote, Member Grindel?

[264] Phuong Nguyen: Yes. I'm also an aye, so five ayes. Thank you. All right, on to consent agenda non-personnel item, item 3.1. Circular, non-circular overnight out-of-state field trip for Newark Memorial High School rocketry to Virginia. Superintendent Triplett.

[290] Mark Triplett: Thank you. Good evening. Am I on? Can you hear me OK? OK. Good evening, board members and public and staff. Yes, this item, we're really excited. that the Rocketry Club has been, what's the word? It's qualified for the national competition in the D.C. area, in Virginia, I believe. And so, although we really wanted to focus the majority of this session on the budget balancing solutions, we did add this just to make sure that we had gotten this in because the trip is coming up. It is on the 11th, so there's another board meeting before then. But just to be safe, we wanted to make sure that we got the item up. So we have three different rocketry groups that's qualified to go to this national competition. It's super exciting. They're really jazzed up. And we're actually hoping to have some of the students come and speak at a board meeting in the future and talk a little bit about the experience.

[360] Phuong Nguyen: Does anyone have any comments or questions?

[363] SPEAKER_18: I just have a comment. First and foremost, good evening, everyone. And I wanted to commend Teacher Burns for moving steadfast and taking care of this and providing our youth the opportunity to participate in something across. For some, it may be the first time that they've actually traveled out of state or on plane. So it's going to be exciting as well as knowing that we have the three teams that are participating. So if there are no other comments, I'm ready to make a motion.

[387] Phuong Nguyen: Member Hill?

[388] Aiden Hill: Thank you. So I understand that the trip and the event is commendable. But I think that given the cuts that we've already had to go through as a district and the fact that we're talking about additional pretty severe cuts in budget balancing right after this agenda item, I just don't think it's appropriate that we fund this at this point until we can get things sort of under control. So that's my position.

[421] Phuong Nguyen: Member Grindel?

[424] Terrence Grindall: I'm excited for the teams and when Member Marquez is ready to make her motion, I'm happy to second it.

[433] Phuong Nguyen: I just wanted to say congratulations to all the teams that qualified and wish you all the best of luck when you're headed, once we approve this, for approval and when the team is headed out to the competition. So Member Marquez?

[452] SPEAKER_18: Just one last comment before I make the actual motion. I do want to commend, again, the teacher, Burns, because in reading the report, I did recognize that there is a GoFundMe and that the students are fundraising to pay for this trip. I think about the minimal cost is $4.80 per student. And that's what they're fundraising for, because they've taken the time in this short amount of time or period to actually get the fundraising and the funds to pay for the trip. So that doesn't affect what it is that we're working with this evening. Thank you, Teacher Burns and the staff and the parents and the community for making sure that this is an event that will last a lifetime for these students. So if you could please send us an email and let us know the link or provide us the information for the GoFundMe to support these youth and let the community know what it is that we're doing so they can reach this goal, I'd appreciate it. I make the motion that we approve.

[507] Terrence Grindall: I'll second. I'll second.

[509] Phuong Nguyen: Thank you. Motion made by Member Marquez, seconded by Member Grindel. How do you vote, Member Zhang? Yes. Member Marquez? Yes. Member Hill? No. Member Grindel?

[522] Jodi Croce: Yes.

[524] Phuong Nguyen: I'm a yes. Four yeses and one no.

[528] Mark Triplett: Thank you. Sorry, President Nguyen. If I could say, just to be clear, that there are some funds, I believe, that will be coming out of the club the Rocketry Club funds, but the majority is something that the students do. Like you said, Member Marquez, the students are trying to fundraise for, so the majority of the cost is really something that I believe they're really asking the community to rally around and try to support. So, yeah, just to be clear about that.

[563] Terrence Grindall: Yeah, and just to reiterate, like Member Marquez indicated, board members and the public would love to have the connection to that GoFundMe, because as members of the community, we'd be we'd be interested in helping.

[576] Phuong Nguyen: Yes, I would. I'm in agreement with my fellow board members, member Marquez and member Grindel. I'm happy to if we could get that additional information. I would love to make a donation to for the trip. Thank you.

[590] Mark Triplett: Thank you. Will do.

[598] Phuong Nguyen: Okay, on to our study session, 4.1 Budgeting Balancing Solution. Do you want to make any statements here, Ms.dela Cruz, or should we just move to the table?

[612] Marie dela Cruz: Just briefly, the study session is going to be based on the assumptions in the second interim budget report and the multi-year projections and how At this point, we are projecting a deficit of $4.5 million in the next fiscal year and $4.7 million in 2023-2024. So our study session will be focused on how the board has committed to at least implementing solutions of $4.5 million for next year and $4.7 million in the following year so that we can have a discussion and incorporate hopefully some of the items that we have come up with in our 22-23 adopted budget.

[660] Phuong Nguyen: Great. Thank you so much. Let's move on over to the conference table and we'll start our study session. Thank you. Please begin.

[708] SPEAKER_24: 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, with liberty and justice for all.

[777] Nicole Pierce-Davis: And it's, yeah, and it's meaning to, so that the people on YouTube can pass it.

[781] Marie dela Cruz: No, I missed the clicker for that. Marie, let me get batteries for you.

[804] Marie dela Cruz: Okay, so good evening, everyone. I've included an attachment on the board agenda. I will also print it out for you to follow along if you like. Next slide, please. So what we will be reviewing this evening during the study session is the purpose of the session, which I've already kind of went through before we sat down. And then the board also asked that we review our enrollment and ADA history and projections. And then we have some potential budget balancing solutions that we'd like to present and discuss. And then something new for next year is a reserve cap that we'll be reviewing and then board discussion. If you want me to go through the presentation first and then discussion or discuss as we go along, that's up to you. Whatever's however you want to.

[877] Marie dela Cruz: Sure. OK, next slide, please. So this is a review of our enrollment and ADA history since 2013-14. You can see how our enrollment in 2013-14 was at 6,294. And then as of our second interim period, our enrollment for this year is down to 5,167. So in terms of how our funding is based on our ADA, which is average daily attendance and not enrollment. So our historical ratio of ADA to enrollment has always been about 97 to 98%. However, this year it has gone down due to our COVID situation and protocols. So this year our ratio is at 93%. Our ADA based funding for the last couple of years has been based on the 1920 ADA, which the state has given us a provision to use our ADA from 1920, but that will end at the end of this year. So starting next year, we're back to the regular ADA base, which is either you get funded based on your current year or prior year, whichever is higher. So our ADA projected for next year is a lot lower than our base ADA. It's over 600 ADA lower than our 1920 ADA. So it's going to impact our funding for next year. All right.

[1003] Phuong Nguyen: Yes. Do you know if, or we won't find out until the May revise, if they're deciding whether or not they're going to average the three years or we just go by prior year and current year?

[1019] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah. At this time, since we don't have a definite decision by the state and we probably will have a better idea at May revise, but The legislature probably won't pass the bill until June when they pass the budget. So we have to base our budget right now based on either current year or prior year. We're hoping the governor's proposal will be approved, which is based on a three-year average.

[1056] Mark Triplett: Could I just add something in there? You used the word hope. And I think that that's really important. All of what we're going to do tonight is based on what we currently know is going to happen. We all hope that the legislature will actually give us some relief. And if they do, then some of these really hard decisions won't be necessary in the same way. But as we all know, we should not be budgeting based on hope.

[1095] Mark Triplett: However, in the meantime, we want to make sure that we are doing our due diligence and really moving forward with hard decisions based on the current reality.

[1105] Terrence Grindall: Well, I think that's a conservative approach.

[1110] Terrence Grindall: In addition, really just talking about sort of a softer landing rather than sort of an ongoing fix, if I understand the language. So it's prudent for us to be thinking in terms of how we match our revenues with our expenditures, even though we may have a few years to get it done. I think it's prudent to do it the way you're proposing.

[1136] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, and the guidance that we received from the county has been based on what we know today, which is current year versus prior year.

[1149] Terrence Grindall: Yeah, we'll continue to hope, though.

[1150] Mark Triplett: Continue to hope. There's always hope.

[1152] SPEAKER_18: And this is through 23, correct? Through June of- 20. It would be June 30th, 2023. What it is with the governor, what the budget spread is.

[1164] Marie dela Cruz: The proposal, three-year average, I believe it's ongoing. It will be. They could always change it to temporary, maybe for the next couple of years.

[1180] Mark Triplett: what's currently on the table is for an ongoing change.

[1184] Terrence Grindall: Yeah, it's a roll in three years. So it just removes the shocks. It doesn't change the real bottom line at the end.

[1195] Aiden Hill: And the last year, so this current year, 2021-22, so that's to date right now, right? I mean, we're obviously not finished with the year. And so 470. as of this point. And then what's the source for the enrollment data?

[1219] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, so the enrollment data is from our student information and our student information system. Same with the attendance. So that was the attendance report data as of December.

[1234] Aiden Hill: And would the enrollment number ever change?

[1248] Marie dela Cruz: OK, so next slide, please. So our enrollment in ADA projections for next year and the two subsequent years is based on the report that we received from School Works, our demographers. So you can see our enrollment projections are still declining for the next couple of years. And relative to that would be when we look at our ADA, how we project it based on our current enrollment, an ADA to enrollment ratio of 95%, that too is on a declining trend.

[1301] Aiden Hill: So just out of curiosity, so I literally got an email today in my district from the central office basically telling everybody that they were advising the schools to put a hold on section scheduling because there was an unanticipated, actually, increase in enrollment. And I'm not sure, and it's going to take a few weeks to sort that out, and But do we see anything like that potentially happening right now? Because I know that the demographers have done a study at some point recently. But are we seeing any fluctuation in that projected enrollment, at least for next year, those numbers?

[1349] Marie dela Cruz: Well, just based on our review and some pre-registration information, there are some fluctuations. some optimistic numbers for certain areas, but we really won't know for sure because there's still a lot of... Sure. But we're not seeing a potential increase at this point? Not at this point, no. Okay. Yeah. The ADA is what we're gonna focus on because that's really what we get funded. So if we have historically been at 97, 98%, And because of the pandemic, it's gone down. That is one of our proposed solutions in that we start focusing on how can we get our students in school, and what do we need to do to increase our attendance rate.

[1402] Aiden Hill: And why are we projecting, because in the prior slide, you were saying that historically, 88 enrollment is 97 to 98%. Why are we projecting 93% across the board going forward?

[1413] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, that's a good question. So basically, we have criteria and standards built into the SACS report. And the basis of the criteria is you can go up or down plus or minus 2%. So we could adjust that projection plus or minus 2%. But at the same time, again, we're just being conservative based on our current experience.

[1446] Terrence Grindall: Well, I applaud the being conservative in this case where we've really we really see a departure and due to COVID, which is hopefully, you know, receding in the rearview mirror as I sit with a mask on. I think, you know, 2% still gets still is still 2% up is still well below the historical average. So I'm not sure that I agree with being that conservative in terms of the ADA, because I think as COVID disappears, you would return to more historical averages. So if you're allowed to go up, I think that might be more prudent.

[1487] Marie dela Cruz: Yes, and that is one of our proposals.

[1493] SPEAKER_18: get to that. The one question I had is then the opposite. So let's say the budget then does come through, everything comes through, and it's not what we anticipated, right? I'm not to be pessimistic, but I'm thinking as far as protection-wise, so that 2% wouldn't drop us to the 91. Is that correct?

[1509] Marie dela Cruz: No, I think we're talking 95.

[1513] SPEAKER_18: So if we know that worst case, it would be maybe 91. You see what I'm saying? So looking at that study, what would 91 look like, 93, 95? so that we have some type of data to look at. You never want to say worst case, but at the same time, it's preparing us to know this is what we could come up against if it is not approved. And worst case scenario, because we're using that 2% buffer, positive or negative.

[1544] Marie dela Cruz: Right. And plus, we're still finalizing the P2 attendance period. We're hoping it's still at least 93%, but it could even be lower, like you're saying, because what happened in January after Christmas break, we did have a spike and a few more students out at that time.

[1569] Terrence Grindall: I'd like to make another point, and although I think we have to use our demographers, our best estimates going forward, but we also hope, back to the hope idea, Our efforts to better market our district and things like the dual language immersion program and so forth are going to lead to more enrollment. I'm not saying we should build that into our assumptions, but I do want to inject hope that if we're successful in better marketing the district, we will see increased enrollment as well. But again, I'm all for being conservative, using the experts' demography, but we also have some reason to hope.

[1613] Marie dela Cruz: Thank you. Next slide. So this is a review from our second interim multi-year projection based on the assumptions with our COLA at 5.33% for next year and 3.61 for 2023-2024. It also assumes that we're back to our ADA year. The current year versus prior year instead of the old harmless prison provision. With with those assumptions. We are projecting the almost 4 and a half million in deficit. For next year and then. for the next couple of years that still meets the 3% minimum. We'll also go over a little bit about that in the next couple of slides. Next slide, please. So when we look at budget balancing, just basics in order to balance our budget, we're either looking for ways to increase our revenues, or how could we reduce expenditures and find some cost savings measures?

[1709] Aiden Hill: Can we go back one slide?

[1710] Marie dela Cruz: Oh, uh-huh. One slide? Yeah. Sure.

[1713] Aiden Hill: So, actually, sorry. Yeah, that one. So, 689 was funded ADA. Yeah. And so, we're saying ADA for this year is 4794. And then that was a decrease from the prior year of when I added up 373. And then if we're projecting going down to 4,700, that's an additional 94. So can you help me understand how you calculated the 689 less funding? 5,483 minus 4,700? Didn't that come out?

[1759] Marie dela Cruz: So it's the ADA 4700 compared to 5483. That's from the year prior? Yes. 5483, 5,483 has been our ADA base for the last couple of years because of the special hold harmless provision that the governor gave us because of COVID. So remember that COVID started in March, spring of 2020. So they allowed us to use our 19-20-88 because of that. Okay.

[1798] Marie dela Cruz: Thank you. So next slide, please. So these are some of the line items potentially that we we're considering in terms of ways to balance our budget. So in increasing our revenues, we talked about increasing our ADA by at least 100 each year. And that's about 2%, you know, what we talked about in terms of staying within our range and our criteria and standards for our SACS report. So each 100 ADA based on 10,000 average per student, or per ADA, because it's really about attendance. It's about a million dollars. And if you break it up by school, 10 schools, that's 10 per school. So we think it's doable. And plus, looking at our history, where we've always been 97%, 98%, I think we just need to focus on what we can do to increase and improve our attendance. hopefully with the pandemic also, it will help improve that number.

[1880] Terrence Grindall: Can you see what, can you, do you have already or could you generate at some point what percentage ADA, what percentage ADA that would mean? You know, basically how optimistic are these perspectives? Is it 1% better than it's been, than it's been you know, in the worst of times, is it a much better, you know, be good to know what the 88 percentage would be based on the, on this, on the next page, the revenue enhancements.

[1914] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, it's about 2%, 2% more.

[1922] Terrence Grindall: Okay, and the 2% is a cap that comes from the county or the state?

[1928] Marie dela Cruz: It's a state, the state standards. In order to meet the standards. If you go beyond that, then it causes a red flag. It says not met, not met, not met. But just to reiterate, but historically, our attendance has been much higher, up in the 98th percentile, or more or less? 97, 98%, yes.

[1952] Aiden Hill: We've had great attendance. If you put it at 97%, you're over 200.

[1966] Terrence Grindall: Right. And we have every reason to think that we should return more to a normal pattern. Maybe not exactly normal, but people are going to be a little more concerned. If Johnny or Jane has a sniffle, they might be more likely to stay home, although that could have actually net positives. But that's another story. Anyway, so that's really as optimistic as we can be. That's sort of within the rules, because none of us want to be waving any red flags.

[2006] Aiden Hill: Well, I think that what really hit our EDA was probably the Omicron surge. And so it seems reasonable to expect an increase of at least 100. next year unless we have some new outbreak. So that part I understand, but can you explain how we're calculating the increase in unduplicated?

[2034] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, so the unduplicated pupil percentage is the percentage of students that we have as English learners, foster youth, and low income. So that percentage was really impacted as well because of the universal free meal program. So a lot of our families didn't feel the need to complete our lunch applications. So we really have to make a push on that as well. If you remember our more than a meal campaign, it truly is. It's not just about getting a free lunch, those applications give us additional funding because that's the way that our state gives us the supplemental and concentration money. So anything above 55%, we get additional funding.

[2091] Terrence Grindall: Right, so the district benefits, but under the existing circumstance or the past circumstance where there was no need to fill out that form and to get the lunch, it so now you know when we return to normal if people don't fill out that form it's going to hit them in their own pocketbook and hurt the district right so if they they're going to have to fill out the form in order to get the free lunch going starting next year or is that a certainty or is there any talk of that extending?

[2127] Marie dela Cruz: I believe there's talk of that extending for next year as well so but there's also other areas where the families get benefits from completing these applications. It's not just the free meals.

[2142] Terrence Grindall: I think there's other things that you could talk about. Right. That's your more than a meal sort of campaign to get people to sign up. I understand. Thank you.

[2153] Mark Triplett: But as you know, it is challenging.

[2162] Phuong Nguyen: Can we put that? I mean, I think in the In the prior two years when we had the free and reduced lunch, I don't think the forms went out with the enrollment packets at the elementary school. They were being passed out as families were coming to pick up lunches, but can we make that? part of the enrollment packets, because I remember it being that way when my kids were a lot younger, that it was part of the enrollment packets, so families had to fill that out and submit that before they got their class scheduled.

[2196] Marie dela Cruz: We have talked about that, yes. Plus, I think the applications also went online, so they're kind of also didn't help from what I understand, because there's still a lot of families that wanted to do it on papers. So we'll have to make a push for that. And again, $100,000 is another conservative number. In our best years, I think the district has had like 70%, 80% of unduplicated pre-billed percentage.

[2235] Terrence Grindall: And if that were to return, what would that number be?

[2239] Marie dela Cruz: That number will be a lot higher, I would say. Like 500,000. A lot more. A lot more. Currently we're at about 50% or a little bit below. We're below 55%.

[2252] Terrence Grindall: We're not getting any funding. There's no incentive. It's not necessary for the families to fill out that form to get free lunch. You know, it's another form that's on their table that doesn't have an effect on them directly. Whereas if their kid comes home from school saying, uh-oh, if we don't follow this form, I'm not going to get lunch, that's going to motivate, right?

[2286] Marie dela Cruz: But it does provide additional services, especially what's included in our LCAP in terms of intervention.

[2297] Phuong Nguyen: I think a lot of times families aren't sure what the form is all about, too. So I think we need to do a better job at explaining what the benefits of filling out the form is for, so that we can probably capture that better. Yeah.

[2310] SPEAKER_18: For some reason, I envision this liaison or family advocacy where it's almost as if it was every four years in the census, where someone was coming in the evening, or you're having the local library or even the board in the school, multi-purpose rooms open where the family's able to go and eat on weekends and complete some of this paperwork and have that worker from the census approach to make sure that we're letting them know how important the paperwork is.

[2346] Phuong Nguyen: Yeah, correct, because there's a lot of families who they pack their lunches for their students and for their kids and they don't know that, hey, there's additional benefits that the district gets and the school sites get because you're filling out that form, right? And a lot of kids, I've had families tell me, oh, well, my kids don't really like the school much, so we just pack, and so we don't fill out the form. So that's something to keep in mind.

[2376] Marie dela Cruz: And so now we go through some of the expenditure reductions we considered. So in terms of certificated FTEs, because of declining enrollment, we'd be able to decrease about 10 FTEs based on our declining enrollment. So that would be about $1.3 million for next year. And then in the following year, add a couple more FTEs to that. estimated at one and a half million.

[2418] Terrence Grindall: Is this roughly proportional to, not roughly, is this proportional to the reduction in enrollment? In other words, assuming class size is staying the same, you simply, you're dividing the number of students by the, I know this is overly simplified, but you're dividing the number of students by the normal class size and you're getting a, we need this many teachers. nuances because of special ed and special programs. But basically, it's keeping our ratios the same. Because there's less children, we don't need as many positions if that happens.

[2461] Marie dela Cruz: Exactly. Yes. And that's exactly what we do when we do our projections based on enrollment per school, the class sizes, and grade levels, how many FTEs we allocated to each school based

[2486] Aiden Hill: FTE rate of like 75,000. I don't know if that's the right number or not. We're talking about a reduction of 39 FTEs in terms of teachers certificated. Is that roughly the number of people we're talking about reducing?

[2502] Marie dela Cruz: No, we're using 100,000 as a estimate for an FTE for certificated. So it's about 13 FTEs. for next year. For next year, and then another couple of FTEs in the following year. Because it's ongoing. So unless enrollment starts to increase, the reductions that you make for next year would still carry to the following year. That's the concept, the idea there.

[2536] Terrence Grindall: And then just for scale, how many How many positions, how many FTEs exist in those positions right now? So you're talking about a 13 reduction out of how many?

[2548] Marie dela Cruz: It's about, well, 13 FTEs total. How many FTEs total? Certificated. Certificated. Yeah, right under 300. Right under 300. Yeah, almost 300. So 13 of the 300. 13%. Yeah. But 300, that's. Sorry.

[2569] Aiden Hill: And then in terms of

[2596] Marie dela Cruz: reduction, we haven't really identified what positions those might be. But we would have to go through and see where.

[2603] Terrence Grindall: So that's not as clear of a ratio as you need. You're going to have a teacher roughly for every 28 to 30 kids or something like that. But when it comes to estimating your classified, there's no real clear formula about that, right? Right. Because we're talking about everything. We've got the same six schools, right?

[2633] Marie dela Cruz: We have the same six elementary schools in similar facilities and so on. So we'd have to look at our priorities.

[2650] SPEAKER_18: Figures were determined, right? And for example, the reduction of the certificate of death, DE, was it a conversation that was being held in the bargaining unit with the teachers? Or was this just from the main office coming up with this projection?

[2665] Marie dela Cruz: Well, we did engage our management and our labor partners in terms of getting some feedback on potential reductions.

[2680] Mark Triplett: And the reductions you see certificated for 22-23, that's the board has seen those as well.

[2686] SPEAKER_18: Right. And I'm just like, because it's going on, right, to 23-24. So I just wanted to make sure that this wasn't, for example, the 23-24 is something that this is the first time that they're seeing, right? This is something that they have been involved with or aware of. And this wouldn't be the first time, basically.

[2706] Terrence Grindall: Can I also, can I roll back just a little bit also? What is our typical natural rate of people retiring or leaving the district?

[2720] Terrence Grindall: What's our normal attrition rate? Is that 13 in the ballpark of that or much higher? Anyone willing to take a guess at that stat of that?

[2732] Nicole Izant: Not off the top of my head.

[2733] Phuong Nguyen: I don't think, I mean, from previous years, just thinking about it, I don't think there was a huge percentage. It was relatively low, like probably maybe less than 2%, 2%. But again, I'm speculating. Good.

[2751] Mark Triplett: I do think there is some fluctuation through the year.

[2756] Terrence Grindall: And we hear of the Great Visitation.

[2758] Nicole Pierce-Davis: I would say COVID is a particularly special year.

[2768] SPEAKER_18: if the idea is entertained that if there are staff that maybe are on that, you know, edge thinking yes or no, whether we as a school district, do we have the opportunity or the availability to offer possibly a golden handshake, right, so that then we can meet the projections that we have.

[2795] Aiden Hill: So classified FTEs, what was our sort of assumption around a rate? So is it 100? Is it 150?

[2807] Marie dela Cruz: Average for classified, for one FTE, it's about 50 to 60. So we're talking about two? So we're talking about two to three FTEs.

[2815] Aiden Hill: OK. And what's the total number of classified that we have in the district?

[2824] Abbey Keirns: It's pretty equivalent to the teaching staff. It's right under 300. Under 300 as well.

[2829] Marie dela Cruz: Real close. And then the next line item. Oh, sorry.

[2836] Terrence Grindall: With that many people, that probably is close to the natural attrition rate, right? If you're talking about one or two positions, is that what you're talking about?

[2848] Terrence Grindall: With almost 300 positions, you're probably losing that many a year just typically. People retiring, people. One or two? Oh, next. Oh, yeah.

[2866] Mark Triplett: We can't control which category.

[2868] Terrence Grindall: I understand. But even within that, if our people have interest in expanding their abilities and areas, there may be opportunities. As long as we have a similar number of positions, you know, the ones that people who are motivated to get into other areas, we have that opportunity. There's a possibility that we can hold that out to them. Does that make sense?

[2905] Marie dela Cruz: That's a good answer. Thanks. The next line item, offset general fund salaries with one-time COVID funds. We do have some COVID funds still available for next year that we are allowed to use to offset some of the generally funded salaries. So for next year, that's about a million dollars. But for the following year, we won't have that same opportunity. So that's just for next year.

[2947] Terrence Grindall: Like the state, that really is sort of a soft landing sort of approach. It's not an ongoing fix, but it does avoid the shock to the system.

[2955] SPEAKER_18: And also they use it or you're going to lose it, right? There is no recovery. So let's say we wanted to bank it, we couldn't because according to the stipulations, it has to be used by the end of 2023, correct?

[2969] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah. Some of the funding is 23, some is 24. And then management, one-day furlough is about $20,000 for next year. These are really tough. We're trying to look at every possibility. Management FTEs for the following year is about $150,000. So again, that's probably one FTE.

[2997] Terrence Grindall: How does the one-day furlough work? What's envisioned?

[3003] Marie dela Cruz: All of management would take one day, non-paid. For a month or? For the year. One day period? One day period, yeah. Yes. We did that in 2021 as part of a balancing solution at that time.

[3021] Terrence Grindall: Right. Now, that would probably mean there'd be less use of other time as well. Not a one-to-one, but So a lot of the other time has essentially cash value, at least upon retirement, right? So our staff already has, compared to the private sector, already a fair amount of time off. And so adding a furlough date might just mean there's less consumption of vacation time.

[3066] Mark Triplett: something to consider. Thank you.

[3069] Aiden Hill: What categories fall into the management bucket, and how many people are we talking about?

[3076] Marie dela Cruz: The management is the NEWMA group. OK. So it's all of our principals, executive cabinet, and directors. OK. And how many supervisors? How many people total in that category? And then your rate that you're calculating when you say reduce management FTEs, what's your rate that you're planning for there?

[3105] Nicole Pierce-Davis: It's one FTE.

[3132] Marie dela Cruz: And then a general reduction in materials and supplies, our overall budget for unrestricted materials and supplies is about $3 million. So reducing that by 10% gives us $310,000. And if we do that next year and the following year, that should help reduce our expenditures. And then in services and other operating expenditures, $200,000. Oh, sorry. In terms of the reduction?

[3163] Terrence Grindall: in supplies, what impact would that have on the students?

[3170] Marie dela Cruz: That's a good question. We're trying to stay away from reducing site allocations as much as we can. So it's materials and supplies for maybe non-instructional-type items, that we'd have to look at our priorities.

[3197] Nicole Pierce-Davis: Also, just to add to that, when we did look at the budget collectively, we did notice that there was some funding not used for some of those supplies. I would like to think that that is maybe because during distance learning, we increased our Chromebooks and maybe learned some other ways instead of doing paper. I would like. That is a complete conjecture on my part, right? but something to consider when we think about this number.

[3226] Terrence Grindall: Well, if my experience is any indication, it seems like I've been using my printer to do the things that the school's printer used to do.

[3235] Nicole Pierce-Davis: Well, listen, that works too. I think you get a better deal on it than I do.

[3238] Terrence Grindall: And prior to COVID, I mean,

[3246] Phuong Nguyen: In the elementary schools, definitely, there's always a list that went out to parents and families for class supply donations too. So that really helped out too.

[3257] Terrence Grindall: Yeah, what I'm hearing is there's already a priority on not having it affect the classroom.

[3263] Marie dela Cruz: And some of the budget this year also, in terms of Chromebooks, We won't have to repurchase, right? So that's also part of the materials and supplies.

[3276] Aiden Hill: Right. And the materials and supplies is only in the classroom or supplies including other expenditures?

[3292] Marie dela Cruz: And in services and other operating expenditures, that includes consultants, professional services, legal fees, utilities, anything we can do to save in those areas. We're estimating we could probably save about $200,000 a year in that category.

[3317] Terrence Grindall: Are the savings from the solar arrays figured into that already?

[3321] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, we've already included that in our current assumptions. That's already been factored in. I was just guessing. Just hoping. Yeah. Because again, that was part of our balancing solution the last time we went through this exercise.

[3357] Terrence Grindall: Right. Is there any thought of expanding the solar program in that regard? Not that it probably wouldn't hit in either of these two years, but it does provide some hope of cost savings, correct?

[3370] Marie dela Cruz: Yes. We have already started conversations on which be next, because we did plan on having another phase. Because the two schools that we did were what we were considering phase one, because we knew that we would be consolidating schools. We didn't want to start adding solar panels to schools that could potentially close. That's why we did the junior high and the high school. So now, yes, we are talking about the next phase.

[3400] Terrence Grindall: And just to retract to the communities about that as well. The way that that was structured is it didn't actually cost us capital costs. We allowed the solar arrays, and they were financed by another party. And we achieved cost savings without any capital outlay at all.

[3423] Marie dela Cruz: Correct. Yes. It was through what they call a purchasing power agreement. So the contractor they put up the upfront capital costs, and then they incorporate that into our savings for future years.

[3441] Terrence Grindall: Yes, well, obviously, we'll see that going forward. I like that program for that reason, that we're not having to invest any of our money up front. I also like what it says to our community and to our children about trying to use alternative forms of energy.

[3464] Mark Triplett: been in conversations about combining that with shade structures.

[3487] Terrence Grindall: Or at least even out the cost, right? Two for one.

[3490] Aiden Hill: Yeah. Great.

[3501] Aiden Hill: Okay, and then reduced services and other operating expenditures, so what is our spend in that category, our total spend?

[3516] Marie dela Cruz: But it's over five million, sizeable amounts.

[3526] Aiden Hill: And that district office budget's $158,000.

[3533] SPEAKER_18: Those are the items I think we're seeing in the report. Can we go over it? Can we go here?

[3543] Mark Triplett: You're talking about like purchase?

[3545] SPEAKER_18: Yeah, the $4,000 purchase orders, yes.

[3549] Mark Triplett: And that item is on top of the departments that would result in, for example, a 20% reduction versus a 10% reduction in materials and supplies, which starts to be pretty significant, but necessary.

[3572] Marie dela Cruz: So then the next line item, it's not our favorite item, but the use of one-time reserves is a possibility of $300,000 for next year. And then we do have online instructional platform called Illuminate that we could discontinue. And that's about a $40,000 cost a year. And just looking at overtime, monitoring that and reducing it by 50% would be about $40,000. So total, the revenue enhancements plus our expenditure reductions were up to $4.5 million. $4,548,000 for next year, and then $4,728,000 the following year. So we're just a little bit over our target if we were to implement all of these items.

[3629] Terrence Grindall: Not that we need a whole report on this, but can you describe the Illuminate program and what the impact would be on the students if it was eliminated?

[3639] Marie dela Cruz: Can I defer to Ms. Pierce?

[3641] Nicole Pierce-Davis: So that is our, we talked a lot about- When I say you, I mean all of us.

[3644] Terrence Grindall: Yes, I understand. Understood. Not to put you on the spot, so I don't know.

[3649] Nicole Pierce-Davis: We talked a lot about iReady, right, for the entry. We talked a little bit about Illuminate kind of replacing our SBAC scores last year during COVID and that that was kind of a state program. You could trade out that for Illuminate. So we've only been doing it for a couple of years. And I think we've discussed a lot about how we want to improve progress monitoring assessments. I think we've heard from the board directly. I think we've all heard that we kind of want to think through what those progress monitoring tools could look like and what those kind of leading indicators for assessment could look like at the secondary levels. There are free assessments out there called IEBs. And they're aligned with the SBAC tests Now, Illuminate has other features like embedded assessments and all of those kinds of things. And so, you know, it's one of those tools where if you get really good at using it, right, it could have some benefit. We haven't gotten really good at using it yet. And I say yet because if we continue it, then we would want to get better at it. If we don't, then we would need to find other progress monitoring tools because we have identified that as an area of need.

[3724] Terrence Grindall: I can only imagine, well, let me make it a question instead of a statement. Is there innovation happening in that realm, in that field? Is there a lot of change occurring in terms of what's happening?

[3743] Nicole Pierce-Davis: I mean, not so much. We've seen this kind of innovation happening for the last few years now, right? So Illuminate's been around for some time. permit me to say, I think that because of the distance learning and COVID, what we've seen is a difference in adults' willingness to take up the new technology. And I put myself in that category too, so this is not any sort of statement on tech use. But I think just sort of everyone's sort of willingness and sort of being forced to switch in that space, all of a sudden you're now saying, okay, how can I maintain these tools that I've now learned how to use? And then in some areas, we kind of want to let them go and get back into environmental literacy and get back outdoors and get hands-on learning happening again. So yes and no. It's kind of been out there for some time now.

[3790] Terrence Grindall: I'm sorry to take up some time, but so far I understand what's happening with Luminate is getting rid of it would lose some future potential, but we're not really utilizing that right now anyway. It potentially is something that would impact the options that we would have, but that we're essentially paying for those options now and not using them.

[3812] Nicole Pierce-Davis: Well, it varies. It's not that we're not using them, but it varies by teacher, I think, right now. And so I think across the board, I don't think we would rank ourselves very high right now in terms of utilizing it to its greatest effectiveness.

[3825] Terrence Grindall: But there are some teachers that are using?

[3827] Nicole Pierce-Davis: Yeah. So I think some teachers would absolutely feel this as a loss. especially if they were like an early adopter, you know.

[3835] Aiden Hill: But we did use that as a substitute for CASP.

[3839] Nicole Pierce-Davis: That's what I was just saying, yeah. And we saw those scores, and we saw having, you know, taken them for the first time, those scores were very low. That's why we then looked at the other scores around the PSAT scores that came out of North Memorial as well, and we discussed kind of Again, we've only had this program for not as many years. We certainly hadn't done that level of testing using Illuminate before. And so you saw those growing pains come out of those assessments for sure.

[3868] Aiden Hill: And this is a subscription, right? So this is cloud-based software. So we basically just lock by a certain number of licenses and log into the cloud. We're not actually hosting this software on our own servers, right?

[3884] Clarissa Kennedy: I believe that to be true.

[3888] Terrence Grindall: Yeah, so I guess based on what you're saying, I do have some concerns about taking an instructional tool away from, particularly, there's going to be some of our leading teachers that are using it now. So I have concerns about that.

[3901] Nicole Pierce-Davis: Yeah, and we do, right currently, this is in our LCAP.

[3905] Mark Triplett: It's in there to be, we're proposing to pay for it in our LCAP.

[3910] SPEAKER_18: Was there another source of funding, right, that at the site council levels that we can digest to this? to cover that so that the teachers don't lose that tool. And then the one thing that I did want to ask, the use of the one-time reserves, would that be that category for the $300,000 for next school year? Would that be, if we were to rate the expenditure reductions, like let's say offset general fund salaries, would that be number one? Would that be the first thing we'd do? Then leaving, let's say that we use the one-time reserves as the last, reduction in expenditures that we would touch if we were to rate that? Or is that something that we would look at immediately?

[3956] Marie dela Cruz: For me, it's the last thing that we would want to look at. Because I still feel that having strong reserves really helps keep our district fiscally responsible and stable.

[3977] Terrence Grindall: I was wondering, so what's proposed is essentially shifting the funding to LCAP, not getting rid of, not discontinuing the... No, no.

[3988] Mark Triplett: In the LCAP currently, because none of this has been approved or decided on, we do have it funded in the LCAP.

[3995] Terrence Grindall: I see, so that's a change to the LCAP essentially.

[3997] Nicole Pierce-Davis: It would be a change. I just, I said that to say, you know, we just had a meeting last night. I really, I don't want our community to see that and say, wait a second, we just approved that in the plan and then see that. I just want to make sure.

[4010] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, I could change that to shift or change source, funding source.

[4020] Mark Triplett: Not to belabor the illuminate part, but there are, as Pierce made reference to, there are some other really good free services, in particular, one that you referenced is actually created and monitored by the by the SBAC company itself and a lot of districts just use that and had a lot of abilities to do really fantastic analysis. So with anything it's it's like shifting an entire system over to another entire culture over to another system it's sort of taking that's something that we're exploring. Okay.

[4068] Terrence Grindall: So is that staff's recommendation to do that regardless of the budgetary impact? Would you be moving in that direction in any case?

[4078] Mark Triplett: I think we haven't gone deep into it. Okay. So but it's definitely a possibility

[4086] Terrence Grindall: I guess if you can't see a theme in what I'm saying is I want to impact the classroom teacher, the classroom environment as little as possible. And if $40,000 is causing us to do something that's going to have a direct impact, then I think we should rethink that. But if it's something that's part of a progress anyway, then obviously I want to stay out of that.

[4114] Marie dela Cruz: And we are about 48,000 above our target. So that is one item that.

[4122] Terrence Grindall: Can you describe how the reduction of overtime works? Where do you see that? 50% is a fairly substantial piece. And then, I don't know, where is overtime usually expended?

[4135] Marie dela Cruz: Well, it's in different areas. I think this year we had a lot of clerical support, some custodial, extra custodial. especially when there are no subs available, some maintenance also over time. So a lot of those areas we would have to closely monitor.

[4162] Terrence Grindall: So you're, historically, did we use more over time recently than we have historically had COVID impact that? Is this reduction get back to sort of our normal expenditure of overtime? Or is it really a, is there a real reduction? Is there a chance we can, because I'm assuming every time overtime is used, it's necessary. So there's going to be an impact.

[4195] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, I mean, I think overtime on the average has been anywhere from $80,000 to $100,000 a year for this district.

[4208] Mark Triplett: The other factor there is anytime a district reduces positions as a cost-saving measure, then there's that unintended consequence of requiring more overtime because there's less people. Exactly. That's kind of what I was trying to get to is that, for example,

[4229] Terrence Grindall: is to reduce one classified FTE, and then we're counting on it going down, that's not the way to do it.

[4238] Mark Triplett: If I may, I think with any of these things, we're going to see, I mean, there are cuts because students and community. I think their overtime is a good example. Things could be less clean, or things could be not serviced as quickly. It's just the reality of it. But when faced with these kind of hard decisions, that's kind of why we're here, is to sort of wrestle with that.

[4293] Marie dela Cruz: 80% to 90% of our budget is services, people, salaries, and benefits. It's hard not to get into those areas. Any other suggestions or comments before we move to the next?

[4313] Terrence Grindall: Yes. Back to the revenue, I think given these challenges, we really should be trying to monetize the closed facilities and leasing them out or something like that and see that revenue going in. I know it's hard to figure into a budget, but I really would like to see us making making use of our resources so that we can provide funding that can go into the classroom. And hopefully, as our enrollment increases, then that allows us to do even more. But as we're facing a challenge, and the challenge is like two years from now, right? The real place where we're facing as non-qualified is in the third year that's off this chart, right? Our reserves allow us to to go through and have a qualified budget. But we would be, as we talked about during the budget process, we would be irresponsible not to think about what that happens. So I'd like to hope that we would start to find a way to monetize, to create revenue for our closed facilities.

[4399] SPEAKER_24: And I don't know if I'm going to, if I want to see an estimate of that. However, these are, this goes out to 2024.

[4427] Terrence Grindall: you could imagine that we'd get some revenue from leasing out those facilities.

[4436] SPEAKER_19: Yeah. Or tell me I'm wrong.

[4437] Marie dela Cruz: Possibility. Not today, but today. Yeah. No. We would go through the process, obviously, and it probably will take a year or two before we can actually realize some income.

[4448] Terrence Grindall: Yes. Well, again, if we go that route. You can hire a property manager and start making who would do the leasing and process for you. Because I know your staff is juggling a bunch of things.

[4461] Terrence Grindall: But you could conceivably hire a property manager that could start generating some revenue from the leases relatively quickly.

[4476] Phuong Nguyen: Yeah, it's definitely something that we should probably have a study session on in regards to. what we plan to do with those sites, and then how we can monetize, and like you said, maybe lease them out, and what are our potential options for those sites?

[4494] Terrence Grindall: Absolutely, and maybe more than one.

[4498] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, there's a whole process, and yeah, probably a study session would be a good idea.

[4503] Phuong Nguyen: But in the short term, I know, I mean, obviously the last two years because of COVID, we haven't been able to rent out the multipurpose rooms at the school sites for basketball practices or whatever. Would we be able to continue to do that next year and then in the next couple of years?

[4523] Marie dela Cruz: We started opening up our facilities for use and rent this year. But we could look at our rates again. Maybe that's something that we can adjust. We haven't made any adjustments lately.

[4540] SPEAKER_18: Because our neighboring school districts have made their adjustments.

[4547] Terrence Grindall: do we make, oftentimes, public entities like this that are not in the business of renting out, right? We end up just covering our maintenance costs. Is that the case here, or do we actually make some bottom line revenue from renting our facilities?

[4562] Marie dela Cruz: We do make some good money from our facilities rents.

[4566] Terrence Grindall: Yeah. Well, I'd like to, I certainly would, I'm hearing a consensus around the table that we'd love to see us make sure we're getting fair price for our facilities.

[4579] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah. We have a good program now. It works a lot better than before where it was manual. So we have an online system where our community can go in and book, and it automatically will determine the fees and send them the invoice. It's a lot better.

[4596] Phuong Nguyen: Because I know CYO always books the gym, right? The gym. The gym, yeah.

[4601] Marie dela Cruz: We have quite a few regulars, too.

[4603] Terrence Grindall: But it also plays a role in the school being sort of the center of community as well. And I think that has an enrollment benefit down the road if we're in that realm. So I think it's a good thing. However, we're not a charity. We're here to educate children, and we need to get paid for our resource. Yes, yeah.

[4627] Phuong Nguyen: That's the other thing. I mean, if you're looking around the city as a whole, I mean, We've had the tennis courts, which we could have maintained over the years if we had opened them out and rented the courts out for use, because the courts at Birch Park is really run down, and the one at the community, at the community center is always full. We don't have that many, but the junior high, we have the tennis courts there, and the high school, but obviously those, our facilities right now really do need a nice facelift, right? But if we had nice facilities, we would be able to rent those kinds of things out.

[4674] Aiden Hill: One thing would also, I mean, are we going to save our kind of final recommendations to the end, or are we sort of pulling that up?

[4682] Marie dela Cruz: At any time. I mean, at the end, I did have just some prompts on whether there's a consensus or any other suggestions.

[4694] Aiden Hill: Because what I think would be helpful is, right now, we're looking at a very high level. And we're just looking at numbers. And we're looking at percentages. But we're not actually seeing the details.

[4708] Aiden Hill: So when we say that we're going to cut 13 teacher-certificated FTE, so who specifically are we talking about? And I think that what we want to really focus in on is, focused on you know in terms of being equitable to say our goal should be how do we maximize essentially class size and and we and if there are areas where we aren't able to get to full class size then those should be the ones that should potentially be targeted for you know reduction first you know again it's it's basically based on demand but I think it would be helpful to actually see what those projections are and I mean if least I would feel uncomfortable just signing off and saying well okay we're going to cut so much but we don't really know specifically what we're cutting so that's I guess one observation the other is just as I do the back of the envelope analysis it doesn't seem like we're we're cutting equitably so just on a percentage basis we're taking 4% out of certificated we're taking 1% out of classified we're taking 2.5% out of management and I think that if we're going to If we're going to ask the district to take a haircut, we should try to have it be as equally spread as possible. And I understand that there are situations. But I'm going to give everybody a comparable example. Our state is currently going into drought. And right now, the water districts aren't saying, well, we're going to let you cut back 1% and you cut back 5%. So that's just, you know, that's my perspective on that. But again, I think the details will really show us, again, what's possible and what's not. But where I see an opportunity that it doesn't really seem like we're taking advantage of it at all, so services and other operating expenses, it's $5 million, right? So we're projecting. That's a massive area. We're only taking $200,000 out. That's 4%. And as a former consultant, I know that a lot of services are oftentimes discretionary. And so I think that we should look really hard at that number, because I think that there's probably more that we could take out there.

[4865] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, that also includes our utilities, though. So it's really difficult to cut back on our water, electric.

[4873] Aiden Hill: Sure. But if we could carve that out, and we could see, OK, of the $5 million, how much of that is utilities, and then what's left over, and then what composes that.

[4883] Marie dela Cruz: There's also insurance in there, which is about $600,000. So there's some big ticket items in there. Sure. So we've looked at it all. And then in terms of the certificated, we have presented that to the board because we had our March 15th deadline. So the details of that have gone to the board. That's why you don't see any classified FTEs, because if they didn't go to the board by March 15, we really can't do any reductions for next year. So the details of the FTE reductions have been presented to the board.

[4919] Aiden Hill: But I don't think that we've seen any data around, OK, what are our current class sizes, and are we actually achieving full utilization?

[4930] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, so when we do our projections, that's how we project. So if there's, let's say, 100 first graders that are projected to be at a particular school, we maximize it so that we have just enough FTE. So if it's, let's say, 30 to 1, that would be your three full classes. And then you have your overage of 10. So you have to decide, are you going to overflow that to other schools? do we pay the overage for the teacher? So we've gone through that exercise.

[4966] Aiden Hill: But it would be helpful for us to see the assumptions, the numbers.

[4973] Phuong Nguyen: It was presented to us at a previous board meeting.

[4977] Aiden Hill: So is this being applied equally to every program? So is this being applied equally to, for example, DLI?

[4984] Marie dela Cruz: So we're projecting full enrollment? Full. Yes, so we maximize each class, each FTE when we do our projections. And you sometimes use combined classes to make that work, right? Sometimes we have to do combos, yes.

[5000] SPEAKER_18: And within what's in the MOU with your bargaining units, right?

[5005] Marie dela Cruz: Correct, for each grade level, whatever that class size is for that grade level, we've maxed it out.

[5012] Phuong Nguyen: All right, very good. I have to respectfully disagree with you in terms of, you know, saying that each section should be, you know, equitably reduced by 10%. We're going through the budget process year after year at the City of Lopez, and I see it every year, you know, when they say, okay, each department, you have to come, you know, come back with a 10% reduction in staff. And when our department is small, it's a huge impact. And we have to support 500 plus employees. So no, for me, it doesn't work that way. I don't see that as being equitable at all when there's larger departments that can take a much larger hit in terms of their budget and what it is that is needed. So these assessments that I feel that our current staff is doing here for the district is pretty reasonable.

[5071] Aiden Hill: One, and that's why I'm saying, I understand that, you know, obviously, you know, 10% of a million is bigger than 10% of 10,000, right? And so, you know, so what I'm saying is, is that there's, you know, there's oftentimes, you know, greater opportunities the bigger your budget.

[5089] Phuong Nguyen: No, I don't disagree with you on that.

[5092] Aiden Hill: Right. So, so, but what I'm driving at here is that if we're only looking at these numbers at a high level, the inclination is just simply to say let's level set. And so my thought is that either we try to approach parity if we're operating at this level, or what I would really much rather see is I think what you're driving at is to say we need to see the granular level where, you know, what's actually in these numbers around, you know, again, we could pick management, we could pick classified. I mean, we're only doing a 1% cut within classified. we're going to be able to do that. It would be helpful to understand and see what are all the services are falling underneath this and are there some services that we say we really like to to fund these. But we just can't afford that right now we don't have the visibility to be able to say that and then especially within the within we're not going to be able to see all of the big percentages that are consuming that so utilities insurance, but it would be helpful to be able to see if we take out some of these things that really are not we can't flex on much and see what the remainder is I think we could also sharpen our pencils and see are there further you know. And we've gone through that exercise. Right, but we the board haven't, right?

[5188] SPEAKER_18: Well, we do get that information. I mean, this is what we need to understand. Because every time we find out how many students are enrolled or in a school, if you want to look at it like a pyramid, that's where it starts. Because the amount of students that we have enrolled in Newark Unified then drives everything else. It's at the top. So if they're telling us that fluctuation, if they're being extremely conservative, that number, that ADA is what's driving what's here. Because if you need X amount of classified to support the number of students that they've provided and X amount of certificated staff, that's what they're giving us for the two years. And we went through that, and it was presented to us in the meetings leading up to meeting the state deadline of March 15th based on driving numbers. To say, well, we need to see, we don't know that yet, because we don't have the students in their seats yet. It's not 22, 23 yet. So until we have that number, and I just historically always go to that October 2nd or October 30th, right? You can see, because that's when CBEDS, you grab, and then that's your driving number, right? And that's when you receive the information that tells us who your UPP is, how many kids, right? And you're getting that information, then that allows them, to support whether this budget balancing plan that they have is functioning or if they need to go ahead and rely on that 2%, whether it's the plus or minus.

[5280] Aiden Hill: But for example, for example, right, because there's a difference between fixed and variable costs. And so obviously, your variable costs are tied to your enrollment. And so your teachers, your certificated are obviously going to be variable. But your other areas, right, it's overhead. And so it doesn't necessarily flex based on your enrollment. And especially, like, you know, nobody can tell me that our amount of legal services, that there is a good ratio that establishes how much we spend on legal services is correlated to what our enrollment is, right? And so these, like, they're a lot, I mean, in my experience, there are lots of little areas like that where if you actually go in and you look and see, we're spending that much on this area, you know, how can that be? And then there are other areas where actually we can be creative. And I don't even know if we've done that. So for example, we're spending a lot on transportation for special ed. Have we actually explored an opportunity where we could maybe partner with another district and have some type of shared services model? So these are all areas that where we can be creative, but we can't be creative until we see

[5356] Terrence Grindall: We're not superintendent. So having a high-level discussion that lays out the general plan, things go from general to specific.

[5370] Terrence Grindall: And our level is at the general. We need to give some direction, is what I understand it. We need to give direction about what areas we go into. We don't need to know the details of what's to happen. We're the policymakers, not the executives of the district.

[5390] Aiden Hill: So I think that you have an incorrect understanding, member Grindell, of how this works. And so number one, we are the high-level policymakers. We establish goals and objectives, right? But it starts at the top and it flows down, and it is completely within our purview to be looking at this. And I think if it gets down to deciding that, you know what, we need to cut in certain areas and that there's going to be an impact on the community, it's we that are the people that ultimately need to make those calls. It's not to be made by staff. And so if we decide based on, you know, the funding that we have that we shouldn't have music, right, or we shouldn't, you know, or we shouldn't do, you know, some other program, we shouldn't do, you know, the rocketry program or whatever that has an impact to the community, that we are the ones ultimately that should be accountable, and we should be the ones that are providing direction to the staff. We provide the direction, staff executes on our direction.

[5452] Aiden Hill: You just stated what I just stated. And so we need the details to be able to make those choices.

[5466] Phuong Nguyen: John, Marie, would you, can we move on to the next point?

[5471] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, so the next area that I wanted to review was, if you can go to the next slide, Ms. Gutierrez, has to do with the reserve cap. So this is the first time since Governor Brown implemented this new requirement in terms of the state stabilization account. So based on the threshold and the ed code, the reserve cap is triggered for next year, which means that our combined assigned or unassigned fund balance in our general fund and our special reserve fund, Fund 17, cannot exceed 10%. So our budget for next year has to show that. we have a reserve of less than 10%. And there is a way to meet that cap. And that's what I wanted to go over today. And it has to do with how we apply our reserves to what's called a committed category in our fund balance. So again, this is the first time I think that the board has had to deal with a reserve cap. And it is part of our budget adoption requirement, because our county will be looking at this as part of their review. And if we have any reserve that's above 10%, then they will not approve our budget, basically.

[5575] Aiden Hill: And why wasn't this triggered in prior years?

[5578] Marie dela Cruz: There's a stabilization account. at the state level, and if it reaches a certain threshold, then this goes into effect for all school districts.

[5590] Aiden Hill: So they're basically saying that we have a kitty at the state level that could be used for bailouts, for lack of a better term. And if we have so much of that, then we don't want to have you have extra funding, because we're double counting.

[5608] Marie dela Cruz: Is that what they're saying? something like that. It was again during Governor Brown's time and we thought it would be a while before we would see this day, but we got this notice from CDE and we're now having to review the requirements and what we need to do to stay within our cap.

[5640] Phuong Nguyen: So what are considered committed funds?

[5643] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, so we'll go over that. Next slide, please. Excuse me for this small print, but I just wanted to take the snippet just so you know that this is in our board policy. So there's basically five major categories in our fund balance, and one is considered non-spendable. And those are items such as our inventory, items that normally can't be converted to cash. And then we have the restricted fund balance. And those are your fund balances that are specifically constrained by either law or providers. For example, all of our federal funds, those are restricted. They're restricted for particular purpose. And then committed fund balance, this is where the constraint is based on specific purposes that could be approved and determined by the board. And we'll go over some examples of what that is. Assigned fund balance are those fund balance that are specific, but they don't fall under either restricted or committed. And unassigned are amounts that are available for any purpose. So those are the five main categories that we could put our fund balance in. Next slide, please. And then I just wanted to show you what it actually looks like in the SACS report, because every time I give you a budget report, it includes the SACS report. And in the SACS report, it does show those different components. So if you look at number 3, where it starts with the components of ending fund balance, there's the non-spendable amounts. And for this particular example, there's $139,000. That represents some prepaid expenses or our inventory, what we hold in our store's inventory. And then committed, as you can see, we have not identified or have ever committed any of the funds. Because if we did, you would know that would have to be approved by the board. We do use the assignments. And in this example, we've assigned $1.1 million. And that included deferred maintenance, money that we set aside for that, and instructional program improvements, and also strategies to improve attendance. So those are some of the categories that were under the assigned. And then the unassigned, unappropriated, that's the reserve for economic uncertainties. So going to the next. In doing the calculation on what amount we would have to look at just based on second interim numbers, We had an ending fund balance of $7.4 million. And if we deduct the non-spendable amount of $139, that leaves the $7,278,000 that would be applied to the cap. But we also have to add the Fund 17 reserves of the $2,354,000. So now we have total reserves of $9,632,000 that would be applied to this cap. And then we look at our total expenditures, which is about $71,600,000. And that represents a 13.4% of our total expenditures. And 10% cap is $7,166,000. So what we have in excess is almost $2.5 million. So this is, again, based on second interim numbers as an example.

[5897] Phuong Nguyen: We can move that $2.4 million into any of those five categories.

[5903] Marie dela Cruz: Into committed. Into committed. So what we would want to do is move at least $2.5 million into a committed category so that we would stay within our cap. So next slide. So these are some ideas, some options to manage the reserve cap. One is to spend down the reserves, and we did have a line item in terms of the budget balancing the $300,000. Getting a temporary waiver from the county, although that is an option, we've already been told by the county that that would be very difficult because you'd have to have an extreme situation to get a waiver. The county will not approve just any waiver. have to be really extreme to get that waiver. The 3rd is to any amounts that could be constrained for specific purposes. It has to be approved by the board, and this would come to you in a form of a resolution. And it has to be done no later than June 30th of this year, because it's for the 22-23 adopted budget. So since we're presenting the budget at the first June meeting, and then that would be our public hearing, and then having a final budget adoption at the second board meeting, this would be along that timeline. So our plan would be to have resolution by the second June meeting when we adopt the budget, cuz we have to incorporate it all into our budget.

[6030] SPEAKER_18: So I have a question. So let's say we were to exercise, right, number three, to classify. At any time in the future, if the situation was to improve, right, statewide and with the funding, would we be allowed to reclassify those?

[6049] Diego Torres: Yes.

[6049] SPEAKER_18: So what we committed is restricted and then go back to there. So even though we would have a resolution, I think that we still have that opportunity to switch the category.

[6057] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah. OK. The same way that you approve that commitment, you can approve a revision. OK. So it doesn't have to be permanent. And you can change it throughout the year up to the end of the year. Right. Number four just says that we can't use the reserve for economic uncertainties.

[6083] Marie dela Cruz: We can't call it that. It can't be categorized as restricted or committed. We can't move that to committed. Although, I mean, you could call it reserves or whatever, but we couldn't call it reserve for economic uncertainties.

[6099] SPEAKER_18: And that was going to be my next question, is if there wasn't an existing category within finance, create or locate a term that we could use in reclassifying, or does it specifically we have to go with the area that we have in existence?

[6117] Marie dela Cruz: No, you can classify it as long as it could be justified and there's some backup. It just can't be random. So for example, going to the next slide, please. Here's just some examples of purposes that we could use. Any unspent supplemental or concentration grant that could be defined. Technology, if we had a plan for refreshing and upgrading any of our technology. We just had our review, so there's some things in there that could potentially be used as a backup for upgrading and refreshing technology, deferred maintenance. There's plenty in our facilities master plan, as well as the items that we discussed at our last report that could be applied to deferred maintenance and facilities improvements to mitigate declining enrollment. And I think that $300,000 that we mentioned as part of our balancing plan would be part of that. any specific equipment or furniture replacement. So for example, if we wanted to replace furniture at certain schools, we could commit funds to that purpose. And then any textbook adoption that we see that are coming up, or any- So these are on a specific order, just basically as

[6213] SPEAKER_18: higher the need, and that would help us as far as ranking or rating. Right.

[6219] Terrence Grindall: And I think you're probably looking at the next slide, but since most of the issue that we're dealing with has to do with adjusting for declining enrollment, why wouldn't we simply, for transparency's sake, put that reserve in that category since that's really what our reserves are looking at is addressing the decline in enrollment. We don't have a structural problem in our district where we're spending more than we're bringing in. We have a problem where we're seeing our revenues decline because we're expecting revenue decline because of enrollment dropping. if the excess reserves are in that category, that seems perfectly appropriate and transparent to me.

[6274] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah. I mean, you could have that as a line item. I don't know that I would recommend you put it all in there because there's still, you want to make sure that you don't end up with a structural deficit because if your enrollment goes down, then you have to make sure that there's a respective kind of related.

[6290] Terrence Grindall: No, I understand. And that's where we're looking at the budget plan and so on and so forth. I'm just saying that's really what the problem that we're facing right now is. So that would seem to be a place where you could put the bulk of the funds, because that's what the bulk of the use would be.

[6307] Phuong Nguyen: So I'm sorry, just a time check. It's 743, and so we have until 8 o'clock. And just wanted to give everybody a heads up.

[6316] Marie dela Cruz: Thank you. So I did put it in here, your question, Ms. Marquez, regarding the purpose and the commitment that it doesn't have to be permanent, and you do have the opportunity to change it during the year.

[6328] SPEAKER_18: We have an entire calendar year. Well, not calendar year.

[6335] Terrence Grindall: But actually, you're saying you could actually change it at any time. The board would have to act. But there's no, it doesn't necessarily have to happen in a set time.

[6344] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah. So let's say you committed it all to, declining enrollment mitigation, and then you wanted to move it to deferred maintenance projects at some point, or however we could do that throughout the year.

[6385] Marie dela Cruz: Well, if there is like a temporary kind of relief on how we can fix our deficit.

[6408] Aiden Hill: So a suggestion for maybe an additional category, and this is building on what Member Grindel Sean were talking about, could we create a category called Revenue Enhancement Projects? And so we could put aside funds where if we wanted to go and refurbish the tennis courts and then start to actually use them as a revenue generating asset, we could. Because I think as you were mentioning, Member Grindel, we really do have fundamentally you know, a demand problem, right? We do not have enough people right now and we're going to try our best to change that, but in some ways it's a structural issue that's happening in the state of California. And so we may be challenged, we may continue to be challenged, but if we can start to think about are there other ways to bring in revenue that might help to save, to help us. So you want to add it as one of the... Yeah, could we just add like a number 8 and just say, revenue enhancement projects.

[6488] Marie dela Cruz: But we're... Yeah. I'm just trying to keep the expenditure connection.

[6493] Aiden Hill: So... One of the expenditure would be... Well, so you could rephrase it and you could say, you know, deferred maintenance or, you know, deferred maintenance and facility improvements to, you know, to support, you know, future revenue enhancement.

[6507] Marie dela Cruz: Oh, I see what you're saying. Okay. Yeah. That would just.

[6518] Aiden Hill: I mean, it might not necessarily be just that. But again, if we decided we wanted to, maybe there was something else that we could figure out. I don't know, doing fundraising for something, or who knows.

[6534] Marie dela Cruz: So basically, it's an improvement so that it helps us market.

[6542] Aiden Hill: And charge money. We could take a facility that's not being used right now and rehab it and then rent it out.

[6555] Terrence Grindall: And if there's even options, not disagreeing with you, but there's even options to, in the case of the tennis courts, which are not used at all, right? They're not even usable at the moment, is that correct? They're used by students. They're used for students. OK, but they're not used after hours, and they're not used by, you can conceivably have a contract with a tennis club that would do the improvements. and in return for a less rent to us, so it's not a capital outlay. But that's not saying that having a capital category wouldn't help us. You could do both. We could or we could evaluate it, you know, half of one, half a dozen of one, six of the other, and see what was best for the district. So there are ways to enhance revenue for facilities like that that don't even require any capital costs. But having capital costs set aside isn't problematic. just to back up back to the what the real problem is we we're going to need the unless we see a turnaround in enrollment we're going to need these funds to to be in the black in three years so um we shouldn't be creating categories that that um we shouldn't be creating categories that give the impression to the community that we're going to be that we're necessarily going to be spending the money in that we really do know that unless enrollment turns around, we're gonna be needing pretty much every penny of these funds. We just happen to have a reserve that's higher than the state requires. But we know in our particular circumstances, and what the story sees that we're on, that we need those reserves. So I'd like them dedicated to the stuff that we really need them for.

[6666] Phuong Nguyen: Just so the community knows what we're talking about. Yeah. I mean, you're absolutely correct. I mean, because of the cap, we do have an excess amount of reserves for this year. Doesn't mean that we should spend it because outlier years, we're going to be in the deficit again. So depending on whether or not we're able to increase enrollment and median. So yeah, we just have to be very mindful of that.

[6694] Marie dela Cruz: Right. Which is an example of the number seven, I think, because of the fluctuation. And depending on the assumptions, right now we're projected to deficit spend for the next couple of years. So we need some mitigation to get us through that so that we can meet our minimum to get us to be positive. we've been through qualified almost negative, and we really would hate to get there again by using our reserves, because I think that's what's happened in the past.

[6727] Terrence Grindall: Right, we should, you know, again, despite all the language the state's throwing around, we're very lucky that the previous boards and staff have set aside these reserves that will allow us to have some time to adjust. So reserves are reserves of this level are a very good thing, and we may have to change how they're categorized. Is that the right word? How they're categorized in order to comply with the rules. But let's not kid ourselves. Having these reserves is really, really good.

[6763] Aiden Hill: Our goal is to hang on to them. So to simplify, we're basically just creating some different buckets, and we're going to put the money in there. And again, try to see if we can save it for a rainy day. And can we put restrictions on this to say, you know, that this ultimately, you know, any bucket that we put into it, that put the money in, that we, the board, explicitly have to authorize use of that so that we, again, don't fritter it away.

[6795] Marie dela Cruz: Yeah, that's part of the requirement. Anytime we spend out of the committed or change the committed, It has to go through the board, the same way that it was approved initially.

[6807] Phuong Nguyen: OK. So are there any other proposed budget balancing items that any of the other board members would like to propose, or any comments or suggestions to the fund balance, or prioritizing any of them?

[6824] Terrence Grindall: Not to be repetitive, so I won't be. I made some comments during the discussion

[6837] SPEAKER_18: I just want to appreciate the amount of work that went into providing this information and the responses received, because then it allows me to look at what's being presented from a different lens. I know it takes a lot of work, so I commend, as well, previous boards and the fact that, to be told you need to spend this money instead of, no, you need to find this money, but the money that deserves exists, and that we're having to work to actually re-categorize

[6870] Phuong Nguyen: I think that concludes the study session. Thank you very much. So back to the data center. Thank you.

[6876] Marie dela Cruz: Yes. Thank you. Appreciate everything. Thank you for the input. Yes. Thank you. Everything. Thank you. Appreciate all the feedback and the comments.

[6896] Terrence Grindall: Oh, I didn't know they were open. I would have grabbed one. I had one. Excellent.

[6929] Phuong Nguyen: Okay. Thank you again for the presentation and the study session tonight. Ms. Dela Cruz, Superintendent Triplett, Ms. Pierce, and Ms. Ingham-Watters. And thank you, Ms. Gutierrez, for making sure that we're up and running and everything's fine. We appreciate you all. And with that, may I get a motion to adjourn the meeting, please?

[6954] Terrence Grindall: I'll move to adjourn the meeting.

[6958] Phuong Nguyen: Motion made by Member Grindel, seconded by Member Marquez. How do you vote, Member Zhang? Yes. Member Marquez?

[6964] Richelle Piechowski: Yes.

[6965] Phuong Nguyen: Member Hill? Yes. Member Grindel?

[6968] Richelle Piechowski: Yes.

[6969] Phuong Nguyen: I'm also a yes. Meeting adjourned at 7. Oh, we have five ayes. Meeting adjourned at 7.54 p.m. Thank you.

1. CALL TO ORDER

Meeting Practices and Information

Type Information, Procedural IN-PERSON MEETING INFORMATION

NUSD has opened its boardroom for in-person meetings and will follow the State's and Alameda County's safety guidelines for public gatherings. Please refrain from attending in-person meetings if you have any of the following symptoms: Loss of taste/smell Difficulty breathing Vomiting Diarrhea Fever Cough Headache Sore Throat Runny Nose

For additional COVID-19 information please go to https://www.newarkunified.org/covid-19 or https://www.acoe.org/guidance

OBSERVE THE BOARD OF EDUCATION MEETING

Members of the public may observe the meeting via the NUSD YouTube Channel, live transmission on Comcast Channel 26, or in-person at the NUSD Boardroom. Spanish translation will be available via Zoom.

PUBLIC COMMENT

The public will have the opportunity to address the Board of Education regarding non-agendized matters and agendized items with a live audio-only comment via Zoom with advance notice requested by email at PUBLICCOMMENT@newarkunified.org, a written comment by submitting a speaking card via email at PUBLICCOMMENT@newarkunified.org, or with live in-person comments by submitting a speaker-card with the Executive Assistant.

Pledge of Allegiance

Type Procedural PURPOSE:

The Governance Team will recite the Pledge of Allegiance

Roll Call

Type Procedural TRUSTEES:

President Phuong Nguyen Vice President/Clerk Terrence Grindall Member Aiden Hill Member Alicia Marquez Member Bowen Zhang

STUDENT BOARD MEMBER:

Member Estaina Resendiz Ortiz

2. APPROVAL OF AGENDA

Approval of the Agenda

Type Action

Recommended The recommendation is that the Board of Education approve the agenda for this meeting. Action PURPOSE:

Members of the Governance Team may request that the agenda be amended or approved as presented.

Motion & Voting The recommendation is that the Board of Education approve the agenda for this meeting.

Motion by Alicia Marquez, second by Terrence Grindall.
Final Resolution: Motion Carries
Yea: Phuong Nguyen, Terrence Grindall, Aiden Hill, Alicia Marquez, Bowen Zhang

3. CONSENT AGENDA: NON-PERSONNEL ITEMS

Curricular,Non-Curricular, Overnight, Out-of-State Field Trip for Newark Memorial High School Rocketry to Virginia

Type Action

Fiscal Impact Yes

Dollar Amount $17,550.00

Budgeted Yes

Budget Source Trip will be paid for by Newark Memorial High ASB, students, and Rocketry Club Funds

Recommended The recommendation is that the Board of Education approve the field trip to Virginia for the Action Newark Memorial High School Rocketry Club to participate in the National Rocketry Finals. PURPOSE:

For the Board to approve a field trip for the NMHS Rocketry Club students to participate in the National Rocketry Finals.

BACKGROUND:

According to Board Policy 6153, all trips in excess of 100 miles, non-curricular trips, and overnight trips require Board approval.

The Newark Memorial High School principal and rocketry teachers request permission to take students on a curricular, overnight, out-of-state field trip via private vehicles, commercial air, shuttles, and rental vehicles to Virginia to participate in the National Rocketry Finals. School: Newark Memorial High School Dates: May 11-16, 2022 Location: Manassas, Virginia

Field trip requirements met: Grade K-3, one adult for every 5-8 students; Grades 4-12, one adult for every 10 students; Board Policy requires at least two adults on every trip regardless of the number of students (BP 6153 and AR 6153) Overnight trip supervision must be gender appropriate No student will be denied due to a lack of funds

Motion & Voting The recommendation is that the Board of Education approve the field trip to Virginia for the Newark Memorial High School Rocketry Club to participate in the National Rocketry Finals.

Motion by Alicia Marquez, second by Terrence Grindall.
Final Resolution: Motion Carries
Yea: Phuong Nguyen, Terrence Grindall, Alicia Marquez, Bowen Zhang
Nay: Aiden Hill

4. STUDY SESSION

Budget Balancing Solutions

Type Discussion, Information PURPOSE:

To review and discuss budget-balancing solutions for fiscal years 2022-23 and 2023-24 with the Board.

BACKGROUND:

Based on the Second Interim Budget Report and assumptions in the Multi-Year Projections, the district projects a deficit of $4.5 million in the fiscal year 2022-23 and $4.7 million in the fiscal year 2023-24. Consequently, the Board approved Resolution No. 2021.22.29 committing to implement budget-balancing solutions of up to $4.5 million in 2022-23 and up to $4.7 million in 2023-24 to maintain the fiscal stability of the district.

Staff will review and discuss potential budget-balancing solutions with the Board for the 2022-23 proposed adopted budget.

File Attachments Board Study Session- Budget Balancing Solutions April 27 2022.pdf (1,556 KB)

5. ADJOURNMENT

PLACEHOLDER - Extend Meeting

Type Action

Recommended The recommendation is that the Board of Education extends the meeting to ____P.M. Action PURPOSE: This is a placeholder, only to be used if the Board adds a motion and action to extend the meeting.

Adjournment

Type Action, Procedural

Recommended The recommendation is that the Board of Education adjourns this meeting. Action PURPOSE: No items will be considered after 10:00 p.m. unless it is determined by a majority of the Board to extend to a specific time.

This action will conclude the meeting.

Motion & Voting The recommendation is that the Board of Education adjourns this meeting at 7:54 pm.

Motion by Terrence Grindall, second by Alicia Marquez.
Final Resolution: Motion Carries
Yea: Phuong Nguyen, Terrence Grindall, Aiden Hill, Alicia Marquez, Bowen Zhang

No minutes available.