[0:00] All right, I'm gonna call the meeting of

[0:01] the Derfield Elementary School committee

[0:03] to order at five o'clock.

[0:06] This meeting is being recorded.

[0:09] Uh, welcome back everyone. Happy New

[0:10] Year. Feel like it's been forever

[0:13] already that we've been in January, but

[0:15] it is a new year. Uh, first order of

[0:18] business tonight is uh to review and

[0:20] approve. We have a bunch of minutes. M

[0:22] minutes from October 21st, 2025, October

[0:24] 30th 25, November 2025, and December

[0:27] 18th, 2025. able

[0:36] to do them separately or other ones

[0:41] to approve the minutes as October 21st,

[0:43] 2025, October 30th, 2025, November 20th,

[0:48] 2025, and December 18th, 2025.

[0:52] >> Second.

[0:55] » There's no further conversation. All in

[0:57] favor?

[0:59] Thank you.

[1:03] » Next up financial statement.

[1:05] >> So I realize I did not send you

[1:08] financial reports about midday today. I

[1:10] realized that I think with the holiday I

[1:12] got behind and then uh we worked on

[1:15] budget pretty much all afternoon for the

[1:17] presentation tonight. So I owe you

[1:19] reports. Um with that said, I can state

[1:21] the warrants for the record. They don't

[1:22] have to be in the email. So we'll get

[1:23] them on record here. Um, 46 warrants

[1:26] were signed totaling $553,820.31.

[1:31] I will email it to you.

[1:33] >> You're doing minutes.

[1:34] I'll email it to

[1:36] you. That way you don't have to

[1:37] regurgitate that. Um, there are no new

[1:40] concerns with the fiscal year 26 budget.

[1:43] Uh we we probably will have while I've

[1:46] talked a lot about we have some overages

[1:49] from salaries um because we settled at a

[1:52] higher placeholder than we had in when

[1:53] we built the budget for the contract. I

[1:56] expect that we're going to see some

[1:57] savings. Um there's been some IA

[1:59] vacancies. There's always unpaid time

[2:01] off, those kinds of things. With that

[2:03] said, I did want to let you know that

[2:05] there was one staffing change. Um,

[2:09] so we had an IIA resignation midy year

[2:11] and then we had an IIA vacancy and Tina

[2:15] was able to look at the staff and sort

[2:17] of see what the needs are for the

[2:18] students in the building and we've moved

[2:20] forward with hiring a full

[2:24] specialist on

[2:27] we're sort of swapping out some wages.

[2:30] I'm saying that because one, we want you

[2:32] to know, but two, it will have 27 impact

[2:35] when we look at the budget because

[2:37] teachers are more expensive than IAS.

[2:38] So, we're not exactly swapping dollar

[2:41] for dollar. Um, but based on the needs

[2:43] of the students in the building and the

[2:44] support services that were being

[2:46] provided, it was a position um that was

[2:48] necessary. And I will say we had a

[2:50] central position sort of years ago um

[2:54] that transitioned into something less

[2:56] when someone resigned. So, we're sort of

[2:58] going back to that original model.

[3:00] >> Can you say a little bit more about what

[3:02] an inclusion specialist is specifically?

[3:05] >> Yeah, like behavior support um and

[3:08] helping kids. It doesn't have to just be

[3:10] big behavior, but just helping kids to

[3:12] be settled in in their classrooms.

[3:15] >> And that's someone who's a teacher or

[3:17] someone with like a behavioral

[3:20] the person we hired has a BCBA,

[3:23] but they're on a teacher's hat, right?

[3:27] That makes sense. Any other questions

[3:29] about that?

[3:30] >> One more question. So, it's a it's is it

[3:32] someone who is available to all grades?

[3:35] Yeah. Currently, at least.

[3:37] >> Yeah. They also um kind of hold a

[3:38] leazison position. So, they have kids on

[3:41] their case load but is also available to

[3:42] the like crisis management but also has

[3:46] a case load and also supports um

[3:50] students that um are not able to be in

[3:53] the classroom.

[3:56] Wait, sorry, one more question. So, I'm

[3:57] just trying to distinguish what that is

[3:59] between a adjustment counselor and then

[4:01] a psychologist.

[4:03] >> So, when you say not in the building, do

[4:04] you or not in the classroom? It could be

[4:06] like in the building and could also be

[4:08] someone who's not even in

[4:10] >> they support like the specialized

[4:11] programming too. So, we have students in

[4:13] Yeah. in the den or the LEA program and

[4:16] then there's students that are in the

[4:18] classroom but um need like a more

[4:20] involved behavioral plan and support.

[4:23] their students have crisis like some big

[4:25] feelings that come up

[4:27] >> and they might not be on even on an IEP.

[4:29] So they're just part of the team.

[4:31] Gotcha.

[4:32] >> Tina, it would be safe to say that I'm

[4:35] setting up throwing a softball. Go

[4:36] ahead.

[4:37] >> When you put in programs like the Dan

[4:39] program and we have increased enrollment

[4:42] in our LEAP program that this possession

[4:44] is necessary to support the teachers in

[4:46] those programs.

[4:47] >> Absolutely.

[4:47] >> Okay. That's kind of that's kind of

[4:48] basically where it's coming from is that

[4:50] we built this DEN program

[4:52] >> um and had someone inhouse that could do

[4:54] a lot of the skills that this position

[4:57] has but as an IIA

[4:59] um

[5:00] >> you know some of the skill set of

[5:02] deescalation and such not the license

[5:04] training but yeah so

[5:06] >> um so it's the in the long run it's

[5:09] going to save the district money because

[5:10] bring the program in house for um

[5:13] increasing number of kiddos in we reap

[5:15] the benefits when we're able to tuition

[5:17] in students to that program.

[5:19] >> So,

[5:21] >> and it is another adult because

[5:23] typically there's more than one child in

[5:25] crisis in the building at the time.

[5:27] >> So, it's nice to have another

[5:29] >> another trained person who can go

[5:30] deescalators.

[5:31] >> Well, and I'll be honest on that the

[5:34] my observation on that is Tina's at BCBA

[5:36] and spends a lot of her time doing that

[5:38] deescalation work. And

[5:40] >> um that's wonderful when it saves money,

[5:43] but then you have an administrator who

[5:46] um can't support other needs in the

[5:48] building if they have a child in their

[5:49] office.

[5:51] >> Yes.

[5:52] >> Is that another southpaw?

[5:53] >> That was that was that was that was

[5:55] really slow pitch.

[5:58] >> Yeah.

[5:59] >> So yeah,

[6:07] » not for the current year.

[6:09] I sure know.

[6:12] >> Okay. Principal's report.

[6:14] >> Yeah. So, it's a school improvement plan

[6:15] this time around. I know that um I think

[6:18] I sent it out in November. So, just some

[6:22] things to highlight. Um

[6:24] over the summer our instructional team

[6:26] looked at a lot of data sources, student

[6:28] achievement, demographics, survey data,

[6:30] and we created a draft and we solicited

[6:34] family feedback through surveys

[6:36] and um teacher feedback as well and

[6:40] school council feedback. Um our work was

[6:42] grounded in John Hattie's visible

[6:44] learning. I don't if anybody's familiar

[6:46] with that, but we really leaned into

[6:48] collective advocacy for um our round uh

[6:53] for our goals this year and helping us

[6:56] um become a stronger team. Uh some of

[6:59] the parent feedback just look at this we

[7:01] got was um they really it consistently

[7:05] affirmed Deerfield's kind caring

[7:07] community strong curriculum and

[7:08] opportunities to see student work. They

[7:10] asked for more consistent communication

[7:12] across grade levels and additional

[7:13] opportunities for student families and

[7:15] staff to connect up outside of academics

[7:17] particularly through evening events. So

[7:18] those priorities were reflected in the

[7:20] family and community engagement

[7:21] objective in the action steps. Um so our

[7:25] work with collective efficacy you'll

[7:27] know note in school culture um and

[7:30] leadership on objective one and

[7:32] objective two high impact instructional

[7:34] and datadriven practices.

[7:37] Um one of the um collective advocacy

[7:41] things uh activities that we're working

[7:42] on with staff is ed microteing. So guide

[7:45] cancer teacherdriven sessions where

[7:47] educators identify topics most relative

[7:49] to their practice. Um which builds

[7:51] shared ownership and micro teaching is

[7:54] where staff can share short practical

[7:56] examples. It could be video clips that

[7:58] they're looking for feedback or video

[8:00] clips where they've um these are things

[8:02] that work for them. So we're building in

[8:05] those pieces.

[8:08] Any questions around it? You'll notice

[8:10] that it has a different format. We

[8:13] copied the strategic plan. Thought it

[8:15] was a little bit more family friendly.

[8:17] So hoping that that's true.

[8:25] » All right. We have school improvement

[8:27] plan later on the agenda. So we'll get

[8:29] to the

[8:30] >> Okay. Quoting on that later unless you

[8:32] really want to go over it.

[8:34] >> I don't know. You might want to get it

[8:35] over with topics.

[8:37] >> You can just keep going. If you want go

[8:39] ahead and make the you're going to have

[8:41] to accept it if you want to just do if

[8:43] you want to go and have a discussion now

[8:44] since we opened it.

[8:45] >> We're going to go into budget and I

[8:47] don't want so um you've already started

[8:50] the conversation. I would go ahead and

[8:52] finish up the SIP.

[8:53] >> Okay. If that works for one then yeah.

[8:55] Okay. So any question

[8:58] discussion on the improvement plan?

[9:09] I would say I appreciated the um

[9:12] yeah object the family and community

[9:13] enga engagement objective all the the

[9:16] different things laid out there

[9:20] helpful

[9:22] >> that's most of the feedback that we get

[9:23] back

[9:25] events the families and

[9:27] >> it does as a parent it seems like I can

[9:30] see that the school's been trained out

[9:31] daily and it feels good

[9:34] >> like the arts night last year was like

[9:37] oh my gosh and then the announce was

[9:40] also a huge hit and math science was

[9:45] » but we're waiting for you to approve it

[9:47] before we get started. No, I'm only

[9:48] kidding. We already started those

[9:51] are

[9:53] >> Yeah.

[9:54] Yeah, I mean that was the problem

[9:55] with the one thing with the schedule is

[9:56] that we usually do the student

[9:57] improvement plan and school improvement

[9:59] plan October, November and so I sent it

[10:03] to you early and said we're moving on

[10:04] this none of it is objectable work you

[10:06] know but if there was stuff you wanted

[10:09] or didn't see or have questions on was

[10:11] really

[10:14] where it's at but school committee does

[10:16] need to approve it

[10:20] there's no further discussion on that

[10:22] I'll be looking for a motion to approve

[10:24] Move the student school improvement

[10:26] plan.

[10:28] Motion to approve school improvement.

[10:35] Right. All in favor?

[10:43] » Okay. And anything else from you, Tina?

[10:45] >> Okay. Thank you very much.

[10:48] >> Okay. Next couple comments.

[10:58] I don't see anything online.

[11:01] Okay. Uh next up we have uh the update

[11:04] on the playground renovation progress.

[11:08] >> Um

[11:10] we got the signed off. Excuse me. This

[11:13] just today we got the signed off. Um

[11:17] trying to think what it was called, but

[11:18] you have to go put it bring it to the

[11:20] deed register the deeds to put it

[11:21] through. So, um, with the, um,

[11:25] provisions that they talked about,

[11:28] >> um, you know, I printed it all out and I

[11:30] didn't bring it, but um, so basically

[11:32] we're progressively moving forward.

[11:33] We're going to talk about the funding of

[11:34] it as we talk about budget. Um, and um,

[11:39] we have a meeting

[11:42] today's Tuesday, Thursday.

[11:46] I have two different conservation

[11:47] committ

[11:49] Wednesday or Thursday. One of them is

[11:50] Weightley, one of them is Deerfield. Um,

[11:52] just to do the final walk through of it.

[11:54] I don't understand why they sent us the

[11:56] paperwork of it being complete, even

[11:57] though they still said they had to have

[11:59] one more meeting. So, um, like I said, I

[12:01] got that this morning. I was a little

[12:02] confused. So, I haven't talked to Carlos

[12:03] yet. But, so we're kind of we're kind of

[12:05] lined up to move forward on this and

[12:08] then the next step will be getting it to

[12:11] go out to bid um,

[12:14] which we will do once we figure out the

[12:16] funding of it. Um,

[12:19] and you know, we'll talk about that. I,

[12:21] you know,

[12:23] I guess we'll talk about that more at

[12:24] the next meeting, but we can also put it

[12:27] out the bid and then not move forward

[12:29] with the project. You know what I mean?

[12:30] It's just going to be cost you $1,000 to

[12:33] that's the calculation of what was it to

[12:35] put out the last bid to roughly around

[12:38] $1,000.

[12:39] >> Oh, yeah. Yeah.

[12:39] >> Yeah.

[12:40] >> So, I mean, that's what you lose if you

[12:42] put it out there and you know, the

[12:44] prices come back too high or, you know,

[12:46] that kind of thing. Good.

[12:48] >> Not to jump ahead on funding, but as

[12:50] aside from prices increasing, if you put

[12:52] it out today, decide it's too high, wait

[12:53] a while, come back to it later.

[12:56] >> Are there any constraints with the CPA

[12:58] funds from the town?

[12:59] >> We had to do it within, I believe, three

[13:02] years. We definitely have more than one

[13:04] year.

[13:04] >> Three years when it was approved.

[13:05] >> Yeah.

[13:06] Um

[13:08] when you put it out to bid

[13:11] is it possible to sort of

[13:15] how do I say this like they can give us

[13:19] different figures potent like we can

[13:21] come back to them and say okay if we

[13:22] like don't put this piece of equipment

[13:23] in should that change so you have to

[13:25] start the whole thing over there.

[13:26] >> So the way you can so I hear what you're

[13:28] saying so you can't

[13:31] negotiate or else you're kind of you're

[13:34] cheating the bid process. So you got to

[13:36] say what you want. What we could do is

[13:39] we could do add alternates.

[13:41] >> So what you do is you say this is the

[13:43] base project. How much to do that and

[13:46] let's say on this particular one and

[13:48] pave the basketball court

[13:50] >> like so you can say that's an ad

[13:51] alternate. So they add them all up and

[13:52] so that you can do the base bid and then

[13:54] say um you know we're going to do the ad

[13:57] alternate or not, right?

[13:58] >> You know that kind of thing. That's

[14:00] >> needs to just simmer for a while.

[14:05] Um,

[14:07] if you have projects that may have

[14:09] fluctuation where you want to hold a

[14:10] certain part back, right, you say,

[14:11] "Well, if you want to do this as well,

[14:12] how much that cost?" But usually you

[14:14] start with the base.

[14:24] » Well, you have budget coming up next.

[14:26] So, we do seg

[14:38] This means we'll be right along

[14:41] Darius is going to share the

[14:42] presentation

[14:44] and I will walk you through it. Jump in

[14:46] please if I'm

[14:48] stating something incorrectly or not

[14:50] remembering what we talked about a

[14:52] couple of hours ago. All right. So, uh,

[14:55] next slide shows our starting point is

[14:57] always level service budget. So that

[14:59] means that we're taking our exact

[15:00] staffing and programs and services from

[15:02] the prior year and replicating it in the

[15:04] new year and adding where necessary cola

[15:07] increases for our contracts, um

[15:10] increases for non-contract staff, uh any

[15:13] other nonwage adjustments, which you're

[15:15] going to see is a little bit more

[15:16] significant this year than usual

[15:17] primarily because of health insurance,

[15:19] but we really start at that baseline. Um

[15:21] and just consider cola for all of our

[15:23] expenditures. So, jumping right in,

[15:26] let's see what that looks like for

[15:28] Deerfield Elementary next year. I'm

[15:30] going to give you a moment to look at

[15:32] that number. I can see shock on Mary's

[15:34] face.

[15:36] >> Yeah. And and can we just kind of

[15:39] preference? So, we're going to doing

[15:40] things a little bit differently tonight

[15:42] in the sense that we're going to

[15:43] progress through

[15:45] >> the next phase two where we're going to

[15:47] offer suggestions on bringing this

[15:49] budget down. Um the reasons for that is

[15:52] the timeline of this budget

[15:55] um puts us in mid to late February and

[15:59] if we're going to have conversation

[16:01] actually late February is where our next

[16:02] school committee meeting is. Um and

[16:07] you know giving the information as we go

[16:08] through. So we're just saying so there's

[16:09] be a lot of movement of these numbers

[16:11] but basically the first part of this

[16:12] presentation is like this is the

[16:14] foundation of where we're starting at

[16:16] and then we're going to talk you through

[16:17] about how we bring that down. So, she's

[16:19] going to talk about how she stripped

[16:20] everything out to show you the true cost

[16:22] and then we're going to put things back

[16:23] in and then kind of work toward work

[16:26] toward another number. Okay.

[16:27] >> Well, and what I want to also say about

[16:29] this is typically we have a part in this

[16:31] process where we talk about new needs

[16:33] and requests and then maybe that's what

[16:35] we're stripping down. This is level

[16:37] service. So, this is not any additional

[16:40] staffing. It's taking this year's um

[16:42] staff which is the majority of our

[16:44] budget is is wages. Um and when you look

[16:47] at these different growth categories

[16:49] here, so this is how the expense

[16:50] categories are broken down how you guys

[16:52] get your quotes from me. These

[16:54] categories are set by Desi. They come

[16:57] out of the budget in this way and out of

[16:59] the database so that we can report back

[17:01] at the end of the year what our expenses

[17:03] have been. So instruction is essentially

[17:05] anyone on the ground working with

[17:06] students in the building. But it also

[17:08] includes um principal's office staff,

[17:11] principal secretaries, that kind of

[17:13] thing. IAS's um teachers wages and

[17:17] non-wage expenditures. However, what I

[17:19] will say is that budget growth really is

[17:21] primarily related to wages. I don't

[17:23] think there's any non-wage growth under

[17:25] that category. Student services, the

[17:27] growth of almost $64,000 is related to

[17:30] transportation, which I'm going to talk

[17:32] a little bit about um more in the

[17:34] presentation, but there's some wages in

[17:37] there because they also lump in um the

[17:40] health office staff. So nursing staff is

[17:42] considered a student service, but that's

[17:44] mostly non-wage. Operations and

[17:46] maintenance is minimal. It's your wage

[17:49] increases for anyone that falls in that

[17:51] category, which does include some

[17:53] central office staff that work in

[17:55] facilities and it um administration is

[17:58] not administration in the building. That

[18:00] is primarily central office and school

[18:03] committee. So any school committee

[18:04] expenditures, superintendent's office or

[18:06] business office comes in there. that is

[18:08] strictly wages of the $5,000 growth. And

[18:11] then benefits and insurance is

[18:12] self-explanatory. When it comes to

[18:14] benefits and insurance, the important

[18:15] part for us to remember here is that the

[18:18] town covers insurance for school

[18:20] employees. So when we're looking at a

[18:22] $53,000 increase, um there's one

[18:25] component under building and liability

[18:27] that the town bills us for the school's

[18:29] portion of their building and liability

[18:31] insurance. We are seeing some minor

[18:33] growth there, but the other major

[18:35] increase here is due to central office

[18:37] health insurance increase, which we're

[18:38] going to talk a little bit further. So,

[18:40] we're uh about $530,000

[18:43] at level services.

[18:45] >> So, let's I'm sorry. Can I ask a

[18:46] question? Yeah. Could you remind me what

[18:48] we asked for last year? What percent?

[18:50] >> It's coming up.

[18:50] >> Okay. And then the salary increases for

[18:53] staff. I was just wondering where the

[18:55] 400,000 came from.

[18:57] >> We're going to talk about it right here.

[18:58] >> Okay. Thank you. Um, so wage obligations

[19:02] and I'm seeing that I didn't update that

[19:04] first slide after I updated this today.

[19:06] So I will fix that. $418,000. The

[19:08] previous slide I think says,

[19:12] no, I'm confusing myself. $418,171,

[19:16] which is 7.6%

[19:18] of the 9.64 is strictly going to wages.

[19:22] So the primary growth in our budget is

[19:24] wage driven this year. There's several

[19:26] factors coming into play here. for all

[19:28] non-union staff. There is a placeholder

[19:30] in the budget of a 3% COLA. We do have

[19:33] staff that step even though they're not

[19:36] on a contract. We have salary schedules

[19:38] for all the different groups. So,

[19:40] custodial, school lunch, secretarial,

[19:42] and then the bottom piece is

[19:43] administrative contract renewals. So,

[19:46] um,

[19:48] we've taken into consider anyone that

[19:50] has a automatic placeholder in their in

[19:52] their contract or Darius has given me

[19:55] some feedback on where he thinks

[19:56] renewals will be coming in the new year.

[19:58] So, that's on the left hand part of the

[20:00] slide. You can see that the primary

[20:02] driver is our union contract. Uh, we

[20:05] have a very healthy contract that we

[20:06] settled on. We're making up a little bit

[20:09] for the current year. You've heard me

[20:11] talk about this with the FY26 budget.

[20:13] the placeholder was not quite enough to

[20:16] meet where we settled. So, we're having

[20:18] to make up for that in 27 and add in the

[20:22] new year's growth. So, top step is at

[20:24] 4%. If anyone on the unit A contract is

[20:28] stepping, they will see 6.22%.

[20:31] The third factor on the union contract,

[20:33] which is most significant here in

[20:35] Deerfield, is that we have 10 faculty

[20:37] advancing columns. So they've advanced

[20:39] their degrees, they have additional

[20:41] credits, they may be moving from masters

[20:43] to masters plus 30. The the total

[20:46] increase when this happens varies

[20:48] because it depends on where someone is

[20:51] in the salary schedule already for

[20:52] column and for step. So this is pretty

[20:55] significant when you're talking about 10

[20:57] faculty making that type of movement.

[21:00] And then we have unit C. Um all unit C

[21:03] members are moving up. So uh we added a

[21:06] step. So the coal is 2 and a half and

[21:08] then the step is 3%. That's costing us

[21:11] about $44,000.

[21:13] And then summer stipens um we were

[21:15] slightly over budget this year which

[21:17] we're still analyzing but if you look at

[21:19] our existing budget report that is

[21:20] negative funds. So we're making an

[21:22] adjustment to account for that because

[21:24] we do expect that we're going to need

[21:26] that money moving forward as we continue

[21:28] to develop summer programs.

[21:30] So if you go back one slide, what I want

[21:33] to point out is so if you look

[21:35] instruction first line where it says

[21:37] 42,000,

[21:38] that's just the increase for contractual

[21:42] teachers and IAS, each of those

[21:45] categories has salaries and wage

[21:47] increases in it. That totals the 418,000

[21:51] on the next page. Does that make sense?

[21:55] Okay.

[21:56] Um, next slide after this is non-wage

[21:59] expenditures. So, non-wage expenses,

[22:02] even though this 2% I think is high for

[22:05] our elementary schools because we don't

[22:08] carry a lot of non-wage expenses that

[22:10] typically see growth, but it is not the

[22:13] primary driver of the budget increase at

[22:15] level services. Two things are impacted

[22:18] here. There was a small cola increase on

[22:21] our transportation contract. It's a few

[22:22] thousand dollars. It's not a lot of

[22:24] money. the the majority of that change

[22:26] is coming from uh where we use rural aid

[22:29] in the current year to supplement the

[22:32] budget. I always add that back in

[22:33] because it's not a guaranteed funding

[22:36] source. So I want us to see what that

[22:38] impact would look like were we not to

[22:40] receive those funds.

[22:42] And then central office health insurance

[22:44] is taken into account there. Like the

[22:46] wages, we're getting hit twofold in this

[22:48] category because there was an October

[22:50] 1st increase. And then we're going to

[22:53] see a projected we have right now 20% as

[22:55] a placeholder for July one. So that

[22:58] totals 112,000.

[23:01] So the next slide gives us historical

[23:03] data um to answer your question of where

[23:06] we were. And I gave you the dollar

[23:07] amounts as well because I think that

[23:09] that's even more important to look at

[23:11] than the percentage points in Deerfield

[23:13] in particular. So you can see last year

[23:15] 3% was 160,000.

[23:18] Uh the year before was the renewal of

[23:21] our transportation contract where we saw

[23:23] that big change in our cost. That's

[23:25] where we came in at 4.65%.

[23:28] Otherwise, Deerfield has been really

[23:30] fortunate. We've had some hard

[23:32] conversations to get our numbers here.

[23:34] We've reduced sections. We've eliminated

[23:37] uh faculty and staff where needed to one

[23:40] make sure that we have the right

[23:41] staffing for enrollment and two be

[23:43] fiscally responsible with our budget. So

[23:45] we've been able to come in at that 3ish%

[23:48] or under for many years. This is really

[23:51] an anomaly for our level service budget

[23:53] to be at this level of 9.46%.

[23:59] Typically, we would talk about the

[24:00] principal's budget and new requests and

[24:02] initiatives at this point, but we do not

[24:04] have anything new to to request this

[24:06] year. Um, we did talk behind the scenes

[24:08] about a few different things. Uh, it was

[24:10] sort of decided that given the level

[24:12] service budget, we didn't want to put

[24:14] forward any new requests. Tina felt like

[24:16] we could make do with um what we have

[24:19] and we can look at other funding

[24:20] sources. you know, there may be a grant

[24:22] that we don't rely on to supplement the

[24:25] budget that could be used to buy some

[24:26] consumables and things of those natures.

[24:28] There was nothing significant. We were

[24:30] not coming in asking for a new teaching

[24:32] position or anything like that. Um, so

[24:34] there's nothing new, no impact there.

[24:37] However, um, as Darius mentioned, given

[24:40] the timeline of the budget and some

[24:42] communication that we've already seen

[24:44] from the towns and the 9.46%, 46%. We

[24:48] felt like it was important to come into

[24:49] this meeting with some brainstorming

[24:52] ideas to reduce our budget. Normally, we

[24:55] would wait a month, sit on these

[24:57] numbers, and then we would come back and

[24:58] talk. A February 26th meeting, and then

[25:02] our public hearing just two weeks later

[25:04] is a really tight timeline. And we're

[25:06] all already sensitive to the fact that

[25:08] the town is working on their numbers and

[25:10] I think feeling some pressure from the

[25:12] health insurance increase as well. So,

[25:15] we're going to talk about what

[25:16] reductions look like in the next couple

[25:18] of slides. So, our options to reduce the

[25:21] budget are very limited. We cannot avoid

[25:24] the increase to central office health

[25:26] insurance. Um, we can look at other

[25:30] funding sources. So, we added back in

[25:32] the money from rural aid. We know our

[25:33] allocation. We can look at that. Um,

[25:36] other funding sources that we haven't

[25:38] talked about yet would be primarily

[25:40] looking at school choice. What do we

[25:41] have available in school choice to help

[25:43] offset? The other component is to reduce

[25:46] positions which ultimately ends up in

[25:48] reducing services because wages is the

[25:51] most significant part of our budget. So

[25:53] what we've done in the next couple of

[25:55] slides we're going to outline for you is

[25:57] what that would look like if we were to

[25:59] make reductions. I think one of the

[26:01] important pieces to look at when we're

[26:02] talking about reducing services and

[26:04] positions are items that are enrollment

[26:06] driven and items that are budget driven.

[26:09] So the next slide shows you enrollment.

[26:12] Currently

[26:14] we have um 293

[26:17] students on the October 1st roster. That

[26:21] is because the sixth grade has 55

[26:23] students.

[26:25] That's going to go away because all of

[26:27] the the current fifth graders that will

[26:29] be sixth graders next year, there's only

[26:31] two sections of that grade. So we're

[26:33] losing a full class section. So we're

[26:35] going to be going from 293. I have 263

[26:40] on here, but Tina will likely add a

[26:42] couple of school choice kids here or

[26:44] there or our kindergarten enrollment.

[26:47] Um, this is based on the census for prek

[26:50] and K and and where we typically land

[26:52] that class size. So, this could really

[26:55] be 265 268.

[26:58] Bottom line is we're reducing a

[27:00] significant number of students. We're

[27:02] going from 55 in the current sixth grade

[27:05] to 34.

[27:07] So this is where the discussion of what

[27:10] reductions in positions I know he very

[27:12] much I can see Carrie smirking if you

[27:15] like this new feature Google he's doing

[27:18] it at all the meetings

[27:21] um so this is when we can have a

[27:23] conversation that says do we need to

[27:25] reduce a class section next slide

[27:28] outlines what we actually are proposing

[27:31] for staffing reductions so that first

[27:33] piece based on student enrollment we

[27:35] will naturally decrease sixth grade from

[27:38] three sections to two. Um, it ultimately

[27:41] ends up being an IIA position and a

[27:43] teaching position. Uh, we did talk today

[27:46] there is a long-term sub that would

[27:49] transition back to her IIA role. So,

[27:52] we're not actually eliminating someone's

[27:54] job and we have at least one vacancy in

[27:57] an IIA in this building already. So,

[27:59] again, not actually cutting someone's

[28:02] job from them. Um, so these are natural

[28:04] things that we should be looking at as

[28:06] part of our budget process. There's

[28:08] things that we have looked at in the

[28:09] past when we reduce sections at other

[28:11] grade levels. So that saves us about

[28:13] 1.79%

[28:15] on the budget. From there, we have to

[28:18] look at actual cuts in programming and

[28:21] services. What we talked about today as

[28:24] possibilities and is still being

[28:26] discussed administratively would be an

[28:29] additional reduction of $185,000.

[28:33] We're not going to get into the

[28:34] nitty-gritty of that yet. You know, is

[28:36] it

[28:38] IAS? Is it teachers? Is it related

[28:40] service providers? We're not ready for

[28:42] that conversation. That would definitely

[28:44] be a um February discussion, but this at

[28:47] least gives us an idea of what that

[28:49] number looks like. So that would drop

[28:51] off an additional 3.42% from our budget.

[28:56] Next slide shows where these uh changes

[28:59] get us to. So again, applying rural aid

[29:01] of $79,000, eliminating the sixth grade

[29:04] class section, and then almost $200,000

[29:08] of additional staffing reductions would

[29:10] bring our budget down to a 2.99%

[29:13] increase over the prior year or 164,000

[29:16] roughly. you can see level services

[29:19] versus the reduced budget um over fiscal

[29:22] year 26. So we started at the 9.64 at

[29:25] level services and with those changes

[29:27] are looking at 2.99%.

[29:30] It's a lot of information. So I'm going

[29:32] to pause for a minute and see what

[29:34] questions you have and we can flip back

[29:35] if we need to.

[29:42] What is the uh and you may not know this

[29:45] right off the top of your head, but

[29:46] you're much better at math than I am.

[29:48] What is what would the um

[29:52] total increase be if we just had the

[29:54] sixth grade classroom in the IIA?

[29:57] >> Um so it'd be another 185,000 on top of

[30:00] it. If you go back one slide, Darius.

[30:02] So,

[30:05] um, we'd be taking off, let's call the

[30:07] top line 2% just to keep it even number.

[30:09] So, our budget's 9.64 at level service.

[30:12] So, we're taking out almost two. So,

[30:14] we'd still be at sevenish. Got

[30:16] >> a little over seven.

[30:18] >> Um, and no one wants to happen anyway

[30:20] like that. We've known this from for

[30:22] like a long time that we probably four,

[30:24] five, four years, maybe three years that was eventually going to go down.

[30:28] Yeah. So that was something we were

[30:30] expecting

[30:30] >> and no one wants to have the

[30:32] conversation about reducing staffing and

[30:34] reducing services. But given the state

[30:37] of the budget and given our enrollment,

[30:39] this is a good opportunity for us to

[30:41] have those conversations. There does

[30:43] become a point where you need to right

[30:46] side your budget for the needs of your

[30:48] community. Sometimes that means adding

[30:50] and sometimes it means reducing. And

[30:52] we're at the point of reducing. If we're

[30:54] going to add at certain years, we have

[30:56] to be able to deduct where needed. So,

[30:58] but even reducing that sixth grade

[31:01] position, our class size is still well

[31:02] under 20.

[31:04] >> Yeah. One more longer enrollment.

[31:06] >> That's good.

[31:07] >> Have we been able to look at any capital

[31:09] improvements and delaying those out a

[31:11] year

[31:13] to shave off what we had lined up?

[31:16] >> Well, so we don't control

[31:21] they're different piles of money. It's

[31:23] just that sometimes we pause the

[31:24] conversation in case you have to go into

[31:27] potentially piles I should say silos of

[31:29] money because you're putting you're

[31:31] always you know the town's always going

[31:32] to have its capital fund and putting

[31:34] things towards improving and just

[31:36] because they have a bad budget year they

[31:37] don't stop capital work unless they have

[31:39] a catastrophic year. The reason why

[31:41] we're talking about the school choice,

[31:42] we were kind of pausing about the school

[31:44] choice money toward the playground is

[31:46] depending on how deep we have to cut and

[31:48] we're going to talk a little bit further

[31:50] that this isn't the request from the

[31:53] finance committee which we is it slides

[31:55] still exist.

[31:56] >> Yeah, there's a bunch of so we'll talk

[31:58] about that in a minute. So we're still

[32:00] haven't reached where the finance

[32:03] committee you know made our suggestion

[32:05] that we put our budget coming in at

[32:08] should I just go to that slide? Um,

[32:10] well, let's keep moving.

[32:11] >> We'll come back around to that. So,

[32:13] >> that's our So, our class sizes.

[32:15] >> Yes.

[32:15] >> Yeah. This is next year's.

[32:17] >> Yep. Based on what we know right now and I don't know if this changed since

[32:22] October 1st. Ben did have some movement

[32:23] in his enrollment, but this is based on

[32:26] 10 one of 25. So, by September, there

[32:31] will be whether it's plus or minus a few

[32:33] kids, some changes, but we are under

[32:36] >> 20 students. that's stable, but also

[32:38] take the kindergarten and prek numbers

[32:40] as just those are placeholders, right?

[32:42] Those will change.

[32:43] >> Yeah.

[32:45] >> Can I ask a question about the 185? Is

[32:48] that I'm just wondering where that

[32:50] number came from? Is it I know you're

[32:53] not ready to talk about any specifics,

[32:55] but did it come from

[32:57] >> your discussions about that or did it

[32:59] come from a number that we need to get

[33:02] to

[33:04] ideas that you have? Is this where it

[33:05] came from? projected ideas of what we

[33:07] could probably do.

[33:08] >> Okay, thank you.

[33:09] >> Yeah. No, it wasn't a number we were

[33:10] trying to reach. That was fact it was

[33:12] 299 just happened to be like, "Oh, you

[33:15] got just under 3%." That wasn't that

[33:17] wasn't that's how kind of worked out. In

[33:18] fact, that number could change slightly.

[33:21] >> Um, as we go deeper into those numbers

[33:23] that could be like, you know, could go

[33:24] up to 38, go to, you know, 28, you know,

[33:26] um, it's

[33:29] those are kind of right. They were

[33:31] ballpark numbers about where we about.

[33:32] So, we're going to learn.

[33:33] >> Thank you. We're decreasing by like 20

[33:36] or 25 students

[33:37] >> overall.

[33:38] >> Yeah. Right.

[33:39] >> Yeah.

[33:40] >> Uh Shelley, before we move on, you uh on

[33:43] the first slide when we talk about

[33:44] reductions, you said applying rural aid

[33:46] funding and you talked about school

[33:47] choice, but that is not reflecting

[33:48] school choice money. Correct.

[33:50] >> So, go up um two more.

[33:54] >> So, we do use school choice money to

[33:58] offset the budget. So, whatever we were

[34:00] using in 26, we're using again in 27.

[34:04] But we did not add any new expenditures

[34:06] to 27. So that is still a conversation

[34:09] that we can have.

[34:10] >> We're going to talk about that in a

[34:11] little bit more with those other slides,

[34:12] too.

[34:12] >> Yep.

[34:14] >> Um so if we go down to one more, two

[34:17] more. All right. So let's look at other

[34:19] funds and expenditures and then our

[34:21] total budgets. So the next slide

[34:23] outlines revolving funds. So this is

[34:25] what Carrie was referring to when asking

[34:27] about school choice. You can see the

[34:29] funds are relatively level from the

[34:32] prior year outside of increased wages.

[34:35] So when you look at school choice and it

[34:37] shows 358,000 from last year and 372,000

[34:41] in the new year, that is only to account

[34:44] for the cola and step increases on the

[34:46] contract. It's not a new staff member.

[34:48] Okay. Same thing goes uh uh down the

[34:50] line there

[34:51] >> because when she goes in the budget, she

[34:53] so Carrie, if you're a teacher, she

[34:56] would say, "I'm going to put Carrie on

[34:57] the school choice." She assigns it to

[34:59] people rather than just a general number

[35:00] of 50,000. We assigned it to people. So,

[35:02] it's a little bit easier to tracking

[35:05] where the money is going when you look

[35:06] at different personnel people.

[35:07] >> Yep.

[35:08] >> Okay.

[35:09] >> Rural aid, you can see we're using more

[35:10] rural aid in the new year. Uh last year

[35:13] I think we used the rest of rural aid to

[35:16] help pay for the front project maybe or

[35:19] the paving in the back um and the budget

[35:22] was in a much better position. So we

[35:23] didn't need the amount you know same

[35:25] amount. This is fully using our rural

[35:27] aid money. There will not be any

[35:30] reserves left there.

[35:32] And the next slide shows you the total

[35:35] budget when we look at uh general fund

[35:38] plus revolving funds. And I do have a

[35:40] caveat in here. Uh, revolving funds has

[35:43] not taken into consideration any funding

[35:45] for the playground. In my spreadsheets,

[35:47] I have a number in my mind of where

[35:50] >> yeah, we have talked about that. But for

[35:52] demonstration purposes and not to skew

[35:54] the numbers, I really wanted you to see

[35:56] the comparison of the prior year to the

[35:58] new year. So, uh, we're going from 6.4

[36:02] roughly million total budget to just

[36:04] over 6.5.

[36:07] And the next slide shows our cost per

[36:09] pupil. This is based on the 293 because

[36:12] again everything is October 1st. That's

[36:15] how the state calculates chapter 78 as

[36:18] well.

[36:18] >> Um and then I do have that note in the

[36:20] bottom left hand corner. It's you can

[36:22] see that we have a downward slide

[36:25] compared to 2020 in overall enrollment

[36:29] and in resident enrollment, but it's a

[36:31] little bit harder to see what those

[36:33] numbers actually equate to in the chart.

[36:35] So it is 73

[36:38] um residents and 20 school choice

[36:40] students over seven school years that

[36:42] we've reduced. So it it's fiscally

[36:46] responsible for us to make the changes

[36:48] given the decline in enrollment.

[36:50] >> 2020 school year we have 356 students.

[36:54] So we'll be down to 265ish.

[36:58] » Okay. So, uh, the rest of the

[37:02] presentation gets into what Darius

[37:05] touched on a little bit. So, we did

[37:07] receive an email from finance committee

[37:09] that had a request for the school budget

[37:13] to grow at a maximum of 2 and a.5%

[37:17] including the cost of health insurance

[37:19] for school employees.

[37:22] >> We're going to break that down a little

[37:23] bit further, but I'm going to let you

[37:25] process that for a minute. This is

[37:27] atypical. the school elementary school

[37:30] budgets, none of them have ever covered

[37:32] the cost of health insurance for school

[37:34] employees. I think the town is seeing

[37:37] like Frontier is hundreds of thousand

[37:39] dollars of growth in health insurance

[37:42] between this year's impact and next

[37:44] year's impact. And um we don't believe

[37:47] that the school's the only one that is

[37:49] asked to look at things this way. From

[37:51] the email with Julie, she sort of

[37:53] alluded that they're taking this

[37:55] approach with everyone. We also

[37:57] recognize that it's probably worst case

[37:58] scenario, but we wanted to have that

[38:00] conversation and see what that actually

[38:02] looks like. Anything to add before I

[38:04] keep going?

[38:06] >> Okay, so what does this look like? Let's

[38:08] break it down. So 2 and a half% growth

[38:11] over fiscal year 26 is only $160,000.

[38:15] Where does that come from? So, the town

[38:18] told us that in 2026, school employee

[38:21] health insurance costs $913,000

[38:25] plus our dees operating budget from the

[38:27] current year of 5.5 million would mean

[38:30] that the total cost to fund the school

[38:32] for health insurance and budget is $6.4

[38:34] million.

[38:36] 20 2.5% on top of that is where we get

[38:39] the 160,000.

[38:41] So, if we add that to the 6.4 4 million.

[38:45] Our maximum budget could be $6.5 million

[38:48] including health insurance. Does this

[38:51] make sense?

[38:52] >> The next page I think explains it when

[38:54] you

[38:54] >> Go ahead.

[38:57] >> So what does that mean? the cost of

[39:00] projected health insurance for next

[39:02] year. If we take the 913,000

[39:06] plus what we're projecting for a 20%

[39:08] increase, we're looking at almost $1.1

[39:10] million in health insurance costs for

[39:12] school employees alone. Maximum school

[39:15] budget just outlined on the slide before

[39:17] was 6.5. Let's deduct the health

[39:20] insurance that they're saying we have to

[39:22] include. What does that leave us

[39:24] remaining for our budget? We would have

[39:26] um 5.4 4 million. Our FY26 budget was

[39:30] 5.5 million. So, we would be starting in

[39:33] a deficit.

[39:35] We've talked about that reduced budget,

[39:37] which was adding rural aid, reducing a

[39:40] sixth grade classroom, and an additional

[39:42] $185,000 in staffing comes in at 5.6.

[39:47] We would need, if the town pushed us on

[39:49] this and said that this is what has to

[39:51] proceed, we would be looking at

[39:53] additional budget cuts of $187,000

[39:56] on top of the cuts that we've already

[39:59] talked about.

[40:02] So, I wrote a snippy email back because

[40:05] I could read that really quickly that we

[40:07] were going to be upside down just in

[40:09] request alone because we knew it was

[40:11] about 2.7%

[40:13] increase alone would be health

[40:14] insurance. I just made that number up on

[40:16] the spot, but when I wrote back and

[40:19] Julie kind of wrote back like, I

[40:21] understand that, but that's the request

[40:23] we're putting out there. And so, you

[40:25] know, you guys do what you got to do on

[40:27] your end of doing your work, but that

[40:28] was kind of there. So, um,

[40:33] there's they're trying to figure out

[40:35] what they're going to do, all that

[40:36] information. So, talking about the

[40:38] budget process, right? So, the cherry

[40:40] sheets and such, the governor's budget

[40:41] gets released on Friday, Friday morning.

[40:44] Um, and then so all the towns will know

[40:45] what they have for monies coming in. And

[40:48] so, it's kind of like the what the games

[40:50] begin at that point. Everybody's got

[40:51] their cards up and kind of trying to

[40:53] figure out what's coming and going. um

[40:55] the cards kind of get put on the table

[40:56] after Friday, including Frontier. So,

[40:59] Frontier is kind of the um waiting to

[41:02] see what the assessments are because

[41:03] when Frontier sits around the table, it

[41:05] also has a um huge increase due to

[41:09] health insurance. And to put it in

[41:11] perspective,

[41:13] Frontier increases its budget by around

[41:17] $300,000 a year, between $300,000 and

[41:19] $350,000 a year. insurance alone before

[41:23] anything else is half a million.

[41:26] So the assessment the the cost of the

[41:28] towns is is closer their increase is

[41:31] closer to a million overall. I mean the

[41:33] frontiers increase in budget right now

[41:34] is closer to a million. We haven't done

[41:36] any work on that budget yet because we

[41:38] haven't tried to bring that down through

[41:40] reductions which is probably going to

[41:41] have to be the case. Um, and I've had

[41:43] conversations with frontier staff about

[41:45] the fact that they meant to have

[41:46] reductions um when they start reading

[41:48] about it, but

[41:50] um we had to wait until we see what the

[41:52] assessment numbers are because you don't

[41:54] know how it's going to affect the town.

[41:55] So you can go cutting hundreds of

[41:57] thousands still the assessments can be

[41:58] very high. It's it's an interesting

[42:00] assessment is a whole different game in

[42:01] budgeting. So there's a re that's why

[42:03] we're p that's why Frontier hasn't come

[42:05] out with a more has not gone into the

[42:08] work of how it's going to get its budget

[42:10] down is because it wants to see how it

[42:11] reflects the assessment. So we'll have

[42:13] that information on Friday. So

[42:15] everything's going to kind of heat up on

[42:17] Friday and I've had some side

[42:19] conversations with you know um town

[42:22] government and the question of what are

[42:26] they going to do? How much money do they

[42:28] have? Um the town of Deerfield does have

[42:30] a lot of issues because they've been

[42:32] funding a lot of things out of um free

[42:36] cash instead of putting it on budget and

[42:38] just kind of depending on free cash

[42:39] every year. It's a bad process to be in.

[42:42] So

[42:43] um they are talking about when do they

[42:45] straighten that out? Is this year to do

[42:47] it because everybody's going to get hit

[42:48] by insurance. The insurance numbers are

[42:50] also coming out shortly at sometime in

[42:53] the next week or two. So we'll have an

[42:54] idea of what the we've been putting

[42:57] placeholders in. we'll have an idea what

[42:59] the exact ask is going to be. Um so

[43:03] all that kind of happening at once. So

[43:06] um

[43:08] >> essentially if they needed us to push

[43:10] this forward we're cutting it's not even

[43:12] level funding which we've done in the

[43:14] past where we've funded at the same year

[43:17] from the prior year same amount from the

[43:19] prior year. We it requires

[43:22] >> for also so let's go through the process

[43:24] for and Mary you can help me out too

[43:26] because you've done this quite a bit. Um

[43:28] but so let's understand the process

[43:31] right so the way they the reason why

[43:32] school committee is separate in the

[43:34] state of Massachusetts is so that

[43:36] schools don't get chopped up without

[43:37] review and so let's say you say it's

[43:42] unreasonable for us to pick up a health

[43:44] insurance in that same year and we meet

[43:46] with the town we have conversations next

[43:48] thing will be you know we're going to

[43:50] send our preliminary budget over um at

[43:52] some point um we'll probably hint it

[43:55] over this is where we're kind of playing

[43:56] around with trying to get their

[43:57] feedback, let them get a kind of test of

[43:59] water. And let's say they come back and

[44:01] they say, "No, this is absolutely we're

[44:03] going to go two and a half and

[44:04] absolutely you're paying for insurance

[44:06] this year." Okay, you can still bring

[44:09] forward a budget where you believe is

[44:12] correct. Okay, but you won't have the

[44:15] endorsement of the finance committee,

[44:16] >> right?

[44:18] >> And the question is, will you get the

[44:19] endorsement? You get the two votes when

[44:21] you go to town meeting, right? You have

[44:22] the finance committee and then you also

[44:23] have the select board. So, who's going

[44:25] to endorse and who's not?

[44:28] They get to put the number on the

[44:31] warrant, but you can make a you show up

[44:35] prepared with a sheet of paper and

[44:36] handouts for everybody as to why you're

[44:38] going to increase it on town meeting

[44:40] floor because this is what you know blah blah blah blah. So, it's a very

[44:44] hard to do, but is I'm just explaining

[44:46] what the process is is. You don't have

[44:48] to absolutely listen to um the finance

[44:51] committee, but we in our best interest

[44:52] of working together. Um you know,

[44:56] if we reduce the budget by this much

[44:58] this year, the question is what happens

[45:00] next year because we're going to get

[45:02] hit. They're saying that the insurance

[45:04] problem is is several years in the

[45:06] making. So before it's going to come

[45:08] before we're going to pull out of this

[45:09] kind of nose dive with insurance. So how

[45:11] far do you decimate the school budget

[45:14] and start taking away programming and then you know what are those

[45:17] effects? You know those are the

[45:19] conversations we have to have with the

[45:22] town. We don't know the rest of their

[45:24] finances. I have no idea where the

[45:25] police is coming in. I have no idea

[45:26] where fight I have no idea where their

[45:28] asks are and so forth. So

[45:32] there is talk that we you know we are

[45:35] and a conversation that we have to have

[45:37] at the town is how we use school choice.

[45:41] So we built up a reserve of school

[45:42] choice of you know close to a million

[45:44] dollars, right? And we've been hovering

[45:47] around that million dollar mark by not

[45:50] spending too much more than we're taking

[45:52] in um and

[45:56] by and keeping it there as reserve. So

[45:58] if something comes up, so let's say we

[46:00] have an added district placement that

[46:01] shows up, okay, this just happened in

[46:03] one of our communities and all of a

[46:05] sudden we got to find $110,000 in the

[46:07] middle of the year. If we don't have

[46:09] school choice reserve, then the school

[46:11] committee has to go to the select board

[46:12] and ask them to take it out of free cash

[46:14] >> and then they have to do and then if

[46:16] they have it in free cash, that kind of

[46:17] thing. So there is that kind of level of

[46:19] protection and we started using it

[46:21] toward capital projects instead of

[46:22] offsetting the budget.

[46:24] The question is that they think may

[46:26] think that we're sitting on too much

[46:28] money and so the question would be well

[46:30] how do we bring that number down to what

[46:31] they think it should be at. I would say

[46:34] that you know we should be definitely

[46:36] carrying what I call a year in the rear

[46:40] in a sense that we should always have

[46:43] the amount of money we're spending this

[46:45] year into next year's budget so that

[46:47] you're never caught

[46:49] and we have you know much more than

[46:51] that. Um

[46:53] it's a question about how you do

[46:54] finances. Does the school you know

[46:57] should a school pay down and then go to

[46:59] the town for money or you know school

[47:02] choices is an interesting thing because

[47:04] the way it developed not every school

[47:06] has this problem. Um in fact most

[47:09] schools don't most schools are upside

[47:10] down.

[47:11] >> They may not have this problem

[47:12] >> and and once you burn it down it's gone.

[47:14] And our

[47:15] as you see we used to be in three

[47:17] sections. Remember we we made conscious

[47:18] decisions to reduce the amount of school

[47:20] choice revenue coming in because we're

[47:22] reducing the number of students. So that

[47:25] number is coming down. Um you know some

[47:29] of the smart things that we did when you

[47:30] build something like the den program you

[47:32] could take a you know it's tuition or

[47:34] school choice in but you can take those

[47:36] in and get significant returns on

[47:38] placements there. So building those

[47:40] programs is very financially beneficial

[47:42] to the school district. And so sometimes

[47:44] like we get you get a jump in school

[47:46] choice like I didn't realize that well

[47:47] we had a student come in we had

[47:49] additional needs and we were able to

[47:50] bill out for that kind of thing. So I

[47:52] kind of kind of bouncing all over the

[47:53] place but um I I did hear that the

[47:57] question is well how much school choice

[47:58] do you have? And that's the one of the

[48:00] questions that will be asked of us and

[48:02] so I want people to understand that

[48:03] school choice number kind of where it's

[48:06] at. We were going to with the spending

[48:08] on the playground that number at the end

[48:10] of year would be roughly envelope

[48:13] numbers.

[48:15] >> It depends on what happens with the

[48:17] playground project. Originally the

[48:19] placeholder was about 150,000 but it was

[48:21] going to be over multiple years because

[48:23] we were going to do multiple phases. I'm

[48:26] not even sure 150,000 is going to cover

[48:28] the existing plan for the first phase.

[48:30] So, if we have a million dollars and we

[48:33] go forward with all the playground

[48:35] renovations and we spend 400,000 or

[48:38] 300,000, you know, the math is pretty

[48:40] easy, 6 or 700,000. But two things, one,

[48:45] Darius said this really quickly,

[48:48] we're already exceeding revenue coming

[48:50] in. Our revenue coming in, for simple

[48:53] math, let's say it's 200,000. Our

[48:55] expenses going out are 350. We're

[48:57] overspending as it stands. And if you

[49:00] can flip back to the enrollment slide,

[49:05] while our class sizes are less than 20

[49:07] each, we could blow these up and have

[49:09] Tina take in a lot more students, but it

[49:12] changes what our community looks like,

[49:13] especially if we're talking about

[49:14] reducing services.

[49:17] But more importantly, what I want to

[49:18] point out is

[49:21] the next couple of grades have some

[49:23] larger numbers, six, eight, nine in

[49:27] first grade. Once those kids graduate

[49:30] out, you're not going to be able to

[49:31] backfill kindergarten with six or eight

[49:34] more new students. You have to have room

[49:36] for your resident enrollment. So, our

[49:38] school choice numbers are naturally

[49:40] going to decline. Two reasons. One,

[49:43] we've reduced our sections and you won't

[49:46] be able to take in as many new students

[49:48] as you're pushing out. So, right now, as

[49:51] it stands, we're exceeding revenue by

[49:53] $150,000.

[49:55] revenue is going to continue to come

[49:57] down. We can backfill three

[50:00] eight or nine not probably doable.

[50:03] >> Well, and it's not smart. Well, there's

[50:06] lots of ways to do finances, but it

[50:08] seems the less responsible to put wages

[50:11] on school choice and revolving funds,

[50:13] right? So, and the biggest percentage of

[50:16] our cost is wages,

[50:18] >> right? So,

[50:19] >> just transitioning to that to draw pock

[50:21] down means we're still going to have a

[50:23] budget problem.

[50:24] >> Correct. So if we're if we're we're

[50:27] drawing so let's say we we move forward

[50:28] with the playground project right that's

[50:30] our kind of wheels in motion and so now

[50:31] we're at $700,000 right so we got seven

[50:34] years before we're out of money right I

[50:36] mean it's reloadings

[50:38] >> as well but it it's you know you're

[50:40] going to bring that down and then you'd

[50:42] have to eventually

[50:43] >> last that long but okay

[50:44] >> okay so it's not going to last that long

[50:46] but then you're going to have to go to

[50:47] the town to make up for

[50:50] this you know we were spending you know

[50:52] as we as we saw in that budget line what

[50:54] page is that Wait, before you go off of

[50:55] that slide,

[51:00] finish your thought and come back.

[51:05] » Where's the number of No, that's wrong.

[51:09] Sorry.

[51:13] Where's the uh

[51:16] >> total budget?

[51:18] >> Right here. I mean, so we're already

[51:20] This is what we're spending.

[51:23] >> Yep. within the budget of school choice

[51:26] revenue as it is. So, so we are

[51:28] offsetting it. So, it gets to be a

[51:29] dangerous game. I think it's safer. So,

[51:32] if we So,

[51:35] the other way of kind of playing with

[51:36] the it's all about like shifting numbers

[51:38] and and shifting kind of risk within the

[51:41] budget. And so, I would argue with the

[51:43] finance committee, okay, we'll reduce

[51:46] the budget here and then I will ask the

[51:48] town for a warrant to pay for the

[51:50] playground. So you'll just take from

[51:52] free cash instead of offsetting a

[51:54] budget. You're going to take from free

[51:56] cash to take care instead of we were

[51:58] kind of handling the house and using our

[51:59] money conservatively in the sense of so

[52:02] it's just about like where you kind of

[52:04] put the money and take the money. Um

[52:08] but essentially

[52:11] it's just it's that kind of level of

[52:12] risk and do they want the school to hold

[52:15] the protection

[52:18] within its own budget? Right? And so we

[52:20] haven't gone to the town for bailouts,

[52:22] for transportation midyear, for

[52:25] placements midyear, for you know those

[52:28] kind of things. We've been able to

[52:29] handle all that in house. So

[52:33] >> and subsidizing capital projects

[52:35] >> and we've had decent and we've had very

[52:38] good budgets. So I'd be curious as to

[52:40] like why are you messing with the stew?

[52:42] Do you know what I mean? Like you got a

[52:43] good good group running a solid thing.

[52:45] But

[52:46] >> I'd love to hear their their opinions on

[52:50] Maybe they aren't trying to go there.

[52:51] Maybe I'm reading into it. Maybe they're

[52:53] um you know, maybe the two and a half

[52:55] coming out there is saying, you know,

[52:56] we're in a slight panic and you know,

[52:59] we're putting this out there to see what

[53:00] it takes to get there so that everybody

[53:02] looks seriously at their budgets, you

[53:04] know, and so um I've had two and a

[53:06] half.99.

[53:09] >> That's like very good face. Yeah. Right.

[53:12] At least on

[53:13] >> and they don't know where we we're

[53:14] starting from. They they don't have all

[53:15] the information. there's an information

[53:17] imbalance which is really and I don't

[53:19] know where they are. So that's the

[53:20] problem with it's the positive and

[53:22] negative within schools and that's why

[53:23] they do it this way is so that you build

[53:26] your budget based on the needs of the

[53:28] children of the community not on city

[53:31] hall's needs right and so that you don't

[53:33] get police versus school fire let's go

[53:36] prettier fire versus school you know

[53:38] what I mean like so you don't have those

[53:39] two departments going after each other

[53:41] you have that's why you have this kind

[53:43] of separate that's why they set up in my

[53:45] opinion why they set up Massachusetts

[53:46] that way with the oversight of the

[53:47] school committee So,

[53:49] >> can we go back to enrollment for a

[53:51] second? Because I I just want to make

[53:53] another point that if you're getting

[53:54] questions, it's up

[53:57] >> back.

[54:00] >> Yeah. What does up mean?

[54:01] >> Yeah. One more.

[54:05] >> So, I know I get this question a lot and

[54:07] it comes up more at Frontier than

[54:09] Deerfield, but it's definitely come up

[54:10] on town meeting floor is, you know, why

[54:12] do you have school choice kids? You

[54:14] know, they're bringing in some money,

[54:15] but we're paying teachers. Look at our

[54:18] resident numbers. You could not have I

[54:20] mean I guess we could but it would be

[54:22] complete woe to our community. You could

[54:24] have one classroom of 31 students.

[54:27] But likely even if we did not have those

[54:29] school choice numbers, we're still

[54:31] having two sections with the exception

[54:33] of probably first grade still having two

[54:36] sections.

[54:38] >> We're not paying for staffing. We're

[54:41] using school choice funds to help offset

[54:44] the budget, but we're not paying

[54:45] staffing specifically for school choice

[54:48] students, right? I think that's a really

[54:50] good distinction for everyone to

[54:52] understand when you're having

[54:53] conversations with the public,

[54:55] >> right? And we made that decision last

[54:57] year on this one as that we were going

[54:59] to do that to keep consistency to across

[55:01] and hope to backfill that with choice.

[55:03] So that class a little bit smaller. I

[55:05] mean we've what we've run into other

[55:07] towns as well is it's also the starting

[55:09] number of the class and then we've seen

[55:11] kids leave

[55:13] like you lose the free resident kids are

[55:15] like wait a minute why are you sub you

[55:16] know this is particularly we're talking

[55:18] about like Sunderland has this issue

[55:20] because they have two you have two

[55:21] sections as well in some of their

[55:23] classes and it's like wait a minute you

[55:24] could have ran that class with residents

[55:26] alone why'd you add choice well when we

[55:29] opened and we started the class the

[55:30] class was at 26 four kids left and now

[55:33] it's at 20 you know 22 two, we could

[55:35] have done that, but we've already once

[55:37] those students are in your school, you

[55:38] can't say, "Oh, we we don't want you

[55:40] this year, you know." No, once you you

[55:42] make that decision, we make a decision.

[55:44] Not so much here. I'm just kind of

[55:45] bringing that out loud when you look at

[55:46] other um schools that have done that.

[55:49] >> So, we really should be looking at a

[55:52] plan to get expenses off of school

[55:54] choice, not adding expenses to school

[55:57] choice because we're going to need a

[55:58] multi-year plan as the revenue. And I

[56:01] can try to do some bigger projections

[56:03] for us that would show, you know, if the

[56:06] school choice kids age out and we don't

[56:08] backfill all of them, what does that

[56:10] look like for revenue? What the, you

[56:12] know, assume a 3% growth on cola for the

[56:15] next five years? What does that look

[56:16] like for wages? I don't think it's even

[56:19] going to be seven before we're at a

[56:21] point, you know, and and maybe that's

[56:23] part of our conversation is, oh, let's

[56:24] deal with it down the road. Right now is

[56:27] what we really need to tackle and focus

[56:28] on. but it wouldn't be my recommended

[56:31] approach and you know we just have to

[56:33] strike the right balance with that.

[56:38] » So are other town departments

[56:41] also taking on their employees health

[56:44] insurance? I don't know.

[56:46] >> We don't know.

[56:46] >> I don't know.

[56:50] » Trying to remember said

[56:53] >> just looking up the email right now

[56:54] because I kind of

[56:57] » um

[57:00] >> so if we look at this from a m and I'm

[57:02] sorry we're Mary's question wasn't

[57:06] answered. you're looking at.

[57:07] >> She's looking down.

[57:08] >> It does not mention any other

[57:10] departments in the

[57:12] >> because if we're looking at a scale down

[57:15] >> and less of reliance on school choice,

[57:17] we really need to make steeper cuts. if

[57:20] we're looking at a multi-year

[57:22] perspective to get that to get the

[57:24] expenses down even more because if if

[57:27] health insurance is a multi-year issue

[57:30] and we're going to be eating away at the

[57:32] pot of school choice knowing that that's

[57:34] not going to be growing anymore, we're

[57:36] looking at steeper cuts over the next

[57:38] two, three years. I think in the current

[57:40] year if we can pull together what we've

[57:43] presented today to make the reductions

[57:45] of the sixth grade classroom and then

[57:47] the other 185,000 and if the town

[57:49] doesn't ask us to come to that 2 and a

[57:51] half% we're okay with school choice

[57:53] where it is right now and we can use

[57:55] some of it to offset the playground. I

[57:57] think if we can't pull together the

[58:01] 185,000 in additional cuts and the town

[58:04] asks us to bring it down another

[58:06] 185,000.

[58:08] We do have a bigger school choice

[58:10] problem.

[58:11] But yes, to your point, two, three, the

[58:14] next two, three, four years, we're going

[58:16] to have to start pulling expenses off,

[58:19] >> especially if we're using

[58:21] >> it's coming

[58:21] >> three to 400,000 for the playground.

[58:25] >> And I would not get into the well, let's

[58:27] cut more now to save later. It never

[58:29] seems to work. You know what I mean?

[58:31] Because it just gets back filled with

[58:32] other

[58:32] >> No, I'm just thinking if we're looking

[58:34] at an issue of scale, which it seems

[58:35] like we are, like what what the our

[58:38] supply and demand is out of whack. It's

[58:40] getting out of whack. And so

[58:44] trying to understand what this means for

[58:45] the identity and the land and and kind

[58:48] of defining what the school is and who

[58:49] we serve and what our objectives are. I

[58:51] think just trying to understand that

[58:54] this is just helpful to to let that

[58:56] stew. Um,

[59:02] » so I think as far as school choice goes,

[59:05] I think the first step would be we come

[59:09] back next month and say these are the

[59:11] positions slashservices that we're

[59:13] looking to cut. And we have that

[59:15] discussion as to whether or not we're

[59:17] willing and you're willing as a

[59:18] committee to make those reductions. And

[59:21] if not, then we're talking about using

[59:23] school choice money to fund them because

[59:25] we do need to bring the budget down. The

[59:27] bottom line, whether it is in reduced

[59:29] positions or using a supplement fund.

[59:32] >> And just to jump on that, so the

[59:34] timeline is we come into the February

[59:38] meeting and we're going to make a budget

[59:40] that we're sending to public hearing on

[59:42] March 11th,

[59:43] >> two weeks later.

[59:44] So, um that's why we

[59:46] thought it was important to have this

[59:47] here to kind of kind of mle it over and

[59:49] you know um and so forth that kind of

[59:52] where things are at um how and how we

[59:56] get there. Then it goes to public

[59:57] hearing. You still can change it again

[1:00:00] after public hearing you can bring it

[1:00:02] down and you just can't increase it. Um,

[1:00:04] but between now and February, you know,

[1:00:08] after this meeting, I'm going to reach

[1:00:10] out to both finance and and select board

[1:00:13] and say, do is there going to be a

[1:00:15] meeting of the minds of the budget once

[1:00:17] they we get it on Friday um from the

[1:00:21] state so we all have kind of, you know,

[1:00:23] we're playing with um about what we want

[1:00:26] to do there. And so there may be

[1:00:28] maybe there might be another meeting

[1:00:30] getting on the books about a joint

[1:00:31] meeting where um to have that

[1:00:34] conversation

[1:00:35] even before the public hearing rather

[1:00:37] than doing an isolation because we

[1:00:41] because I don't have the answer of you

[1:00:44] know this number we can make work or

[1:00:48] you know they're going to say you know

[1:00:49] you need to bring that down further and

[1:00:51] then so forth. So that's kind of like

[1:00:54] the next step. It's a little it's a

[1:00:55] little foggy. It's not clearly defined

[1:00:58] exactly how it because on good years

[1:01:00] they never bug us. You know what I mean?

[1:01:02] Like when we said when we said, you

[1:01:04] know, two and three over before, they're

[1:01:06] like, "Thank you. That's that's great.

[1:01:08] That's, you know, normal growth."

[1:01:10] >> So, if you go back to that last slide,

[1:01:12] just to recap what we're sort of still

[1:01:15] deliberating.

[1:01:22] Sorry, I can't go faster then.

[1:01:30] » So, we'll continue to review

[1:01:33] internal suggestions for cuts

[1:01:35] administratively.

[1:01:37] Darius and I will continue conversations

[1:01:39] with town officials. We will know better

[1:01:42] the impact of Frontier's budget on the

[1:01:45] town of Deerfield in the next week.

[1:01:48] and then we come back next month.

[1:01:52] >> Right.

[1:01:55] >> So, you'll have to have input though or

[1:01:57] conversations with the town

[1:02:00] because with the way you just outlined

[1:02:02] it when you come back next month,

[1:02:05] it's not going to include taking on the

[1:02:08] health insurance.

[1:02:10] Well,

[1:02:10] >> the way it stands, the way it stands

[1:02:12] today, the way you know, the way you

[1:02:14] just presented, unless there's some

[1:02:16] conversation, which I think we should be

[1:02:18] part of.

[1:02:18] >> Yeah. I don't think

[1:02:21] um

[1:02:23] I don't think that

[1:02:26] the letter that I got was not I don't it

[1:02:29] was

[1:02:32] not I'm not sure we're going to suddenly

[1:02:34] change the structure of financing the

[1:02:36] school and its benefits if the finance

[1:02:40] community can just do that and I'm and

[1:02:42] you know and I without much without that

[1:02:44] conversation with this group we also

[1:02:46] without the conversation with select

[1:02:47] board I don't know where the authority

[1:02:48] lies But it's set up that we don't

[1:02:50] oversee that.

[1:02:52] >> And so to suddenly say, "Oh, it's a high

[1:02:54] year now. You get to oversee it."

[1:02:57] >> You know, I I can see the pluses and

[1:02:58] minuses of the overseeing it. And all

[1:03:01] the elementarymentaries are set up the

[1:03:02] same way. So, um, so you're you're right

[1:03:06] on that. And so I'm not

[1:03:09] I want to say I'm not entertaining

[1:03:10] completely. I want to have a bigger

[1:03:11] conversation on that. Um and

[1:03:17] we you know we end up going to public

[1:03:18] hearing with a higher budget than we

[1:03:19] come to public hearing with a higher

[1:03:20] budget. We have a little bit more

[1:03:21] flexibility

[1:03:24] although the timeline's going to get

[1:03:25] really tight after that March

[1:03:27] you know. Great

[1:03:28] >> because I think they are last Monday in

[1:03:31] April for town meeting and they have to

[1:03:33] have their budget I think done a month

[1:03:35] before I posted in the warrant

[1:03:38] >> two weeks right

[1:03:39] >> two weeks.

[1:03:40] >> Yeah.

[1:03:42] But they're going to want they're going

[1:03:43] to want to go here. But I'm just saying

[1:03:44] the smaller town sometimes go two weeks.

[1:03:46] >> They can fiddle around up to then.

[1:03:47] >> How long does it take to get bids for

[1:03:49] the playground? Like that does seem like

[1:03:50] we need to understand numbers and what

[1:03:53] that would do to school choice and for

[1:03:54] the finance committee to see that it's

[1:03:56] actually not 800 something thousand.

[1:03:58] It's going to

[1:04:00] >> even if we posted even if we had it in

[1:04:02] the queue to go ahead and do it, we

[1:04:04] wouldn't have the numbers.

[1:04:05] >> Yeah.

[1:04:06] >> It takes like 90 days

[1:04:08] >> at least.

[1:04:09] So, you know, if we look to

[1:04:13] get an idea,

[1:04:15] you know, February, it's a it's a

[1:04:17] relatively small job just in in a scope

[1:04:20] of things of contractors. They'll be in

[1:04:22] and out in just I would say a few days.

[1:04:24] Um,

[1:04:28] » the problem is is we're mandated by Mass

[1:04:30] General law to post things for a certain

[1:04:32] length of time and then you have to

[1:04:34] provide opportunities for questions,

[1:04:37] site visits, and some of the behind the

[1:04:39] scenes work that still would have to be

[1:04:41] done between the engineer and us and the

[1:04:44] person helping us put the package

[1:04:46] together. Like that can be lengthy just

[1:04:49] to get the bid documents ready. So,

[1:04:52] >> I mean 60 days would be really hard.

[1:04:54] It's 90s more realistic.

[1:05:00] » Well, I'm reluctant to spend on school

[1:05:03] choice too quickly.

[1:05:07] I don't you know, if we go back to the

[1:05:09] town, here's our budget 3%. We're

[1:05:11] sitting on 800,000 in school choice.

[1:05:16] I don't that doesn't feel like we're

[1:05:18] showing them that we're operating in

[1:05:19] good faith there. So is it we're saying

[1:05:21] we're committing to spending certain

[1:05:23] amount of the playground which are our

[1:05:25] best guess is

[1:05:28] even then though even if it's half of

[1:05:30] that the playground

[1:05:32] I just feel like the town is still going

[1:05:34] to feel we're not doing enough out of

[1:05:37] school choice. There's you know based on

[1:05:38] conversations I've heard from them last

[1:05:39] year I know there's some people who feel

[1:05:41] that it shouldn't be as high as it is.

[1:05:47] >> Yeah it's been that way for years. We've

[1:05:49] gotten the questions on school choice

[1:05:51] and how much money do you have and why

[1:05:52] are you

[1:05:54] >> um sitting

[1:05:54] >> punished for saving

[1:05:57] >> well preparing for a very potentially

[1:05:59] costly. So, the good news is we could

[1:06:01] use this savings to to leverage us out

[1:06:03] of this moment with the decisions we

[1:06:05] make, but it's going to leave us

[1:06:07] empty-handed.

[1:06:08] >> If it's offset wages, though, it's just

[1:06:10] going to be bigger, which we went

[1:06:12] through when we did when we ended up

[1:06:15] producing three positions the last time.

[1:06:18] you know the we talked about school

[1:06:22] choice to offset budget but then the

[1:06:23] next year it would be like a triple

[1:06:26] >> problem instead of just like

[1:06:28] >> I think we need to kind of prepare some

[1:06:32] um just putting some visuals about what

[1:06:34] it what does it what does it look like

[1:06:35] and what is what is our already

[1:06:39] um track that we're on that is slowly

[1:06:43] depleting school choice right and what

[1:06:46] is the you know is it a five or sixth

[1:06:49] year based on whatever you know as Shel

[1:06:51] said earlier that she put something like

[1:06:52] that possible together to say this is

[1:06:54] what this is what we're seeing right and

[1:06:57] share that information you know I mean I

[1:07:00] think it's about it really is about um

[1:07:03] you having you know not having all the

[1:07:06] information

[1:07:07] >> and I don't I don't think

[1:07:10] everyone understands how much an out of

[1:07:12] district placement can cost and that we

[1:07:14] have to provide it like it is not a

[1:07:16] choice we can do our best to serve in

[1:07:19] house, but there may be a situation

[1:07:21] where legally we need to spend $150,000

[1:07:24] in a year to place somebody.

[1:07:27] >> I think we can easily demonstrate also

[1:07:29] how revenue has already come down over

[1:07:31] the last few years, but expenses have

[1:07:33] not. So, yeah, there's there's

[1:07:36] definitely some materials we can put

[1:07:37] together for the town to help better

[1:07:39] understand.

[1:07:40] >> Yeah. Or an easy way to show the town

[1:07:42] how much we would have had to ask for

[1:07:43] them

[1:07:44] >> if we didn't have a school choice

[1:07:45] budget.

[1:07:46] >> Great. Yeah.

[1:07:48] it gets it gets slippery because

[1:07:54] it's like what is the staffing need in

[1:07:56] this building if you reduce it by that

[1:07:57] number of students? And if you look at

[1:07:59] those classrooms, you'll see where you

[1:08:01] need two sections of all that, but

[1:08:03] there's a lot of whatifs in there. And

[1:08:05] so you can have a blank, you can have a

[1:08:08] kind of like a this is an envelope

[1:08:10] number, but they'd have to take it in

[1:08:12] good faith rather than if someone could just kind of Yeah, but you

[1:08:16] could do this and you can move this and

[1:08:17] you only need you only need one nurse

[1:08:18] and you only need one, you know, this

[1:08:20] based on in you don't actually know the

[1:08:23] needs of

[1:08:26] » I was thinking, you can't really go off

[1:08:28] in enrollment numbers. You have to look

[1:08:30] at the kids in front of you,

[1:08:32] >> right? But at a minimum our resident

[1:08:34] members

[1:08:35] >> if nothing else. I mean could we reduce

[1:08:37] at that point related service providers

[1:08:40] because it's less students. Could we

[1:08:42] reduce specials? Like those are the

[1:08:43] kinds of things we would be looking at.

[1:08:45] But you're not really reducing your

[1:08:47] grade level teachers or your

[1:08:49] instructional assistants.

[1:08:51] And it

[1:08:55] all and it gets to this weird kind of

[1:08:58] thing like every other ele school would

[1:09:03] love this problem.

[1:09:05] You have too much school choice. We're writing a check to you before we

[1:09:12] do our budget because the amount of

[1:09:13] school choice we have going out. And so

[1:09:15] the fact that it's kind of like it's

[1:09:18] there's this kind of um I don't know the

[1:09:21] Most people don't who are talking illy

[1:09:24] about school choice don't realize that

[1:09:26] we are on top of it as a district. All

[1:09:29] five towns are on top of it because we

[1:09:32] are winning the school choice game.

[1:09:34] Okay, it's a game that we didn't set up

[1:09:36] the rules to and people are upset that

[1:09:37] we're, you know, doing that game. But if

[1:09:40] we were in the flip side, we'd be

[1:09:41] saying, "Okay, the first thing in the

[1:09:43] budget is we have to payundundred or

[1:09:45] $500,000 to school choice and charter

[1:09:47] going out and then um we're going to

[1:09:49] start in a deficit and then we're going

[1:09:51] to figure out how we're going to we're

[1:09:52] going to cut teachers here to pay school

[1:09:54] choice going out." Instead, we're we're

[1:09:56] getting upset that you have understand

[1:09:57] what the real argument is. You've saved

[1:09:59] too much money

[1:10:02] and put it on our taxpayers at 3% the

[1:10:04] last few years.

[1:10:07] You know what I mean?

[1:10:08] your budget. It's not like, you know,

[1:10:09] look at the other elementary schools

[1:10:10] around us. They're 6 7 8 9 10 there. No

[1:10:14] one is coming in under five around us

[1:10:16] and elementary schools. And I'll have

[1:10:18] all that information for the next

[1:10:19] meeting, too, because you we're all

[1:10:20] sharing that so people have an idea. The

[1:10:22] fact that, you know, we're going to

[1:10:23] propose something under five,

[1:10:25] you know, it's just kind of I know

[1:10:27] there's a get me fired up in that kind

[1:10:29] of thing. Like there's been very good um

[1:10:32] managing of our budgets and being

[1:10:34] fiscally responsible. Um

[1:10:38] >> I can also put together what we have

[1:10:41] paid for capital projects with school

[1:10:43] choice money that has saved the town and

[1:10:45] the taxpayers. So that is really

[1:10:48] importantly done some things there.

[1:10:52] >> Yep.

[1:10:53] >> My opinion at this point is I think

[1:10:56] there's a lot of work there's a lot of

[1:10:58] things you've taken off to bring the

[1:10:59] budget from 9.6 or 7 down to just a hair

[1:11:02] under three.

[1:11:04] I am comfortably moving forward with

[1:11:06] that at this point. I don't really have

[1:11:08] the stomach to at this point say we're

[1:11:10] doing two and a half percent minus

[1:11:13] health insurance.

[1:11:18] » So there's no um action by the committee

[1:11:21] tonight. Just kind of an understanding

[1:11:22] that this number we're at now. we will

[1:11:25] bring you a

[1:11:28] um the plan what the numbers what the

[1:11:31] 185 represents

[1:11:33] and um you know look at school choice

[1:11:37] and the modeling of that. So we have

[1:11:38] that conversation and maybe it's um

[1:11:44] maybe we invite you know a conversation

[1:11:47] with the finance committee and select

[1:11:48] board invite members from each committee

[1:11:50] to come to that meeting so that you know

[1:11:54] I don't know I'm trying to feel you know

[1:11:55] we can fill out where they're at instead

[1:11:57] you know instead of doing a whole

[1:11:58] another meeting may that be a meeting

[1:11:59] they could come here and attend here

[1:12:01] with us they've done that in the past

[1:12:02] yearfield's been usually um those

[1:12:05] members have been pretty open to coming

[1:12:08] and talking about it and they'll have a

[1:12:09] better idea of their numbers as well.

[1:12:11] So, um

[1:12:15] I we'll see. Well, I'll work on all

[1:12:16] that. I mean, there's a possibility we

[1:12:18] might be moving meetings around and that

[1:12:19] kind of stuff where we may have to go to

[1:12:21] them earlier. Um and of course, I'll let

[1:12:23] you guys all know and either we formally

[1:12:24] make it a meeting or, you know, we go or

[1:12:27] you know, whatever the mix of the group

[1:12:29] is. So, um it's just that

[1:12:34] it's a lot of um

[1:12:36] yeah, there's a lot of crowded dates

[1:12:40] because you're not the only budget

[1:12:41] that's in upside down right now.

[1:12:44] So, Shel and I doing a lot of visiting

[1:12:46] to towns and having conversations with

[1:12:48] select boards and finance committees

[1:12:49] because um Sunderland's in very rough

[1:12:52] shape, very very rough shape. And

[1:12:55] Wheatley is in semi- rough shape.

[1:12:56] Conway's okay. They're announcing that's

[1:12:59] going to be somewhat palatable depending

[1:13:00] on where their health insurance and

[1:13:01] their town lands.

[1:13:03] >> Yeah.

[1:13:03] >> And then Frontier,

[1:13:05] some of their assessments might be

[1:13:07] crazy, too.

[1:13:08] >> So,

[1:13:09] >> and the other don't have that built too.

[1:13:12] I'm just thinking about the other

[1:13:14] >> What's that?

[1:13:14] >> Is there a tech school building?

[1:13:16] >> So, yeah. Wait. So, the tech school is

[1:13:18] hard to put a put a it's hard to put a

[1:13:20] finger on because they increase their

[1:13:23] budget, but because it's based on

[1:13:26] enrollment, we only see how it hits

[1:13:27] enrollment in each town. And while

[1:13:29] they're our school committee member and

[1:13:31] ours is is um Bob Decker is the school

[1:13:33] committee rep for town of Deerfield

[1:13:35] there. There's no real feedback loop and

[1:13:39] accountability to the tech school

[1:13:41] because there's so many right

[1:13:43] >> towns into it and they and they keep

[1:13:46] getting hit up and down based on their

[1:13:48] enrollment. So you know people like oh

[1:13:50] the tech school's up and they go you've

[1:13:51] increased enrollment. Oh that makes

[1:13:52] sense. Well they don't say well we've

[1:13:54] increased it by 6% on top of enrollment.

[1:13:57] They don't they don't really talk about

[1:13:59] that as much. The numbers just on the

[1:14:01] thing and it's usually oh Roman's down.

[1:14:03] You like tech Roman slightly up. Oh,

[1:14:05] goods are going there. That's great. You

[1:14:07] know, I mean there's never really that

[1:14:09] kind of like how quickly is their budget

[1:14:10] going. Um I mean there is some

[1:14:13] oversight, but just not at the town

[1:14:14] level where they're held accountable.

[1:14:16] >> There's rarely a question about the tax

[1:14:18] budget at any of our

[1:14:19] >> I don't think I've seen one in the nine

[1:14:20] years I've been here

[1:14:24] and nine times four because I go to all

[1:14:26] four towns.

[1:14:33] Thank you. Thank you for holding.

[1:14:38] >> All right.

[1:14:40] >> Okay. All right.

[1:14:44] So, the next thing So, we'll revisit

[1:14:47] next month.

[1:14:50] » I think so.

[1:14:53] Um

[1:14:55] this needs to appoint a member to

[1:14:56] superintendent uh subcommittee supery

[1:14:59] agreement. Um so a little over two years

[1:15:01] ago starting three years ago um I think

[1:15:03] the first time um we formed a

[1:15:07] subcommittee to write a superintendency

[1:15:09] agreement which just formalized put into

[1:15:11] place everything um that had been

[1:15:13] happening with the four districts in

[1:15:15] frontier.

[1:15:17] um

[1:15:19] and it was uh approved two years ago. It

[1:15:21] has a clause in there that says it will

[1:15:23] be reviewed in two years. So here we

[1:15:25] are. Uh so there'll be a subcommittee

[1:15:28] putting one member from each committee.

[1:15:30] Um and you know I don't think it's under

[1:15:31] a huge time commitment and you know a

[1:15:34] couple meetings maybe and then they'll

[1:15:35] bring that back to the joint committees

[1:15:37] to vote on any changes. Um I I can say

[1:15:42] that we had the chair's meeting in

[1:15:43] December and there was some feedback on

[1:15:45] things that could be changed tweaked. So

[1:15:47] there's some ideas to start with. So

[1:15:48] you're not starting from scratch. So is

[1:15:50] there anybody who would like to be part

[1:15:53] of that?

[1:15:56] » I would do it if no one wants to. So

[1:15:59] Mary, did I cut you off?

[1:16:04] » No. I think I should probably do it. I

[1:16:09] was like, "This is sounding unfamiliar."

[1:16:10] >> Yeah,

[1:16:12] >> I'm happy to do it. Okay.

[1:16:14] >> Yeah, sure.

[1:16:16] >> Yeah, makes sense. Probably.

[1:16:17] >> Okay. All righty. I appoint to

[1:16:20] subcommittee.

[1:16:25] » Okay. All right. Reports. Uh I have no

[1:16:28] report. They're a collaborative report.

[1:16:30] >> Um the search committee put forward five

[1:16:32] candidates um for interview. one of

[1:16:36] which is extremely controversial and

[1:16:37] have been receiving letters from

[1:16:39] teachers union all around the area. Um

[1:16:42] that's kind of where the collaborative

[1:16:44] stands. They are still despite all of

[1:16:46] their butts cuts, sorry. Um facing

[1:16:49] pretty significant financial challenges.

[1:16:53] So

[1:16:55] >> thank you.

[1:16:57] >> All right. Superintendent report.

[1:17:00] >> Um I had a really short report that I

[1:17:03] emailed you. It included just a timeline

[1:17:05] for the state budget to remind those how

[1:17:08] that kind of that process works. And

[1:17:10] then the other thing was the graduation

[1:17:13] um the graduation council came forward

[1:17:16] with its initial recommendations for

[1:17:18] changing graduation requirements. Just

[1:17:20] it's not obviously affect the

[1:17:21] elementary, but you can see how that

[1:17:23] trickles on. Um I've been asked to serve

[1:17:26] on the committee to review the next

[1:17:28] step. Um,

[1:17:31] I think it was because I wrote really

[1:17:34] bold statements in their survey they

[1:17:36] sent us. Um, so I don't know if that's

[1:17:38] good or bad. So, it's kind of sassy in

[1:17:40] it. So, um, I'll let you know. So, I'll

[1:17:44] have a little bit more knowledge about

[1:17:45] what's going on in next steps. Um,

[1:17:49] anyway,

[1:17:51] that's what's going on there. So,

[1:17:55] well, thanks for working on that.

[1:17:57] >> Thank you for working on that.

[1:18:01] All right.

[1:18:03] No one has any other business to go

[1:18:06] over. I would be looking for a motion to

[1:18:07] >> adjourn.

[1:18:10] Second.

[1:18:12] >> All right. All in favor.

[1:18:16] >> All right. I vote meeting at 618.

Deerfield Elementary School Committee - January 20, 2026

Transcript