e e e e e e e e e the board president will call the meeting to order at 7
p.m. meeting notice statement adequate notice of this meeting of the Berkeley Heights Board of Education was given as required by the open public meeting act as follows notice of this special Board of Education meeting was sent to the Star Ledger and The Courier news on
February 19th 2025 and was provided to all schools PTO presidents the bhaa president and posted at the administration building a copy was also provided to the public library and filed with the municipal clerk please rise for
the flag salute Mr secretary may we have a roll call Mr Kiri M Bradford here M dlan Dr forer here miss Jolly here Mrs
Conor here Mrs Stanley Mr Tero here tonight's Board of Education special meeting uh concerns the referendum presentation and discussion Dr FY would you like to introduce our presenters thank you very much Mrs
Bradford oops sorry so tonight I want to thank um our uh Architects our bond counsel and um our financial advisers to for coming and actually working with me
on very short notice um and meeting with me for the first time I think it was a week and a half ago uh to help us start the process of understanding um the whole referendum timeline process uh
intricacies I know that this is my sixth week in the district and one of the things that um you all charged me with that looking at was whether or not a referendum was palatable um for the
community and this is the first step to open up the conversation uh I know that there were things that happened in the past and I can only move forward I can understand what happened in the past but I can only move us forward and this is
the first step in opening the lines of communication about what is a referendum what's it going to take and then our the the steps in the process and the next steps that we would need to take if we actually want to move forward with doing this for 2026 when our debt rolls off or
if it's we're not going to do it then then knowing what the um uh consequences is the wrong word but knowing what is it it entails to do it at another time if we're not going to be doing it in March of 2026 so we can be
informed as a board you know as a district and as a Community as to what we want for Berkeley Heights so without further Ado I'll let you all introduce yourselves individually and take us through it please evening everyone can you guys
hear me hello my name is Frank MSO I am uh the principal and founder of solutions architecture we are the board's architect of record we've been in District for 12 years uh we have you know done a variety of projects
uh throughout the district very successfully and we have looked at the subject of referendum on more than one occasion um you know the referendum process is a collaborative process that involves everyone uh from the Board of
Education the administration your Architects um with me is uh fond counsel uh Tony salamini from w we also have here uh Finance team uh from Phoenix advisers Danielle Marino is here uh so
this team is is brought together to walk you through the process and let you understand it what you're going to see tonight is more of uh of the process and more of the history of what was previously looked at because nothing here is set in stone tonight this is not
a decided thing this is something that we're going to talk about and reboot where we were we're going to determine if this is necessary if it's something we want to keep the projects that previously in this which ones have been completed already which ones still remain to be done so this is really you
know a starting point there's nothing here that's that's sacran or we're GNA we're going to look at all these pieces and you as a board we're going to give you the information to make decisions on moving forward evening everyone as Frank indicated I'm Tony salamini I'm an
attorney with willin Goldman and Spitzer um our role is uh as Bond counsel to the Board of Education so we take advise the board of education on all legal aspects of a referendum if you decide to move forward with a referendum we prepare all the resolutions authorizing the referendum
process and then ultimately I'm the one that writes the bond question that goes to the voters and then we we help and assist with the hopefully eventual sale of the bonds I've had the opportunity to work with the district uh for many years and on several of your past referendum
back in the day um also so I've been involved in the planning process for a couple years uh with some of your prior Administration so I have a little bit of the history um in terms of referendum just real quick um there's 15 referendum coming out in the state March 11th um
I'm working on 10 of the 15 um so I have a pretty good idea of the referendum that are going on in the state what other school districts are doing and the reason why most school districts are going to referendum is to basically get that Debt Service Aid and to spread the cost out over the useful life of the
project um so it's a really exciting opportunity for you guys with your uh debt forecast and I'm looking forward to helping with the process and being a resource to answer any question hi everyone I'm Danielle Marino and I'm with Phoenix advisers and we're your financial advisor so we provide all
the financial projections and tax impact information when it comes to the referendum and then if the referendum is successful we help bring the district into the bond market to sell the bonds um so just a little background Phoenix advisers was founded in 2004 I've been
with the firm since 2013 and Berkeley Heights word of Ed has been our client for the past 10 years um and this just shows some of our experience and we were number one in New Jersey as a financial adviser in the past year um I just thought this would be
helpful for you all to see just to get an idea of what other districts have done in the past year or so so this is our experience selling bonds from successful referendum since the beginning of 2024 um as you can see most districts
have sold bonds between 15 and 30 years and interest rates have been somewhere between three and a half and 4% under four everything has come in under four um um for the past year so um this just
shows you know how much they sold their credit rating and the term and then again the interest rate they received so Berkeley Heights um you guys have a double A+ rating just to com for comparison purposes which is just one
notch below the AAA which is the top rating that you can receive so that's something to um keep in mind when you're looking at these rates you're at the top of the uh the rating scale here so what that means is that you'll achieve the lower interest
rate um and then another slide I have I just thought this graph would be helpful because um sometimes we hear that people think that we're in a high interest rate environment and um what what this graph shows is that further in the front of
the curve in the shorter term rates are in fact higher than they were on average for the past 20 years but as you look forward um the rate rates are about average um for the past 20 or so years um
so what we expect I guess from the district um is that if you're mostly doing renovation projects you can do a bond for a 20year term so it's a it's going to be a longer term um issuance and when we go out for the public we we
use a conservative interest rate because we don't want to come back and say oh sorry it actually was higher so we' use something around a 4% with the expectation that rates would come in lower um and just to give some historical perspective on the district's debt in 2005 the district had a
successful referendum that was financed through Bonds in 2006 in 2014 the district refinanced their debt um basically how you would refinance a mortgage to get a lower interest rate and that is the only Bond that's currently outstanding and it
matures on March 1st of 20 26 so the idea is when a District's debt is maturing or falling off that you can replace that debt with little to no impact to the taxpayers so in order to do that you
have to have a referendum in the same fiscal year that the debt is maturing so that's the next fiscal year which is 2026 and then you have to also issue the bonds in that same fiscal year so that your debt payment is in the 27 f school
year so that there's no there's no overlap and then there's also no drop off so that's why the timing may make sense now for the district to do something if you decide to for example let the debt drop off then in the future the taxpayers would sort of feel that
hit a little harder maybe depending on the amount of bonds you go out for I just want to point out out that we have worked successfully with both Phoenix and W on numerous referendum uh numerous referenda uh over the past uh
15 years that we've been doing business so Solutions architecture is a multi-disciplinary architecture and interior design firm we're located in Verona um and we have this is school work is what we do we don't spread ourselves with other work one of the things that we have a great deal of
success with is referendum planning we are statistically proven passing referenda putting them up passing them and our system is based upon transparency district and Community involvement making sure that we convey the need to the public and then we also
provide single Source referendum planning and marketing our referendum Su our list of re referendum successes you see here it's a big table but in short uh in March of 2023 or in 2023 the entire year
we passed four out of four referendum for $212 million and since 2019 we've been responsible for 11 out of 12 referendum successes so the the system works um and we want to talk to you a little bit about that process and how we
work and how we work with the team so that you have an understanding of where you know how this process goes so in initially this is about meeting with the administration determining which way we're going to go working with architect Bond counsil and finance team develop a
Target date for the referendum which you just heard in order to take advantage of debt rolling off needs to be March of 2th 2026 there are dates for other dates for the referendum which we can talk about um but the because of the debt rolling
off and the time needed to prepare the packages the doe submissions March 26th is a viable option uh we want to establish the referendum submission schedule and with that is reviewing your facilities needs as I said before what work has been completed what work
remains to be done what capital projects what educational projects meet with the administration and establish those educational projects a Capacity Analysis this is a a a pretty big thing that we've been doing a lot of and the reason that we do it is
we try to determine whether additions are truly necessary where a district is looking to add square footage to a building if we do a Capacity Analysis a lot of times we find out that through scheduling or through um through
manipulation of classrooms we're able to gain more space and the reason for that is enrollment is not always the issue your enrollment may be flat but yet your buildings are losing capacity why is that and nine times out of 10 they're losing capacity because of special ed
needs and the limitations put upon those classrooms through special ed you may have an 800 foot classroom that has six children in as required by that special ed requirement you may have three of those classrooms if we were to divide one of those
classrooms in two and put the two small group into the classroom that that it's meant to have you now pick up classroom space so we can do that and look at that process we want to finalize a referendum scope in budget we want to incorporate Community input there's potential for uh
Community surveys to go out and ask the community what their thoughts are would you support a referendum if it had this in it would you support a referendum if it had that in we want to establish the question or questions to be asked and we work very closely with Tony to do that
we want to conduct the tax tax impact analysis and we want to talk to the financials ad financial advisers to do that one of the things we do differently with tax impact uh in working with Phoenix is we a lot of referenda go out
and they say your tax impact on the average assessed home in town is going to be X well not everybody has the average assessed home in town a lot of people have a home that's lower than the average assessed home and they automatically think that they're going to pay what that number you said for the
average assessed home so what we do is we provide a district tax impact calculator goes on your website people from town can go on your website plug in their assessed value and we explain what their assessed value is it's not market value it's what your tax assessor's
office has and you enter that and it will tell them what their assessed value will be based upon the numbers that Phoenix comes up with so nothing is left to chance there's no guess work everybody can has the opportunity to see what the tax impact is that's also a reason for S we
prepare schematic designs and and submission to doe referendum dates as I mentioned there are five referendum dates that can be used fourth Tuesday in January second Tuesday in March last Tuesday in September mber November 7th which is the
general election and the second Tuesday in December there are statistics as to which which dates are the most used and the most successful we typically try to stay away from January holiday bills are coming in and people don't really like
to add more to their plate come January March has always been a very popular referendum September has become one of the most popular referendum dates it never used to be because because when people were away over the summer we couldn't get them the information but
with social media posts and and websites everybody can get the information and September's become very popular November 7th is the general election it's true that the other elections cost money there is a separate fee for those and the general election is not um not an
extra not an extra cost however depending upon the relationship with the community and the township the December uh the November 7th election could provide difficulty for a referendum to pass because the ability to politicize
the educational work is always there so if someone wants to you know is concerned about being reelected then the you know the referendum could have difficulty so we try to avoid November uh for our referendum because we don't want to mix the two and then second
Tuesday in December is also very popular so if you look at this chart you're going to see uh referendum results for uh election by month from 2014 to 2023 January there were 54 78% passed uh
March 96 72% passed in April there were only 10 April's kind of an odd month to do this but 80% passed um in September 122 referenda 69% passed November there were 95 and 70% passed and in December
there were 86 total referenda with 56% passing so as you can see the most popular month is September at 122 March 96 November just behind uh with 95 and that edged out December which has always
been higher um uh with 86 the success rates are pretty close March had 72 November 70 September 69 and December 56 so months like January and April had fewer elections but did have higher success rates they're not your common
referendum dates for us the referendum strategy anything that we do for a referendum we want to make sure that we're including something for everyone we don't want to be heavy Athletics and no no instruction we don't want to be heavy instruction and no
Performing Arts we try to address and convey needs not wants obviously this district has a great deal of work that needs to be done we've had it for some time and we've got a get to a point where we are in agreement as to what
work needs to be done for a referendum unfortunately what what people don't see doesn't sell votes the roof the windows the boilers and they don't see it it's behind the scenes although it is critically important for the operation of the school and can shut down School
in a second major roof leak boilers go offline in a time in in winter season but they're not the high impact things so we want to focus on including much-needed projects that the community can see in value in addition to handling those capital
projects so we might look to consider special projects that have higher visual impact and create learning uh and exciting learning environments media centers Media Labs maker spaces in fact the media center was part of an evaluation that we did four years ago
that was the impetus behind establishing the referendum stem and steam was also a key component uh and considering lowcost high impact Graphics in big common spaces which can enhance school spirit and the educational
environment we often do a community survey because we don't like to do things in a vacuum we want we value the input of the community and we want to find out what's important to them the previous in survey that we sent out in Berkeley Heights the following items you can see stem and steam receive a high
level of support from the community exterior building improvements rece received a high level of support interior building improvements received a high level of priority full day kindergarten at the time received moderate support and Paving projects receive moderate support uh I'll note
that at the time we we saw moderate support in the surveys for Paving it was surprising to us because Paving has been a Monumental issue here for a long time we've wanted to do parking lots over and over again so the community survey would look something like this it's a Google survey
it goes out it goes out to every member of the community uh and the answers are collated and you know analyzed and it spits out a report on the the metrics associated with the survey and from there we have the data and information
we we can use if there's zero support for a particular topic or question that's something we're not going to look to fight to put in the referendum if there's a lot of support then we're going to try to steer and do things to make that happen if budget
allows in the past and again this is not about the past but it is about understanding we had a facilities audit that we looked at we walked through the building we found out a great list of items to be done at the time that list was submitted uh or paired down and then
submitted to the Department of Ed um these projects were submitted received uh preliminary Ed eligible approval uh and at the time Co hit and the referendum kind of stopped at the time so but those projects that were included media center and stem lab Renovations
and alterations at Governor Livingston uh as well as capital work that we had but was later removed from the store at Columbia it was media centers and stem Labs uh various roof Replacements were included and existing asphalt parking lot repaving was included Media Center
upgrades at Hughes classroom reconfigurations and various window replacements were part of the submission at Mountain Park we had Media Center classroom reconfigurations various roof Replacements parking lots and mechanical
upgrades at wood uh William Woodruff we had Media Center classroom reconfigurations roof Replacements and uh mechanical upgrades and this the similar at Mary K McMillan with the exception of roof so Media Center classrooms and mechanical that was
essentially the submission that went down to doe last time so our charge this time would be to say did we do any of that work is it complete can we take it off the list does that lower the cost can is there stuff on this list that we still find to be a high priority and we
still want to do are media centers still a high priority if they are we want to look to include them um our stem lab and steam or science labs are they the priority so as far as our strategy for referendum we would meet and understand
the needs we would look at that list we would look at the new list we've already obtained a new list from the principles of items that they you know perceive need to be done in each of the schools some of them and we when we originally talked we talked about wants needs needs wants and wishes right when we're
looking at the whole picture we want to look at needs wants and wishes in a perfect world we can afford to do it we would do everything but we want to understand where their heads are at when they're doing this so we've received lists from them those lists are going to be collated and coordinated with our
list obviously costs have changed since the last time we looked at this significant unfortunate so we need to update all the cost estimates in the list we need to determine which list or priority and then what we can do from there is once we have the list and the
priorities we can tell you all priority ones are going to cost X you're going to get X in debt service a this is the net impact of the district so we're going to do that we're going to look at the facilities again anything that was listed mechanical our Engineers will come out again evaluate them make sure
that the need still exists if something's been replaced we can take it off the list um review the priority projects with the Board of Education we've also got something called a project selection tool um previously it was an Excel spreadsheet with a yes or
no column you hit yes or no and it takes it off the list and changes the the cost for it we now have a website page that you can go to you can actually see your referendum scope you can say no and it will revalue the referendum take certain
items out and you as a board can play with that so you know if there's a need that each of you think you can have your own copy and say this is the referendum I want it's a great tool it there's nothing again nothing set in stone you can say yes or no or change it and come
up with a value as long as we understand where you want to be we would develop the bid documents and adjust costs as necessary a big part of the cost Factor here is working with Phoenix to understand the tax impact obviously people look at the first
number we come up with as the be all end all the referendum is going to be and I'm throwing this out1 million but they look at the 10 million and what you have to recognize is that when we come up with that value a lot of these projects are eligible 34% state
aid so the 10 million is actually closer to seven so the seven is also what the tax impact will be based upon so we have to understand getting Debt Service Aid and you have to understand that that number that that resulting number $20 a
year is based upon your the tax impact so whatever we're comfortable with at the end we have to weigh back and forth with scope budget and tax and understand where we're coming so how do we get the message out
obviously it's a collaborative process involving communication between the board the admit the administration ad hoc committees Architects financial advisers and bond counsel we need to express to the public why this work is needed we need to
establish a theme what are we looking to achieve through this referendum we need to we need to be very mindful for the timing of the release of information and this is one of the reasons I think we've been so successful the right information needs to be distributed at the right
time the wrong information released at the wrong time can be detrimental to the process even the right information if released at the wrong time can set us back so we have to be mindful of when we're putting these things out there this is a work in progress we're going
to have option one option five option three you guys are going to make a decision so if option five goes out and it wasn't even on your radar well now the public thinks that option five was in play and it's not or it never was so we have to be mindful of when that's
done and how do we control that we make sure that everyone involved in disseminating that message it has to be the same response from everybody how do we do that we give you a Chi-Chi we provide when the referendum gets the scope gets evaluated and finalized we
provide a trifold brochure with every piece of information that the refer that's required for the referendum every board member has it you can have 50 in your car if you're at Shop Right somebody comes up to you and says what's in this referendum you can hand it out or read from it
everybody now has the same answer you may not have a different you may have a different impression you may have said no it's six science labs and it's only four and now the wrong information's out so we try to avoid that from happening that need for transparity parency is
huge the public wants to know that you're telling them everything that we have to tell them nothing's being held back there's no reason it's important to be willing to provide um and we have to provide opportunity for review com it's big it's big ask a question it's all
people want there may be adversarial you know conversations but it's debate it's all good we they want information we have it we want to provide it we may not agree but getting the information out there and providing that opportunity for review and comment is uh
essential the other thing that we do is we try to uh espouse the need for Simplicity in our presentations everything that we do is simple long wordy documents don't help anybody because I can't get past the first
paragraph let alone anybody else and I know the job so we try to use graphics and infographics to display the information if you vote Yes what will you get if you vote no what will you get it's very simple people can look at that
and understand what happens if they vote Yes or no understanding that the district can save Millions with Debt Service Aid is is an enormous uh you know uh point to make knowing that you're not getting Debt Service Aid if you take money out
of capital and do this work you may have 10 million in capital you may say tomorrow we can do all the parking lots out of capital or all the roofs out of capital the problem with doing that and you can problem with doing that is you're going to pay full price 100% if
we did parking lots and and wait now here's another there's another scenario you can do that put it in the referendum if the referendum passes you get 34% on those items you can then take your Capital Surplus and pay down but you've now used your Capital to do that work
and gotten 34% so there are strategies that we employ with Bond counsel with um Finance to be able to make this work in your favor so we want Simplicity in the message we want to let people know that
Deb service Aid is available it's only available on eligible projects additions it's very difficult to get funding for additions without a significant number of unhoused students uh but Capital renovation projects parking lot projects
Fields not eligible expansion of parking lots not eligible but parking lots milling and Paving fixing the potholes and restriping all eligible so those are projects we want to take advantage if the district wanted to use Capital to do a project I'd say do a project that's
not eligible for funding now you're not losing um everything that in order to get The Debt Service Aid it has to be funded through a referendum and it has to be tied to education or maintenance any other work it's ineligible if we were to do one classroom and replace the
ceiling the state would not find that eligible for funding because it's maintenance you should be doing that one classroom by yourself but if we do a wing of classrooms in the ceilings now it's eligible so understanding the eligibility requirements understanding is what allows us to craft a referendum
and tailor tailor it to maximize your debt service Aid receed we'll talk pretty quick on referendum schedule so we have a referendum calculator we put in a referendum date that spits out some standard numbers on the side I'm going
to zoom into those a little bit so you can see so if the referendum date is Tuesday March 10th um we have to notify the County Board of election 61 days prior uh which puts that Friday January 9th uh the board is going to review the and PC
letters you have 30 days to do that so that backs us out to December 10th um there's a a doe review period doe takes anywhere from uh they have 90 days by regulation they have an additional 30 so 120 but they have been taking up to six
months to review projects depending upon the size of the district and the complexity of the project and the fact that there's only five reviewers down at the so we need to get in early so we give enough time so this is showing 140 days days for doe to approve 120 days
for to prepare the doe packages get everything ready and then necessary time for schematic uh planning scope brings us all the way back to October so we the reason for showing you this is that decisions need to be made to make month right we can't Sally we need to make
sure that we can come up with a list a positive list of of items to be done and get it done we we will tell you that we'll do everything we can to make that submission happen from our end but it's going to require decisions being made on
this end so public relations part of this we offer we have an in-house uh social media uh coordinator and a graphic designer we prepare all the content we work with your uh media Specialist or
your technology person to gain access to your social media Pages we'll create the posts we'll get approval from you once you once it starts to hum we'll just submit we'll just put posts out um we'll start uh early enough on you know
September usually after we get final doe approval and we know the numbers and We Know The Debt Service Aid we will now start to litter social media with teasers and posts uh find out more meeting dates uh dates with you know local organizations from the Lions to
Unico whatever organizations you want will start doing you know Road shows UH 60 days out is really an intense campaign ongoing public info public meetings responding to voter questions your website will have a frequently Asked uh questions page on it anybody
that asks a referendum question you'll also have an email associated with the referendum anyone that asks a question it gets responded to and goes up in the frequently Asked section today now anybody who's looking for it and see that the question's already been asked here's the answer uh 20 days out a
postcard mailer which is called an EDM Every Door Direct mailer goes out to every address in the community um and that makes sure that it's not just the school Community seeing it but everybody else gets it we can do them more than once they tend to be costly because of
postage and they're going out to every single member in the community but we typically find that doing them 20 days out gives people uh a little bit of boost we also boost Facebook and Instagram posts during the final weeks make sure that people are seeing this uh prepare renderings for the
public get the website up and running so we have a kind of a a checklist for ourselves on when that stuff needs to happen agree on dates for the meetings which organizations do you want to see PTO fantastic way to get the word out to your parents go to each of the PTO
meetings September back to school nights comeand Deere a piece of that to talk about the referendum coming up and what's going on uh so social media campaign begins in October school club meetings band choir after a football game haveit table
brochures um Town meetings etc etc on your website we prepare information packages they will be the referendum committee presentation so that's the final presentation that has everything in it there'll be a quick reference guide which will be select
slides so that people aren't going through a 1 page presentation if they want to see the scope of work in the plans they can click on just those we have those separated if they want to just see the costs they can click on those they want to go to that tax impact calculator and enter their assess value
they can do that and they can look at the schedule as well so all these packages are on your website the frequently asked questions are there as well this way we have one location that everybody goes to and we can we can work with the township to try and get any
emails and information through their website so there's try to get full transparency social media web news and local we have great relationships with news12 we've done articles with them before we have the ability to get press releases out do
things like that you know to shine a focus on the need and what what needs to be done here face-to-face promotions I mentioned back to school night site building walkthroughs we've done successfully uh information sessions Community committees and Community
organizations examples of social media posts these are Facebook posts they are Instagram posts uh talk this was for Oceanport talking about the average age of the schools uh what we were doing reminding people to vote um and you know
talking about when these things are so that you're keeping people informed along the way we prepare we prepare uh videos informational videos there's a YouTube link attached you can check out the video that we've done but it's a you know one minute twom minute video on
what's in the referendum we can provide any number of social media elements to show the public uh this is that trifold I was telling you about it's a big component here so it has every everything that the referendum has cost
budget scope um dates polling places where everything is it's all in one location you simply have to hand that out or read from it and you have all the information you need um there's a newsletter style if you put out a a district newsletter we can incorporate
our style to your style one of the things that you'll notice from any of the the graphic information we put out the branding is all the same when someone sees it they know this is the referendum this has to do with that referendum so it sets a tone across the
board the direct mailer is the same information that's on that D brochure but it goes out in a postcard to the public we've done vinyl banners at the school so that each School reminds everybody when it is we've done lawn signs lawn signs handed out people can
put lawn signs on your vot on your lawn reminding them when to vote as a board you cannot tell the public to vote Yes but you can tell them to vote go out and vote vote dates coming up you can vote presentation boards for the lobby whatever else is needed we provide a
host of those information of that information so process-wise you've just got a lot of information in a short period of time so I apologize for that but I think that it gives us an oversight in what's what needs to be done in terms of the process
specifics we're going to delve into you know at the administrative level and you know working together with the district to understand what those needs are you as board members have the ability to put your you know your items in the list as well what do you think as board members
needs to be done so we want to include everybody we want to get the most information possible and we want to make sure that you know we try to do this as efficiently as possible so we don't waste time meeting that March date is critical if you're going to take
advantage of that debt thank you okay thank you Mr MSO um are you the presentation or do we need to hear from our other individuals no okay if there's questions yes so let's ask for questions from board members
first yes Dr forer yes yes thank you for the presentation what do you have any idea what the cost of a special election would beell yeah um this is an estimate but probably for a community your size is about
$30,000 30k okay and uh let's see uh one of the things a couple things are under cons yeah okay sure so when you have a general election um
the costs are paid for by the municipality so it's all the voting machines the poll workers the printing of the ballots all the Publications uh the moving of the voting machines all the fees associated with the county the board of election superintendent of Elections um so I'd
say that's a probably a pretty good estimate the one thing with any of the costs um as Mr MSO indicated The Debt Service Aid Mr MSO will include the cost for the special election the cost for the professionals the design cost in with the overall cost of the referendum
so if it's an eligible project you also will get Aid on any of the associated costs as well and and do people sorry just why why don't we go around in order then if if you have a followup you can I I have a follow up I C you the have a
few questions I so is is the election exactly like the November election where people have the ability to do mail and ballots and everything is it exactly the same or does it have to be in person uh the rules are exactly the same so if you've requested a mailin ballot for any
prior election you will get a mail-in ballot uh you don't have to request again you can there's ballot drop off boxes uh the only thing that's different is the time of the election is selected by the board so that can vary for all right um you talked about things
that are eligible costs would a Press Box uh be an eligible cost it is unlikely that a Press Box would be eligible unlikely okay and how about lights on the on the governor Livingston field I I don't want to say yes but I I
will get back we'll we'll look at that okay and the 34% uh is that by Statute or is it could could it somehow turn out to be less than 34% yes it could be less and the reason it could be so yeah and Tony
may want to answer this because got sure so these projects are being submitted under a law that was passed in 2000 um and the statute says that any eligible projects will be eligible for up to 40% Debt Service Aid or your District Aid percentage which ever is
higher because the wealth of your community you'd be capped out at 40% um for the first 11 years of the statute the state has fully funded that Debt Service Aid requirement at 100% And since 2011 the state has funded that at
85% so that's why Mr MSO is indicating 34% and that's why when any of your financial projections will be done your financial adviser does its most conservative way and does it at 34% 85% of the 40% and I guess to note prior to
this law a community like yours wouldn't have been eligible for any so it's a this law has really been a a huge benefit for communities like yours to get paid back to your communities and uh when just finish that question yeah the reason that it could be less than 34% is
of the number of projects if 80% of them are eligible that those 80% would receive funding the 20% would not receive funding and therefore the the net difference would be 28% 25% whatever
that whatever the cost of the ineligible versus the eligible be you know lower agregate does that make sense yes um now on the tax impact analysis you consider
the we lose uh we lose from our ratables uh properties because of uh pilot agreements you take the pilot agreements into account just the tail end of that question okay uh basically the
Township's been entering into pilot agreements because of affordable housing yes and um so those properties I think are essentially removed from the tax rols for about perhaps 30 years right so that that does not there's a hit to our
ratables the question is when you do your tax impact analysis you consider the pilots the fact that some of the ratables are off the rules for 30 years uh we would just use the current ratables which would not include the pilot money and for a project that your
District might do is only 20 years so those Pilots may still be in place during the term so they would not the school would not receive well depending on your agreement with the town may not receive any of that pilot Revenue
okay I'll stop there and may come back later I have a question okay uh this is Terror um so when you're looking at the term for the bonds um how do you take into account
projects that have items that are depreciating in other words if you get involved in technology technology ages so how do you factor that in are there separate pieces of it or how or is it just kind of like that money's gone how
do you work that in yeah it's the average useful life of all the projects typically renovation projects run 20 years um athletic type projects are not as long um you can go go longer in the term if you're doing an addition and really the only way to reach a 30-year
term is to do a completely new building so 20 years is sort of the jumping off point for renovations but um we work with the architect to kind of take into account which projects are being included and what the max useful life is and I it's it's also um Tony can probably talk about this set by State
Statute yes Mrs Conor can you talk about the role of the board through the referendum process so the the board is there to you you are
responsible for making the informed decision on a the projects that need to go forward so that's a big piece of this understanding what the cost of those projects is and what the tax impact is and coming to an agreement on what we
consider to be a palatable referendum costs for the community obviously we want to be fiscally responsible knowing that we have debt rolling off to be able to use that to our advantage is Big um and uh to I think it was said in one of our other meetings just because you may
have 24 million rolling off doesn't mean that you're going to be able to replace that with 24 million you know today uh interest rates are different things like that so obviously as a board you you are involved every step of the way we give give you updates on the doe you're going
to have to approve the submission to the doe it's going to have to be signed by the board president superintendent of schools uh the business administrator is going to have to sign the cost estimates the budget estimates that go down to doe so as a board you're involved every step of the way and uh you know responsible
for the submission of this we're just the tool so uh you know we want to make sure that you have the right information and that we guide you in in this process so if if I can just double click on that a little bit you mentioned that there
are we need to approve the submission that needs to go to the doe that are cost estimates is that generally through resolutions like at a board meeting okay so the list of projects that I showed you from the previous that
was attached to the resolution that said you know the board of uh Berkeley Heights uh is going to submit the project to the Department of Education is going to expect Debt Service Aid uh for Capital Renovations and improvements to the district that list that was that
you saw was attached to the back of it so you'll see the exact list that was done you'll see each of the floor plans for each of the buildings at that show the scope of work that's going to be submitted so you'll be able to know unequivocally what's in the referendum that's what you'll approve by
resolution oh sorry do you help write those resolutions absolutely Mrs Stanley sorry I'm not done sorry sorry Mrs con um you mentioned that there was a survey done was it 2019 I believe it was 2019 do you have
any idea how many respondents to that survey so the survey process that we have um we typically do the survey that was done then was done by the district so I can't pull the survey otherwise I would have shown you your survey I don't
I know the survey results because we got them but we didn't administer it it was administered by the district through the um PR consultant or PR PR person so um but I don't have the information I could dig back and try to see if we have a
copy of the initial but yeah I I think it'll be helpful for us just to kind of have some background of what was done before sure um you briefly mentioned that as as board members we can't really ask people to vote
Yes um so is it's is is The Stance of the board expected to be neutral meaning we can share information but we can say hey let's be supportive like I'm just trying to understand better what we should and
shouldn't be doing sure that's a great question so the bright line rule is as a public entity you're not allowed to spend any public funds to advocate for a referendum or for any you can spend public funds to educate but you can't
spend public funds to Advocate but you're all individuals you all have constitutional rights you've all been elected by your community as an individual you can advocate for the referendum The Advocate advocate for the needs of the project if you do so on your own social media you just have to
put a disclaimer that you're speaking as an individual and you're not speaking on behalf of the board but the real bright line issue is you're not allowed to spend any public funds to advocate for a referendum but as an individual you can say I support this because you know we did this information and we want to
improve the libraries for the following reasons so if this becomes a topic of discussion say in a board meeting we are allowed to sit at the table and and express our point of view sure it's just there's a there's a very you're making a
very specific point about not being able to advocate for the referendum through the you know spending District dollars correct that's why if you noticed all the the great information and Mr firm does a great job of with all the Flyers and the graphics and the website it all
is just informational we're doing these projects we're fixing these roofs it cost this much to the average taxpayer this is why we're doing it not vote Yes not you know no Scare Tactics it's just information because you know Flyers cost money you're spending money on that
information but as an individual you're allowed to Advocate got it um two more questions can you maybe talk a little bit about how do you select the projects that go into the referendum is it it looks like
the Deb service Aid is certainly a factor to what goes in there but are there like other reasons or other factors on how we as a board should work with you to select the projects so it comes down to Priority comes down to
what is an an imminent need it for us the first things that we look at are health and safety any health and safety issues that need to be resolved those are at the top of our list uh the second would be building envelope roofs Windows Doors anything that can allow nature in
poses an additional threat to the school ceilings get wet that causes another issue sheetrock gets wet that causes problems we want to try to address building envelope then it comes down to the need you know when's the last time the locker rooms were renovated is it a
long time ago or is it recently is your science lab you know the original to the building are does the facility support the curriculum that you're offering can it because if it can't then those are those are you know direct correlations
to you wanting to upgrade those rooms so that list is going to be based on priority now a lot of times we'll do a facilities audit we'll walk through a building we'll the team of Architects and engineers and we'll note and on our list the boilers have five years left the windows are pass their useful life
they're only single pain the rofes the warranties are ending and they're leaking um these are all Priority One items for us there may be other items that we list as priority two or three however that's from our opinion you as board members know where the hot button
topics are in District something that I say is a priority three may be to you a priority one may be something you have to address just because it's part of what's going on in District that we don't know so we're going to look at it from a professional architectural
standpoint and you're going to look at it for what you know and you're going to put the two together so that project selection tool I mentioned to you where it'll enables you to look at a master list allart and then pick and choose each of those that you want or that you
think you can also change the priority of those numbers so ultimately the goal would be to say what's the cost of all the priority One items what's the cost of all the priority two items three and four if the cost of doing everything is
palatable we do everything if the cost of doing just Priority One and Two is the palatable number that's where we go so that's kind of how we try to steer it and direct it by priority what is important what needs to be done health and safety building envelope and then
infrastructure wherever wherever it else you you see needs to be done got it um and then the last one right now SA we have this referendum in March of 2026 what is the earliest that any
project can be executed coming out of that assuming it is successful so March puts us in a bad spot and it puts us in a great spot for a referendum because March is a great time for referendum but if we were to do a September referendum that would give
us from October November December January to build drawings for the projects March as a rule as as our firm will not put a project out to bid in March the reason for that is it's already too late for
that summer so contractors are full they have all their work schedule lined up if we put a project out to bid it's going to be 30% higher than if we put it out in October just just the way of the world just where we are so our office won't we used to bid projects in March May March
April 15 years ago that c happening so we're bidding projects in September and October right after contractors are finished doing the school job they just have because now they're looking for they're hungry they want to do the job so if it passes in March to answer your question we could put out a window
project because a window project is done during the school year so we could put the window project out we're not count beholden to the summer on that project it's also going to take 12 to 16 weeks to get the windows fabricated so we've already blown summer but that project
can go out to bid roof projects typically can go out to big if we can get the right numbers so there are there is work that can be done if there's work in the building that can be done during school those are the projects we would kind of Target it's very difficult to
say we're going to hit the first summer and knockout projects you also have to recognize that a referendum depending upon what the size of it is could be two years could be three years could be four years you can't do every in four months which is your summer schedule June through September so our
strategy a lot of times is we forgo the summer months we say you the contractor H can work into the school year he can do things into the school year the more flexibility we give the contractor the lower the price more we squeeze the contractor you got
to get it done by August 15 the price is going to be here so we try to work and balance the budget because we know so it's a and I'm going to go off on a little bit of a tangent but the budget estimates we prepare for a referendum they bear in mind that this
referendum won't be completed tomorrow going to be completed two years from now so in the budget estimate are escalators and multipliers that take the cost and make it viable three years down the road the the logic and what happens most of
the time is the projects we do the first year come in under budget right we've got budgeted numbers but they have escalated L since we're doing them early they come in under budget we take that Surplus and we put it aside as we go through the referendum the project start coming in on budget and as we get to the
later years of the referendum now the pro projects start coming in over budget but those projects are able to use the monies that we have in Surplus from the first round it's one pot of money and we were able to do it so we try to plan the projects accordingly so that we know we
have the ability to do them so not everything's getting done one year it's a multi-year project process and we need to be strategic about planning long question sorry long answer thank you I have more but I'll wait for my next
turn okay Mrs Stanley so I kind of see tonight's meeting as a a little kick in the butt for the board to start getting stuff done because we we know right things dates are coming up so the first date we have is March 25th with a submission to
the DOE what what are we submitting to the doe on the March 25th and what do we need to get done in order to have that happen so essentially what you need to get done what what we need to have from the board is a list of projects approv list of projects we do all the r and
what the submission is is conceptual set of plans that detail the scope of work so if it's classroom Renovations they're laid out with furniture plans and designs and laid out they're not fully designed in the state of New Jersey we
do not design the job to completion before the referendum it's kind of smart but other states don't do that they design the entire project and then you go out in New Jersey we do that because if we designed every project the board would spend hundreds of thousands of
dollars on design fees and the referendum could fail now you're stuck with a design but no money so we're going to submit conceptual drawings educational specifications and a budget estimate to doe for there to for them to review doe will review it take their
time they will approve come back with our estimate of Debt Service Aid and we will the board will have to approve that say yes we agree to that number if that we don't we can go back to doe and say why didn't you approve this I think we should be getting approved and we'll
have that argument but for you guys what we really need to get done is that list of priority projects and what neighborhood we want to be in referend that's a that's a pretty big pretty big uh decision in uh less than
30 days um my second question is right we started this off of well what happens if we we get a referendum but what happens if we don't right so I'm hearing you say that some of these projects it's going to be two to four years before we even get to them if we have a referendum
that passed next year right so um I'm just trying to think of like what are some of the issues I know that we're talking about about right we were talking about HVAC systems we're talking about um driveways Right Paving
drainage um some of those issues that maybe couldn't wait the four years um compared to you know some things like when you think media center but I know right like there are spaces in our district that are big but they're just
not being used they're not being utilized well um and I think that's the big push for the media center right is that we could have students really using this as a space and instead it's just a place for books and maybe AP tests um so I think we have we have a lot of work to
do but I think the bigger thing is that we realize that you know stuff like Heating and the driveways and the paving right we can't continue to wait um so I think some of the questions were can we wait and I I think that's where we we really need to think can we wait another
year to even do this okay and right and that's why this process once when and if the referendum passes or even prior to the referendum passing we'll have an idea of what projects are the ones that we need to push forward first what I do want to clarify is you it's not March
25th March 25th is for us to begin preparation of those packages doe packages you have until about July end of June July to be able to make that you know make that decision before we have to submit the deal okay so it's not
March okay so March 25th March is US beginning the preparation okay so and that you know again we're going to do everything we need to do get the submissions done but it comes down to Preparing the drawings the backgrounds for everything looking at
what your list is you know looking at getting our Engineers out to do that stuff and preparing the submission packages that's not on you July is June July is is going to be the area that we need to be in the sooner we can make the decision if we can submit in May that just gives us more cushion so again I'm
not not pushing you to March so just make sure everybody's aware no I'm aware what you're saying yeah something that I think what the slide Mr MSO showed previously about the passage rate one of the thing that kind of is driving your
timetable is that expiring debt and if we looked at the passing ratees for districts that went out for referendum with expiring debt it's much higher because it's much easier to tell your community you're going to get x million dollar worth of projects and it's going to cost you no new money than it is
waiting till that debt expires and then go out and say Hey you had a tax decrease and now we're going to ask you to pay that back so that's kind of the also the impetus to really pushing the timeline to make sure you catch that debt volume I I just want to mention
something I just want to piggy back because this may qu some of the questions I think as you mentioned before about those time timelines and coming in in the March explain to the board where we are in this process I know we collected all the projects of
we've talked about with the teachers and I know what we've done where we are at this point with the demographer and all the other things explain where we are at this point but we need to project you collected at this point and once we do where that's going to go and what the
board's peti ofation is they once just pull it all together and let them get a clear understanding of it and I think it'll pull it in and let them absorb it and see where they got to go so we started out as I said before with the list that we originally had the list of
projects from there um from there we hold the principles and administration on the projects that were done what was done what was new where does that where are we there we've now we are now in the process of compiling that list into that
website I was telling you about that project selection tool that list will list each of those projects with a priority the cost square footage and whatever once that list is done it will now come to you as the board to say here's the list these are the PRI
projects and priorities if there are other items to be added they'll be added if there are things that are absolute NOS they'll be removed but that we are already in the in the project planning phase by looking at projects it now
comes down to just taking that list and making decisions is this a priority One or is it a priority four do we want this at all do we want to do all the media centers let's put them all in this box do we want to put this and then figure out where we are so we do have a direction
it's not like we have to do a full facilities audit again if we had to do a full facilities audit we wouldn't be talking because we're not going to make that time frame we're going to verify we're going to have our engineers and us we're going to go out and verify all the items we talk about but we don't
have time to do a full-blown facilities assessment on all the buildings so we're we're in very good shape in terms of having you know starting point of a list and now we're going to develop the costs and the list and give you a list that has our priorities and you'll determine
whether they are your priorities and then ultimately we'll come up with a final um Dr forger you had your head up first um honestly this seems like a very rushed thing I don't like rushing
anything but let me ask you a simple question how everything seems to be driven by the desire to essentially trick the public say there's debt rolling off you're not going to see this in your tax bill but
of course that you will see it so let me just ask you how much debt is rolling off in March of 20126 how much do we have left I should know this but I think public should know too so the original referendum in 2006 was
24 million current no I'm just asking what's left because that's the that little bit that's left is what's going to impact taxes so there's about 1.5 million in debt service but the district's receiving almost 34% on the
existing debt so what that accounts to for the average home is about $180 on the average home so if you do nothing essentially you get that 80 back um or you can do projects and so it's it's not
like it's going to be all concealed there will be there will be will if we do let's say you mentioned 10 million I don't think that's what it's going to be but if we did 10 million 34% off of that 6.6 billion but you're only replacing about one and a half
million right so there will be a visible tax impact I don't think the argument that you know we should just do this in March of 2026 because there's debt rolling off and public won't notice it is a good one I think we should take our time and do this correctly and really
understand what's needed here and I don't think there's enough time to do this by March of 2026 so you know we did run some preliminary analyses for the district and over the 20 years and with The Debt Service Aid and the way the interest
rates are today um depending on where your Deb service Aid comes in you can do somewhere between 21 and 14 million and keep the payments exactly the same so it would be exactly the same tax impact for the entire 20 years and something that I
didn't mention before and something the district has taken advantage of is that you did refinance your old debt so what you're paying right now is not what was voted on in 2005 you were paying more at that time and then 10 or so years later the interest rates came down you
achieved the uh um minimum required savings and the district refinanced and that's something we include in all longer term debt issues um we we include a seven-year call provision so after seven years again if you reach the minimum required savings you can
refinance and there there would be some savings there so I we didn't work on the initial referendum so I don't know what the initial tax impact was but it was above that $180 on the average home essentially than it is
today just point out too the typical referendum schedule for us starting from scratch is 12 months so we're we're just getting to March and you know we we have a pretty good head start with the list that we have and some of the previous work that we've done but if we were starting in a
district that we were never in before looking at a referendum we'd be looking at a 12mon schedule um Mrs Terrero great so I I want to go back to piggybacking what Dr forer said
so when we're looking at how this would impact the taxpayer how much and I mean I know we don't have the project set how much could we borrow to make it
tax neutral and that number would also include the 34% Aid that we're talking about what's the number um so the maximum if all the projects were eligible is about 21 million and if none of the projects were eligible it'd
be 14 million so okay you're going to be somewhere in that range okay yes Mrs Conor so given that this is this seems like a multi-year process clearly we create a list of projects we get them
approved 3 years down the line does the the board have any flexibility to choose a different project or change the scope of the projects that were approved so the what you tell the public what you're what you're is in the
referendum question and it is it is nebulous but it is detailed um but what you tell the public has to get done you can change you can modify the way it's done but if you say you're going to renovate this room you have to to
renovate this room um the only way you have a way around not doing a particular scope is if you run out of money by the time we get to the end of the referendum um you cannot add projects that weren't in the original intent of the project so
if we had HVAC univ ventilators in the project and you the referendum called for 26 to be done let's say we were lucky and project came in under budget and you had Surplus at the end you could do 40 if you wanted to you could add more univ ventilators so you can change
the scope from that regard you cannot detract from what you received funding for so if you do less scope than what you receive 34% on doe is going to want that 34% back on what the scope that you didn't do so we can we have flexibility
and what you should recognize too is when we submit these to doe they are conceptual designs right so if our design shows you know a desk over here and a countertop over there and something else when we design this space and lay it out meet with the teachers
after the referend passes that layout is moved we could do whatever we want as long as we meet the intent of renovating that room or upgrading that room so the concepts are the concepts but doe doesn't hold us to those they want to make sure we're meeting educational
PS so a followup to that who decides if the projects that are executed at the in the timeline actually meet the plans or whatever was submitted approved whatever was on the the ballot like there is the
where's the checks and balances process to to say yes this meets or this doesn't meet so part of that's on us and part of that's on doe when we design the projects we have to resubmit them to the Department of Ed to be compared against the original set of drawings submitted
um and make sure that they meet final educational adequacy when we receive approval the first first time on the the drawings it's for preliminary eligible Capac eligible uh preliminary eligible cost but it's a preliminary educational adequacy when we submit final and it's
only the educational projects that have to go again but when we submit for final that's how um it's check got it but then is every project like on a project by project basis is that how it works or I'm trying to
figure out like what's the um what's the process like we we get something approved in 2026 come 2028 come 2029 is there like a repeated process of going back to them and getting approval and at that point what is the role of the board
in 2028 it might be a very different board so so it's a very good question so the process is you submit to Department of Ed you receive approval everything's done however long it takes us to do the projects we will Design them we will put them through we will submit for
educational final educational review however there is no resubmission to doe after that we if two years from now we're finishing up the referendum we have the list of projects we know what has to be done and we're working on them as we go so there is no additional
review or approval after you get your final educational adequacy approval that's done as far as the money we run spreadsheets and and work with the business administrator to say okay we had this pot of money and we're going to work with Phoenix's as well we had this
pot of money this is what's been spent um this is what came in under budget this is what came in over budget this is where we are net Surplus or net you know whatever and then we'll know where we are MoneyWise at the end of the project if there's money left over you have two options one is to pay down the debt and
give that money back to the community second option is to enhance the scope based upon what was originally included in the question but there is no additional review process thank you Mrs Dolly so thank you very much for the
presentation and I think the board had asked some really good questions so my one last question is for the list of projects that you're going to provide to us will there will be a priority order at least but your based on your priority we'll also include um anticipated start
dates um again based on what you said about you know going out for bid there might be timing you know con considerations right of getting a better price as so I was wondering if there because something could be a top priority but you may not go out to bid for a bit and
you know so I just wanted to know the start time anticipated start time and length of each of the projects typically no that's not something that we provide because what happens once we have a final list of projects is projects are packaged together so if there's window
projects at two schools we might package them as one project if there are boiler projects at five schools they may be packaged as one project so that's that happens after we have our final list not usually the preliminary list um because
it's a it's a economy of scale question it is a strategic question as to which projects need to go together um some projects may be bid alone but we don't typically do that because of the economy of scale we want contractors to want to
bid this work and give us the best price if we bid it off in little pieces and it is multiple projects it's not you know this isn't one big job that we submit one big job for all the work we break it up into Specialties boilers and mechanical gets bid to Mechanical
Contractors GC work Renovations gets bid to the gc's plumbing work if it's big enough like boilers and whatnot they'll go just to the plumbers so this is going to be a strategic process but it's typically after we have that finalist and are and are you managing
those projects throughout the the entire period yes our our contract our post referendum contract would have construction Administration Services included in there there is you know there's always the ability to bring on a
construction management firm or a um a clerk of the works type person that would work on behalf of the district depending upon the size of the re of the referendum um we did a $150 million referendum in Bridgewater that was an absolute necessity um they brought on
someone to work work as an employee they didn't hire an outside construction firm they hired a referendum manager and we've worked with him he's our daily on-site eyes and ears so there are many ways to control the management but our contract will have management of these
projects and $150 million in Bridgewater includes 30,000 foot of additions so if we're doing a boiler project this summer may we may have 10 projects in one summer we pretty much can manage that so it's it's an added expense but if it's
something the district wants to entertain that needs to go into the budget as well Mrs this Con can you explain a little bit about all the the work and the people
that are associated with these projects are they all expected to be paid using the the debt that that we would take on or is there a budgetary impact packed so every year we have to plan for a budget
right the district will have to itemize a bunch of things so in your example the project manager that somebody hired would that all come from the referendum yes as long as you tell Mr MSO at the submitted to the
due okay so that's something that has to be planned UPF front and depending on how many projects or how many projects all at the same time you might recommend you know think of hiring a project manager and that is that person then
essentially a district employee like a contractor there are a variety of ways you can do it there are gentlemen out there that are Clerk of they they're considered Clerks of The Works they work for the district they would be an outside consultant to the district there are construction management firms full
firms that would provide a ma on-site manager however many days of week that you would require um and they would require they would also have support with them secretarial everything again there's a cost for that uh and then if you did what some you know if you have
we've had districts smaller districts uh that have uh director of facilities who's very Savvy and knowledgeable they've paid him a stipend to be there eyes and ears on the ground while we're managing the construction so yes I mean there's a variety of ways to do this it's just you know what is the What is
the appe appetite you know of the board and and how big is this referendum ultimately going to be and is it worth the 3% or 4% it would cost to hire a CM Mr MSO uh the Board of Ed is not the
only decision on the projects it's the community also decision based on the survey that we will send out absolutely any other questions from board members okay we'll open it up to questions from
the public here in person you want to wait excuse me Steve could you just wait a second we had a question yes go ahead you want to ask it there so before people ask questions I
wonder if is there like a sample question that can be put up on the screen if if there is one for people to just understand at the end of the entire process when we say that there will be questions on the ballot what does a question look like is there any chance
is there a sample so tonight I don't have one but as part of our presentations throughout the referendum we will provide what that sample ballot looks like we also provide links to voter registration and things like that there's a whole voter turnout piece that
we do as part of the public relations piece for the project but sampling showing that sample of the ballot will be part of the presentations that we do so people are are aware of it before they walk into B thank you and what you guys can do is New Jersey School Board
Association just came out with a list of all the March ones on their website today and they have questions on there that are all being presented in March that's a great idea yes you before public comments let me read um what I have to read during this portion of the
meeting District residents and staff are inv Ed to address the board of education on any topic the board requests that individuals State their name town of residence or School of attendance for the record the specific action items they are commenting on and ask that all remarks be directed to the board
president or design not to individual members or staff the board asked that members of the public be courteous and mindful of the rights of other individuals when speaking specifically comments regarding Personnel matters are discouraged and cannot be responded to by the board students employees have
specific legal rights afforded by the laws of New Jersey the board Bears no responsibility nor will it be liable for any comments made by members of the public if a matter concerns a District staff member is of Interest or concern to a resident the matter should be
referred to the responsible building principal superintendent of schools or the Board of Education either by telephone letter or email although the board may not respond to items raised during the public forum all public comments will be considered please note that if any member of the public becomes
disruptive during the meeting the board president May terminate the participant statement continued disruptions may result in removal from the meeting or adjournment of the meeting so we will deal with the speakers who are in person first and then online you are limited to
three minutes in duration okay Steve my name is Steve guski and I'm a resident uh on Len Lane in Berkley Heights um I have a question that just relates to the actual referendum date and that is if you had the referendum uh the same time as the
general election could you skip the 30k um this is going to be maybe we should do this a little differently maybe we should have our presenters respond to each question first and then we'll go on I think that would be better okay so yes this is different than we're
used to so the gentleman is you would not incur the $30,000 if you were to ask a question in November however the timing for the November election this year you would have no chance of being able to submit the project applications
and get on a November ballot that's not a practical date this year but there would be no cost thank you I'm Laura menal and I teach uh environmental science at G my name is Anna karuk I'm president of
environmental Club at GL and I live in Berkeley Heights thank you so I didn't we didn't realize this was the question format but um we came to encourage you to add solar and Energy Efficiency projects to um your list projects and a
couple of examples of how this can save us money so the schools have saved about $10,000 a year with the existing solar projects at Woodruff generate about 90% of the power that they use 90% And there's lots more room at GL it's about
15% but we use a lot more power um the power purchase agreement that they have right now that you have right now expires in 20207 so make a decision about that um anyway so so I had actually three asks one is that while you're deciding which
projects you consult with the students because the students have a lot of knowledge they're very and this is their future so they have a lot of good ideas like for example the IMC is used all the time and it's a really really dreary place the half the
lights don't work um so that I think I would bum to the top of your list but also solar can save you money so Montclair is saving about $100,000 a year um and the panels that they just installed are expected to last for 40 years so it's kind of a win-win um
Energy Efficiency the gyms were all the gym lights were all replaced in I think it was 2016 and it was expected to save um over 10 years $215,000 so these projects that we're asking for are going to pay for themselves they're not easy I'm not saying that they're easy but I think
they're important and Anna so one overall goal of the environmental club for the past few years was in promoting efficiency of lighting in all of our buildings in the district and some benefits of replacing our fluorescent light systems with LED lights include overall less wattage
which means longer lifespans and replacing light bulbs can be costly and dangerous for staff considering that the CFL bulbs also contain mercury and making this switch now will allow us to put money that would otherwise be be put into lighting costs to be directed elsewhere such as essential building
maintenance enhancing educational PR programs supporting staff and improving student experiences and another action we should consider in achieving Energy Efficiency is upgrading School a vac systems which would similarly save a lot of money and maintenance hours and
energy use our current system relies on fossil fuels for heating and therefore lowers a air quality in and surrounding our facilities but installing an electric heat pump or a new high efficiency HVAC system will make the schools be greener cheaper and healthier
for all students now and in the future and I think that our school making improvements to mitigate climate change will pave the way for students to take action and contribute to wider Global effort to preserve our envirment our environment for future Generations thank you thank
you you may I that I saw that you have experience with solar on your website yeah so can you tell us about projects You' done that was going to be my question Mr MSO can you answer that about solar projects so yes um we do solar we have done solar so the biggest issue with solar is that you can't put
solar on roofs that aren't good so roof replacement is Paramount the good part of that is if we do include Roofing in the referendum that Roofing gets done First Solar would not be tied to a referendum because there are other vehicles in which to finance solar solar
solar is typically done through a PPA or power purchase agreement uh which is a 15-year lease purchase with a provider to basically provide the district with a fixed energy rate so many people when
you were with Aces you were paying 11 cents per kilowatt hour with solar you could drop that number to zero or three depending upon the size of the system you mentioned that one of the schools has 90% of the power being used the only issue with solar is that there are
limitations with how much solar you can produce you cannot overproduce so if you're already producing 90% at that school you can't add any more to it um and other Schools they're going to be limited by shading uh equipment so if
the roof is clean and free we can certainly do solar analyses and determine whether you have the ability to do systems on each of the roofs it's definitely something that is viable it would be viable after the referendum not
part of it um if you were to purchase the solar there are other issues with that and there is a cost to the district up front with a PPA there is zero cost to the district upfront because the providers are able to sell the srex to
and gain benefits from the tax credits available through a solar project that's why they're able to put in they're basically leasing your roof they're putting the equipment on your roof they own it they maintain it for the life of the lease typically at the end of the
lease they will give you an offer for a dollar or5 dollar to buy the system at the end of 15 years a solar system doesn't stop producing it continues to produce while it degrades it degrades minimally um the only time we've ever told a Solar
Company to remove the solar panels at the end of 15 years is when the district roof was uh out of warranty during the duration and they were experiencing major leaks the reason that we said no take it and and get rid of it is because the cost to remove
solar panels from a from a building in order to repair a roof is very expensive it is the Le's obligation so it's yours if you had a leak under a solar panel you'd have to remove it you are obliged to pay for the removal and the
reinstallation and you're also Prov obliged to pay the the provider for the downtime associated with the lack of energy being produced while the solar panels were off so there's an issue with that whole thing um but yes solar is something we can look into I will point
out that every project that we design for the district uses leadership and energy uh principles so we use lead design as part of everything that we do certification of lead is different it's more expensive to do but everything that we do we try to do environmentally
friendly local sources uh no over overseas shipping any of the products we use americanmade so that and and local not just americanmade we don't want to ship from California to New Jersey so if there's local sources we'll do that so we try to use those principles in our
design do to clarify the the re referendum would cover roofs but not solar and that would come after correct correct when you when you said they won't cover is it because they don't get The Debt Service Aid just help me
understand I say won't cover solar solar panels not being covered in the referendum the reason we wouldn't is because there are other vehicles for financing the solar because they are better than doing it through a referendum if you you would be paying money up front for the solar solar panels but in this case you would be
getting a power purchase agreement and okay they would put them on they would lease your roofs you'd get a fixed energy uh cost over the life of the project they would provide you know screens in your science labs that show the energy being produced and the power being produced it could be used for
instructional models so there's a lot that can be done through that system uh if you were to purchase it yourself you're now responsible for the maintenance and the upkeep and if a string goes out now you you know it's it's more we tend not to do ownership models but they are available
and the referendum would lead to an ownership model whereas the other ones are more of the um the lease models that you talked about all right got it thank you okay thank you any other comments or questions from the public Mr
jaquilla good evening everybody Michael Della Whitney drive for disclosure purposes former member of the Town Council and former member of the Board of Education First I want to say I feel old now because I was part of the public committee that put in that solar panel Bal in Woodruff and here so that does make me feel a little old don't have a
question uh more of a comment and a plead to the board um this is a very important issue facing this District you when I sat on this side of the table um this is something we did review and debate and um a lot of work went into it I encourage the board to please look at
the work that went into the prioritization of the list the generation of list obviously Frank working with you back then um we put a lot of work into it priorities have changed but but the age of these buildings have not a lot of buildings are aging we've done some work I know
you've done some work over the last three years but the bulk of it has not been done uh it is a tight timetable but not to disagree with a former colleague we need to do this you know we need to get this done we need to get this out to the public this school district needs a
lot of work that it's not going to be the fancy hey look at this beautiful night great things there's a lot of things behind the doors The Boiler Room room the roofs Windows everything it needs to be done in order to help out and as you brought up a good comment about uh environmental and everything
you're conditioning outside air you're spending a lot of money wasting heating cold air coming in cooling you know hot air coming in during the summer and the winter respectively so I do encourage you take a look at the list get this going start educating the public on the
needs we have a very big need to it you know do this for the children for the environment do this for the teachers the administration are in the building it's very important so again I just ask everyone to please work together let's get this going let's work to get this referendum on on the path to get
executed thank you thank you any other comments from public in person haly do we have anyone online to promote Hy I can't see who's first could you let me know uh it's me oh can you hear me
yes hi John MC um thank you for the presentation a few points I'm not against the referendum uh in fact I think actually it's a good idea it it makes sense for a lot of reasons I I think as a general
idea my concerns I think have to do with you're you're asking the public for money and I think there has to
be Clarity and I don't think this is on the Consultants I think this is on the board there has to be Clarity on how the budget is going to make more sense in about 10 years we're probably I think projected I looked at this last night I think we're projecting to lose about 200
students um every five years uh if Trends continue that that's off of the top of my head and I think there's got to be a lot of thinking around what that means in terms of building projects but before we even get
in and so we kind of have to rightsize the budget and I'm not talking about tax cuts I'm talking a lot I'm talking about how some services are increasing despite enrollments reducing like big discussion two meetings ago about police in schools that cost
doubled you know uh within a period of a couple of years um we hired an Athletics trainer that I'm still not sure what that's about there's a lot of bloat in there that you a person would take a month to look at and figure that out and I think the
board if the board wants to engender trust it can't be a marketing plan from the Consultants it needs to start with an honest and authentic effort at the budget so that the public can feel okay so these guys are dealing with us in a genuine way now they're there're you
know there aren't these weird transfers there aren't these weird positions there aren't costs going north while enrollments are going south and I think if you rightsize that and you come to the public with a good effort on the budget this year um I think that the
referendum as a whole might be easier to swallow I like the idea of it being on a gen in a general election I don't think the goal should be to get the referendum through I think the goal should be to give the public access to make a decision with the best information they have um so I don't think this is about
selling it I think I think the public will buy it if it's a good product I think if it's about building a good product based on a good foundation and you don't you won't have to worry about what month to put this on the public the public will vote for it if it's good um
I want to disagree with one thing the consultant said about timing of information um I I think information should be put out there when it's available like I was a little bothered by the fact that this presentation wasn't out there before
this present uh before the presentation tonight um yeah and I think you might get some scrutiny and some comments and and things like that but I think that can help you understand what be might be coming in the meeting and what's what questions the community might have it's
not there to hurt you you want to know ahead of time what people are going to say or they're going to think when they're looking at that piece of paper all right that's it thank you very much thank you um Mr MSO can you talk about the difference between an annual yearly budget by a district and a referendum or
yes someone so your annual budget uh to answer the gentleman's question inquiry that's obviously it's your general fund operating budget that's for your utilities for your staff for healthcare benefits all your cost of operating the
school district for a referendum is one of the limited ways where a school district has the legal ability to borrow money just for capital projects and that's why you're allowed to finance it over the useful life of those projects so we're talking about two different
things the general fund operating budget that's what you guys are going to be preparing in the next month uh to cover your operating costs and there is a small portion of that budget that goes for Capital maintenance and may you may be able to put put money in your capital reserve but for the bond referendum
we're just talking about borrowing money to finance capital projects and capital needs and financing it over the useful life and when you think about it and this is kind of hard um you know whenever I try to do a project at my own
house I try to save the money to pay for the project up front but I don't get that service Aid at home so for you guys saving the money in your general fund operating budget putting your cap Reserve if it's an eligible project you're actually penalizing yourself
because you're not getting that Debt Service Aid component and also when I saved the money to do that bathroom renovation at my house I'm the only one that's got to pay the debt here if you spread the cost out over the 20 years everybody that's going to live in your community over those 20 years pays their
fair share of the roof or the media center that everybody's going to use over those 20 years if you pay for it all today you guys that are sitting in this room and the people that are here are going to pay the 100% of the cost for a Community Asset that people are going to use for 20 years so that's the
difference between the current general fund operating budget and The Debt Service budget that is authorized via reference thank you haly is there another um person who would like to ask a question yes
yeah it's me again sorry thank you for the opportunity to talk a second time I wasn't conflating the annual budget with the referendum the point that I was trying to make was that the referendum requires public trust and we've had an issue with that
when it comes to the budgets for the past several years and yes Dr felter you are not responsible for anything that's happened in that time but I think everybody sitting at the table has a responsibility to fix it moving forward and I and I and I think if you're going to ask the public to agree to this kind
of investment the first question they're going to want to know or the answer they're going to want to know is what are you doing with our money that you already have this year that's all I understand they're two different things but one trust in one leads to buy
in in another in my opinion all right thank you thank you are there no other comments from um offline or online participants no okay uh Mrs Jolly follow-up question
sorry there was just um one comment that was made um with respect to the difference in dates the March date versus the November date and I think you said something like oh the November date's not really viable because of a timing of filing of documents can you just replay that a little bit um just
explain that one more time please so again given the timeline if we were to take any referendum date that we have and work backwards the 61 days for the County Board of Elections the uh which is you know two months the doe review process which is a month for you to
review and come up and and approve the PEC letters and then Doe's process Doe's process can take anywhere from four to 6 months so we're already moved back 9 months in the process so if we move further back from where we are today or move forward from where we are today
making November making the submissions and being able to get the information down to doe and get approvals it's very very difficult so are are you referring to November of 2025 November this year oh I was thinking yeah I wasn't thinking November year gives you more time okay
that's but the following year gives you more time but you lose the rolloff of the debt okay okay thank you um this is an important issue so ow
other speakers in public did you have another question hello I just wanted to agree completely with what Mr Dila said about um how we should probably spend a lot more money on like improving what we have already because in especially in
the last couple of years here I've noticed a lot of like maintenance issues that have caused like disruptions in learning like for example teachers rooms like the heating breaks so we have to like move our classroom entirely and we have to abandon what we're doing or pipe
bursts so I think if we replace those systems and we make them more efficient we could just be saving a lot more time and money while also saving all the trouble that we would otherwise have from having to move classrooms or even cancel school thank
you I see no other comments from the public or online is there any follow-ups from the board Mrs Terrero so I just want to have some clarity on a couple things as we're talking about we're talking about dates November
March if hypothetically we proceeded with the March date how M how how much additional time needs to H items need to happen after that in order to be able to Leverage The
Debt roll off as opposed to pushing it out to a later date maybe it wouldn't be November maybe you do July or whatever that is um what what else needs to happen so that we would utili be able to utilize
the debt roll off um so once the vote is successful if it were to be held in March it takes about a month and a half to two months to issue the bonds and then you essentially receive all that money in a month and a half two months and then
then the architect takes it from there your debt service payments would be in the following FIS schal year so you have the money almost immediately so the so the debt is rolling off in March of 26 correct yes so in order to for us to be
able to leverage it you said it has to fall within that calendar year is that accurate or it has to fall within a month of when March happens what specifically is it so you have to issue the bonds in that same fiscal year and you also because you have to get
into your next fiscal Year's budget so in order to do that when you do have a March referendum you have to do it right away because the budget needs to be finalized in May or so so we immediately start the process of going to the market and getting things sold so that you have
you have those numbers because you need the final debt service numbers in the budget okay I'm I'm asking these questions because what if we run out of time and don't hit March what happens you don't hit March you're going to miss your debt falling off March is the last
possible date because as you're doing your budget for this year now you're going to need to sell those bonds right away so you can put those Debt Service Aid numbers in your budget just like you're preparing it this year so if you Miss March you're going to miss that
debt fall okay the bond sale has to happen like reality a lot of districts that would have debt falling off here maybe we would have had a September referendum or even a referendum this year to hit that Deadfall this is kind of like the last possible so that's like
the 12th hour you're like 12th hour and a half okay yeah yeah yeah just to be honest can I can I ask um related question when was this referendum um in 2006 is that what is that what you said
before it was um a December 2005 referendum and then the bonds were issued in 2006 so they did it in December 5 there was enough time to kind of plan it for the budget for next year right as long as you issue sometime in this fiscal year between
July and April you can include it in your next fiscal Year's budget so for example um if your debt was falling off not in 26 but in 27 you could issue Bonds in July of 26 which would put your
next payment in July of 27 so it would just it would um kind of Follow that you have you have the whole fiscal year to issue the bonds but because of the timeline of the actual vote you only have that short period of
time to get it done and it sounds more like it's it's that plus the fact that it has to be budgeted the next budget is sort of driving the timing for this right you can't put an estimated amount
in your budget for Debt Service and kind of what I right understood okay all right and and Mrs Dolly thank you um and so when we're talking about you know coordinating with the U the old debt rolling off and the new debt coming
on is it really just um not an Optics thing but well I mean in a sense an Optics thing right so if we go in November the debts going to roll off people's taxes will you know reduce right but then when the new debt will come on the taxes will go up so
um it it's not that people would be losing money it's just the appearance of low having a lower tax rate and then with the new bonds coming on you know having then the tax rate go back up to maybe where it was before right um you
know the the old debt rolled off yeah it's part of the planning phase I mean we do this with districts across the entire State you know it just makes fiscal sense to sort of just keep things where they're at and it's more palatable the public to do projects and not pay
the additional money and you know yeah if you're saving money in one year and then it jumps back up again it just you know it looks maybe like planning wasn't done timely or something of that nature also the right like Mr Stanley if we're
if we're what I'm hearing right if we wait to November of 2026 it wouldn't be in the budget until the uh August 1st of 2027 2028 budget right and again this is
just setting us back and back and back and back when we have know right like I mean most of us have been impacted in some way by maintenance and building issues Lely right we have the middle school all watching for snow days on whether they're going to have to go back
on a Saturday right so I think right that that we can keep saying like we can do this any time right but it's going to get harder and harder and harder to do and is going to push the timeline back and back and back right cuz now you're not going to be able to get the the
things done even it's going to be 3 to five years instead of two to four Mrs Dolly yeah I wasn't arguing one way or the other I just wanted to clarify right so I'm not necessarily opposed I just wanted to understand what the you know what the impacts were and if I I
can just add thing the longer you wait to do projects the more expensive they become so the longer you put it off the escalation for the costs are going to increase over time so something to keep in mind can you clarify one quick thing there is a so the referendum and
everything that we would approve that goes to the doe is the cost of the project some sort of a not to exceed number or is it just a number the the number is not enough to exceed because it is budgeted per the work that you're doing it has doe
doesn't will allow doe requires that every project that goes down have contingency attached to it they require a minimum of 5 5% contingency have to recognize that that started in 2000 we we don't put a project down without less than 10% contingency and in some cases
if it's heavy mechanical may have 12% contingency so the estimate is actually calculated based on square foot cost it's not a detailed line item estimate it is a square foot budget and we categorize and catalog all of the jobs that we've done in the past the projects
that we've recently bid and we have a database that shows a toilet room is going to cost us $120,000 to renovate a mediumsized gang toilet it's going to cost us 60,000 to do a unisex toilet so every project that's in here we are going to estimate
that estimate is going to include contractors overhead and profit Architects Engineers bonding legal fees it's going to include contingency it's going to include Environmental Testing if it's necessary it's going to include all of the cost associated with the
project so when we put it down it's not just a construction cost it is a total project cost doe approves it based on that now if we've shorted it we don't get any more Debt Service Aid we get only what we put down only based on what
we put down so our estimate are conservative if in fact they are Ultra conser and we have to be mindful because we have a referendum to pass so we can't just pad the you know the cost and the referendum has $40 million in you know contingency we can't do that so we have
to be mindful of how we strategic how we put together the budget estimate it has to be accurate but it has to plan for the future and once that's done that's it there is no going back to doe and asking for more money asking for more Debt Service Aid we have a very very
good track record of estimating projects and as I said before some in the beginning come in over budget or under budget and as we get to the end it all comes out in the in the wash so that's that's the short answer any Miss Dr
forer yeah can you just there was a you mentioned a way that there was a you could get Debt Service aid but you were really taking the money out of the capital reserve can you just go over that again I wasn't familiar with that I'll give it a shot Tony but so we've
had districts that have a significant amount of surplus in debt service Aid right or I'm sorry significant out service Surplus in capital reserve they've got a lot of money and they want to use it to get projects done why don't we do the paving or why don't we do the roofs they really need to get done we
should do it and as uh Mr solamini mentioned it if you do it you can you have the money you're going to pay full price 100% there is no Aid unless it's a rod GR Grant which they're only offered sporadically but there is no Aid so if
we take that project and roll it into the referendum the cost of that roof is now receiving 34% in debt service Aid once as as Tony structures the question it can be said that the district is going to go out for a $20 million
referendum they are going to receive seven or eight million in debt service Aid and they are going to add $2 million from capital reserve to offset that further the tax impact is based upon what's left so you have the ability to
use capital reserve to offset the debt prior to the Imp but the project has project has to be in the referendum right but you're just not going to borrow money on it you're going you're not going to borrow the money you're
going to get the funds from the capital reserve so there's two ways to do it okay there's the one that Mr MSO just described where putting in a contribution of your capital reserve um and that potentially you could lose that service Aid that way alternatively what
you could do is the regulations allow you to use capital reserve to finance any project in your long range facility plan but the regulations also allow you to use capital reserve to make a Debt Service payment so by a simple example you have a million-- dollar roof project
you go to referendum you get 34% of the cost so now your roof project cost you 600 $60,000 so you have a $660,000 Debt Service payment you could technically pay that full Debt Service payment from your capital reserve that
year after you got the aid so you'd write a check for $660,000 from your capital reserve but you've already gotten the 34% a so you could have paid prior a million bucks out of your capital reserve but if you do the referendum get 34% and then instead of
budgeting The Debt Service to the taxpayers you allocate Reserve um Mr MSO suggestion works out well when you're trying to lower your tax impact as well you can put a contribution if you have capital reserve in there so then you're
going to borrow less money for a project which then reduces the tax impact so there's different ways to kind of is is there any uh ability to use maintenance Reserve in the same way no just capital reserve just a followup to that when you craft the question that goes on the
ballot is this information available to the to the people to say this is the total you know value of the referendum the cost of projects and is there a commitment that goes with a question
that says there will be you know $2 million worth of capital reserves that will go towards um servicing that that bond is like is that is that how it's done potentially if you use the example Mr MSO said that'll be in the question
question if you use the other alternative I suggested that's up to the board at that's seated at that time to make that decision when they annually structure their budget so it's a board decision on what type of question correct ends up on the
ballot correct okay okay I see no more questions by the board or by our public in person or online so at this point I'm going to ask for a motion to adjourn so move thank you Mrs Conor
second thank you Mrs Terrero a Voice vote all in favor any Nays the meeting is adjourned at 8:58 p.m. thank you all so much