Mhmm. The meeting is now called to order. Roll call, madam vice president. The only board member absent is mister Greg Brown. All others are present. Thank you. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States I'll now read the Carmel Clay School's mission statement.
Carmel Clay Schools will provide opportunities for all students to realize their potential in an ever changing world. Next on our agenda this evening are recognitions. Recognitions this evening include the Carmel High School girls tennis state champions, the Carmel High School girls track team state champions, and the Carmel High School boys lacrosse team state champions. Mister Inskeep? Thank you, mister Shapiro and members of the board. It's it's really awesome to be able to come here so many times a year to recognize these, great student athletes and their coaches and have their parents here as
well. We really, know that that is not not something we take for granted, and, we hope that they are a great reflection on our community and our school district as well. So at this time, I'm gonna have members of the girls' tennis team come forward, and I'll say a bit about their season here in a moment. But I did wanna say a few things. I really appreciate your taking the time to recognize these student athletes. You'll come over here, girls, right over here to the side. I didn't give instructions, so that's that's why. But I wanna say a little bit about, what separates these these groups from others,
and it starts with their parents. And I wanna say thank you to them because without their positive support and their encouragement of our coaching staff and the kids and all the little things they do to enhance the experience for kids, I just don't think a lot of these things would be possible. But they are, very positive, and they are always reinforcing the things that the coaching staff is saying to their kids too at home. And and we realize that's a unique thing for us and one of the things that sets us apart in education based athletics.
So, I say thank you to them, and and you see the large turnout tonight. They're they're very excited about what their kids accomplish and as they should be. They're great representatives of our community. So this was a great school year we just finished as we ramp up for a new one. And so as we close the 2526 school year, Carmel was able to capture eight team state championships this year. And, again, I I don't think that's something we should ever take for granted even in our community, but I think it speaks volumes about the high goals these teams and these coaching staff set and their ability to continue to fight and claw to
reach them each year. So each of these three teams has their own separate story from the year that I'll try to kinda reflect on from my lens. But just to say a few quick things about our girls' tennis team. This team had a run-in the state tournament that nobody would have predicted a month into the season. And, sometimes I'm not sure those that here tonight would have maybe predicted at some points in the season that they would be here being recognized. But sometimes the funny thing happens when you show up every day and you work really hard and you listen to what your coaches say and then you just keep back at it every day.
And sometimes you you fall down during the season, and you get back up, and you keep keep doing it. And this group had one of the most difficult state championship runs in terms of the teams they defeated to get there that I think anyone has ever had in the tournament. And so they defeated seven top 15 teams out of the eight teams they defeated in the tournament, including number one Garen Catholic in their own sectional. And that was a pretty major upset, and I think the only people that thought that they could win, were these parents and these kids and these this coaching staff
that were here. And sometimes the the road took a little longer. Sometimes they chose to play for four hours at a time on the court. Some matches lasted longer than others. But the biggest thing from my lens watching them was that each of these positions, the five positions and these seven girls here, had their moments in the state tournament where they were counted upon to overcome really pressure points to win their match, when it didn't look like things were gonna turn out really well and all the focus was on their court. And that's a really unique thing to have all five positions do that throughout the
course of a tournament. Does not happen very often. The head coach is Kirsten Carlson. She's a Carmel graduate, and she started the season as the interim head coach. And like the rest of this group, she grew as a head coach during the year two and is now our permanent coach. And I wanted to recognize coach Carlson tonight because she became the youngest head coach to ever win a state championship at Carmel, and that's saying a lot out of the 208 state championships that have occurred at that point. So let's recognize Kristin. So she will come up to the mic and introduce our, young ladies that are here this evening with with us.
Alright. Here with us this evening, we have Gabby Hall, and then we have Shravya Palutla, Annie Mann, Olivia Wojaya, and Alex Wajaya. Our next group to recognize this evening is our girls track and field team. So members of that team and those, coaches with us this evening, please come forward. The girls' track and field team finished a second consecutive state championship season in June. This team showed their incredible depth at the state meet, scoring in a number of events to become the top team in the state for a second straight year.
This group set a number of school records this season and will leave a legacy of being a historically dominant team in the program's history. The one thing from my lens that separates this team out from others is the chemistry that they show each other, And you see it here tonight. They you know, track and field is an individual sport, but this group shows a lot of love for each other, and I don't see that a lot in all individual sports. And I think it's a culture that coach McCrill and his staff have put together, and they should take credit for that and especially our student athletes as well for
buying in for the team as well. And, you will not see a team that competes at a meet that smiles more than this one. I can guarantee you that. And they're they're pretty talented as well. So now I will have coach, Aaron McGurrill come up and introduce members of the team that are with us this evening. Thanks to the school board for having us. Representing us tonight, Caitlin Oshimura, Sadie Foley, Molly Foley, Elise Mauer, Kalinda Lee, Jenna Harris, Kate Hammond, Libby Miller, Ellie Cooley, and, of course, her mother, Anne, coach coach Cooley.
I'll now have, members of our boys' lacrosse team come forward at this time. The boys' lacrosse team won the state championship over at Culver Academy last month. Pretty great night at Brownsburg High School, I might add. It was capped a, seventeen and two season in which the team was recognized as one of the top teams in the Midwest. To me, what made this group special is the dedication, drive, and focus they show starting with preseason workouts. They have one goal each season, and to see their confidence grow with each week during the year was really impressive. They play fast, physical with enthusiasm, and I would tell you they're just really fun
to watch. It was a truly dominant season, and they earned the title by getting everyone's best shot every time they stepped on the turf. And I'm really proud of the way they represent our community and how much it means to them to represent their school. And now head coach Keith Allen will introduce members of the team and staff that are here with us this evening. Thanks, Jared. Good evening. Again, thank you all for your support. With us tonight is, Will Bates, Cohen Odell, Evie Warren, Aaron Fedorcha, Henry Dvorak, and
assistant coach, Savion Hutt. Thank you very much. Congratulations again to everybody. Thank you, mister Inskeep. Hopefully, we'll be doing a lot more of these in the year to come. So you're all welcome to stay for the rest of the meeting. It's gonna be really exciting. But if you'd like to leave, please feel free. We'll give you all a minute to do that. Next on our agenda would be public comment. However, no one has signed up for public comments this evening. So we move on to consent. Consent, items this evening include the personnel report, claims, payroll, CCS building level safety plan
template for twenty twenty six, twenty twenty seven, change orders for the Carmel High School football stadium additions and renovations, change order for the Carmel High School Polytech addition, the change order for the Carmel High School natatorium renovation and addition, the change orders for Cherry Tree renovation, and the change orders for the Carmel High School 2026 improvements, and the minutes from the June 2026 school board workshop session and the 06/24/2026 school board
regular session meetings. As a reminder, consent are are items, that are designated section where routine items are grouped together for efficient consideration and approval, and that are not meant to take up, a lot of time, but items that the board must legally address. And by incorporating them into a single agenda item, meant to streamline the, approval process. Mister McMichael, before I ask for a motion to approve these items, are can you please share some details about the change orders? Yes. I will. I've identified three or four that I'd like to speak to specifically.
They're rather large change orders. The first is at the, for the natatorium. There's a change order for a $162,000. It's, has to do with a return air booster fan and unit dampers. That may not seem like a 162,000, but it's it's a big commercial facility. But important to us is that we have, really struggled getting the air balanced and getting air conditioning at the level we want. It's a very complex facility. You're trying to have a cooler at the top where the audience is at and
and warmer opposite of what's natural for heat to rise. And so, there's been a number of issues. As as I said, it's a very complex project, but, there's pretty strong confidence that this will re address and resolve that issue. So while it's a $162,000, if it takes if it solves that issue that we've had concern about, we'll we're very pleased about that. A second one is at, for Carmel High School as well. It has to do with the auditorium.
When we were doing we're going to do the Polytech project, the state required us to sprinkle the auditorium. Now remember, we had just renovated the auditorium and, but different people on that board and and different and and we'd had, waivers for that, for twenty years, because it does not meet current code, but but but like a lot of things, it takes it doesn't have you don't have to bring everything up for the current code. Well so that was going to be a a little over $1,000,000, and it's been
a little bit more than that. And these acoustical panels at $58,000, that's the I know you're familiar with the auditorium, so it has, you know, cloud like things that are in the ceiling. And so those had to be removed, and and they were unable to just reinstall them. So most of this has to do with that. There were some side panels, which were new with the renovation that had, the atmosphere had caused the formica to blister. So those are being replaced as well, but most of it had to do with the ceiling, and that but but it all had to do with that project.
So that was there's that and then, there are other smaller ones. For example, at Cherry Tree, it's $41,000, had to do a sound equipment for the LGI and the the stem rooms. And, so but those are the ones and and there was one for 83,000 at the stadium. As you know, that's a very large project. This mostly had to do with the visitor side and doing some work with, some additional concrete work, that we felt was necessary that had not been included in the bid as well as some other, cosmetic, aspects of that side, wanting it to present
itself somewhat equivalent to the home side as far as outside appearance and so forth. So those are the ones that I would address specifically. Great. Thank you very much. So I have a motion to approve all items on the consent agenda? I move to approve items 4.2 through 4.12 on the consent agenda as a group. Thank you. Do I have a second? Second. Is there any discussion? Mister McMichael? I've got a question I haven't thought of before. Is this work in the CHS Auditorium gonna displace any of our many programs that
occur? I don't believe so. I think we we we will substantially complete it, you know, this summer while we're not needing the facility. So I Right. I'm not aware that it will particularly affect the the program that we'll have. Thank you. Any further questions? Great. We will now take a vote. All those in favor of approving all items in the consent agenda, please signify by saying yes. Aye. Aye. Motion carries. Next on the agenda, is our action item, the Homestead Credit Reallocation. Mister McMichael. Okay. That's all legalese terms, but what it means is is that, the $300 credit that
the board's generally aware of, which was part of the, senate bill one, legislation, it gives a credit to homeowners. And so that credit cost the school district in round numbers about $2,900,000. And so we, in '26, when that budget was developed and the board approved it and so forth and the state approved it, we had planned to suffer that loss, if you will, about half in the debt service fund and half in the operations
fund. Since that time, this, the state legislatures, said that they really will insist that it all come from the operations fund. Otherwise. And that's what this is about. It's allowing us to to, take that loss and or roughly half in the debt service, half in the operations fund. Next year, it will be all in the operations fund. And, so that's what this is allowing us to do. It, it it allows us to be consistent with what our assumption and what our planning was. And so we'd recommend you approve the resolution.
Thank you, mister McMichael. Do I have a motion to approve the homestead reallocation credit? I move that we approve the homestead reallocation credit. Thank you, missus Cocay. Do I have a second? Second. Thank you, missus Cashion. Is there any discussion? Seeing none, we will take a vote. All in favor of approving the homestead credit reallocation, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion carries. Our next action item is the Carmel Clay School's school handbooks for twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven. Mister Woodward. Good afternoon. Thank you. Updates to the, student handbooks.
There were, some procedural updates, but the only substantive updates this year were, cafeteria links were updated in the elementary and middle school handbooks, because, basically, we were relying on prices every year, and the prices change or can fluctuate. So we made sure there's a link directly to, food service so that it's always up to date. Secondly, there was updated language for cell phone usage, which is in reaction to, Senate Enrolled Act, that recently came about with regards to bell to bell, no cell.
Also, of further information, there is, info that will go out to all families about, that those changes and what will be expected. But, there's a direct link, to the policy and guidance for each of the schools, in the handbook. Additionally, at the high school, they also had updated language for the cell phone usage, but they have, changed another thing that's substantive, regarding, lockers. They have clear language in there now about sharing of lockers, not being permitted at
the the high school level. So questions from the board about changes? Sure. Let me make a motion, and then we'll entertain questions. Yep. So I have a motion to approve the CCS school handbooks for twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven. I move to approve the CCS school handbooks for 2627. Thank you, missus Cashin. Do I have a second? Second. Thank you, miss Wheeler. Is there any discussion? Missus Cashin. Hi. So one of the things that I noticed when I was reviewing the proposed wording within the handbook is the fact that the high school handbook has very clear consequences
for, I think it was first through fifth offenses, basically, of having a cell phone during the bell day. But notice that it is not there for the middle school, and that's generally the time frame that kids are first getting their cell phones and therefore probably need the most clear direction of consequences. And I think this particular bill has caused a lot of speculation in the community. So just kind of wanted to get an idea maybe putting more explicit repercussions within the middle school language. Additionally, one other question I had noted, we say students who travel to an off-site
location for work based learning will be permitted to have their wireless device and can be utilized as permitted by the work based learning supervisor. I'd like for us to look at changing that so it's clearer that that student still cannot have it during the day when they're at class. If they are leaving at a half day, it doesn't necessarily give them permission to have it while they are on campus. Just make that a little bit more clear. Yep. Do you happen to remember the page on that? I could make that update pretty quick. I I can follow-up. Yep. That'll be easy to find. I will work with the high school to clarify that. With regards to the middle school, the the group that works on them at the
time had discussed keeping the language a little more vague because, totality of a student's actions. But what I can do is circle back to them and kind of just bring the group together and say, how do you feel about being a little more specific so we align with, with the high school? Yeah. Because I think that's a great point on, like, if there's other behavioral issues that drive maybe a more severe consequence for a cell phone usage, maybe we're adding that wording to both then so that at the high school level, it has that flexibility as well, just to be very clear with our students on on what this will
mean for them. Yep. Can do. Well, what I would what I'd like to recommend is that the board approve the handbooks as they are presented this evening, and then the team will go back and look into those inquiries so we have it ready to go by the start of the school year, an approved handbook. And then any of those changes, we would bring those back for an amendment to the school handbook so that we are ready to start the school year. That would be my recommendation. And just to note, we did confirm that we do not print these, so coming
back later and having a change would not have an incremental cost associated with it. And and, doctor Osterreich, we can follow-up with those easily within the next week so we can have that information for the next board meeting. Thank you. Any further questions or discussion? I just wanted to make a comment to have, mister Woodward, and doctor O confirm, you know, when when new things like a bell to bell cell phone policy come out, the rumor mills sometimes get going before we can get these policies in place. I had one of our students at the high school say, hey.
I heard we were gonna get fined if we used our cell phone. And as much as I know, we'd love a new revenue source. We have no intention of doing that. So thank you. Anything else? Great. We will now take a vote. All in favor of approving the CCS school handbooks for twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion carries. Thank you, mister Woodward. Thank you. Our next action item is a bid award for the West Clay Elementary roof. Mister McMichael. Thank you. This is a a recommendation for award to r Adams Roofing in the amount of
$308,750, which is the board is aware that's very close to what we otherwise would have taken informal quotes at three hundred thousand, but it it was estimated. The good news is it was estimated higher than that, which is why we went through the bidding process formal bidding process, but it came in lower. So it's good news and, but you don't normally see a bid that's as close to to that amount. And so I just wanted to elaborate on that a little bit, and we'd recommend your approval. Thank you, mister McMichael. Do I have a motion to approve the bid award for West Clay School's roof?
I move to approve the bid award for West Clay's, roof. Thank you, miss Wheeler. Do I have a second? Second. Thank you, missus Cocay. Is there any discussion? Seeing none, we will now take a vote. All those in favor of approving the bid award for West Clay Elementary School roof, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion carries. Now move on to discussion. Discussion item this evening is the proposed 2027 bond issue and the impact of debt service. Mister McMichael. Thank you. I wanna make some, preliminary comments before to outline what how this will will be
presented this evening because it's a little different than what we've done in the past. So first, this is a a proposed bond issue. I I I want to say facility projects, but about 40% of this is capital expenses for equipment, technology, buses, band instruments, things like that. So it's, bond issues are oftentimes more than just for facilities, but this still has significant facility projects. Secondly, this is a long process. This is the first step, and it'll be about nine months before we'd actually close
on a bond, about six months before we're substantially through the process. The board's involvement in that is at least, two, if not, I believe, two or three more meetings. So I'm emphasizing that this truly this is discussion. The next meeting would be, a month from now in August, which would be a time where we would have a still just a a recommendation to advertise for a public hearing, and then that would come in September, all of which is for the purpose for you as you as you deliberate on the matter.
So you're not making a decision tonight is what I'm saying. You'll you you would, consider the public's input, as you consider your your decision, and then it kinda goes from there. And it gets further into the process as you proceed, but it's not a a one night action is what I'm gonna say. So this evening, I'll start out and present the projects, and then, it's two things. One, it's the bond issue, but we're very much also sharing how this bond issue affects our budget that you will be asked to approve in August.
The board had is had requested to be more aware of decisions that are being made. Because in August, the decisions mostly have been made. The budget's reflecting decisions that the board has made, and and it's too late to you know, that's not when you, you know, would change your mind or whatever. So we wanna make you aware, better than we have in the past as you make decisions that find their way to a budget. And then so this will get reflected in that budget, depending on the outcome.
And so, start with me and then Lindsay, Simoneto with, our financial advisor with Baker Tilly will will, share information about, the impact to our desk service fund. And and that you've seen that format before, but, typically, I I've taken her information. This I was the only one presenting, so it'll be much better this evening. And, and then third, Barry Gardner with policy analytics, so you know, will has some really good information, about updated information, about the assessed value, and and and he will
share that along with some other slides that kind of compare Carmel to the state and other districts and so forth. And then, Amanda Kuchar will kinda wrap it up at the end and also summarize this as as well as, commenting on each of the funds as, again, as it relates to the to the budget aspect of it. So with that, I'll begin. The first project is Carmel Middle School, and this is what we call a mid cycle. It's $16,000,000. It the majority of this is not what people see because we will it includes
replacing the finishes, basically, the walls down to the floor, carpet, and so forth. But that's about 1,700,000 of the 16,000,000. So it's it's the piece that people see, but that's not where all the money's at. And, but it also and this building was renovated twenty years ago, a major renovation, but it was major renovation. It was not a new building. And so some of the some of the mechanical equipment was not due to be replaced in 2007, but it is now. And it won't wait, reasonably for, another major renovation thus it's included at this time
in in the project. And, so, that's, I believe, the largest project in in here. A second project is Forestdale, and it's a million dollars and has to do with, primarily a a cooling tower that needs replaced and other HVAC repairs. The board may remember that a couple of years ago, we, had issues with the mechanical system in this building and had to close school twice in about a month. And, fortunately, we haven't found it necessary to do that since then.
But needless to say, this equipment is, you know, it may not we may not have a problem with it. We have a problem with it, but it may not result in closing school. But but that's what this is. So it's a million dollars, but it's an important amount of money, particularly if you're at Forestdale. And so, then the next project is EFC, and it's similar as far as mechanical items, that that are needing repair or replaced. It's a million and 0.5. And then Carmel Middle School is really a completion of a project we started or
or it's this year, really. And and this is the kind of the the last piece of that, and a significant portion of that has to do with replacing the tennis courts. And, you may be aware that one of the courts is not playable. It's, in disrepair such that it's not even we've not been able to use it. So, so that's that project. And then we have district wide miscellaneous projects, And I'm the board had requested I'm gonna provide some details of what is miscellaneous projects. And and, so and and by the way, this amount now is for three years,
not one year. And so, and it is a projection. So the answer is we don't know we know certain things like what we'll do right away, and I'll give an example of that. Such things that the Carm Creekside Middle School gym floor needs to be replaced. It no it it's to the point where it cannot be refinished anymore. They sand sand down the wood, and at some point, you can't keep doing that. So the floor needs replaced, and and that's one item. You just awarded a bid, for West Clay for roof repairs. Well, we have four of those buildings, and and three more of them need the
same work and or something very similar. And so Prairie Trace, College Wood, and Towne Meadow. And then we have paving and concrete across the district. I should point out that we have three and a half million square feet of space. That's a lot of facility, a lot of square footage, thousands of big compressors and motors, and and and and so, these are large numbers. But in the context of last year, for example, our our budget for this year is $5,500,000 in in our operations fund, for things that we cannot we can anticipate
we're gonna have issues. We can't tell you ahead of time what they're going to be. Last year, for example, the air conditioning there was something with the air conditioning at Carmel Middle School and the gymnasium, had to move the parks program, and I think it cost a 100 or a $150,000. So you either spent the money or you or you didn't have air conditioning, so when school started. So those are examples, but as much we have lots of those across three and a half million square feet of space. And so those are some examples. We also have other HVAC things that that would be in this miscellaneous.
Part of this is is a indirect maybe a direct, reflection of of what's going on with funding or the lack of it. And so some of these things are are being anticipated in a bond issue where previously we may have paid cash. And and and there's a point where we're running out of cash, so they end up in a bond issue. So so those are district wide, some examples of district wide, project miscellaneous projects.
And then we go to Carmel High School, and there's $10,000,000 here, and I recognize that's a big number. It's a big high school. It's about a third of that three and a half million square feet of space, so just to put it in perspective. And so it's such things as elevator repair and renovation. That's about $1,000,000.5, and some of it is functionally. Some of it's aesthetics, but, again, I'm guess I believe that the majority of it is just functionally, keeping them working properly and so forth. Forth. There's also roof replacement. There's miscellaneous projects here, and that's about another $4,500,000, with similar kinds of things.
As an example, at the high school under miscellaneous, we have science labs that because of the program, needing to be reconfigured. And, it's it's like poly tech that that maybe used to be industrial arts and so you instead of having a wood shop, now we have poly Tech and construction trades, things like that. So that's one example. There's fireproofing, that needs to be replaced over a boiler, a a boiler room. And, and there's seal seal coating. You know how much asphalt's up there from the from Smoky Row up to Main
Street and, and then various, again, compressor motors and so forth. So those are some examples of miscellaneous at Carmel High School. And then there's band instruments. And band instruments is is estimated at a million dollars. So it seems like a lot of band instruments. I wanna take a time to point out that, because there's been conversation about, you know, do you have to do all this and, you know, belt tightening and reductions and all that? Understand that that myself and and a whole team of people, of engineers, architects, our
facility director, number of the people at the building, we have a whole there's a whole process that we go through before you see it. So this bond issue could have been a million or could have been a $100,000, and and, Toby Steel would have made good use of it, but it's not. So the band instruments, for example, the request was $3,000,000. So this is a third of what was requested. They're very happy to get, you know, the the new instruments, but and this isn't just for the high school, although that's where a lot a majority of, I might
would say, but it's all it's the secondary schools really. And a little bit at the elementary, but mostly the secondary. So that's an example of of, at Carmel High School. And then we have bus replacements. You've Indiana's on a twelve year cycle, and and you can keep them longer than that, but when when a bus reaches 12 years old, it has to be inspected
twice by the state police. But why do they do an inspection? Safety. And so by implication, they're saying when it's twelve years old, we wanna take another look at it. And and it doesn't mean it's not going to be safe, but but there's a reason why they're on a twelve year cycle. Used to be 10, I think, but, you know, car vehicles have gotten better and longer lasting and so forth. But they're they're already on a twelve year cycle, but that's what that's for. And, similar to the my comments about the district wide, it's reflection, cash versus a
a bond issue. And and then finally, we have technology, and this number, has tends to grow. It's at $12,000,000. And and, I've got some notes here as to what that is, because the comment was made correctly that this isn't just Chromebooks, but we do have 22,000 of those things and other, you know, laptops and so forth. So we have a fair number of them. And but it's also, and at least as significant financially, it's the networks that we have that that, and the wireless infrastructure.
We have a 170 servers that support all of that. And then a newer thing is cyber security. And and you're we're that's a term that, you know, ten, fifteen years ago, we didn't talk about didn't never heard about it, but we do now. And so that's included. And, again, this is a number for twelve years. And and much of this equipment's or I'm sorry. Three years is 12,000,000. It could have been twelve, but I wish it was. But but it's three years. And, so much of this is on a on a a cycle because, generally speaking,
a lot of the technologies has a relatively short short cycle of useful value. And and so so we've got a whole schedule of, anticipated replacements and staying on that schedule. So with that, I think the total amount, amounts to $56,500,000 and, so, I'll now ask, Lindsay, to present, the kind of the financial information and how this affects our
debt service fund and ultimately affects, taxes and so forth. And and then the broader picture of of of our debt service fund and and our approach to, debt and managing and so forth. Good evening. My name is Lindsay Simonetto, Baker Tilly. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you this evening. We're going to walk through what the how those twenty twenty seven projects might be financed. But we'll first visit what your existing debt structure looks like, then look at the proposed financing layered in and what that might mean to a typical taxpayer and then
we will conclude by talking about, some of the long term capital planning as well. This slide here is a schedule of all of the bonds that are outstanding currently. Demonstrate that as well. The total payments on the bonds this year are about $42,000,000 and it stays at that level for 2027 as well. And then you can see the payments step down a little bit in 2028. And then over time, as debts get paid off, those payments step down.
And, ultimately, all of the debt that is existing is fully retired by the end of of twenty thirty six. Looking at the proposed financing, we have as we've summarized here some of the pertinent financial information, but also the assumptions borrowing amount of 59,500,000, providing at least 56,500,000 to
address the construction related expenses. And we've assumed the to twenty years. But Carmel has consistently been able to repay the debt more quickly to save on interest costs. Certainly, the the trade off is the annual payment is higher when you pay it off quickly, but the interest costs over the life of the bond, are substantially less
that way as well. And with this, and we'll walk through it, it'll show a little bit more on the next slide, but the another key assumption is assuming a 4% kind of cost of living or inflationary adjustment to the debt service levy from year to year. So it's the assumption built in that construction costs continue to increase, and the facilities will continue to as as Roger said, $3,500,000 a square foot. You will continue to have facility needs to be addressed, over the long term as
well. Well. And so that is built into these assumptions. Flipping to this slide, this is where we've layered in the proposed financing with your existing debt structure. The gray bars represent the bonds that are currently outstanding and then the navy bars represent the financing for the proposed projects. I will note that this is showing that the financing is done all at once. It would not need to, be it would not need to be financed all at
once. It could be multiple issuances. Ultimately, but, sorry. Let's go back to the slide. Yep. It's not on this one. But as you can see through this, the payments start in 2028, and they're the
step downs are still built in in the future when there's an assumption for future projects that might be coming down the line, which we will talk through as well. Looking at the potential taxpayer implications on the next slide, we have here, trying to demonstrate that 4% assumption of of growth to the debt service levy. What might that mean to a typical taxpayer?
We have home values here ranging from 200,000 up to a million dollars. 500,000 is the median home value, and so we've bolded that to to focus on for this evening. And that $500,000 home is eligible for homestead deduction. And those deductions, as you've heard with senate enrolled act one, those are continuing to phase in. Those, meaning the the deductions are are growing each year through 2031.
And what those deductions ultimately do is reduce the taxable value or the the value of the property that you can be taxed on. So for that median home, that net assessed value or the taxable value, 225,600. And so with that incremental increase to the debt service levy, that equates to about $32 per year or $3 a month. And, again, this is there's a lot of assumptions from year to year, with assessed
values, what what that property, how that might grow, but also those deductions that are holding in, and how does all of that ultimately impact tax rates. But this is really demonstrating the the planned approach of knowing that the facility needs are continuing and trying to, be trying to manage not having to raise the debt service levy drastically from one year to the next or let it drop and kind
of the yo yo effect. So it's really a planned of approach of of those cost of living adjustment. Lot of planning. So I want to reiterate again, this is there's a lot of, all this is subject to change. Certainly, this is demonstrating that there's is not just this 2027 project being looked at
in isolation, but also what else might be coming down the line and making sure that you are planning accordingly for those so you don't make a decision now that might make you feel like you're tying your hands, for a few years from now. So this layers in future financing. It has the the same gray bars of the existing debt plus same blue bars of the 2027 projects. And then it also layers in potential projects in 2030, 2033, and 2036.
Again, with that same planned approach of those cost of living adjustments or inflationary adjustments, to the debt service levy, from year to year. So, really, again, as mister McMichael already mentioned, there's no action or or anything that is being this is very much, preliminary in nature. Things can change, especially those future projects that are are again built in there to really demonstrate a planning framework and, demonstrate that long term vision.
Happy to take any questions too. Yeah. Questions for Lindsay. I have a question from Greg for about one of the slides, so I'll let you go first. Okay. I appreciate the forward looking slide that was just previous to this where you're trying to show us, like, over time, what does that look like? Because if someone had only taken another slide in isolation, it would look like we basically pay off all our debt by the end of it. However, I had a question such large ones?
Because I admittedly, when I opened this pre meeting to prep for this, this chart gave me a lot of heart palpitations. I tend to lean more on the side of keeping us pretty consistent, and this one has some really aggressive ones. So I just wanted to hear some of the the thought process behind that. Yeah. Actually, I saw them just the opposite because what the slide what it represents is well, what it represents is is what was said and that is and and the the visual may seem more dramatic, but but what it's showing is is that the
the the the expectation and the plan and the projection is is that that our our levy in debt service will continue to remain somewhat level. I'm gonna say level, but adjusted for for an assumption of inflation. So it's it's no more or less aggressive than it has been for the last, you know, twenty five or thirty years. If you had seen the same if this had been going backwards for twenty years, it it would it would still go like this because until recently, we we would
all we would state and it was true that, our we maintain a level tax rate. Well, that doesn't work anymore because when the state legislation is reducing the assessed value in spite of inflation that goes up, that doesn't work anymore. So now we're talking about dollars, and we write checks based on dollars, not on rates. And so I kind of like this actually in the sense that it's simply saying that this district plans our debt service expenditures and and maintenance and of our facilities
and capital needs in such a way that taxpayers can rely on having a a consistent, payment and that is not spiked. It does not go down because when it goes down, it invariably will go back up. And when it goes down for Periods of time. It reflects, it it in many cases, it's reflecting neglect of facilities that the taxpayers have paid for, and then I would say they're not taking care of them, and being responsible in that respect.
But importantly, from a tax standpoint and a taxpayer standpoint, this is not a district that spikes your tax rate, and and so the line is essentially level adjusted for inflation. And so there's larger projects, but, if and you've been here around long enough to, you know, in the past when we were growing, we were building a new school every three every two or three years. And so we've always had, for thirty years, we've had large projects. First, because we were growing, we kept adding facilities.
And now as we've gotten to as large as we are, now we have three and a half million square feet of space that will will will always take a certain amount of financial effort to maintain and ultimately up to replacement of that of that square footage as you've seen with, you know, six six years ago, I think, when we, rebuilt two new elementary schools, for example. So so there's really not been a change, in terms the numbers get bigger because of of inflation and cost of living, but but the but the overall picture has
stayed pretty consistent. Because it looks like it's almost doubling. When you look at that first teal bar of the illustrative a $108,000,000 bond in 2030, 2030 is right around the corner. Yep. So I will say I am very cautious. Oh, I'm sorry. You're saying the 108,000,000 being the assumption in 2030? In part, that's because that's also though the result of that is no different than it is this year in that it's a a rather consistent 4%, and and again
only adjusted for inflation, change in in the payment. So it's not so much how big the bond issue is, it's what's what the net effect is. And so if we have, for example, more debt being paid off and then adding and then offsetting that with a larger bond issue, not because we could or, you know, but because we have need and the need is planned out accordingly. So some years, we're we're we're grouping, need in a larger bond issue and other
years, smaller bond issue. I'll let others know. But the end result, regardless of the size of the individual issue is is that the financial effort is pretty is very constant. May I make a comment or question? I think, why this particular, slide might be a little misleading is that all total existing debt is gray. And I'm not sure that the roll off of the existing debt as it gets
paid off is it I mean, it looks like it's a lot bigger, but I I think I agree with you. It's not because of the roll off effect. Correct. Okay. That is correct. That that's why the the end result, regardless of how big it is, it's there's there's an offset to where the the the change is is about 4%. I don't know if it's also factoring in that these are showing projects for, like, three years worth of projects versus maybe the last few bond issues have been a
year worth of projects. That's correct. Putting more into one block of colors, if you will, that's showing in this graph. And, again, it wouldn't need to be done in this particular manner, but still trying to take all those into account. And this also does build in, in addition to the inflationary adjustment to the debt levy. There is an inflationary adjustment to construction cost built into these too, so those numbers increase with that as well.
That is a good point that I hadn't considered. I mean, I'm aware of it, but but I would emphasize that our planning starts out with and nothing's this simple. This is this takes hours and weeks and long time to get to the end. But of of we're we're of a recommendation. But but we start out, with I try to put put it into three year blocks, so we have a bond issue every three years. As you're aware, and if you've been here a short time, it's like you've had them a lot more frequently than we just had a '26 bond issue, and I
think we had a 20 and we had a 24 bond issue. So and and that that's because when you when you finally get closer to the reality, and then specific circumstances come in, to play, and that's how you it ends up changing. That's why as with any plan or any budget or any forecast, it's it's an an appropriate thing to do, but it it will invariably change. The farther out it get, the less likely it's gonna be just like that. Things happen that, you know, we didn't know about 6% interest.
We didn't know about escalating costs. And so all kinds of things happen. Sometimes things happen with the facility. In our case, the program changes. There's there's something new. I'm just waiting for the impact of AI, for example, and and how that somehow will will impact, you know, facilities. We've we have computer labs at Clay Middle School that are part of this project that they've been abandoned. We don't we don't use computer labs anymore. But but in 2007, we did. So now we've we've got public you know, we got the space that the that
the community has paid for. We're not making use of it because it's a computer lab, so we're gonna spend some money to to to make it functional and and valuable. And so that's just a quick example, but but we have all those changes. What but the end result is is we're looking at however big the and and so that's a good point. This is this is assumed to be three years worth of projects, not one year. And if you take this bond issue in in the 2006 and the 2004, it it'd probably be an excess of this that number.
And it's just was spaced out. And and that one might be spaced out too by the time we get there, because, again, as we get closer to it, things have a way of changing. This project, for example, we we did have some conversation about, the capital equipment such as the the the, buses or the technology. And we've technology is not new, but but, it is for it is a number that anticipates the next bond issue, which means that, we could be we we may
we may not spend the last dollar of that, if you will, for three years. We we surely won't spend, you know, the entire amount in the first year. But then there's so there's a plus and minus. We could sell two bond issues, but there's issuance cost. And so all those things are factored in as to which there's a number it's it's much more complex than I'm describing it, but as to which way is is the best way to go, which is why we, include advice from a a professional financial, firm as well as our legal team and so forth.
And so that all goes into this really rather complex, process. The last thing I sorry. Okay. I was gonna one more thing I would note on this is we do continue the assumption of the bonds being paid off over ten years, which again, that's aggressive. I mean, that most A lot of school districts, if they're issuing a $100,000,000 are are paying that off over twenty years. But this is showing that you have the ability to pay it off at that shorter more rapid rate, while staying within that levy limitation. But that is something that could certainly be another another tool or another point of
conversation when any of those future projects are looked at. I would make a comment on this is like your house. You can have a thirty year mortgage or a fifteen year mortgage. We're really more more conservative than some folks might think. I'm of the mind personally that what you can pay cash for, you ought to and when you can't reasonably. Most of us can't save up to buy a house because the kids will be raised by then and we won't need it. So so there there is a debt, but we also have this aggressive payoff schedule. This would be a lot easier if I came in here and said this is
a thirty twenty year bond issue. It would lower all these numbers, and and we'd look pretty good, I think. And and and some people would say that's a lot better, but that's but they're paying that off with twice the amount of interest, than they would otherwise. And so we're the goal my goal personally is and and our our district's goal, because there's other people involved besides just me, but that is to to, provide a a steady, financial effort from the community to to fund its public schools, and to
do that in a consistent manner. Otherwise, it's not fair because if there's no debt service, then I didn't pay, so my kids went to school. And then the next generation, they pay for mine they catch up for mine and theirs. And so it's it's fair. We try to we intend to keep it at a level that we feel is is financially manageable for people. We know that's never gonna be the case for everybody, but but we could make this lower just like your car payment or your house payment, if we stretched out the payments and then paid more more interest.
And so, question is, but is that the best thing to do for the community? And and and we don't think so. So we're proud of I'm proud of the fact that we have short payoff and and as much debt as we have that we pay it off about twice as fast as most places, and which means the interest stops when when that happens. And so I see those as all good things that we ought to I want people to hear that and understand that. I'm not embarrassed by it. I'm I'm not and I think it's also a very transparent way, to share that
with people. And and I think I believe that a a significant number of the people in the community do understand that that approach. And and, and and and I believe they supported not everybody, but I but I think a a large number do. I think that leads into my follow-up question nicely nicely is because you had made the statement before when you were going over the items for the bond issuance that some of these are things we would have paid for cash out of the operating fund originally. However, due to SCA one, we have to move these over to the debt service
fund. Would it be a safe assumption to say that the buses and the technology are the bulk of what would have just naturally come out of the operations fund that we now have to finance? And, basically, for every dollar financed, how much does it actually cost us now that we have to pay with debt? So the first part of your question is the technology we've we've been been, using debt for years. Years ago with the different statutes, different legislation, I think I mentioned, we built two elementary schools as we were growing and paid cash for it.
You know, that'd be unheard of now. We can't we can't buy compute we can't keep the buildings operated without debt, with cash, let alone, you know, building entire buildings. So things have a way of changing with legislation. And and so the technology has been in bond for equipment, you know, essentially has been in bond issues for a number of years. You go back far enough and a lot of things, you know, it wasn't as much. We we didn't have technology to the extent we have now, now, but but it was all cash. And then it started it yeah. Larger, but but also the money kinda, you know, got less.
You know? And it's not just s b one. I mean, we had circuit breaker years ago that that capped taxes. Is a good thing for the taxpayer paying less, but but it's a a loss to the to the school district. And and so there's a, you know, plus or minus depending on on what position you're coming from. But, so the buses though is new. It's new for Carmel. It is not new for most of our neighbors. They've had to resort to this be before SB one. So imagine where they're at now. And, but we've been fortunate to be able to manage, cash payments, for, I'll say,
longer than most school districts with certain items. And and, there are districts that sell small bonds that that do everything they possibly can because they do not have the cash to do it otherwise. And and, and by the way, if you sell a small enough bond, there's no opportunity for remonstrance from the community. So it's more than coincidental that they're they're they're below $6,000,000. And and I'm not saying as a criticism. That's just that's just the rules. So we're we're we're very fortunate in that respect, and and many others, but certainly
in that one. You wanna reask the second part of your question? So what is it costing the community for every dollar for, like, the 9,000,000 that we have to pay for buses out of a debt service fund, what is that actually costing at the end of repaying that 9,000,000? So you might have saved it in one bucket, but it's now costing you more than another. That is what's happening. I'm I'll I'll ask I don't know if Lindsey could Lindsey may be able to respond to that off the top of her head better than I can, but but, roughly. We're not gonna hold you to it, but if you had to ballpark will say we've built in 5% interest rate into all of these assumptions, which already has over
a 100 basis points of cushion built in. So if we were to sell the bonds today, they would sell by, less than 4%. But with buses, they do have to be repaid within six years. So, that 9,000,000, I don't know how many buses, but you have to make sure that whatever is being borrowed for buses that you're paying that off within a six year period. And, so 5% interest rate on So that's confusing the buses will be considered the
first dollar spent to pay off the buses. Is that what you're saying? Anything that is borrowed specifically for buses, that portion would need to be paid off. So we'd need to show if if a bus was part of a larger financing, we would make sure that you've repaid the bus portion within six years. But it can still be folded into another financing. What's that? What's your estimate of those? I don't have a calculator in front of me. I don't like to Your head. But, yeah, 5% of $9,000,000. There's $450,000 a year.
Well, we have to state that number. It would it would go down with because you'd repay the principal kind of like your mortgage payment is highest in the first year and the interest portion is. But it starts at $4.50. At $4.50. Yeah. Can you go back one more slide? Yeah. So, mister Brown, who was not able to be here, asked sent me some comments, but also had a question about this slide. So he said the first year of the bond issue issue has the lowest impact and that the years 2029 through 2036 have more.
You have amounts for each year for at least a gross assessed value home of $500,000 the life of the bond. So I'm assuming what we're showing here is what the the annual is that the annual impact throughout the life of So this this is intended to show from year to year how much might we expect when we keep talking about the inflationary adjustment to the debt service levy, what does that mean in dollars? That's what this is intended to show. While with changes with SEA one and net assessed value, that could impact tax rates
over especially through 2031. At the same time, those taxpayers, especially homestead properties, are getting more of a deduction through 2031. So, I don't think we can say that the impact is higher in 2036 than it is in 2028, but there's a lot of moving pieces there. Obviously, with what is the assessed value gonna do of that individual property and all the other properties that fold fold into the total net assessed value, and what's the
overlapping taxing units, what are they doing that that ultimately all feed into your tax bill. So, again, this is this was intended to to focus in on these bonds and and that that annual adjustment, what that could look like. On a sure. But if we wanted to Barry may speak to this a little bit also. Right? I mean, we're we're basically working off of this is this is coming from me now, not from from mister Brown, but I'm we are we are working off the information we have today based on what we've got right now. Right? Knowing that Right.
Things could change, they may not change, and we don't know which direction they're going to change. But Right. Again, the illustrative taxpayer impact here is meant to show if my assessed value is a $500,000, my annual impact is approximately $32. Yeah. That's the the increase from year to year. Yes. And that is not gonna based on what we know now, my annual impact throughout the life of this bond is gonna be $32. That's what's basically every year, you can expect that you're going for $32.
An investment of facilities in general. So, both this bond, but really all the future bonds that we have hold it in there too. Just wanna make sure I'm explaining it in in my simple language. Yeah. No. That's a good question. Lindsay, if I would you say that the the $30 will turn into three times that much? I wouldn't expect that, but that close to to it. But it it would depend upon not just what that individual property's assessed value is doing, but also what all the other properties are doing that that ultimately help you
calculate the tax rate. So what this is, again, going back control over what the tax rate is because that net assessed value component is such an important piece. So this is that planned approach of growing the levy slightly from year to year, but based off of what we know today, here's what we think that could mean in the form of a tax rate increase. But, yes, lots of moving pieces from as especially as we get further out in
the projection. Thank you. Anything else for Lindsey? I do have a question. I don't know if it's for Lindsey or not. But one of the things that I thought was extremely helpful going back to the issue of have we done appropriate fiscal management belt tightening when we were talking about the referendum and putting that in front of voters. We did a lot. You you had a great comparison on a per pupil basis of what our, operations
spending was, and it was really striking to me how much less we set spend per pupil. And I was fooling around and I on the interwebs, and I don't wanna cite anything because I don't know what's a reliable source, and you don't want me doing the math. But I'm just wondering if you think it would be possible to do a comparison to what other districts spend on, specifically, facilities repair and replacements as and and I
suspect we may look just as good as we looked, from an operations perspective. So not utilities, not everyday cost, but really what we're talking about here, which is replacing things using debt service. It would be helpful to me so that I can look at our constituents and say, yeah. We're being really you know, you talk about belt tightening, but we've got more than 3,000,000 square feet of facilities. I work in what used to be the Bank 1 Tower and now is the Salesforce tower.
That is just about a million square feet. So if you take the Bank One Tower times three and a half, you have as many square feet as we are responsible for maintaining, repairing, and replacing as needed. That kind of scale blows my mind. I don't think the average person has a sense of that scale. So looking at a comparison to other districts or just even the state as a whole would be really helpful. That may not exist, but if it's something we think we could maybe show the
next time we discuss this, I think it might be really useful. That's a really good suggestion, and and I wish it was mine. But but but we'll take a look at that, you know, together and and, I know one of the and I believe we could do something, but we'll be very careful because, looking at a district like Carmel, you know, looking at a growing district where they're finding need for lots of debt because they're having to build new buildings and and then they still have to maintain the buildings they have versus a district
that, like, we're now kind of in where we're we're we're leveled out on that. So we'll try to identify Apples to apples. Kind of apples to apples. But, I'd make one comment real what what I expect to see, and that is that I mean, the the reality is is that there's a perception that Carmel spends, you know, all this money on facilities and and excess and all of that. Our approach to facilities, and I would want everybody to hear this, we spend less on facilities than other districts because of the approach that we take.
Let me give you an example. We have two people, two school districts, but I'm gonna use a car analogy. And so, which would be equivalent to a HVAC system or compressor or something like that. So we two you know, these two people have the same car, and as it ages, we know the car starts the maintenance start cost goes up. And and some people go, well, I can't afford a new car. I'm gonna fix this one. And and at some point, people go, go, well, you're just throwing good money after bad. And then at some point, both districts replace the car.
And so Carmel is the district that we don't throw good money after bad, but we can see it coming. And so we maintain this equipment up to that mid cycle, let's say, and we don't spend we don't keep spending the money on on the on the old piece of equipment, but but we spend enough so that when then we replace it. So both both parties, both examples have the cost for replacement because they just do it once. But but the other the other approach, you know, let it go down and then
or or keep keep it longer. They also have the cost that they're throwing into it to maintain it until they replace it. So we we're balancing that. That's why we will we will look better and spend less. I think that's a pretty good program. And when I say look, I don't mean that's the least of it. But people can see that and that's what it what that's what they see. But it applies to a roof, it applies to mechanical equipment. And most importantly, which environment do you want your child in? You see?
Because they're there in the first place, and all this money is being spent because it's necessary to have a place to provide an to to teach an educational program. Right? And so, the the, the benefit of the expense is much greater in in our scenario than than than what I'd say is more typical. And so, again, I think we ought to make sure people hear that, because they won't come to that conclusion, just by what they see anymore than they do you
know, we have as you know, we have people that think we're gonna spike the tax rate to $62,000,000 because that's the question that we're made to put out there. But we know it's not accurate, and we're gonna have some good news here as as Barry comes up. Or at least I I think it's good news. That's a good intro. So now we'll let the guys just share all the good news. That might be the first time in the last year that I've been introduced to bringing good news to a school board. So I may just stay here for a minute and revel in it. And so, no. Appreciate the the opportunity. Again, Barry Gardner with policy analytics.
I'm gonna talk about some, different data that we are seeing as a part of the overall process, you know, for Carmel Clay Schools. I do wanna add one thing to a little bit of the conversation there that was happening and the question about some of the facility spending. Previously coming here, I sat in a similar role as mister McMichael with the MSD of Wayne, similar sized school district, similar sized footprint, 3,000,000, you know, at square feet. And one of the things we often talked with our school board, there was, an American Physical Plant Association is a national group that does facility work for not only
k 12 schools, but also higher ed. And years ago, there was a study that they had produced that said k 12 and and really higher ed should look to invest about 2% of building values on an ongoing basis back into their buildings just in preventative maintenance to execute the plan that mister McMichael is kind of referencing. And, yeah, at that time, I'll go back to it's been about three years ago, but we had about $1,000,000,000 in a similar sized district in building value. That's 20,000,000 a year just putting back into preventative maintenance.
So when you think of a plan of a three year piece in $60,000,000 and not all that being in preventative maintenance having other needs, you start to see those figures can add up pretty quickly. And so I just add that for maybe a little context of what we saw in our district that was a similar type approach, and the dollars figures just really add up pretty pretty quickly, when we get to a district of this size. And so, so just maybe a little, context there I just wanted to add is that that conversation. We're happy to help dig into that some of those figures as well. And and we're gonna talk a little bit.
It's kind of a nice segue of some of the the data. This is a part of the summer report that we do for our school districts, referenced really around oftentimes legislation. What have we seen come out of the legislative cycle? What do we see, in terms now this year actually of assessed value and what we're looking for 2027, and what we may begin to have some conversation around, tonight. And so, kinda start to walk through a little bit of this, data here. The first slide, really starts to speak a little bit of some of this comparative analysis.
And so this is taking a look at some fixed cost inside of the operations fund, and these are Carmel Clay specific figures, from 2021 to 2025. This came out of a study we did actually a few years ago for some of the associations, superintendents, the school business officials, and school boards to take a look at what percent of the operations fund levy really goes to four nondiscretionary cost, bus bus replacement, so bus purchases, transportation, property, casualty, insurance, utilities.
You have to pay the bills to keep the lights on. You have to pay the bills to keep your buildings insured. These are costs that go out the door before we talk about pay for maintenance workers, technology, all of those different areas. And so what we looked at is what percent that makes up of the overall operations fund net levy. I think a couple of really key things came out of the data here as we look at Carmel Clay is, first of all, when we look at some of these buckets compared to the state average there on the right, is that you're below the state average when it comes to these cost, on a per student basis.
And so when we look at transportation, that state average of just close to $800, we are closer to that 711 on a per student basis. Utilities at that 400 versus the $4.91. So, again, really in a lot of areas showing that to that point, we're below the state average when it comes to many of these expenditures. The second really key point that we've seen really statewide in this data is you notice that these costs are taking up a larger and larger portion of the operations on net levy. That's an inflationary piece that we've seen.
Property casualty insurance across the state has sky skyrocketed. All districts are facing higher costs when it comes to simply insuring your buildings. Utilities have continued to increase. They're projected to continue to increase again in future years. And so, again, it's just taking up a larger and larger bucket as we look at that. And so, again, I think back to that overall point, you're doing a great job in being efficient, but these are continuing to put pressures and nobody even get into the fact we've talked a little about SEA one and now the additional pressures on the operations fund there.
As we look at the next slide, this is a point I know we've talked, I think, a little bit in in past with some of the referendum conversation. This is taking a look at the ending cash balance of the education operations fund, the the referendum funds, both safety and, the regular operating and your rainy day, and comparing that to the amount of expenditures you have in a given year as a percentage. This is a indicator that S and p looks at. It's an indicator that the Distressed Unit Appeals Board in the state looks at.
And so, again, you can see Carmel's percentages there as we move across, the bottom of, again, finishing 2025 around that 12 and a half percent, compared to the state average when we look at that 35%. Now couple of things here. First of all, this is also influenced by the fact that we have smaller school districts that often have a higher percentage because $5,000,000 in cash balance when I've got a $10,000,000 budget, right, is very different than $5,000,000 on your budget.
But if I have a roof preparer, I need a $2,000,000 whether I'm in Carmel or I'm in a small rural district. Right? So that influences this a little bit. The other piece, though, I would say is this is taken at the end of calendar year, and we receive our property tax disbursements in June and December. So we have to think we have to then carry from December until the following June those expenses before we get our next distribution. So these are gonna be on the higher ends of what we would typically see.
And so, again, I know that's been a a point of conversation. And, typically, our larger districts, we tend to see somewhere in a 15 to 25% when it comes to a cash balance as a percent of expenditures. So, again, just a a data point that I know we're continuing to have some good conversation around here. Okay. Besides of boring you all night with data, which I would love to do, but mister McMichael said I couldn't, and this piece no. I'm sorry. Kidding. I wanted to really get into talking about assessed value because we have actually, for the first time earlier in the summer, received what we call the county assessor workbook
data, which is really gonna drive our 27 assessed value. Assessed value is scheduled to be released August 1. It's not always released at that August 1 date. Sometimes it can be later in August or even September, by, Hamilton County. But we've got a little bit of what is actually gonna go into that data, and we're gonna talk a little bit about that tonight. The first couple slides, I just wanted to kinda revisit. I know this is a topic we don't always talk about. We've had a real roller coaster over the last several years when it has come to assess value. We had kind of that 2012 to 2018 where assessed value, really grew, by pretty,
pretty small amount, you know, about two, two and a half percent annually as we came out of the the great recession. And then we started to see this spike really in 2019, through 2025. Part of that was due when we had in COVID. We had the home prices. We had a home shortage across the country. House home prices really drove up, and, again, our assessment system's market based. When you look over this 2012 to 2025, there was about a 4% average in gross assessed value, which is a little slightly higher than than we go when we
go farther back. It's typically around a three to three and a half percent. But we've seen this big spike in a little bit of a roller coaster, and that's influenced some of the things that we've seen, especially in some of your revenues and tax rates because we know assessed value drives those. As we look at the next slide, then we also had in response to that SCA one. Not gonna go through these tonight, but just threw those in there. That's a big part of what we've been talking about is the response to a lot of this assessed value growth has been SCA one, and the deductions have been put into place. And what that then created was a very widespread change in assessed values over the
last year. So this is just a heat map. We often do these of net assessed value changes from 25 to to 26. For the first time, we had these red and orange, which is actually decreases in net assessed value. And we have a very wide ranging kind of change across the state. That's something we're gonna see again as we talk about 27 data. We're not the story's not the same in every place, and I think that's important to realize. We sometimes hear what's going on maybe at the state level, or we hear what's happening across the state, and it's going to also be unique to Carmel Clay Schools
and what happens in your taxing districts and your assessed values. And that's really what this map is is shown, and we're gonna see that and talk a little bit about more in '27. But what that meant was and this was one of the slides I think we've shown the board previously, is that as we phased in the deductions, both the homestead deductions on the left and the, 2% on the right, we were expecting assessed value decline for the next several years. That's what got into our lot of our calculations, both around the referendum and around the debt service components. As we look at the next slide as we move through this piece, this was
that business personal property. That was the big hit in 2027 because we were pulling out, approximately $250,000,000 of assessed value just being pulled out of your tax base due to SCA one. So we've had all of these moving parts, and that's what this summer report's about. Every so often, we get a new data point, and that impacts all of the calculations that we talk about, and that's really where we're going tonight within this. So we've had this roller coaster that's kind of where we've been, kind of a quick review.
So now we're gonna talk a little bit about what we're seeing and pause with 27 assessed value. So, again, this is based on the county assessor workbook, and then that is what the assessor fills out and submits to the Department of Local Government gross assessed value is actually up pretty significantly. We talked about that kind of 4% average in gross assessed value growth over that assessed value growth over that, about, twelve to thirteen year period.
These figures are actually specific to Carmel Clay Schools. K? So, overall, we see that gross assessed value is going to be up about 8% for the district. We're gonna talk about net because that's what we 8% for the district. We're gonna talk about net because that's what we tax on in here in just a second. It's really driven by two pieces. One of those is the commercial and industrial sectors. This is a second kind of adjustment by the DLGF with their cost tables. The cost table is a per square foot assessment that they apply to a commercial and industrial properties. Those have not been updated since prior to the pandemic.
K? So we're thinking 2019 inflation that we've seen since 2019. So there's a pretty big jump in those and why you see the 12 and almost 9% increases in gross assessed value in those sectors. The other is that your residential sector is up about eight and a half percent, and that's greater than what we've had been expected and greater than what we would have projected. We wouldn't again, as part of our work, we always wanna be a bit conservative because we don't wanna overproject assessed value because that's gonna potentially overproject revenues for the
district as you look to prepare your budgets. So we wanna be a bit conservative, and, typically, we carry about a three to three and a half percent gross assessed value that aligns with historical pieces. This is much greater. That's what we're seeing across the state. Statewide, gross assessed value is up about 10%. Residential is up about 8%, which is good. The challenge is that anytime gross assessed value increases, especially on the residential sector, tax liability can increase, potentially.
And we've already heard some conversation at the state house. We've had governor Braun come out and propose exempting over 65 in veterans and anyone who's paid off their mortgage from property taxes. We've had representative Prescott come out and propose going away completely from property taxes and replacing it with a 7% sales tax on services. There's a lot of talk already about property tax proposals for the '27 legislative session.
This jump in gross assessed value has the potential to probably put some additional fuel on that fire and maybe cause some additional legislative changes in '27. So I told you I couldn't stand up here and be full of good news all night, right, in these pieces. I think there is a potential double edged sword in a sense that while this is gonna be beneficial in some ways for the district, it could create another legislative response. Again, I think we'll see more like the '25 session than what we saw in 2026 where it was relatively minor in terms of property tax proposals.
Right? So that's what we're seeing at least initially on the gross AV level, within green line here, on this represents our projections from, this past spring, and it's what we talked about in both of these when we say the budget order projections. It would have been in February '26, and it's what we use as part of our referendum projections as well as we work through this. The navy line as it continues where it says the ratio study, that is summer
of twenty six. That is the new county assessor workbook. So we can see that while we had you projected to be down slightly in your net assessed value for your debt service and operations, we see it being a little more flat lined, down slightly. About a percent, at the end of the day is where we have your net assessed values for these funds, projected to be down. Compared to before, we were projecting it to be down about four and a half percent. So it's definitely good news. It gives you really, at the end of the day, when we talk about debt
service and operations, operations doesn't really change a whole lot because your operations fund is levy driven. K? So that's gonna grow by the maximum growth quotient. Debt service, it gives you some of the flexibility as we look to adjust that rate. And as you're talking about these bond issues, allows, again, maybe some lower payment structure in those pieces, allows, again, Lindsey and her team as she works through that just to have more flexibility at the end of the the day when it comes to your debt service. When we look at the referendum, similar chart here at the end of the day,
the green line represents what we were projecting prior. The navy line as it continues is what we're projecting, with the referendum assessed value as we move forward. And a really different consistent situation here. Again, we were projecting net assessed value for the referendum to decline. They are quite a bit in 2027, again, to that that business personal property. And now we are projecting it to actually grow by about one and a half percent. This is not final assessed value, but it's it's gonna be fairly close. Reason that we're projecting this to grow a little bit more is because your referendum
assessed value also has access to the TIFs. And oftentimes in our TIF districts is where we find more of our commercial and industrial sectors, and so that growth from that DLGF cost table is captured in there. So that's why it's a little bigger growth, as we look at this piece. And that then again is going to begin to have some potential impact, on the calculations that we are doing as we prepared the referendum and had that conversation before. So what does that what do I mean by that?
Well, what it could potentially allow the district to do is we had run numbers looking at a referendum levy. We combined the operation rep operating referendum and the safety referendum of 2027. It was about $47,100,000 in levy. At that time, it was taking, that $31.94 in referendum rate in that first year in order to generate that. Now the rate changed as we move forward in those calculations, but for 2027, it
was that 39 thirty one ninety four. What this would allow you to do with this additional assessed value is to potentially lower that rate and collect well, collecting that 47,100,000. Somewhere again, we're gonna have to see where this finalizes, but maybe in the 29 to 30¢ range, high 29, low 30¢. So being able to drop it maybe a penny to 2 pennies at the end of the day and still generate that 47,100,000 in levy.
So I think that's one of the options that the district has that you can consider, as you're thinking about, that referendum and ultimately what you look in your '27 budget within those pieces. I think as we look at the the next slide, just some summary pieces here. So, again, that's where we can, I think, do some considerations around the tax rate in terms of that referendum that there's the potential to lower that? I caution, though, because when we talk about taxpayer impact because if you think of the slides we brought to the board previously and we showed both the levy and
we showed the impact on taxpayers, We're not gonna really see a difference in taxpayer impact if that rate is lowered because gross assessed value of the home is going up, right, more than what we had projected. So as that gross assessed value goes up a little bit more, you lower the rate to really keep that impact where we had projected relatively, previously for the district. Maybe a little bit better because of that commercial and industrial growth, but at the end of the day, it's gonna be fairly similar in terms of impact.
Now the flip side of that is if you chose not to lower that rate, it might have some potential greater impact at the end of the day that the district would just want to work through. That's really the kind of consideration at the end of the day is that levy focused of that forty seven one and then ultimately potentially lowering that rate in order to adjust for that piece while staying true to that levy, within those pieces. And so, again, this update will when the 27 assessed value comes out, this is where the financial team would really work together to get that finalized AV.
We would update the projections that that Lindsay has provided within that, take a look at the impact in terms of your unfunded credits. That's your traditional circuit breaker in that 10%. What that does to your operations fund, what that does in terms of what you're considering around the the operation excuse me, the referendum in those pieces at the end of, as as we look at those and really revisit that and be able to bring some of those updated figures with that. This is new for us to have this early of this data. Typically, we've not had it this early.
And we've while it's supposed to be released August 1, final assessed value often comes out in September and October. So we get really late into the budget process, and we get really late into finalizing that. So that's why we want to have this conversation with the district is to get this out ahead of time, allow the board to have that information to think through, to really kinda consider what that strategy may ultimately be at the end of the day. And also just to realize as well that, we could be coming towards, I think, a more active legislative session than what we had this past spring because of some
of these considerations that are being, thrown out there in terms of property taxes and then what we're seeing in gross assessed value across the state. I mean, we're having some counties that are seeing fifteen, twenty, 25% increases in their gross assessed value. So we're seeing some pretty big jumps statewide. There's a little bit, I think, in there's in the assessment and how true those assessments were to market value in some of those places. But when those kind of figures go out, obviously, that's gonna catch some attention. And so I think we just have to be prepared for what that may begin
to look like. Do they accelerate the deduction structure? Do they change the 10%, homestead credit to 15%, right, and have those kind of impacts? I think those are the things that could be on the table that you just wanna be aware of and be willing to speak to in terms of what that that means for the district ultimately at the end of the day. So, again, offset, good news in terms of assessed value, and I think giving the district some additional flexibility that we maybe didn't have when we were running these some of these calculations earlier this year, that I think you can take some time to
work with the team and and kinda decide where you ultimately want to land. But, I think that's really the kind of what we had this evening. Happy to answer any questions, when it comes to some of these changes. Questions for Barry. Miss Wheeler. Thanks, Barry. Another great presentation. Very helpful. I just think it's important to emphasize what I think we all talked about during our referendum workshop and and emphasize to folks, you know, the way the question has to be framed under state law. Mhmm.
It's focusing on the max levy amount at year eight, which is that 62,000,000. And I I feel very strongly I need to state publicly again. You know? I have no intention of approving a budget, you know, for next year that is a $62,000,000 referendum. And I don't yeah. I see a lot of heads nodding. Nobody on this board is gonna do that. Yeah, our our plan for year one was 47.1. And I also wanna emphasize because I know taxes are complicated and everybody gets mad
when they're, they're taxable. The net assessed tax, quote, taxable value of their properties go up. Nobody's happy. They love it when they sell. They hate it when they have to pay their taxes. And but at the end of the day, we as a school board cannot control, do not control how our county assesses property value. We can only react to that and kind of do exactly what Barry's doing for us today, which is look at how that work by our county impacts those future
calculations and do the best we can with the most updated, information that we have. We also have no control over all the other taxable entities in the county, in the city, in the state, at the federal level that absolutely have an impact on folks' bottom line. But for what we can control as a board, we are not asking for the maximum levy in year one. Absolutely not. And I've heard that, seen that a lot on social media.
That is not true. That is a misrepresentation. I will not vote for that. And if I do vote for that, you can fire me in 2028. And I do wanna just add it because I I think one of the things that we are also seeing to your point because of the new structure of the question around the referendum, that is we have this max levy in this max rate. And the simple thing to do is when we plug this into AI or we do a piece is we take that max rate times the 26 assess value, and
we get the impact. And what we have to remember as well is SEA one, and Lindsay pointed this out earlier, SEA one increases the deductions over the next several years. So we're multiplying the rate that is associated with the most amount of deductions when the net assessed value is driven down with today's net assessed values when those deductions are not in place. And so I know that's kind of some things we're seeing out there that's showing that max impact when it's not how the districts are often planning to phase that in as the legislation comes in.
Right. And, you know, even if you call your website facts and truth about x y z, if you are not, you know, a qualified expert in taxes and school law and how all of this works together like you are and like Lindsay is, I don't think you're qualified. You can call it truth and facts if you want. It is inaccurate information, and I want our community to understand that. And we'll talk more about that, I'm sure. I don't have any questions at this time as I know this is kind of the the almost start of our conversation as to the rate that we're gonna be
willing to set. I will say thank you to both Lindsay and Barry for laying things out in a way that I think is very easy to understand because I know this board has advocated very heavily for those earlier conversations, clearer conversations, simpler, so I appreciate assessed values are going up eight and a half percent, when they were projected off of four, I would not be approving, aligning with a rate that we had projected for a 4% increase. I will say, percent increase. I will stay consistent in supporting the max levy that we need to keep business
going status quo. Even Roger doesn't like that statement, but, no vanity projects, let's say. We're just keeping the lights on. However, that would be, to your point, a reduction in our tax rate. I would not be comfortable keeping the proposed tax rate and banking those dollars. Fact, before we go to Amanda, that's exactly the good news that I was talking about. I wasn't talking about, oh, we can raise more money. Just the opposite. And it is good news because the timing is such that this board will absolutely demonstrate that our intent is to do just what you said, and we feel like
we in this case, the example was the 47.1. It wouldn't matter if the AV went up 50%. The tax rate we will recom well, we'll yeah. By my time. We'll rec we'll recommend and you you, you know, you would insist that the tax rate would will be lower regardless of the what with what happens to the AV. And that's why I said in the very beginning, we're the the new norm is we're focused we focus on levy and the money, not the rate. And so the the need didn't change regardless of what the property tax is due.
And and, unfortunately, when they when they go down because of recent legislation, the need still doesn't change, thus going for the referendum in the first place. But you can see we can all see the challenge of a question that absolutely, it it doesn't confuse people. It misleads people. They absolutely believe that it says you're gonna raise my taxes to, you know, double. You're gonna go from 30 some to $62,000,000. And and the challenge is we now have to, somehow communicate with people that that's
not the case because if I believe that for that, I wouldn't vote for it either. So but that's the good news is that you'll have an opportunity to demonstrate, you know, because we can say anything. But but people believe what they see, and they'll have an opportunity to see that well before November when they vote on a referendum. I I was just gonna comment, to reiterate also my my thanks to both of you for the information. I mean, I I think it's important to remind people that none of us up here are financial experts. This isn't what we do for a living, and we're tasked with making these really
important decisions without having the expertise. And so we need it explained to us in a way that we can digest and so that we're able to make, the best and most informed decisions possible, and that we are also paying the same taxes as every other person. Thermal. So we are impacted by this the the same exact way and, you know, similar to what Jennifer and and Chris said, you know, we I think we all sat up here during throughout those referend I don't wanna speak for everybody else, but many of us sat up here, during those referendum conversations and said, we're only gonna ask
the voters to pay for what we need, and that was gonna depend on where how this all played out. It is good news, but I also appreciate the caveat of given what's gone on and and what some of the headlines have already started to be ahead of the legislative session. You know, it there's there's more to be revealed behind a curtain down the road, and we don't know exactly how that how that may impact things also. So, you know, clearly a lot more work and discussion to be had. So, I'd certainly love to hear from Amanda, but I also I wanna make sure
we leave some time to talk about the proposed projects because we sort of went right from the projects into the other stuff, which is fine, but I just wanna make sure if there's comments or questions on that that we have time for that. So yes. Let's do that. No. Let's do that. Mister Perfect. Mister president, I did wanna remind everybody again that this is just the first discussion of this. So this is we are not making a decision tonight. We're not making a decision at the next school board meeting or the next one after that. It's going to be a little bit of a process. So we, you know, we would love the public to send us questions that they
have and ask us questions, and we, the board, will continue to have time to ask questions at at the next meetings. Well, yes. That's a a great reminder. And we're sort of talking about several things that are all overlapping and intertwining with each other at the same time. Right? We're talking about a referendum. We're talking about a bond, and we're talking about budget, and they all interconnect and overlap with each other. And so, these are all ongoing conversations, but specific to the bond, right, that is definitely not being decided tonight nor is the budget nor is the rate for a
potential referendum, which has to be approved by the voters before we consider rate. Amanda, the floor is yours. Thank you. Thank you, Barry and Lindsey, for coming tonight. President Shapiro, vice president, and board members, tonight, I'm hoping to wrap up the financial part of the presentation with two goals in mind. The first goal is to connect to the information that Barry and Lindsay have shared to our current and our future budget. The second goal is to share some assumptions related to the 2027 budget around revenue, so that we can begin building our budget together, looking forward to our September presentation.
I will start with Yep. An an update on 2026 revenue, year to date actuals versus our projections. We are on track for our projections to date. You can see that our education fund, we are right at 50% as of June 30, which is exactly where we would expect to be at this time. Across our other funds, which are our property tax funded funds, we're a little bit higher, around 57% for those.
That is also as expected, because we typically see more of that money come in the spring than it does in the fall. There are two, kind of bright spots on the revenue front. The first one is related to, the unfunded credits. So unfunded credits now make up the traditional circuit breaker plus the new homestead, credit that is credit that is given. And so we use the DLGF, projections when we worked on our 2026 budget, and they had projected, 4,900,000 in unfunded credits.
And the homestead credits came in exactly kind of as predicted, but traditional circuit breaker did come in lower than expected. So as a whole, we're looking closer to 3,300,000 for unfunded credits for 2026. Additionally, we are seeing some strong, stronger miscellaneous revenue than projected, so that could be another opportunity. I know we're just talking about revenue tonight, but just wanna always share a balanced picture, in the same way that there are, you know, bright spots on the revenue, there is also with an eighteen month budget some, usually, some unanticipated expenses that might
come through. You'll remember in in past years, we typically have come to the board in November, with an additional appropriation for expenses as well. At this point, we don't have that information. We will know that in the next, the next few months, and you can expect those details details in November. But, oftentimes, there is, increased expenses as well, so we will keep you posted on that. The next thing I wanna talk through is the cash balances, since Barry had spent some time on that. Last time we had talked, about cash balances is when we presented the budget last
fall, and so this is a an updated version of that. We have our cash balances as of 12/2025. When we looked at it last, we were looking at projections, and these are actual numbers. The good news is these numbers are slightly better than we predicted, so we're starting off with higher cash slightly higher cash balances than we predicted. Our budgeted revenue is is included plus our expenses, and then we've included our projected transfers and our actual transfers as well. So that you can see at the end of this calendar year if those things
come true, where would we stand and how does that compare to where we have historically been? So with with all those assumptions, which we know will be different, will be slightly different on both sides, but we'll be, I think, close overall. We're looking at projected cash balance of 10.8, last year at 12.5, which makes sense because we are using some of our cash balance this year. So with that, my last piece is just thinking about 2027 revenue, and what are we thinking about and what are we planning for.
And so the first is looking at the education fund, which, of course, is our biggest source of revenue. It's about 55%, across our big three fund. And, we know that there will be a 1.5% per pupil increase for 2627. We are assuming that that will be the same for next year because we don't know and we won't know until the spring what that formula will look like. We'll combine that information with our enrollment forecast to come up with what that revenue
will look like. And given the 1.5% increase, it will be very modest growth, in our biggest portion of revenue. In the operations fund, I think we'll see more reasonable growth. We the MLGQ, which is what governs how much, we can grow with our levy and operations, will be 6% this year. That came out at the beginning of July. In recent years, it has been capped at 4%. So that is a a more reasonable, especially given the expenses and the rate at
which they have increased that Barry shared earlier. And then on the referendum front, we really have two scenarios for this one. We have a scenarios for this one. We have a successful referendum. We continue to provide the same educational experience. As Barry said, good news on AV that will allow us to lower the rate. We're committed to the levy that we've shared, and so likely that will be a lower rate. Similar impact for taxpayers, but I think, we've always said that levy is what's important to us. If the referendum does not pass, again, the revised AV, that may look a little
bit different than we had predicted. May not be quite as bad for this first year, but cuts will still absolutely need to be made, if that referendum does not happen. And then finally, the last one is our debt service. So we have spent a lot of time talking about that tonight, especially with the 2027 bond. So the 2027 bond will not impact the 2027 revenue, and therefore, it won't impact taxpayers in 2027. Like Lindsay showed, it will have a future impact. The 2026 debt service revenue will increase modestly, and that will support our current debt
payments. And like Lindsay and Roger shared, we spend a lot of time making sure that we're carefully planning, looking towards the future, thinking about how we can minimize interest, maximize our facilities, to really make sure that we are thoughtful about how we have a consistent tax rate and tax sorry, tax levy. Always thinking about levy now. But a consistent and modestly, increasing for inflation, debt service levy that we are collecting, and we expect that to happen next year as well.
So, we will continue to revise the numbers up until September when we kind of present the final, budget on both revenue and expenses, but we wanted to go ahead and share. These are the working assumptions as we are predicting our revenue for next year's budget. So at this time, I'd be happy to answer any questions. You win. Or you just you're just tired. That could be it. No. Let me get it. Thank you, Amanda. Can Pull up. Missus Novus, can we pull back up the slide with the projects? Thanks. Let's go back to where we started.
So we've had a lot of information, this evening. So I don't know if anybody wants to start. Questions, comments? I have a prepared comment I could start with. Why don't you start with a prepared comment? Sure. That would be great. Great. So as I mentioned earlier, mister Brown is not able to be be here. He's a little under the weather, but he, you know, he and I spoke earlier today, and then he asked if he could send along some comments. So, I'm just gonna read them.
So I didn't write them. I'm just reading them. It's like a it's like a Letterman sketch. Said Greg says, I appreciate that our administration's finance team has taken the approach over the years to provide a level spending plan with our major major capital projects. This allows us to have a steady steady stream of funds to maintain and enhance the facilities. In June, we approved the ballot question to raise the operating referendum rate to offset the impact of SEA one. I've made a point in our recent board meetings regarding the operating referendum that we should show some restraint with our spending to demonstrate to our community that we have
heard their concerns and will take action. Many in the community have asked for some tax relief from the significant rise in property taxes over the last several years. SEA one has provided that. Voters can decide at the local level if they wish to raise taxes to offset some or all of the SEA one reductions based on the needs of their local community. With regards to Carmel, we have a mix of opinions on the matter. I want to challenge the board and the administration to take a position where we will take action to reduce our capital spending in ways that will have no effect on our ability to support the success of our students and still offer a reduction
in spending. This would offer a compromise to the community where we are able to continue to provide an excellent program, but are looking for ways to reduce spending. I believe we can do this with our proposed 2027 bond issue. My challenge is to reduce the bond issue by by $4,500,000 from 59,500,000 to $55,000,000. This will reduce our debt service amount and demonstrate to the to the community that we are indeed pulling back on our recommended capital spending plan. The end of Greg's comments. You know, one of the things I would just be curious to hear some feedback
on, Roger, if you don't mind sharing. You know, I think you did a really nice job in providing some more context in with regard to some of the the projects and helping me understand at least, like, prioritizing what, in my mind, mind, is a more urgent necessary repair or replacement. But if you could share, I'm trying to find the best way ask this question. I think, certainly, in my time on the board, you've done a nice job of sort of explaining the the district's forecasting and how we lay out how we plan
ahead for these things. I think some of the the question that may be asked by some of us or by others may be, well, times aren't the same now as they were. Right? We're in a different climate. Referendum. How do how are we balancing all of these things? Is there a time where we should be looking at a different way to approach facility projects? How how would you respond to a question like that? And or if you wanted to respond to Greg's comments as part of that, feel free. I'll do a little both.
So, what we apparently haven't done a very good job of is of of of what we do before this report's ever present. So what you don't see here is weeks of of planning and discussion, with myself, with Amanda, with professional engineers, architects, people that have, you know, particular expertise in facilities, and we've had engineering studies of our mechanical equipment at Forestdale, for example, and our
director of facilities. So this is what finally kinda makes the cut, if you will. So the the demonstrating the community, we we don't, we're not doing that here, and I will not recommend that this board do it, and I'll explain that. But this could be a a 100, you know, a 100, million dollars. Based on what some of the comments I said earlier, Toby could make a very strong case that we it would be money, and things move around. Earlier, we had a in our planning, we we had we can anticipate the the
Murray Stadium Soccer Complex, for example, and given its age and condition. And we've done some things out of the field and so forth, but but we're estimating preliminary, about $2,500,000, and you don't see it here. Why? Because it's been a part of that as we got closer. It it we're we're we've now pushed that out, delayed that, and if that had been here, it would have been very easy to say, well, how about we delay Murray Stadium? Because we've already delayed it.
But but but the public and the board's not aware of that. And, yes, we can always we cannot do this at all, and we'll still have school next year. And we'll have it the year after that as well. What this community and this board needs to decide is is if if the message is spend less, then they'll share that as they vote, as they come to public hearings, to come to public comment. And and, of course, their elected officials will either, you know, reflect that or they'll probably vote for somebody else.
And so so but for example, the 4,500,000, it I don't know where that number is. It's a not it's a nice round number, but, again, when you when you start to apply it, we wouldn't be recommending this if we didn't feel we should put buses maintain buses on a twelve year cycle or at least attempt to be close to that. You don't have to do that, but I shared with you the the implications if you don't. And, you know, help us if there was a 15 year old bus in a
bad accident. It wouldn't be fair, but you'd think somebody might wonder if it was based on the age of the bus. The carpet at cherry at at, as was stated somewhere along the line, I don't know if not this evening, at Clay Middle School looks really good. Why can't you delay it? The answer is usually almost always the answer is we can. And so but here's what happens. It starts my my my old car analogy, what happens is we can delay it for another five years and and like most other people do.
And we we will spend more money because we will replace it when if it gets because it will not look like it does now another fifteen years from now when the building in that range somewhere will be due for another major renovation. And so the delay is is a way of saying, don't do it now. Do it some just kick that can down the road and do it sometime later when the timing is better. And if we were less transparent, that's exactly what I'd be recommending. I want you to hear that. I would not recommend this, and I would stretch these payments out.
And I could come in here and say, look how good I am. We've lowered the taxes, to the public, and I would be deceiving this public and this board. So so, yes, we can reduce this to to demonstrate to the public it is not the right thing to do. And and, all of that has been considered. It's not like your administration is not aware of the current climate of the taxes, and so forth. We've always taken that in into consideration.
And the outcome of what we've done is I will compare it to anybody you wanna compare it to. Excuse me. So, we're we're fixing a problem that's not something that's not I don't think it's broken. Thanks. I'll I'll I'll spare you. Thank you. Yeah. I I just I wanna make it clear. I'm I am not advocating for one one thing or the other right now, certainly. Right? We're having a discussion, and it's it's really information gathering, similar to what I said a a couple of minutes ago when we made that transition.
You know, I I wanna make sure prior to me making any decision, I'm making the the most informed decision possible. Right? You know, for almost seventeen years, I've had the benefit of child going through the school system, you know, and and that in my opinion, is is that comes at a cost. It's a there's a premium to making decision that my family has made to live in Carmel. That was a conscious choice. We could have chosen to live in another community and and had and had that. I don't take that for granted, and that doesn't mean that we spend frivolously either.
Right? There's a there's But I I wanna make sure that that we're asking all of the questions to have as much information as possible. So that's all for me. And then other this is Chris. Miss Wheeler. Thank you. Just a couple comments. I do think some of the data that we've talked about in comparison, of these types of expenditures would be really helpful and prove out what you're talking about. I it appears to me that mister Brown just took the district wide miscellaneous category
of 4,500,000 and cut that out, which seems like a really easy thing to do, especially when you have a title miscellaneous because you think, oh, well, that we don't really need that. The HVAC goes out at a building. I mean, that's just not an acceptable situation. We have to have, you know, proper cooling, proper heating, or we can't have school. And so that would be something we would have to deal with if that goes out. Concrete and paving, I mean, you know, you have a bus axle break in a giant pothole, that has a cost associated with it.
I was on the PTO executive board at Clay. I when my daughter was in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade. I can she is now a junior. I can tell you that the Clay administration said they were doing a mid cycle renovation back then. I can also tell you that the mid cycle renovation cost was not $16,000,000 back then. So that is a delayed project by several years, and now that project costs significantly more.
I think originally, it was budgeted at 8,000,000. Is that right? Early on based on just numbers and Yeah. Where you start somewhere. And so you start with a without any specific investigation. But knowing the age of the building, that's the very first step. And by the last step, you're getting into the specifics you've had, in so many cases, we've had engineering studies done to assess or studies done to assess the the condition or not. We know the condition of a tower if it's a problem all the time.
But, really, by professionals assessing, you know, what's your current estimate of how much longer this we can keep this running and what's the the cost. So we have all that details. Yes. It went from about and then you also have the inflation that affects everybody. And so that project upfront from 8,000,000 early on to double that, which also then impacts wind. And and it so when this is like a bowl of gel when you touch one spot. You delay things. You either when you do them, you're you're gonna upset it will upset the balance,
of the financial part of it because that's where if you delay them for a long time like many many places do, you'll need a $500,000,000 bond issue Yeah. To to address, and you'll really need double that, but you you'll there's you'll you'll take half of that and and and bring back up at least, you know, half of your district or something. And then sometime years later, you'll you'll try to do that again. And and so that's that up and down cycle. Right. I wanna say while I'm thinking about it. These questions are good questions and are coming from people, certainly mister Brown, who has
the interest of this community. So, those are good questions. Yes. They're not bad questions and they're not I'm trying to emphasize, and you should expect me to because you're you know, I get paid for this, and others do too to give you our best insight as to what the ramifications are. Because, if absent that, the miscellaneous projects, I hadn't thought about that, but that's the exact number never. But here's what here's what happens. Remember, those are many of those things are things we would pay with cash, like
you mentioned about things that can't wait. Pretty much all that 4,500,000 are those that type of thing. So if we're not doing it here, we possibly end up doing it with cash. And you know what happens with that? We don't have any more cash. Right. So that may take a priority over something that gets closer and closer to the classroom. Yep. And my daughter sent me pictures of a classroom at the high school that had several lovely trash cans with the leaks, you know, catching water for leaks.
That's not a look that you think of when you drive by our beautiful new natatorium. And, of course, it was like building a. It was not it was one of the older parts of the high school, and that's on this list as well. You know, I can verify personally that this isn't, you know, a made up cost. At the end of the day, though, I think my inclination after doing due diligence and and what I think the community expects is that we, keep our facilities in
good and repair at the lowest cost we can. I think if you ask, you know, pull the teacher aside, pull an administrator aside, and said, does Roger McMichael give you everything you ask for? You know, it makes me think of when I worked for governor Mitch Daniels, AKA the blade. I think you're our blade. I don't think I I think you are telling us the truth when you say much you know, it's gone through many filters before it reaches us. We've questioned things both in front of the public and and behind the scenes.
So I I think it's a really important discussion to have so that we are transparent. We haven't always talked about all the different things that go into it. But at the end of the day, I trust our staff. And having grown up in a school district, IPS, that I graduated from, I think I got a wonderful, education. But that was thirty five years ago. And what the choices that they've had to make financially in the years are the kind of choices that lead to, you know, horrible building conditions.
It's difficult to retain teachers. Students and families flee the district. Then that further exacerbates your financial problems. And it's just a domino effect. And I don't have any sense that that's what our community wants from this board or this administration. So Thank you. Two quick comments. One, I do think it would be helpful in the past. Now granted, it'll probably be three years before we talk it's sorry. Helpful in the future. It'll probably be three years before we talk about issuance again, it sounds like. Maybe to have that upfront to say, here's the whole list of what we considered
and how much it would have cost, and here's the things we've narrowed it down to just to have that perspective out in the community. But then I also just wanted to make a note since tennis courts are on here and thank the district because that is a community resource that we've heard a lot about from the community, and the board was able to work with administration and work with mister Inskeep to, open up the tennis courts at the high school again. But I know those that would use the Carmel Middle School tennis courts as well would be able to appreciate that space as a community asset.
And I'll just add, as you said, a special thank you to mister Inskeep, for that and his work on doing that and setting that up so that our community can both enjoy the tennis courts and we can protect that investment. So I just wanna shout out to mister Inskeep, and thank you for mentioning that. Thank you, everybody. More to come. We will move on to the reports section of our agenda. Oh. One more thing I wanna add before we go. This took hours and hours and hours of analysis and meetings and consulting with one
another. So very special thank you to missus Kushar and Lindsay and Barry and mister McMichael, for having this type of discussion because this isn't a discussion that's had publicly in many school districts. And so I just wanna say thank you to all of you, mister McMichael, your leadership as well, as we continue to consider this moving forward. So thank you very much. Doctor Wu. K. Now moving on to the report section of our agenda, staff and student services report, doctor Herrera. Feel free to take just a moment while I get logged in to the to
the computer and Yeah. Oftentimes, when we transition from one computer to another, with the system, it might take a a couple seconds to make that transition. So I appreciate that. Okay. President Shapiro, doctor O'Strike, and members of the board, tonight, I will be giving you my human resources update. This summer, the HR department has focused on hiring for the start of the school year. So this is our very busy season from May, June, and July, and I'm happy to report that we are well on our way.
The pillar by presentation supports is employee engagement and effectiveness, and this initiative directly supports our strategic goal of investing in our people. And the key initiative this supports is to strengthen recruitment pipelines and host recruitment fairs. And then we will measure success through staff retention and turnover rates, reviewing the number of applicants we have for our open positions, and then analyzing job fair data. So our annual, support staff hiring fair was held on July 8, and we had
over 60 attendees in attendance. That is them coming out to hear more about the district, see what our open positions we had available. We held a drive a bus event during this event as well. So we had people stopping by to see about ride driving a bus, seeing transportation, learning more about educator, food service, becoming a substitute teacher. And then with all of that, I do wanna thank because it takes a lot of people to be able to host our recruitment fair from the staff, the schools, Clay Middle School for hosting us.
The community relations department did a great job with all of the marketing and promoting our event, and then our HR team just really helped make it a successful event. So this slide showcases the results of our recruitment fair. And with the support of an advertisement we ran in the current, we received more than 55 new applications in as little as three days. For transportation, they had 13 bus driver applicants that they interviewed last week, and that was just as a result of the drive a bus event.
And then 11 of those bus drivers are now in the pipeline to be hired. So, hopefully, the goal is with hiring all of those 11, we will actually see an increase in drivers for the upcoming school year. And then we had six interviews scheduled with food service. And this month, we will have 19 substitute teachers scheduled for onboarding. So along with this, this summer, our department has a bus driver recruitment campaign. And so this is something new that we've come up with, and I will give
a huge kudos to Sarah Inskeep, our HR director, in really taking the initiative and helping with this. But this campaign included placing recruitment signs. You'll see the one that we had in front of the ESC, hosting the drive a bus experience, during the job fair. We used social media to highlight current bus drivers. And then we also had a bus in the fourth of July parade, so we said, hey. Let's get a sign on the front of that on the side of that bus and let people know we are hiring. So we tried to use in every way that we could this summer to really
push our initiative to let people know that we're hiring. This is an example of one of our best driver campaigns. So we put these out on social media. And the goal behind this is really to highlight our best drivers, but we wanted to personalize the role and then give the community a closer look at the drivers behind the wheel. So helping them realize that a lot of our drivers had, a career prior to becoming a bus driver, that it is something that they can do out of retirement, and just really trying to personalize it, to help everyone get a better feel for
being a bus driver in Carmel Clay Schools. And then moving on to teacher recruitment, it's been a successful summer of hiring, and I'll say much of that had to do with our spring recruitment. So being able to attend all of the teacher recruitment fairs, having our own internal teacher recruitment fair. And so along with that, I will say that we have maintained our 6% turnover rate across the district. There are different pockets depending on different buildings, but across the board, it has been
averaged around six percent. And then along with that, we really look at how do we support the retention of our teachers. So looking at how we hold our new teacher orientation, before the start of the school year. We focus on, what it means to be an educator in our district and kind of give them the bigger broad pieces of teaching in the district before they actually we also focus on providing support as they transition into the new role. We continue that by visiting classrooms at the start of the school year. Every new teacher will receive this t shirt, and one of the designs that we're
changing the school year is the back of it will have the class of and then the year that they're hired. So this is something new that we started, last school year. And then along with that, we have the crest of each of our schools along with the vision of together we achieve. And then professional development, one of the great advantages of onboarding a new teacher early on in the summer is that they also have the opportunity to attend all of the summer PD that really gives them a leg up before the school year starts. Starts. So I'm happy to report that we will be fully staffed before the first day
of school, pending no major unforeseen circumstances. So while teachers continue to be in high demand, our positions continue to attract strong applicant pools. With several highly qualified candidates for each opening, I've included a variety of job postings from this summer to demonstrate the volume of applications we've received and the strong interest in employment opportunities across the district. So these are just a few to show, in the primary grades, high school teacher in there, middle school teacher, and just the number of applicants we have that our
buildings are going through to really look for highly qualified teachers that we have coming in. And so along with this, I'm happy to announce that we have 10 returning, Carmel High School graduates returning to our district this school year. I've included the years in which they graduated. And, these returning graduates represent the impact of our schools and the strong connection they have within our community. So that is my HR update, and I would welcome any questions or any feedback. Thank you, doctor Ferrera.
Questions or comments? This is Cashew. Hi. You had mentioned the 6% teacher turnover for the district and indicating that there are pockets. So I just wanna make sure the district's still on track for September to have that school level turnover by resignation and retirements, just that we are keeping on top of that going forward. And so once we're done with the hiring process and have onboarded our new teachers, I will be able to pull that data. I just wanted to say I'd be more than happy to buy my own cool new T shirt. We do hear from other staff members and other teachers that they love that T
shirt and wanna get it. But we it it's a it's a an elite, very rare, T shirt that we get to our new hires. If it makes any difference, we don't need a classic o on the back. So say we've put the design under lock and key. So we've made it very clear no one else is allowed to use this. I'll take it down for a second. Did you say sunglasses? Oh, we can get her some sunglasses. Absolutely. A greyhound wearing sunglasses. Yeah. It's great to see more alumni continuing to come back, and it just makes me feel really old to see what year they graduated high school.
That's all. Just wanna reiterate that. But, no, thank you for the data. It's it's really good to see. It it would be interesting, at some point, when you show the number of applicants for those positions, like, doctor whispered in my ear, like, other districts would be really envious of the that to see that volume of applicants. Like, just getting a a sense of understanding. What is that? Like Well see some odd applicants middle school band teacher position seems excessive And it's it's not yeah. It's not just the quantity.
It's the quality of applicants that, you know, when we bring in a team to interview, it is it is really, you know, for for someone to be sitting there at the table and interviewing with Carmel Clay Schools is a big deal just because of the the volumes sheer volume, but then also the quality of applicants you're going up against. Yeah. And it's a it's a hard decision for those interview committees, and it's a place to be when hiring. So thank you. Thanks again, doctor Herrera. Our next report is the Carmel Clay Parks Department report.
Is okay. Yes. Last Tuesday, the Carmel Clay Board of Parks and Recreation approved the management and use agreement, the resolution. At our last board meeting, we approved it. Basically, an agreement between the the parks department and the schools for the use of Odom Woods. And so we will still maintain ownership of the woods, and the parks department will be doing some things to improve the pass and, leading up to what will be the new Veterans Park. So that that next step was that the parks board approved it last Tuesday.
Thank you, missus. Our final report this evening is the superintendent's report, doctor Osterreich. Thank you again, president Shapiro and members of the board. Shapiro and members of the board. Wanna start out with academic excellence tonight. And, this is the time that we start receiving some of the data and outcomes, from the previous year. And I'm sure doctor Dudley will expand upon this, but I just wanted to share a couple highlights regarding our AP testing. And so this year I'm gonna read some of this off to you. But we had the highest number of students taking an AP exam in school history.
That was 2,354 students, meaning over 40% of our student enrollment last year took at least one AP exam. And when we look at our strategic plan and we look at educating the middle where that's there, that's a phenomenal number that I don't know that many districts can can compete with because we are offering access and rigorous curriculum to over 40% of taking one of those classes.
And not just 40% taking those classes, 94% of those exams that were taken received a three, four, or a five, which is incredible, results, and we're very proud of that. And I'm sure doctor Dudley will dive in to that at a later date. But one more piece I wanted to share with you. So I talked about last year, AP precalculus, was a new course. And so this year, as a second year of AP precalculus, and so, 306 out
of 318 students at Carmel High School who took AP precalculus earned a four or a five on that exam, and that translate into money in your pockets. Missus Bauer put out a, Facebook post on that. That translates not just with this one, but with all of our students and, achieving a ninety four percent pass rate essentially on that. That's to the tune of nearly $5,000,000 that our parents will save when they send their students to Carmel, when they send their or kids to college, not to Carmel,
when they send their kids to college. And so by offering that level of course and seeing that level of a success, we are saving money for our parents. So we'll go a little bit deeper, I'm sure, in the future, but I just wanted to share some of the great news, around our AP testing and the continued academic excellence here, within Carmel Clay Schools. Additionally, doctor Herrera mentioned teacher professional development in the summer. Just wanna take a moment to say thank you to our teachers. You know, we talk about teachers having their summers off.
Well, the teachers in Carmel are coming in, and they are receiving an immense amount of professional development. So thank you to doctor Dudley and her team in curriculum. A lot of, professional development around technology as well. And so thank you to our technology team for offering that, but a big thank you for our teachers for coming in the summer, receiving that professional development so they can enhance and, always strive, strive to improve in our classrooms here in Carmel. So we love our teachers. And then finally, I know doctor or yeah.
Doctor Shapiro is gonna I just got promoted. Is gonna share is gonna share this, very soon. But I wanted to share that for Carmel, the first day of school is August 12. I've heard from lots of, of of my friends who have, kids in neighboring districts who their kids are going to school starting next week or starting the week before. If this board remembers, we were originally gonna start the week before, but we took a look at that calendar and we said we wanna give our families and our students an extra week of summer.
So they get an extra week of summer this year because of Memorial Day flipping back as it does about every, every, six years. So we our first day of school will be August 12. Parents, look for those back to school guides. We received such positive feedback. Thank you to missus Bauer and the team for putting those together, but those back to school guides will be coming out soon. So we will see our students on August 12, and I I believe we're back here on August 12 for a board meeting. But I but but I know, doctor Shapiro's gonna take care of that.
So with that, that ends my report this evening, and thank you very much. Thank you, doctor O'Strike. I appreciate the free doctorate. Honorary. Honorary. Just a couple of announcements. Teacher contract days on August seventh, tenth, and eleventh. As was just mentioned, first day back to school, Wednesday, August 12, which will also be our school board workshop session. A doozy for those of us who are parents. Long day. And then our, school board regular session will be on Wednesday, August 26.
May I have a motion to adjourn? So moved. That's incorrect. I move that we I move that we adjourn. Thank you, miss Wheeler. May I have a second? Second. Adjourned at 08:30.