um has kind of as an issue in front of us is op liability And this goes back a long time I won't steal the thunder from our guest speaker Uh but this is an issue that our district has in front of us that uh we need to reconcile with and
and wrestle a little bit with uh to make the best decisions we can and keep impact for our taxpayers and the best we can um as part of our long-term planning So Karen and I have been talking a lot about this and we thought it would be useful to invite some experts in to
address the board about open in general Grand Rapids area schools issues in specific We've been working with Emily Ericson from BIA and she uh was ill and so tag teamed with uh Mark Schulty to
take over for her so or take this for me So with that I'm going to hand it off to you Mark And if you want us to do introductions we can Um I'll just kind of hand the ball off to you All right Thanks so much And we do have Emily making a guest appearance but she
was very afraid her voice wouldn't last more than about 5 10 minutes So uh I'm tag teaming in She's having me jump on today And I I helped her put together the presentation that we prepared Uh so familiar with the the district's uh OPED liabilities and the information we
wanted to share with you tonight So I'm hoping that I'm able to share my screen and uh go through the proposal that way And I just want to make sure that I've got the right one
[Music] here Okay And I think this is it So let me know I'm hoping that it pops up soon Does everyone see the the presentation yes Okay Excellent All
right So a brief introduction Uh I'm Mark Schulty with V Actuarial Again my my colleague Emily is the ongoing consultant on your plan And we've been working with the district on your OPED liabilities for many many years I I want to say at least a dozen years at this
point And I think that this discussion of benefit levels has come up from time to time Uh but more recently uh it's gotten a little bit more attention because the trust fund that's been that was set up a while back to preund some of these liabilities uh the the assets
are starting to dwindle a bit So what we're going to talk about today is a real quick background on OPED just to make sure everybody's on the same page Uh and then talk about the current OPED provisions or retirey healthcare provisions that the district has uh then
discuss the liabilities and then some ideas for potential uh plan changes to consider that could help uh sort of bend the cost curve on some of these liabilities So the next slides what what is OPED and there's a lot of acronyms in
the actuial world and OPED is other postemployment benefits So essentially anything other than pensions and for most school districts it's retirey health care sometimes some life insurance benefits uh or dental benefits but really for for Grand Rapids it's
really just medical benefits and what we do as actuaries is you've made promises to your retirees about what level of retirey health care benefits they're going to receive over time And so what we do is try to put a price tag on those
promises And so we gather data we project out future costs and then we come up with a a present value in today's dollars of what those costs are going to be And those liabilities go on to your financial statements and the notes to financial statements So there's
a lot of assumptions that are involved here about how fast health care costs are going to grow things like that But generally we we need to put together some type of cost estimate to value these promises But as you might expect with with health
care benefits it's a bit volatile Um you know we we think of them as being similar to pension promises but they are different just because there are so many more areas of volatility involved So the the last thing I'll talk about on on the background here is we have this
this chart which is a projection of the annual benefit payments and they're split up into two pieces and these are from the district's most recent actual valuation The one we're going to focus on are these these blue bars the
explicit subsidy payments And for fiscal 2425 they're a little over $5 million or so expected to increase to a little over 6 million and over time gradually decrease And those are essentially the
annual payments for retiree healthcare So any sort of premium subsidies that you're offering the implicit subsidy payments I'm not going to get into those Those are really some accounting costs that you're required to show on your financials but they don't necessarily
relate to the cash out the door each year So really the the target we're looking at is these five to $6 million in annual costs that are attributable to retirey health care costs And I'll I I'll put that out there I'm I'm pretty
sure that's right in line with what you're currently spending um would welcome any input or confirmation that yeah we're we are spending about $5 million a year on these these retirey healthcare costs Yes
Okay So the next step is what what's causing these costs and right now the the district has a self-insured medical plan So you know all your active employees retirees you're essentially funding the costs of their retiree
health care each year instead of sort contracting with an insurance company for fixed premiums So there's there's a bit of work involved with a self-insured medical plan Medicare is the primary payer for post65 retirees and retirees
are allowed to remain on the plan for life So as you can imagine you know if somebody retires the medical benefits they have pre-65 is is a pretty contained period even if they retire early But 65 and on is a very long time
And we we call that having a liability tale that the the cost can go on for many many decades And that's usually with districts that offer lifetime health care benefits where most of the cost is going to going to show up in those post 65 retirey
liabilities Uh the retirees do contribute to the monthly rates but there is a very heavy subsidy from the district Um as noted here many retirees have no contributions to the plan However these generous subsidies were
sub sunset in most of the employee contracts uh several years ago But again because the they're lifetime benefits even though they were sunset there's still a long time before even those old benefit liabilities are going to be satisfied Any questions on on the
background information so far okay So the current liabilities uh as of June 30 2024 uh our most recent measurement uh the explicit subsidy liability is just under $und00
million And as we can see here very little of that is attributable to pre65 health care costs almost all of it is for the post 65 medical And again we're going to just sort of not talk much about this implicit subsidy That's
just a number that has to go on your your u financial statements because of the accounting rules But it's really this part up here this explicit subsidy liability for those premium subsidies that is the important number And so when
we look at where there's potential cost savings what what immediately comes out is this post65 liability and asking ourselves is there a way to either have a more efficient plan design or something that can sort of limit the
growth of health care costs in the future So those those are the areas that that we looked at it for some ideas of how could we potentially adjust health care costs so we can save on those 5 to6
million of benefits per year And one key factor is that all the benefits right now for retirees are tied to medical claims and expenses and those can be very volatile and increase each year So some of the the options we're going to
discuss tonight are a fixed contribution solution instead of just paying out actual medical claims costs each year And on this page is it's just about a 10-year projection It's similar to those blue bars earlier of the estimated
retiree payments or subsidies that the district's paying for these these retirees And again five to$6 million range We expect them to go up for a number of years and gradually plateau but they're going to stay there for a while So what you need to do when you're
looking for a solution number one is judge what sort of benefit is affordable on an annual basis And and maybe it is the current design but it's how you're going to pay for it uh if it's not going to be out of your general fund revenue
what sort of income sources might be available to you uh is this going to involve a levy in order to get some additional assets uh different ideas have been bandied around you know we don't necessarily work with the funding side of where does
the money come from but we work with the plan design and measuring the effect of how you could potentially change the bl the plan provisions to adjust costs and we can do that according to whatever uh funding mechanisms and income you think
might be available and as mentioned earlier I I believe that the oped web trust is projected to be depleted this year Is that still correct that there's about $5 million or so left in the trust less
than October less than Okay Okay But and also to confirm is it true that in the past though that you've reimbured yourself for the majority of retirey payments out of that trust in order to to offset those costs correct Okay Okay
Perfect And I will say too I'll throw in a note here That's exactly what the OPED trust assets are for So uh we have some clients who build up an OPED trust and then they're really afraid to touch it Like they they just keep paying benefits
out of their general assets And I I understand that because you know you've built up this amount but in the end you the purpose of OP trust assets is to spend them on OP to offset those costs So whether you do it upfront or on the tail end there different approaches to
to OP financing So potential plan changes that we're going to talk about The ones we're focusing on are ones that provide immediate cost savings So what we are talking about here is if you know if you adjust a contract for an
active employee you know by the time they retire and those cost savings go into effect it can take many years to realize them So we need to look at these post 65 benefits for retirees who are already receiving payments What are the options well there there's two that we focused on
immediately One is carving out the post 65 retirees and instead of having them participate on your self-insured medical plan is to contact an insurer and see what the premium costs would be to use a
fully insured Medicare plan Oftentimes we see that there can be cost savings uh with carving out this group into a fully insured plan And I I think one of the potential advantages here is then you know kind of a a fixed
cost for the year You you have a contract with the insurer They say we're going to charge you X dollars of premium per post65 retiree Here's what your cost is for the year Um and that that can be an advantage of moving from a
self-insured plan where the cost is whatever the the claims are that the retirees incur So that would be sort of a a gradual step uh with moving to a fully insured Medicare plan The other option would be instead
of paying directly for premiums and where those premiums could increase each year is looking at a defined contribution benefit in lie of district uh medical coverage And the most common way to do this is with a retiree health
reimbursement account or retiree HRA as they're called And here what the district would do is say we're going to come up with an annual budget of how much we're going to allocate to each retiree in their HR account
And then it's up to the retirees to go shop for a Medicare supplement plan uh using the amounts that are in these accounts And these are actually notional accounts Uh so you're essentially just saying here's what you have to at your
fingertips retirees to go pay for coverage It it can give some additional flexibility to go find a plan that meets their needs Uh but you do need to have an administrator essentially to interact with retirees uh keep track of the accounts and what the retiree does is
then they request reimbursement from the accounts for any premiums that they're paying directly Any questions on these two options that that we've discussed here so far that I guess that reimbursement you talked about if you went that second
option it would just be for the coverage itself It wouldn't be any co-pays or anything like that type situation or anything because you're picking they're picking a supplement plan at that point right yeah And here I may have Emily
jump in if she's able but my understanding on HAS is that they can be used for any eligible medical costs including premiums So say you give a retiree $500 a month into their HR plan so $6,000 a year and they find a premium
that's only $400 a month but then they end up having co-pays and other health related expenses they can still submit both the premiums and those health uh related health costs to the H for reimbursement Uh Mark yeah I'm confirming that's
correct So there it it does provide flexibility If they want to find a very inexpensive Medicare supplement plan then that extra money available to them can be used to offset some other costs as long as
they're eligible medical expenses Oh but there would be a hard cap Is that what I'm kind of hearing yes that that's generally how these are designed is that the district would essentially come up with what's our what can we afford to pay So maybe it's a
total of $300 per month per retiree And generally we see these as an annual allocation So that'd be $3,600 bucks uh for the year it's essentially put into the account
even though it's a notional account um at the beginning of the year but it gives them an idea of what they have to spend for the year The retiree goes out purchases whatever Medicare supplement insurance that they may want and then they request reimbursement from the HR
administrator as those costs are incurred throughout the year And there are we can talk a little bit more soon about potential provisions uh and flexibility in designing these plans Um the amounts do not necessarily have to roll over unused amounts from year to
year You can say here it is sort of a use it or lose it during the year You can limit the rollovers to a certain amount maybe $1,000 roll over the entire amount from year to year But what key one key provision is the district essentially owns the accounts These are
never cashed out Say a retiree says "Well I'm I'm done I don't want to participate on the plan anymore and I've got $5,000 in my HRA." You know they cannot roll that money out They they don't necessarily own the account It's always a
districtowned account So Mark how how how does something like this work uh quite a few of the plans we would have uh would be family plans not just the individual retiree
Yeah So you you'd have to decide um do you want to offer differing amounts depending on the coverage elected um you know if you have somebody with single coverage do you offer them a $3,000 allocation and family at $6,000
do you just want to offer a a level amount to everybody and it's up to them to decide how they want to spend that money so the design is is really up to you Um realizing that if if you don't have a a higher
level of benefits offered to folks with family coverage they might see that as a benefit haircut Go ahead Correct Uh quick question Um have you seen um or is it possible to do HSA here for portability after
that's a a good question Generally you have you have to offer HSAs with a high deductible plan Um and I believe postretirement HSAs that you're not allowed to contribute to them
That's correct Yeah So they're they don't work quite as well as an HRA for retirees at least If employees if your current employees had time to build up an HSA account balance while they're working then those funds would
be available postretirement but it it does not work for retirees Is there a cap on the HA accounts like there is on an HSA like that uh specific level of contribution annually
Emily do you recall the the cap on HR benefits if any i do not believe there is a cap Um that for retirey HAS that's been my experience too since it's employer dollars and there's not really a a tax deduction involved that it's
it's unlimited But given that you're trying to rein costs I think there's going to be a practical limit to how much you'll be able to spend Right Mark since we're only since we're self-insured
um and we're only paying for retirees actual costs essentially How would how would funding an HRA be less than funding their actual
costs yeah it it all depends on the actual costs associated with the plan that's being provided So I I'm think for for practical purposes when you open an HRA for retiree instead of
offering them full coverage on your plan you're essentially attempting to to cap the benefit spend I mean that that that's really what's what's the objective is of of moving to an HRA account Can the retiree potentially get
similar coverage for a lower cost potentially But I think what what it is is is a bit of a cost shift and a risk shift from the district to to retirees but that is a way to reduce the 5 to6 million in costs that you're
experiencing now Emily did you have other thoughts on that i just wanted to jump in and say that my understanding is that the district is funding uh claims for retirees kind of preemptively which a lot of times you do
with a self-insured plan You put funds into an account to pay claims in the future And so they're using the trust to fund future claims and they're setting these based on expectations So um even if claims are a little bit
lower or higher uh they're still funding at the same level um and adjusting as needed each year And so the the cost savings would so they are kind they are kind of setting a funding cost each year So um each month So the cost savings would
also be from um choosing maybe an HR level that's lower than your current funding levels We So we're paying five to six million in the next 10 years That's our liability right is how many retirees do
we have that are on and like Mark brought up is that just the retiree or is that also now their spouse and does that does that somehow make that number change does it increase and then most of
them will have families Yeah Sure So then does that number increase because of that or are we only looking at just the retiree and then not really factoring in anybody else that might be using that uh the district is funding for both the
retiree and the retiree spouses So um if they have if they're covering a spouse they're funding a larger portion which makes this unique great because most places the employees I mean your whole family Mark what
direction do you see um other districts moving in uh as they look at other options no that that's a good question Um we definitely have other clients that have explored this idea and have a few
who have moved to an HRA arrangement Um I don't know my experience is many are fully insured on the post 65 side Emily is that your experience too that's correct And I'll also mention that it's
not entirely common to offer lifetime benefits uh for school districts So there's a lot of people that are not in this current situation where they're having to reduce their post 65 costs but you're right Mark Um vast majority that
do have a fully insured medical plan So I'd say it's less common to have the retiree HR accounts at this point but there's definitely a growing interest uh just because of the cost predictability aspect of it
you know at the beginning of the year exactly how much you could potentially spend because you've essentially said per headcount we're going to give you this amount into your HR account Um and it it's a way to bend that cost curve
very quickly Uh just because you you've automatically reduce the cost the annual cost if you lower the subsidy enough But it is a lowering of subsidy So there's there's likely going to be some effects on uh what kind of benefits can be
provided with those costs The fully insured plan kind of this option one is is a stepping stone just that we we generally see these can be more cost competitive than uh uh self-insuring the the post 65
group But the first step there is is to talk to an insurer and broker and get a quote You know that that's a pretty easy thing to do Thank you Yep Do we um do we know how many people are on
there's 379 but like Mark said um there's a lot of spouses So we'll pay the family price for you know a teacher or staff member but we're also paying for their staff also or their their
spouse you know if their spouse was a staff So our latest actuary report has 420 retirees taking that over Yep And I believe that's retirees and spouses
Yeah Let me just Actually that's that's retirees only Um there are more spouses I I'd have to look here and see Yeah I think in probably the last report Emily there's there's a statistic there there I don't have it at my fingertips
but as far as the number of covered spouses or family coverage that that are being valued for these retirees but there's 420 retirees and then another almost 200 retirey spouses Yep So do we
know out of that number how many are post 65 um the majority I I'd have to look a little closer Um I I can't recall at the moment but uh it's definitely the vast majority And are we passing that funding
on to family members whose retirey may have passed on and then we're paying for spouses still we're covering still If if a retiree is on insurance they pass away and their spouse is on there
the spouse will have to cover They'll have to pick that up then They want to retain that insurance Yeah And then does that we do have some from a very long time ago Very very We have someone
that's overund years Um we have people who's got in at a good deal and their spouse is passed away and they keep our insurance and then would something like that HRA then roll over to that spouse or does that like it
doesn't because it was attached to that retiree even though that retiree was able to then use that with their spouse but now that retiree has passed are they then able to contrib retirees Answer my own question right there Thank you
Yeah ju just for a rough ballpark Um so say we're going to use roughly 400 retirees and you give them $5,000 a year That'd be $2 million spend compared to your current 5 to$6 million
So that'd be significant savings Granted that would probably not be nearly the same level of benefits that they're current receiving but just you can kind of gauge how powerful an HR is as far as managing the costs Um you know if if you
gave enhanced contributions for those with family coverage obviously that's going to to drive up the annual cost but it still might be substantially lower than the five to $6 million that you're currently paying for fully for self-insured coverage
At $5 million a year just at five million with 620 people on the plan we're paying $8,64 a month for each person Say one more time 8,000 $8,64 per person that's insured current
That's at the bare five million going up Yeah About eight grand a year per head Eight grand a year Eight grand a year I'm sorry Yeah Yeah So none of our new employees get these
benefits I just think it's important to you know that we say that out loud and reiterate that this isn't about new employees It's been sunseted out of almost every contract post 65 It is out of all contracts We have some that still
earn 365 benefits So how was it sunset was it sunset you know let's say they said 2005 2007 sunset So you had to retire before then or if you were on a if you were
tenure before then If you look at our if you go through and look at contracts we've still got quite a few years that are going to roll into this That's why we're out to 35 still rising right now We got more people that'll be rolling in than than p pushing out Um I am
curious I am curious about the elimination of rule of 90 and the propensity for teachers to be anybody educator to be working later How that's going to affect this i don't I
haven't really walked that scenario out Um and again it would depend on when they were hired I'm sure but but we kind of have people in three or four different buckets This retirey contribution group till death pass 65
This group big this group in the middle that we're covering till 65 and then everybody that we're covering till they're retired Uh I think that you know even if people are retiring a little later I still think majority of people retiring around
65 or earlier So the post65 benefit uh issue will still still be there Yeah we actually work with the state um as a retained actuer We consult with the legislature on a number of the proposals that are out there to come up with new
um retirement rules for TRA and um I think the proposals that are out there this legislative session are 62 and 30 or age 60 and 30 So they're they're much different than the old rule of 90 for pre89 hires Uh and as Emily mentioned
even if they adopted them you know it's a relatively short time period where they would have retired medical benefits pre-65 relative to post 65 We're talking 3 to 5 years versus decades post 65 That that's really where the cost savings can
be found So Mark just to clarify a fully insured Medicare plan would that be like it would be paying part C and D you know you really have to go out and
get a quote for the type of plan that you're looking for Uh as far as what sort of coverages they're going to be I don't know Emily what what you've seen in most of the the fully insured plans Um I've seen a mixture So some will will cover um you know they'll it's it's
what's called a Medicare advantage plan that covers um the part C and D and then some PE some uh districts will offer a Medicare supplement plan uh which is not a replacement for current Medicare but it just supplements the costs the gaps
that Medicare doesn't pay Um and some will offer both options to retirees to choose Um usually Medicare supplement plans are a little cheaper than Medicare Advantage plans but not always It It really just depends on the plan design So let me ask a question If we're
running out of funds how are we going to pay for any of this there is like we're out like well then what we'll be living for Great Do we have the authority to vote for that
so when the when the legislature created the window for districts to create trusts districts had choices whether to essentially borrow all the trust borrow a bunch of money put it in a trust and
make payments um by levying um or pay as you go districts made those choices So one of the things that we have discussed was whether trying
to re reinvigorate the idea of of refunding the trust would be worth it but money is a lot it's more expensive to borrow money now So we'd be paying interest on any any
money we'd earn would be outpaced by interest we'd be paying But at this rate we'd have to levy for $5 million a year Yep Every different had to continue to go up and then eventually it would be based on
remember it based on our spend Yeah Let's put a pin in that one for a second Um if we were to make a change like this since this is a you know these people have been on this for x years how does
that happen do we have to I mean obviously there's a we have no money Um I think there's a you know public service that we have to share
that this is the situation However um if we I don't know like what has to happen do they have to agree yeah So I I asked uh I asked this question of our kind of our monthly collaborative
meeting that I have with admin Um and you know the current the current bargaining and Angie if I say something wrong is correct The current bargaining group for admin manages the contract They bargain
for the contract So any change any change would have to go through the bargaining process Um and there was a lawsuit not all that long ago about messing with retirey
health benefits and our limited ability to unilaterally do that So it would be there would be a process to doing it Did that court case land favorably on
the district side on retirees so we would need qu I mean we need cooperation to do from the current members of the bar So if it would be beneficial to some but not all Could some accept some sort of a
a change you'd have to make right to make kind of a two and then you you know when you start getting quotes from carriers there's a
minimum you know usually a minimum and Mark can Emily cut me off uh if I say something wrong but usually there's some sort of a minimum number before they'll quote a group So there have to be some sense of
what how many were talking about Um yeah I just wanted to bring up that you know if you decided to make a change and you didn't want to uh go get into a bargaining issue switching to a fully insured plan
probably wouldn't be a bargaining change because you're offering medical coverage to them and you're subsidizing a portion of those costs and they're contributing you know some of them are contributing a small amount some of them are contributing nothing If you kept the contribution levels at the same amount
but you just changed your medical plan people change medical plans all the time and that's not a change in their what they're offering to retirees So you might have more flexibility if you go that route Yeah the lawsuit was about the the value
of the benefits Okay So so I think you're I think you're I think you're right That would be easier to do that as long as we could justify that there wasn't a giant change in
benefits We can find a cheaper way to provide the same benefits That's that that we could do that So but not not everybody within this group we're talking about would qualify for a
Medicare plan right it just be kind Yeah I think if you look at the liability the hugest liability is on that post 65 That's that's what biggest chunk of correct And if there are some post 65 retirees
who are not eligible for Medicare um you know they could remain on the plan I imagine that the vast majority are eligible for Medicare So you would still realize quite a bit of sig beans there Who could that be
well for example um you know I I could throw myself in there I have a spouse who's not 65 I have a child who still eligible for family And you know I'm probably not alone in
that group There's probably quite a few family plan and family plans So you can't have just you off and you might be able to shift off the the 65 year old retirees right
but you still have that liability out there on your But even still from a percentage that can't be got to be a little bit of a unique I it seems like and I think you know when I think when Mark and Emily were talking
about chipping away and that's my word not theirs but you know kind of the place to start like it's going to take it it could take a multiple set of solutions here not not one Right Um so the the goal of tonight obviously wasn't
to fix this or even to deep into you know one of these particular options Um there's still more research I think we have to do and data to gather but it was really about getting this issue in front of you
um hearing from you know company that we worked with for a while to talk about kind of build capacity Um and then we've got some other meetings coming up Uh we have one with
our insurance consultant on the books um to talk through some of this I've actually reached out to admin and said "Hey they have people that do insurance all day every day at admin too Do you have ideas?" Because it's going to affect everyone uh directly or
indirectly So like what is the universe of ideas solutions kind of look like and once we have that we can start narrowing in on strategy I mean even though this isn't the majority there's still quite a few
school districts dealing with this right so yeah the there are we as a percentage our liability makes up a significant portion of the entire state's
um liability like a third of it Yes Yeah Can we be done after this so I think I car I think that data was from MDE like the max levy for retirey health was 14 million and ours is 5 million
So we're we're we're way out in front on this one We're winning the race on this one Is that just I mean is that just because of that premium plan and the and the it took till 2007 to daylight These plans
were put into place to be competing with the mines Yeah Which offered lifetime health and even So it's mostly range schools Yeah Even going back to 2009 um Karen
and Julie dug up a legislative audit report from 2009 looking at OKAP liabilities and um our district and a neighboring larger range district were in the top three or four in the entire
state um comparing liability to operating expenditures That was 15 years ago We were ahead of the pack But it it's all about the rich rich plan for a long long time
and then the you know there the radically the radical increase in medical costs You know if you look at our liability estimated liability 15 20 year 15 years ago 17 years ago our estimated liability was $60 million Well
it's gone up a lot just because of So our trust wasn't fully funded when they when they decide to decide to take that approach They didn't fund the trust fully Um which would have really really helped would have bought us some more
time but we still would have had the problem of a trust Well I mean when these contracts right yeah And we're talking October right is that what I heard october we're out And at
that point we're either levying or we're taken out of our general fund right yep Starting off And at what point can we levy yeah jump in Um so when it runs out in October I'll have to start paying cost
So it's you know about 42 So I'll be taking that from our general fund putting it to our health insurance fund So that's a general fund expense right so next year we'll have about I'm just going to ballpark about $3.5 million more in expenses in our general
fund And I can't levy for those until we spend them So I'm going to tell you right now our budget is balanced So we'll have to do that and then the next year I'll levy for that 3.5 million Next year we'll spend five
So you're always a yearby Yes Always Yeah So I think you know which will take a while to get us back to right to fiscal the 10% over and you can like we were the laws Okay So we'll always be
playing this catch-up game The the the one I I guess the the thing that's important to mention and note is that if we didn't have 10% if we were sitting at 1.6% fund balance we would be in SOD overnight I mean I am glad we are there but it's
like I feel like I just keep chasing the resource I was just gonna say doesn't it i mean it just feels like I just since I got here I'm chasing the guy that's run like that's what I feel like Like just when I think we catch him like dang Just
kidding And I know I'm not alone No I'm not alone Turning over stolen Is there a potential legislative solution to do the same thing again um we it's possible Um it's something that I've talked to some folks about I think the
issue becomes the like is there a practical financial advantage to it um and I have I I don't I don't know that there is because again if we issue bonds we're borrowing
money and if we're paying whatever four or five percent on that money we're we're not making money We're not making money And it's also challenging when it's not so widespread where% of the problem you know and it's
not statewide right you know At a time when there's no money in the state it's not like they're going to start So um information is good
It's an opportunity to excel We have some tough you know tough decisions ahead of us for sure And um we'll keep gathering information and keep you up to date as we learn it Um and at some point I anticipate having sort of a set of options here that we
could look at and then working through that Mark Emily anything um to add before we let you go no I I think it's been a good discussion and I've just been listening the past few minutes and everything you've said
is is lines up anecdotally with what we hear and what we see with our school district clients in Minnesota that generally up north along the range There's a lot of these much higher legacy liabilities just they were put in place to attract and retain teachers
back in the day and the costs are still there Um I will say we had a couple more slides here but I think we covered all this stuff just in our discussions I will point out and these are go along with uh what's just been discussed You
know we'll be reme-measuring liabilities this summer We'll get new data and kind of have fresh numbers So stay tuned We'll have some some numbers there Uh just some notes that open enrollment for Medicare is coming up this fall So if there's any changes that that people
might need to deal with that's another trigger Um communication is going to be super important And again you talked about legal implications just making sure that stakeholders understand what may or may not be going on as far as potential plan changes
Um yeah and I I would also just add that that sort of transitory step of potentially moving to a fully insured Medicare plan getting a quote on that should be essentially free and easy uh if you just want to at least start
exploring that so you have some numbers because it it's easy for us to say you know here's option one option two but until you have some some numbers from the insurers of what kind of cost savings there might be I think that'll be extremely informative to to help you
make some decisions and also talking with um the folks who run your self-insured plan to see what potential effect could this have on the active employees and retirees that are still in there Does Does it have any effect on them just to make sure there's no
surprises down the road if you start moving in one direction Other than that Emily do you have anything else you wanted to added tonight no I think we covered it all All right Thank you Well yeah Thank you
for letting me come off the bench for Emily and uh hopefully she'll get well soon and uh we'll look forward to future discussions on this Sounds good Thank you Take care Thank you Anything else on that item
even if we drop our liability five million a year it's a very good step Yep Right It's still a step we don't have Correct Right any any anything we can do to carve carve into that bio is good
thing I mean you know just putting in perspective that $1,100 operating referendum that we ran in 2023 was like 4.4 million in uh revenue So if you think about tax
impact on tax impact it'd be like you know a $1,200 operating essentially is what it would be Only this one doesn't go to Well this one doesn't go to bring people back to create opportunities for kids Yeah To
pay the liabilities which there's kind of two things as I'm sitting here one I think uh needed with stakeholders and having a presentation with retirees who could show up I think sooner as opposed to
later right just even if it's just informational like and here's all the things we're looking at I think that's one thing but we also have to start some type of conversation in the community so it's not like when all of a sudden they just get hit with a levy uh that could
be near uh the amount that we asked for they don't think oh they're just putting this levy over here but they're using it for something else Like I mean I I do think there's some communication pieces that have to happen otherwise we're going to catch something That's a great segue Melissa
Yeah right Whatever I could do I really just want Moving right along Right after that right moving right along Moving right along for us to keep uh the impacts of OPED
uh separated somehow from the other tax impacts for our current staff Um because I because I think that's a a fair sentence David Let's uh let's talk about that during the next item agenda here
Uh community engagement discussion and Matt do you want to tee that up yeah So this is a continuation of a of a discussion we had at a work session a meeting a couple a couple meetings ago thinking about this fall thinking about issues like this that we're that we're
up against thinking about our need to generate some additional revenue uh thinking about the need to find out what it is that our community wants us to do uh in situations like this and you know what we continue to deal with Um so at
that meeting it was discussed to bring Daylor uh forward and to to speak to you provide some information So I talked to Jeff Daylor from Daylor PR um Ron Wilkey as well and so invited them to come to
just kind of talk about community engagement input gathering um and I shared with them this situation we're in and the complexities that it creates uh because regardless we have to be talking
about this publicly Uh you know it it it's not something you want to sneak up on the community with So anyway um Jeff uh I see a big J there Well that that's Julie I don't know Julie Jeff on He is
All right You should be able to see me here man There you are Thanks for hanging in there We went a little bit longer with that I should have predicted that but thank you for hanging in there No worries I I have to say beginning when I was a very young person I began
going to schoolboard meetings in 1987 and um and I and and I I was going to schoolboard meetings when I was a communications director at Robbinsdale Schools Uh I've gone to lots of schoolboard meetings uh since then since since Daylor PR started doing business
in 2011 and your you your situation is not unique but your situation is challenging And all I can say is thank goodness we have people who are willing to be public servants And so I really appreciate the work that you all have to do and the
decisions you have to that you have to make It's tough and most people I don't think recognize um what you actually have to do and the thanks that you get is pennies on the dollar for how much uh how much time you put into this And so really the thanks you get is people like
me saying thank you for doing what you do Ron was a former superintendent Anything you want to add to that Ron well I I I would echo that Jeff I've been retired for a few years now but I I strangely enough listening to I think I was online
on with you for most of that your OPED agenda item and but strangely enough it makes me miss the superintendency I it was hard for me to just sit back and not jump into your discussion and I think your reflections oh my gosh and and the
last point I can't see your names but about the communication piece I think you're you're spot on too Um but uh um no know and I I absolutely feel your your frustration or pain dealing with all this I've had many challenges of a
similar nation nature to this in my years as a superintendent as well But um I'm I I think you're going about it the right way and getting it off to a great start in in addressing the challenge So I asked Jeff and Ron to come to talk through what working with them might
look like um uh as we embark on this communicating about this issue and others and gathering some information from the community about you know what our next steps should be financially especially So I'll hand you Jeff if that's okay
Perfect Thank you Matt I I have a slideshow that I'll share in a moment but I'll just start by saying that um the um these challenges are are it's critical to be transparent about them Um
um and it's critical to be sort of communicating all of the time in between referendums Unfortunately in Minnesota doesn't matter which school district you're with the next referendum is always right around the corner And so whether you're contemplating that in
November of 2025 or you're contemplating that in you know May of 2026 or or November of 2026 or 27 um the next referendum is right around the corner and communicating all of the time is
essential to uh keep building trust in the community ensuring that people know who you are and recognize that um that that you've got big challenges and that you here are the ways that you're trying to address them And so um from the
community engagement standpoint and we're going to kind of focus on that in this presentation um in order to in order to look at the big picture yes you've got a revenue challenge um uh and an expense challenge How are
you going to deal with that but how does this benefit children what is your why um and Ron is uh by the way beats that into my head all of the time reminds me and reminds all of us that we're here to
support children And so um so our our hope is that any community engagement that you do um results in supporting children in one way shape or form So um let me um I'm going to I'm going to start first by as I share my screen um
telling you a little bit about who we are who PR is Uh and then and then uh we'll move more into what the community um um community engagement looks like And so let me pop the slideshow going
here Hopefully you can see um there we go Okay All right Can you all see this this is the uh our core focus at daily PR Yes Um we're uh for
for years we had been um asking school districts to make sure that you have a a um strategic plan that doesn't just sit on this on the shelf that you are truly working for towards uh accomplishing the goals in your strategic plan and then we
realized that we didn't have one of our own So so a few years ago we intentionally uh went through a process of deciding who we are And when it comes down to it we're in this business um because we
want to improve communities And we do that through exceptional public relations marketing and strategic counsel Our niche is the public sector So we do work for state agencies and for counties and cities but our our sweet spot is schools Most of the people that
work at Daylor PR have worked in the public schools um in various capacities for quite some time Um if you asked some of our other uh customers what they think of us uh these are the words that they would use to describe
us Um we have several people that work in Minnesota and that would be myself and Ron Uh Sarah Thompson is new to us although she's kind of uh been working with us on the side as a as a contractor for quite some time Uh just joined us as
a full-time person um a couple of about a month ago Jane Helgavold and Chrissanti Sicila are round out our team And um this is a lot of words and I'm just going to focus on the ones that are
bolded here Um we use this after my name It says APR That's accredited in public relations And when you get that accreditation through the public relations society of America they um drill this planning model into your head
um uh research planning implementation and evaluation And so people used to come to me in my office in Robbinsdale and they would say "Hey I need to put a brochure together for my department." And I would say let's look at that and see if that's in fact the best way to
communicate with your audience Who is your audience how would they prefer to be communicated with what are you trying to get them to do to for you and how what what messages resonate with them that would help to motivate them to do something and so we start with research
and community engagement is a part of research And so you're looking at this in the right way at starting at the beginning Um we provide a number of services to schools Um but some of that includes community engagement and and um
referendum marketing Um but there are other things that we do as well And so um that's one of the things that we uh love to do is some of this other stuff especially communications planning But I tell you what an awful lot of school
districts in Minnesota are in need of referendums and so we end up doing a lot of work in that area So you all know what your situation is but I'm going to go through a couple of these bullet points There may be some that we got wrong and so tell me if we did but in conversation with Matt um
these this is kind of the highlights So we know that you know you're in that neighborhood of 3100 students you have a pretty large geographically sized school district with a number of smaller towns and townships Um you've seen some growth
in the city Um there's um um you're you've become politically conservative over time Uh the last three presidential elections have seen greater and greater numbers of people voting for the Republican candidate Um we all know that
the school district has financial challenges You've been making a lot of budget reductions over the over the previous several years You've worked on changing things within your your contracts with your bargaining units You're working on solving your OPED problem There's a significant number of
things that you have been working on already You tried to to pass a referendum um to help with revenue That did not work Um and then you know you've got some additional expenses And so of course OPED is is is one big one Um most
school districts are in the same boat as you in that costs are increasing at a rate greater than the state's um aid helps you They the state aid is not keeping up with inflation Um and so more
budget reductions are on the horizon without any new revenue The referendum history was in the neighborhood of 2015 I think it was that there was a failed bond attempt an approved bond in 2018 and then uh failing the operating levy and capital
projects levy in 2023 Um an interesting thing is that your neighbor right up highway 2 from you Deer River is also facing financial challenges
They're they're looking at the potential of a November referendum as well And the question that we have and this would be a unique thing not something we've tried in other places but is there some way that there is some synergy between Grand
Rapids and Deer River two neighboring districts that already have some um collaboration going on that have leaders of those districts that know each each of the districts quite well is there
some synergy there that uh that that um that could help to address things in a in a in a broader way and so that's a that's a thing that we that we'll look at and as we move forward here in this presentation
Um so what does community engagement look like and and what are we trying to accomplish so um there's a number of of uh sort of of of high level goals that we would want to accomplish here And and the first is to make sure that
especially key opinion leaders community members in your in your district those opinion leaders that you would consider maybe are elected officials but could also be uh clergy or even um barbers but
uh bankers or business leaders um chamber of commerce leaders uh presidents of the Kowanas or Rotary clubs Who are the who are those opinion leaders and do they know what your situation is and uh often times uh
school district leadership is responsible for that kind of ongoing um you know not just sort of uh communications but but developing deep community relationships And so so is there a connection with folks in the
community and do they recognize what your challenges are and if they don't how can we educate them um we want for the community uh to recognize the the overview of the situation Um at least know the key the
key bullet points Um and then we also want to get opinions and advice from stakeholder groups And so who are these people well they're the naturals that you would expect You would want to make sure that your staff each of the different uh bargaining groups uh
recognizes what the situation is and that they have an opportunity to provide their own advice on what you might do to move forward So employee groups uh parents of your uh and family members of
your current students um any other stakeholder groups that are important to the community And so sometimes we would want to go uh search out u booster clubs or PTO's or or folks that are subsets of your parent
group And so what do we want to know what do you hope to learn from everyone in the community um we want to know how people receive information Um and how they prefer to receive information which is sometimes different Um and are you
reaching people with your current communications as they are now um we'd want to know more about the community's opinion of the quality of the education that's provided uh by the school district and and the quality and and um
um you know how do people feel about how well the district is managed um we want to know more about how community members would prioritize different areas of public education Do people like language immersion do they like uh career in
teched uh would they prefer to see more investment in the arts um one of your challenges of course is um and and this happens so many times school districts that are looking to um
to uh look to raise revenue uh when it comes to an operating levy are typically just trying to preserve what they have now It makes it very challenging uh to say "Here's what we're going to spend referendum revenue on." Um and so we
want to know what the priorities are so that we can uh two things One consider whether or not we can afford to uh bump up investment in some areas that communities would uh community members would would prefer that we spent dollars
on And two uh to use that in our messaging to say that uh these are important areas to us We would we would and and they are to you and we want to focus on those areas uh recognizing how challenging that is when you're just trying to basically
keep the wheels on the bus At this point um we want to know whether or not um uh uh people are aware of the potential for another referendum and whether or not they would support such a thing and if
so how much could they afford and this is another of the big challenges that all school districts and school boards face which is the number that you need quite often is not the same number as what people say they can
afford And the challenge that you face is making a decision on which to choose And um and whether or not you say um well uh we need what we need so we're going to ask for that and taking a risk
that you might not pass that referendum or choosing to take what you think you can get and and leaving what we need to another day Um uh you know once you pass a referendum that doesn't mean that you
can't go to do another one five six eight years down the road again uh we don't like to do that but it sometimes is what we have to do Um the engagement strategies that we
would recommend are these And uh one of the things that uh and we'll we'll talk about timeline here in a moment but um we still have a month and a couple weeks of school maybe about a month of school left let's just call it That's
not a lot of time but there is still some time to meet with staff and to meet with with uh parents before they kind of sign off and go into a summer mode and it's difficult to connect with them And so uh we would really encourage some
things get done right away um in in the month of May And knowing how crazy it gets towards the end of the month of May really at the beginning of the month of May which is a tight timeline I know that that's only a half a month from
now Um the first thing on the list is a public opinion survey I know that you've done u a survey in the past Um the um there's there's one sure way of gauging exactly how your entire community feels
within a margin of error of about 5% and that is to do a a what we would call a statistically valid scientific survey which typically is a telephone survey Um there are other options um but this is
the one that gives you the best um understanding of how your community feels uh as a whole and um it's you know it's an expensive thing to do um but it's an incredible investment What it gets you is is information that allows
for you as a school board to make a decision on the on on ballot questions if you choose to go that way You may choose based on the public opinion survey to not run a referendum at all at least this year Um you may choose to go
ahead and run a referendum Uh but this would help you to determine what the questions uh would look like what they would um what what fund and how much money you'd be asking for Um but it's also important to do the
other things to meet with staff and make sure that staff recognizes that they had a chance to provide input to meet with parents to make sure that they have a chance to provide some input and any other stakeholder groups that you feel are really critical to um uh to engage
with Uh the two other items that are that I haven't talked about yet are a task force and a road show And so the task force is that opportunity to maybe meet with some of those public opinion leaders um and uh and ask them to meet
with you two maybe even three times um in over the course of between now and let's say the end of June again with the purpose of deeply educating them on your situation and and really starting with
school finance which is a very complic complicated thing to communicate and and uh and so so you need some time to be able to work with people and um and so um uh having having the that deep education for a few people in the
community that are well placed means that they can become ambassadors for you uh at a later time Some of them might end up being on a yes committee Some of them might just be uh willing to um you know behind closed doors share information with other people that that
that are important in the community And then the road show is just getting out and going where the people are Um when we do community meetings we would ask for you know a couple of times to uh to have people come to us but we recognize
that that's really challenging We're we're fortunate to get uh you know 15 people at a meeting but when we go where the people are when you go to the PTO meetings when you go to the booster club meetings when you go to the Kuanas meetings or the Rotaries or the Lions
you have a the people are going to be there and and you have a better shot of of uh of of sharing your your story with them uh that road show ends up being early as a part of community engagement and then
later if you choose to go to a referendum when you're going to talk uh about what that referendum looks like you're going to go back to those same groups of people Um I'm going to do this and then we'll go backwards and and and go through
those these same slides that I've talked about and and and re-engage and ask for your questions on those things But we we've talked to both Matt and we've talked to Pat Rendle up in Deer River
and we've said um okay you guys have you have things going on You're you're both public school districts You both um have superintendent that have spent time in each of the two districts You have you have these two districts have collaborated on uh educational
programming and other things before Each of you has has uh revenue needs or at least you know financial challenges Is there some synergy here is there some thing you know I guess another thing that I might share is that each of the
two school districts share traditional media coverage So um uh so you would see articles about both districts in the same uh newspapers or in the on the same uh hear them on the same radio stations
So is there something to this and um I'm going to I don't want to spend as much time on this as I do on the previous few slides So I'm going to kind of go through this quickly but if we were to do something along these lines
um knowing that a common theme would be that strong schools equals strong communities um that that each of the school districts uh we want to build awareness of what about what the challenges are but also about the uh the
the the positives that are happening in school districts want to build support for schools Uh that maybe results in motivating community members to take action to support on election day but maybe just results in community support
overall And you can do that in a few different ways You can do something in person There can be there can be an event or there can be uh things where people going where the people are where where um where people would talk about
the things that Deer River and Grand Rapids have in common You could go so far as to have billboards and stuff in the newspaper and video and yard signs and whatever There's there's things that are
potentials Um but how would you do that and you would need some sort of community support And could that be um both uh unions within the school district but unions within the
communities could that be business community could that be foundations uh individuals who are the people that might say "Yeah I'm for schools I support public schools I want to see this working together." And could there
be something that leads to uh a ground swell of support as a as an example if you were to do lawn signs that simply said um um strong schools equal strong
communities Um uh you know we support de Deer River and Grand Rapids public schools something like that Um is that a thing that would just you know slightly elevate the the feelings the positive feelings about
public schools So it's a thing that that Matt and Pat asked us to think about and uh as an internal team we looked at this and we thought this is a unique opportunity It's not something that
comes around all the time It is a thing where if the school boards of Deer River and Grand Rapids chose to go out to a referendum there would be information in your traditional media about each of your
referenda Now is there an opportunity to tie some things together obviously the the the things would be different uh that you know their ask would be different than yours but there are some things that would be in common So it's a thing to think about but I think before
we think about it it's more important to start back here um with these with this community engagement work and ask about your questions and your thoughts around um what's doable and and what would you
need to help you know more about your community and and what they think about the situation that you all face questions for Jeff discussion I think these are some points that we brought up
uh in the past workshops that we've had um as far as just brainstorming and what that looks like and where we would need to go and Melissa had brought up a couple of points and one of them was like making sure that we do have all the open
communication that we ourselves are part of that communication not just assembling task forces but that we as the board members are a part of open forums or social media outlets or you know coffee groups um radio ICTV door
knockocking even um if that was even you know options that are available to us and even just discussing deeply educate key community members opinion leaders we all know it's not a secret that we have
a lot of people in our community who have a lot of opinions about what our school district is doing with our finances And we have good and we have bad Um that does not mean that we only make sure that we're communicating with just the people who are saying positive
things about our district We have to make sure that we're engaging with people who also might have some misconstrued information about us as well and making sure that we can educate them the best that we can not obviously trying to change their opinion because they're going to feel how they want to
feel But as long as we are projecting factual information out to all community members that it's not just what you guys are thinking is happening but this is the reality of the situation
Um and then and however that looks uh but that that is stays with within us as we are the main individuals who are responsible for that and getting out that information Um and I don't know what that would look
like with de River but and I don't know what de River's um community is like as far as what their opinions are of what's happening over there Yeah I would almost say let's set Deer River aside for a while until
we we may get there and talk about that a little bit But I the things that I'm Oh please tell me your name Oh I'm sorry I'm Ashley Ashley Ashley Yes Ashley you hit the nail on the head especially on two points especially one making sure
that that schoolboard members are engaged in the process is absolutely critical Um uh one if you decide to go for a referendum you do not want your you don't want this to be the superintendent's referendum This is uh a
board and hopefully this is a unanimous board that says this is what we as your elected officials feel is in the best interest of this school district and our students And so having that board engagement is absolutely critical And
then the second thing that you said that is just spoton is making sure that you're engaging not just with those positive folks but with the negative folks too so that they feel like you listened so that they feel like that
that that that you care about them and they and you may or may not change minds like you said but um if you don't take the time to listen to what they have to say they will criticize you for that And so the beauty of for instance um a um a
public opinion survey that is a scientifically run statistically valid survey is that it gathers opinions from all people positive and negative and so the so the same is true though of all the other community engagement meetings and and such that you would
do Jeeoff I'd completely agree with and with Ashley with your point I would say given the circumstances in Grand Rapids this is an all hands on deck situation here and um you know it sounds like the the board is uh recognizing the need for
you all to get out there and own this and and when you're in that engagement process the listening to people that can be difficult at times to not come across as being judgmental but you know just to really stay as curious as you possibly can and just and just listen But then on
the flip side when you are communicating the district information it needs to be concise clean consistent that you all are on the same page um in terms of the messages that
are being shared out there as well um the um even even this meeting tonight coming out of your OPED discussion what are the core messages key messages that you know I'm assuming this is you know this is recorded I don't know if there's anybody else in the room listening to
this meeting but you know what are those messages that you want people to take away from this from your OPED discussion at this point even you know and so at this point moving forward every step of the way thinking about those key messages and the understandings that you want people to take away from the work
that you're doing is critical Jeeoff did you uh mention timeline with survey yeah So um I'm glad you brought that up because I did not I I was going to in fact I have a slide on timeline and and
um and I'll just zip forward to that Um okay So starting with one year prior to a referendum if you chose to go in November obviously it's too late for that However it's not too late for that Some of these things Matt has been
telling us you've been doing all along And so that's a good thing Building relationships sharing success stories increasing your presence in the community Um I would if I was if I was to look for a November referendum I would want to go
into the field with a survey um in May And it does take some time to put the survey questions together and all of that And so so it it might not go until the end of May And that's probably still okay um you'll still get results in time If
you were to um you know have a have a workshop in uh late June you'd have the results then and it would still give you the opportunity to be able to have um uh the information to make a decision sometime in July if that's when if that's when uh when you were to make a
decision moving forward I it would be something I would move forward on pretty quickly though that the building of the survey especially but actually uh to allow for some time to get some of the other engagement work that Jeff is talking about here wouldn't be a bad thing to
have that out there in advance of the survey itself So that's that survey isn't coming out of the blue for some people Sure Yeah All right So I might be a little bit of a wet blanket Um surveys This would be like the third
one we've done in four years Four years something like that Um we have an economy that's in the tank Uh we have over 800 people locally who've been who are going to or are currently being laid off in our
region And we know that we have to increase the levy regardless So I for one would say no I wouldn't run a referendum because nobody can afford it Um and I don't think we can do this alone We tried So the board and staff
tried last time for a referendum and it failed miserably And the only time we've ever had anything pass here is when it's been led by a community group Not that staff and board weren't engaged
But if it didn't kind of come from a ground swell of community people it fails And I don't know who those community folks are I haven't seen anybody step forward into that space Um and we just did a road show
right i mean we just started to talk about what we're doing Um I don't know I just don't I don't feel good about any of it I just don't I feel like we know what our community feels Um and I don't think we have much
of a tolerance for increased taxes if any and we're already going to increase the taxes because we have to on a levy side Um so as much as I I I like it and I and I as someone who has a research
background love the survey but we have been surveyed to death over the last few years and I just don't think we have much of a community tolerance especially with the layoffs that are coming and we've only seen the first round there
will be more coming on the state side not just the federal side So both from forestry and human services So I just I just I'm sitting here going I would love to do it I just don't I don't feel good about it I don't feel good about it I'm
really hesitant Can you I I'm know we did the survey in June of 2023 I'm not like What other surveys did we do but we did one after the referendum failed
and then even when we did the one in 2015 maybe we did the one right before we pitched the new school Yep And then not only was it a survey but then there was also phone banking that that happened as well So there was there was
that survey as well So at least three for sure that we've done and it's the opinion hasn't really changed and to be fair again our community is middle class to poverty level individuals and and
having a referendum go out especially right now would not it's it wouldn't work It just wouldn't work And regard I mean again like Melissa is saying all of this is phenomenal It's it's a great it's a great
process How does that but it wouldn't work right now with without us It just it wouldn't work We don't even have I mean and unless we decided like in May right if we knew about
the recreational property tax that possibly is going to come through what is what would it look like then even you know because at that point in time even to receive those funds we would have to run a referendum It doesn't matter So do we run a referendum once we know yep
we're going to get those funds only if we you know that resolution passed we're going to get those funds but here's what we need to do And then we say this is how much we're asking for back from the state In order to do that we have to
have our community members say yes This is also what we're going to tack on to that though too This is where that money is going to go Once we get that money then this is where that money is going to go But and it's a really big butt we can't really do anything until we know for sure what the state's going
to even say about that piece or the cuts that are coming from the state's education We're we're stuck in between a rock and a hard place right now on so many different levels It's just we can't I I think you know the the polarity isn't
between the it's more sophisticated than if we run a referendum or not I want to know what they want us to do What do they want education here to look like do they want us to keep all the buildings open that we have open because without more revenue more cuts come That's a
guarantee So so so do they want us to keep all the schools open that we have now or are they okay shutting one down like that has to be part of the discussion then Yeah Do they do they want us to prioritize class sizes in primary and
say "Hey we're okay with 40 at the high school um in order to keep 26 and below in primary grades." Like we're okay with that Like but at some point if if we're going to say no to this what do we have what do we what do we get to say yes to
we have to know what the alternative is what they're okay with because we can't pretend that this is a do we run a referendum or not question It is not that It's if what does the other side of it look like they have to weigh in on
that Yeah And I mean so then the question is is instead of doing another survey do we as the board come together and still do an open forum do we still do something with the radio and ICTV and
then do we still try to figure out who we can rally from the ground up and ask to you know pass that information along and again good or bad I don't care if it's people that have a negative opinion about us I want you to come in so we can
talk to you I want to know what your where did that stem from where did your negative thought process stem from and how do we fix that can we fix that what does that look like that's the other piece of that is I want to know what
parents of kids and want for their kids I don't want someone who's my parents age who's 70s something trying to tune that in because that's how we got to dead last we are now gonna
have 400 or more welders who are laid off from So now what you know I mean it's I mean there's a whole bunch of whatifs and I get your point and we do need to know that but to me that looks like a little bit different process than do we
or don't we run a referendum Yeah Because the what that tells me is we heard you when you voted no the first time and in response to that we do have to make cuts and here's what we have to there's hard decisions decision So what we need from
you now is kind of uh thinking about what does that mean and look like so that to me looks like a little bit different than what I heard here So yeah Well I mean the the agenda item isn't referendum planning This
isn't you know referendum timetable here It's about community engagement I think that's talking because it it the the referendum is only a a is only an option on a list of a bunch of things Um and we have to get to the we have to get to
that point where we can make a decision Um we are not anywhere near being able to do that Yeah So if we just cut out that word entirely and just stick with what Melissa is discussing at this point in time then as far as community engagement and what that looks like and
like hey what is it that you want from us right now like you've made the decision like no said what does that look like and keeping with all of these points because it's phenomenal but that doesn't mean now that we know what you're looking for that doesn't mean
that we're going to turn right around and try to take your money for it That's not what that looks like at this point in time because we can't do that So and your point is really good about our parents Yeah Our one of the takeaways from our referendum in looking at the
data is the 18 to 35 year old voters they're typically underrepresented in votes like that They were extremely underrepresented in our vote So their opinion wasn't really heard in that referendum vote Um and yet it's their
kids right and yet it's their kids getting affected by it Y what do they want for their kids i mean I I I as a superintendent after you know going through cuts for six years we we're going to have to know we're going
to have to know these kinds of things because the there just aren't a lot of chipping away at things that we can do anymore the things that we're going to have to get at are going to be significant and structural if we're going to be able to continue to make reductions right to get
to the point where we need to get So I need to know as a superintendent who's got to make recommendations to you about what programming looks like at ISTD 318 what does our community want that to look like because I'm you know we're kind of out
of out of ideas that way it'll just be more of the same which I don't think that's what our community wants you know they want the basics they want reading the writing the math you know science but what beyond that you know
the key I got and and synergies right I look we've got it community college right in town in my opinion we shouldn't compete with them in anything right now we can't afford we can't afford you know if there's a program they have and
there's a way we can send a kid over there for one hour even if it's a day and I and I'm just throwing stuff out I'm not saying that I know and understand all the intricacies of that but but those are the things I'm looking at and I'm going we just you know even
we just can't afford to in my so the only issue with that is the money follows the student you know so we lose money every time that happens don't save money we don't save money when we lose you know somewhere we have to though I mean you know again one of my arguments
is we've always focused on let's try to find a way to get more money and some of these programs cost us more than we gain somewhere They've got to I mean there's just we can't stay focused on how do we generate more money because it's not
going to happen I mean it's not going to happen through a revenue stream That's not wrong Tom like it's not the kids that we have and how do we keep them And that's really Matt's point too is we need to know what the community wants to
see what what is education going to look like in this district five years from now And the other part of it too is is that you know very hard truthful conversations have to be had with our community members like listen this is this the bottom line is this We get that you guys
are upset because you think that we're going to turn around and try to tax you some more Well you want to know something we're gonna have to keep cutting because we don't have the money to continue on in the fashion in which we are continuing It just isn't going to work So help us help you What does that mean
how do we do that there's just no We keep gently nudging our community We're very polite and we're very calm and that's okay We can do that But we also need to be very
um blunt I think at this point in time which I feel like when we ran the last when we ran the referendum it was more so you know like oh this is this is and it was very truthful It was very blunt This is what we have the potential to lose if this doesn't go through or this is what's going to happen if this
doesn't happen And so I think that it wasn't said as a parent of students in this district right i feel like it wasn't said enough I don't think that it was given to us enough in letting us know like no
seriously this is what we're about to lose This is what's going to happen As a parent of four kids what do you want me to do to make sure that you're not losing out on any kind of educational value for your kids what does that
mean i don't know how else to really communicate that to I don't think our community believes yet Yeah Uh we at this table have eliminated 80 80 positions That's 80 people Those are
human beings that were here doing really good work and we just didn't have money for them Gone Cut $10 million Gone The community's response We're going to You're just wasting money We can make We can vote
this down You're going to have to cut some more Where are you going to cut it administration That's always a That's always a uh the answer Yeah Yeah It's It's the answer Just cut administration because there's way too many administrators we are we are really skinny on
administrators but the community doesn't believe this and that's why it comes down to that one line deeply educate opinion leaders and I put good or bad because it's always it always seems to fall
on you know it always seems to fall on the loudest people are the ones that are full of the most misinformation which is the unfortunate truth but again Like I said where did that come from how did they become so angry and why and how do
we fix that can we fix that well it goes back to Melissa's point Our community is hurting I get that They're hurting I mean I just think I think of the levy and I'm thinking my god retirements went into the tank Like there are some people who are just like looking at their
retirement things and they're like this was how I was supposed to live and now I don't even know I'm going to pay my pay anything Well and you know it's it's our community too You know when we talk
about the cities you talk about that vote The vote here is not the 18 to 35 year olds It's retired people who are on fixed income So every time they're hit they're hit they're hit They can't afford it right the stock market goes down their 401's in that and they got
you know just as we talked about schools we don't have a way to just put a bake sale on and the retired community is in that same position right they don't have an option to start generating more revenue for themselves and and just
what we talked about now we're seeing a rash of layoffs that are going to come through and that's going to hit hit hard because it is the community that can afford to you know and support this right and is
going to push for it because they're the working people so it it's a interesting thing did anybody see in Star Trek last There was a community and and Taylor you might know this but there was a
community in southern Minnesota somewhere who lost a referendum They had like three failed referendums in a row and a group of moms that this is enough And they've raised like 250,000 I mean it's not like a it's not
like good but it could save a couple teachers for a couple years and they know it's not a solution but they basically have started their own campaign to be like we need to save our teachers Like and I feel like we're not
there yet Like we haven't seen that yet But it has to come or you know what it is too though Melissa i think it it's like it's very situational though too because it I feel like every time cuts happen there's this very small window
with our community where like we have to jump on that opportunity right when this is awful but right when cuts happen the community says stuff they react but it's for a very short amount of time and then they go back on to
living their life going doing their dayto-day right but they do engage age for a very short period of time but that how do we catch them then or how does where where's our group of moms that catches them right then and there you
know um how does that how does that work out and and again why does our community just like go on about their day you know like Tom said it's a good point You know the majority of the people in the community are not that 18 to 35 have a lot of them but they're all a part of
the district but then the rest of our community are you know an older population Um so I don't really know I think there's certainly we need more information from the community how we
get that I'm not strugg I don't know that we would get the information probably as an example right I think the survey option while we might have had some I think if it were if we were to go that
route would need to be really focused on this is the situation cuts are going to happen where do you want where do you want to Matt's point which school you're going to close or which you know how do you want us to how
do you want Grandpa schools to look if we can't raise revenue we have to make cuts like we can't keep shipping Now we have to we were using the skele Yeah Well well let's face it I mean that six million that's 10%
That's not and that's taking effect October That's and that just doesn't and and and you know and I mean taxpayers if we try to ask for a referendum and we force that
one through it's going to be brutal and rightfully so to be honest in my opinion I mean that I think it's be brutal 100% agree with you I think it's also going to be brutal for these kids that aren't going to get right the opportunities that everybody else
has Grand Rapids families are accustomed to getting and a lot of the I mean I'll just our staff do a good job of just figuring stuff out I mean and they're not hearing the stories I mean we had two teachers or a few teachers come to
the board meeting a week or two ago and they were talking about you know the one in particular was talking about a change in her curriculum What she didn't talk about is how she's got 35 to 40 kids in every one of her classes And that's just that's become her normal
but our our community does isn't aware of that The parents are like "Oh they must have figured it out." Well they're figuring it out by having to bring in more desks And it's not just at in high school social studies It's in the elementary Our fifth grades next year
will be 30 over 30 Well that hasn't happened in I don't know how long but guess what those fifth grade teachers will soldier up and they'll muscle up and they'll just do it and and you know the the the fifth grade Johnny's and
Suzies aren't going to come home and say "Geez Mom there are so many kids in my class I can't." They're not going to do it because their teachers are going to figure it out And that doesn't mean it's okay It just means that they're burning their candle on more than two ends Um
and if you talk to our staff most of them will say that that they're more tired and more burned and than they've ever felt because they've got more kids that you know for that particular social studies teacher she's grading 30 more
papers than she was five years ago Well I mean in our last negotiations it was can you help us deal with community members i mean who are just negative negative negative negative negative I mean that literally that was an ask from
teachers from teachers like that I mean that I mean I don't know how to solve that stuff because that makes that burning at both ends and then that just that much more difficult right I mean I don't I think for us that's walking very fine
line because how do we engage age appropriately with that kind of language you know i mean I like the idea of having some kind of I don't know if I can call it a focus group because I
think people are kind of like my mom and dad make fun of them Like they have them in my mom and dad make fun of them because they're like we talk and then they never take us anyway So I mean literally like they and they go right they're 70 and they go So
that's but is there a way to have coffee and conversations or something in a drop off or you know I mean is there a way to do it with parents so that we're not asking for more of their time because their time I mean they don't show up to vote because they're running kids I mean
they're just running children And so how do you make that like is there kind of a coffee and conversation at a drop off or is it you know is there a ask a question in the line while you're waiting like I don't I don't know I think we can do
that but I think there has to be an education piece because for the most part people have made up their story and by God they're going to believe the story that they made up because it was a good one that they made up Right And people are not listening to the reality We've laid off way too many people We've
cut way too deeply We've eliminated programs that are important to our kids success to our region success We've done all the we've uh collapsed our uh physical space People are not hearing
that story They're not believing it They want to believe that it's there's someplace else You know there's there's again there's that part of the equation They feel it They're they're feeling it You know it's coming out of their pocketbook And they you know I think they're hearing it but they're also you
they're hearing that's piece but they also have to hear the piece uh of what the schools what our kids are dealing with and that's the piece that they're not paying attention to Well I don't disagree I mean I don't think
they're not paying attention to it They're hurting Again our community is a you know it's skewed towards the retirement age big time You know the places that are passing referendums are all 18 to 35 You know their voting group
is a substantial part of it and they're all wage earners and they got two people in the family earning money you know you know and and they're building places up here So they got money you know it's not you know it's we're dealing with a
community that's just entirely different where these referendums are passing right now I I mean they're they're earning potential you know as Ashley says you look at our our the people and where their income is and it's
dramatically different than than these other communities that are passing these referendums That's the hard part And and and and not only that but they've had a h you know my parents had a place on Vermillion right
you know and they owned it for 40 years And when they got rid of it their taxes were more than they ever paid in their entire house on a house payment in their entire life ever You know at the point they paid it just for the taxes you know because they were grandfathered in when
that legislation came through Well well no but but I mean it's just you know that that the place on the lake just you know it's prime property and and the valuation just skyrocketed you know they didn't have they didn't build any place
on there but it's just it just went you know and that's you see a lot of people here like that And you know when they built it didn't cost anything to build right you know and that and they were just literally trying to maintain it and
that's all you know and we've got a lot of community up here doing that just trying to maintain their place and maintain a life Um that you you know and it's it's just part of our community when we talk about that dynamic of that
age group right and not the having the living group around here being in that working age Um so my question really becomes is how do we engage the people with children or the
people with who are going to have children because that's really I mean if our if we're really in service to kids right like our goal is to make sure kids have a top-notch education when they leave here So whether they decide to go
on to a two-year school or a four-year school or certification or military or whatever welcome it all It's all needed or straight into the workforce or straight into the workforce whatever that means All needed but we want to be the best at making sure that the kids
are ready for whatever step they get Right so then let's focus on the people that have the kids I understand that there are elderly people but but often if their grandkids and their kids and things like that can talk about it all
of a sudden that becomes a much different conversation I say that all the time Who do you want to who do you want to put your medication in your arm who wants do you want milligrams you know who's going to do the math on your pills when you need them like I mean
those are those are and you want that kid to be good at math and science Yeah you do So how do you how do we do that because it seems like that's older is engaged heavily engaged They're paying attention because it hits
their pocketbook But the families that are running like crazy and kids are in it on a daily basis are not as engaged But those are the people we need engaged So for me that's the question How do we engage the group that we've never really had a chance to hear from
and I will say this personally you know I'm engaged because I have 75 kids that live in my home I have four children obviously but the only reason why we're engaged is because we have so many children I work you know with kids in
our school district I don't disagree with you Melissa If I didn't do the things that I do with the district already I would just go about my day I would never know because the teachers that all of my children have they don't
they never complain I do not I mean like I'm friends with some teachers so obviously I hear like a little bit of grumble but beyond that if I didn't make those relationships with those teachers and staff members and I didn't have you know the access that I do to the schools
that are in our district I I would just keep on trucking My husband works I work We would just keep on going we would just keep paying those you know levies We would just keep on going And I've said it personally I personally would pay for the for a referendum But that's
just because my husband and I can do that I don't suggest that anybody else in the district do that because not everybody else is in the same financial boat as myself right my mother does not support it because my mother can't She's not elderly but she's older She's
retirement age she can't afford to do those things Like Tom is saying we the older community is engaged The younger community not so much because we just have these blinders on where we're just like go to school do what you need to do let's get going Like just keep on moving
Like I just I don't disagree with that part about how do we engage that group in our community how do we how do we engage the parents more who are just like "Hey little Johnny have a great day at school I'll pick you up at you know
whatever And then they don't have those conversations at home afterwards because they're just assuming well he got a a he's doing great You know how do we how do we continue those conversations how do we co-parent essentially how do we do
that with our community members if if I could insert here that's that you can do that Yes you can engage your parents Parents you're right They are very busy and they are hauling kids around and the kids get sick and the
kids have practice and the kids do all of the stuff and it is busy and man I am right there with you when you say yeah my husband and I when we we're we're just barely able to kind of keep the wheels in the bus but how can you make
this the story that the the talk around the dinner table when you get that rare opportunity when all of you are around the dinner table at the same time it is possible to do that um through a variety of ways And one of the things is this that you probably
have seen this many times before where um where it takes seven times of seeing something before you actually remember it before it it it sinks in with you And part of it is about that repetition Part of it is about like Ron says the
consistent the clear consistent messaging um that is used over and over and over again You keep saying it until you can't stand saying it anymore but that's when they're hearing it for the very first time Um but a couple of other points I want to make because the
discussion you're having is is is great It is a really healthy and and uh um valuable discussion but I would say a couple of things Um one is your assessment of the community is probably pretty accurate when you say the economy
is in the is bad 401ks are in the tank um people are getting laid off from their jobs it is not a good time uh for asking for people's money right now There is no doubt about that Um the other thing that you were saying is that
they may not understand what the ramifications of the cuts that you've been making really are They may not know that next year there's going to be more than 30 kids in fifth grade classrooms They may not know that at the high
school level it's more than that Um and so getting that message out there and just keep continuously hammering on that telling people it it will and when you say it enough it will start to sink in and people will start to hear that and
people will start to question whether or not that's the thing that they want for their community Um a couple more things I wanted to mention and that is um there is good news for you and there has been a lot of of um challenging news for you to
share right now and because yeah the situation is not ideal But there is good news for you and that is that most other school districts really are about 30% families uh and 70% that do not have
kids in school Sometimes it's 2080 Um and so you're not alone in having a a a greater proportion of your community uh not having kids in school and you can still uh pass a referendum You can still engage with people and have them support
you even though they don't have kids in school Um and so the so so part of what I'm thinking here is you know what worked and what didn't in the 2023 referendum is on the one hand it might be that uh senior citizens voted
overwhelmingly against the referendum and 18 to 35 year olds maybe they weren't in favor and so they didn't turn out or maybe they just didn't turn out And if it's that we can solve that too we can get
them to turn out We can put the effort in that it takes to get people engaged even when they are that 18 to 35 age group um that is least likely to vote but when they do vote they're most likely to vote yes And so other
districts have made that work and I think that it can happen here too So where do we go i'm I'm gonna go out on a limb here Um and again we're not talking about referendum but when or if that time
would come Um whether it's this November or a year from then or two years from now You know when you're talking about that my demographic the retirey demographic you got 420 retirees there
Can you flip that OPED situation that negative into a positive as well you know with those 420 retirees that do have skin in the game in terms of the financial stability of your school district as well you know and may maybe
that can be flipped a little bit and as you're addressing and working through that challenge you can also take see that as an opportunity to build some support from that demographic That's a significant number I'm you know maybe they don't all live in the district but
you know that's just food for thought So I I mean just trying to keep you know moving forward here I think there's a few questions One is do we think that some form of community ga engagement is important and like is there agreement
around that especially uh you know targeted at our parent group potentially So that's I think a question I think the second question is if we think that's important is working with someone like Daylor useful um and helpful would that
be helpful to us and I think if the answer to that is yes I think a path forward might be to have some kind of a subcommittee work with Jeff and Ron on a proposal that they could bring to the board for consideration I'm just throwing that out
there as a path kind of forward here might take some time to think on that I don't know that I'd want to vote on that tonight but we're not gonna vote tonight So yeah I don't know I think those are the questions we have to ask Those are all fair questions Do we think it's
important is it is it you know is working with a firm like Daylor's you know going to help us accomplish our goals and then um how do we get to get a proposal that works um targeting on the things we want to target on and using these strategies we
think are going to be useful For sure I I think that's pretty valid approach I mean I think that would take us at least get us the information that we need to make the decisions going at our next
board meeting And I do I do think we need communication strategies even if we have a survey around what people want because I think being transparent keeping that connected whether it's road shows or coffee and conversation or whatever like
a whole bunch of tools like here's what's happening here's what that means right and how do we get the stories out about classrooms and teachers and things like that because if I heard you right
like we just kind of put our head down and do the work right and good things happen but the sacrifice for what that means is that story is not really being teachers are going home with you know you know that I think the at some point there has to be a reconciliation of
expectations right like that's when tension and frustration occurs when there's mismatched expectations and at some point there's going to that's just going to elevate and so to to Dave's point earlier
like we have to get clarity from the community about what its expectations are because at some point we're not going to be able to continue to do what we've been doing and meeting most of their expectations based on the resources we have So expectations will
need to change We need to know what those are [Music] Um otherwise we're just going to be living in this tension At least at that point if we know that the answer will continue to be no to to new resources at least we can say this is what you told
us you wanted This is what we're providing Um and I you know I'll sit here as a superintendent and say I sure hope it's not more of the same because that's not what I want to see That's not what I want to be serving up for my community
and for the kids here They deserve more than what we're doing right now That's what they deserve Um that's what kids before now got And the only reason they're not getting it is because when they're a student here if they were a student here 10 years ago they'd be
getting more If they were a student here 10 years ago they'd be getting more attention from their teacher Um it's just a function of when they happen to be coming to school here And I I don't like that I don't like that And I don't
I mean there are retirees everywhere in every community And we don't have the market cornered on people that are retired and can't afford to pay for it We don't have the market cornered on that So it the all of this boils down to
priorities at some point That's what it all boils down to at some point and choices And people's priorities and choices can be different Like that's that's part of it But we also don't know until we ask We got to ask one way or another Whether that's in a ballot or in
a meeting we got to ask what people's priorities are Now a couple thoughts One is you don't have to go back 10 years you just go back to last year Um and two I think that while a survey
or community engagement or whatever allows some people to share their voices um not everybody and we may make the wrong choice based on the some people an election allow gives everybody the the
voice And so I also don't want to presume that because somebody got laid off that they don't want to still have great scores And I'm not you know I'm not saying that I mean it's a terrible
situation all around However I don't want to make a decision based on that and assume that their intent then is to make a sacrifice in education instead of somewhere else Yeah I
think the one concern I have is if you go to voters I think you got to go to them with something that's going to have a chance for success right otherwise they're just going to get even more ingrained and more mad and and risk
I I mean I'll be frank you you know tonight to hear the issue we've got with the 5 million is very frustrating right and the and the initial reaction is somebody who is running this place right you know that's the initial
reaction you know and and that that didn't get created yesterday you know that's been coming and it's a challenge right um but people react and and then they ingrain and that and you're just going
to make them matter you know and you're not going to So so see if you go to them with something you better have a chance to go to a success at it or or every time you go it's just going to be less and less chance You're fighting more and more of an uphill
battle every time I think Um you know I you know until you get a community coming back to you and saying "Hey this you know that's we need this We're past that point We've been in this now for Dave and I for ever Feels like since the
first year I've got on the board but we have never seen like that community swell of my goodness we need more Our kids deserve more." And we haven't seen that We've seen it in pockets but and a
little bit disappointing And I'm I'm gonna say this and it's probably recorded but we cut Spanish which made me sick to my stomach when we cut Spanish in the middle school Like I thought oh my god that's just an awful thing Two people maybe three showed up I
mean small We cut we cut tennis which we don't even have to do activities We could cut every activity and we don't have to do them and we get a whole entire group shows up for 10
kids like it just it just so when you start talking about what are priorities like some of this makes me a little bit sick to my stomach Well I think what honestly has happened is that to be very frank it hasn't been painful
enough yet Yep And when it starts really hitting in the thing the librarians that have been gone the German thing that's been gone all the all these opportunities are gone but it's death by a million cuts It's not a painful enough thing that people are saying and
creating a ground swell that says "Okay here's the moms that are gonna or whatever." Yeah Yeah I mean I just used Anadale right because that was But I think that's that's what it is It's just not painful enough And I think we have to understand in the community what's the pain tolerance because we certainly
can't keep it on the backs of our teachers We can't keep doing what we're doing We also can't just be very frank we can't be doing what we're doing to our administrators either right because our administrators are overt taxed overburdened regardless of what the some in the community feels It's incorrect
And so we have to we have to ask the community what um there's going to have to be the lesser of two evils No choice That's awesome I think your three questions are legitimate Matt We come back we give
some time to think about those things and come back to it Um be nice I also have this this like forward thought process of this continual death spiral And it sounds terrible but I
don't see this I don't see where we are because we cut services we cut opportunities we lose families we now have less money we don't keep up with inflation we cut deeper cut deeper we get deeper Where does it end or is it or
is it better to just um bite the bullet and end up in statuto operating debt and let the state figure it out I said it during the forum when we were running for school board If we keep going in the direction that we're going we're not going to have a Grand
Rapids area school district because we can't afford to keep doing this and we're not going to have anything left to cut And like you said what what is what cut is going to be the too deep of a cut
for the community to to really let us know like okay okay you were serious Now we'll figure it out with you right so but I think at what point does the
economics of the region take a hit right so we know when we're bringing in businesses when we are doing recruitment for new businesses to come in or businesses are looking at expansions or
you're the people that are coming in are saying "What do your schools look like?" First question what do your if I have to move a workforce here or I'm moving here what do your schools look like what do you provide for kids it's the first
question they ask every time Every time after you know second one how is it yeah Right Both in a great place Both both in a great place Right I did talk to a principal this weekend at a tennis match that was just having a fa family
conversation with a new family moving to town talking about how excited they were about the IB program that we have and the marching band program because they're coming from the marching band family that's relocated or whatever Um and that's one of those things that yep
that's here for now Yeah we get a lot of people would talk about the IV program because the other piece about that that people I don't think understand is do you want your 16year-old kid with 20ome year old males in an ICC
building that's just a question you know because that that's what and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the men or the children but no that's what you just did I never thought about it like that Thank you very much Melissa
Jeff does that kind of work for you on your end if we if the board takes a a little bit to sort of sort that those questions out i mean do you feel like those are the right questions or would you add or amend any of those for the board to think about i think you're all
on the right track I think that you know I think the bottom line is that um that you think you know the community pretty well but you also think that the community maybe doesn't have all the information that it needs about the impact of the previous cuts that you've made and about the impact of cuts that
you may have to make into the future So there is a combination of one um needing to provide information and two truly understanding where the community is at And the only way you can
do that is is is by talking to people All right we'll be in touch Jeff thank you Thank you Sounds good Very good to meet all of you and I recognize again the challenge that you all face It's not an easy thing I want you to know that um your school district is still doing good
things I don't know enough about it and I and I know you know a lot more about it I can tell you that there are still success stories I can guarantee it And that um that despite the fact that this feels like an incredibly negative and and horrible situation there are there
have got to be some things that you can hold on to some hope for And your community really needs you as leaders in the community uh to be there as champions And I think that you're can you can do that uh despite the fact that you've got these challenging situations
to deal with And so so I again I really appreciate your service Thank you for being elected members of your schoolboard community So so keep up the good work everybody And and I would add your students are very fortunate to have a school board that deeply cares about
them That was very clear in in listening and being a part of this discussion tonight So again thank you for what you're doing and um I gosh I hope we have the opportunity to help you folks Um we We would really like to help make
a difference in Cran Rapids Y good to meet you all Have a good night Thank you Thank you Uh moving on on the agenda safe routes to schools RGM parking
lot instruction Superintendent Gross Um so this is a followup from the U meeting our last meeting Um we had an opportunity to sit down um uh your reps to the facilities committee uh Dave and
Tom had a meeting with uh Woods with um Schwarz who's current low bidder um and others to get some questions clarified and answered Um so these are the two pieces that um came forward last time
for approval one is the contract with Schwarz or the agreement with Schwarz and then the second is the grant agreement um for the safe routes to school project So looking for approval on these two separate
items going to award bid Schwarz and one um to approve the grants So put that on the agenda for the next No you for action tonight You can take action on this if you want I'd make a motion to approve the
contract with Schwarz Second Got a motion and a second Discussion um all your questions answered because um you guys were asking really really good questions and I was waiting
for both of you to have discussion on that So go ahead Tom Sorry Well I just wanted to bring out one one thing that that came out through uh through our meeting Um you know obviously anytime you see a
a bid come in and it's it's higher than the grant amount you're you know and and we talk about financial stuff right now you want to make sure you're doing the right thing right especially when it isn't necessarily in the classroom either right i mean you need to keep
kids safe obviously Um one of the things I was glad to hear about um were there you know there are some things in here that would be routine maintenance that are going to get addressed and it's a timely thing to
do it I mean it's going to be much more cost effective for the district to do it now right when they got people on site and and they're considering those things So so that's part of the equation in that delta you know which which made me
obviously help my comfort level a lot there Um and and I would say um I would hope we do a little better job of expressing that you know because that that helped appease me a lot when when that came out in that discussion Um
the other thing obviously that was a of of concern is the terms of the contract right you know making sure that that the 29 delta or whatever it is does not become 99 and right and chill into our fund even more right um you know part
part of the terms of what came out was um because a grant is coming from the from Minnesota um and the DOT specifically um the terms of the contract follow Mindot terms which are pretty specific on any overages and and
that's where the per unit quantities came in when we got into the discussions on that So it outlines if there are any excesses here's what they're based on right and here's the terms that those can be requested for It's not just a
wide open all of a sudden they start charging you three times what it was for So I was it it helped it helped me a lot and made me much more comfortable with this with that and and I'm I'm comfortable with it I also think that
that I'd add that um right now the delta is like 29 grand something like that Um that do you know the fund balance is for the long-term facilities maintenance so um even if
it's god forbid but even if it does blow into 99,000 we have the funds to cover it that aren't going to take teachers out of the class So it's not like we're going to get the general fund if we do end up going out if we something unexpected occurs That gives me
confidence that and the fact to's point that the state of mind dictates the terms of the agreement We don't really have the opportunity to do a G&P Further discussion hearing none All in favor say I I I
Opposed Motion passes Mr Chair the second piece of this is the grant agreement Um so this is the agreement that uh that goes along with the safe routes to school that enables us to to
um to get the $469,700 from uh state for approval to accept that I like a motion to accept the grant Do I have a motion do I have a second second Second by
Ashley Discussion I just want to mention again that this is this is one of those things that since I've been here it's been discussed at nauseium the middle school pickup middle school pickup I mean and it's always it's always been we hear you we
can make some small things and here's some high viz vests and some more radios and some signs and training and things like that but there's never been enough money to dedicate to this and so this is a really huge thing to take care of and
it's even um better by the fact that uh it's being paid for from a grant and hats off to you know Ann Campbell again and I know she worked closely with Matt Wood and from the city so big thank you to them I I guess an another point that
was kind of an eyeopener for me during that meeting was um you know the fact that you know school district actually owns that road right you know from the fence all the way down to um oh the 99
people in county out of 100 yeah and and you know so all the all the traffic we're maintaining that all the city traffic that's going through there We're maintaining that And you know um it it was a little bit of an eye openener for me I didn't realize you know and when
you look at the city layout that's the road that you can come off 169 and get up on Ridgewood on I I mean it's it's kind of a you know we're we're getting it a little bit from
the only indication that that's a private road would be that the speed limit is 13 miles that I had a parent tell me the other day that you guys don't own this road and I was like okay well sure sure we don't but I know we do but no that's a that's that's public
okay it's not but okay but I guess to clarify uh my understanding is that uh we can't put this money in our pocket and put it into teaching funds It's different different buckets just to be
clear and transparent Yes Further discussion hearing none All in favor say I I motion passes
any other business So at the risk of keeping you guys really love I just want to do flag a little bit Um so with I ask um I want to flag it because I I think it's important and I and I want folks to know
um the with all the districts cutting there are some that are impacting the collaboration Oh and that brings a lot of issues to the table like if there's less people involved in a certain area
can you still afford to do it with I ask right Um so there's conversations that are happening I've asked that the board and the superintendent at least come in and the superintendent and board do presentations on what they anticipate cuts to be so that IS can better plan
because this is the first time really that IS has really had to look at multiple school districts that are cutting at the same time Uh last year Hill City withdrew their technology contract with IASK Um so that was a
little different Well if four or five do it what does that leave for you know so I want I just want to be really open like we're going to be having a conversation around what's cutting how does that impact um Greenway just uh
decided to do their own investor early edge So they're not going to be part of that What happens to early edge when Greenway pulls out um so we'll be letting go of people there too So I just wanted to put that on folks radar because I don't think a lot of people
think about it when we do cuts because we kind of focus like this but when we do cuts and where that those cuts happen could impact other programming and uh right now nothing's hit career pathways but certainly that's a that's a
possibility as we go down the road So just wanted to put that out there as as we see this kind of dark cloud hanging over a lot of districts I will say because we kind of saw the cards a little bit before everybody else that
our cuts probably have never been as deep as what some of these schools are going to do right off right out of the gate because they didn't see it Feel a lot better Feel a lot better You know any other thanks for picking up yes you know I tried That was all what I got
That was all what I got Like was it a pick up or was it lowering everyone else around you i don't know I don't know We're gonna adjourn the meeting Reminder tomorrow's