Yes, no, definitely, I would remember her was like, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I'm good. All right, yes, um, and I, you saw the agenda, right ? So you're, it's, you know, by your 1st, 1st, if you want to offer your thoughts on the budget. OK Oh, I have some. Oh, not me. I'm kidding. I was
like, Oh, I have. say everyone agrees with what I'm doing. Got it. with what I have on the present it's this one. Does that make sense? Yeah, and what's
Thank you. this this I know more than I do. don't know what you're talking
about. That was good to me talking it slower. Yeah, well, they have all those forms. Yeah, like just laying in the snow right next to the walkway,
like where the, I'm like I see in the. you know I keep track of parking lot for 4 months. I weird. I feel like we do that one moment. Oh yeah.
Holy cow Oops Oh well. I will let her know. Yeah.
That's Darwin Fest. How was it? 30 right now. OK, I am. ready. OK. museum He when you guys are. Not now, don't, I didn't. on its own.
Oh. budget OK. Good evening. Um call to order the meeting of the Hamilton Wyndham Regional School Committee at 6:32 p.m. on Thursday, February 12, 2026.
Um, I'd like to remind everyone that this meeting is being recorded and live streamed on HWCAM. Um and um just to let everyone know, the
first item of business is a public hearing on the um our our Hamiltonwyham Regional School District FY 27 budget. So public hearing is a little bit different than our regular
citizen's comments. This is an opportunity, um, for citizens to offer um comment to share your thoughts about the budget so much. Oh, I see we've got is joining us he's to get her on. School committee member on Zoom,
uh, hi, Julia. All right, so we're just getting the budget hearing started. um so a little bit different than um Citizens' comments. It is an opportunity for you to share your thoughts, um, to provide us with, um
your feedback, um, but it's also an opportunity to ask a question regarding the budget if you have one, and so if that's something that you are interested in and you want to ask a question, we are here to answer. It updated, so um, all right, and if I walk
we're gonna start with um Vinny is gonna give us a little bit of an overview. You wanna put it up turn on Sorry, uh. It's OK. I was trying to talk a bit there I know thank
you. Perform a poem or something. site Julia, can you hear No. Oh, hold on, let's just make sure we can, our Zoom is working here.
Julia, can you hear me Yes OK
Thank you. I can't hear Dana She doesn't say I'm not talking. We're just waiting for Vinny to get set up popping his computer on. OK. We're seeing what he's watching currently on Netflix and uh
It was good. I watched it. Um, OK, thank you guys for joining us tonight. We are here to Vinny, I'm gonna make sure that Julia can hear you. Can you
hear Vinnie? OK good. Sorry, good. Sorry yep. Sorry,, uh, so we are here to start our public hearing number 2 for the superintendent's final FY 27 budget request. I'm gonna try to keep my portion brief because really this time should be allotted to the
citizens for uh any questions they might have, but just to kind of reiterate what Dana said . Uh, the public hearing really allows, uh, citizens to voice their support, ask their questions, uh, and have dialogue between the school committee and the administration, uh, to
receive answers about some of their questions. Unlike our normal school committee meeting, uh, under the public, uh, comment period where there is not dialogue between the school committee administration, uh, and the citizens. It also works in the reverse. It allows the
school committee, uh, to gain the the knowledge and the concerns of taxpayers and of citizens, uh, and really to take their um questions and recommendations into consideration before you guys go to vote on the budget, so it really works both ways and our
public hearing is really an important part of the budget process. Uh, so just to jump right in and review the numbers briefly, our FY 27 final gross budget. This includes both our operating and our debt service. Uh, it's coming in at just over $51
million. Uh, this is an increase of approximately 2.5 million year over year, which represents a gross increase of 5.23% from there we remove all of our offsets and revenues and for FY
27, we are actually, uh, projecting a decrease in revenues of approximately $283,000. Uh, this number would be added into the overall net budget, the net assessment that we, um, turn on to the two communities for FY 27
, our net operating in debt service budget is 41.76 million or an increase of 2.8 million year over year or 7.25%, uh, presented to you tonight in front of you right now is our Desi chart of accounts that breaks down our operating
portion into the DEI categories. Uh, just to briefly talk about our largest year over year changes, uh, salaries are our biggest increases year over year between our callers, uh, between the cola are stepping increments , uh, our salary scale
advancements and any changes to our longevity. We are seeing an increase year over year of 1.38 million, which is our largest increase uh that we've seen year over year. Uh, in addition, we are seeing large increases in our health insurance premium
costs. We are estimating an increase, uh, compared to FY 26 of approximately $600,000. Uh , we have also enhanced our investments in our maintenance and facilities, uh, in our requesting an additional
$501,000 to take care of our buildings. Um, this has led to a lot of difficult decisions, and one thing we've incorporated is a reduction of 7 staff members, uh, over FY 26. Uh, we are realizing savings budget to budget of approximately 4
1800 $0 with these seven staff members. Um, some other big savings year over year, we are realizing $212,000 from our natural turnover of staff from FY 26 into our FY 27 budget. Uh,
we also have a few retiring staff members where we're realizing another $186,000 savings for FY 27. When you factor all these things in, uh, and you look at again that $2.8 million year over year assessment increase and you
apply the new 3-year, uh, rolling average of student population, how many students are from Hamilton and how many are from Wenham. Uh, we have a new FOY 27 final budget for Hamilton coming in at 27.3 million, uh, which is an
increase of just under 1.7 million year over a year or 6.5% , uh, for the town of Wenham uh, the overall change year over year is an increase of 1.1 million or roughly 8.54%. That is just a brief overview of the
budget and I will, uh, give the time to the community for any comments they would like to make or any questions they have. Thank you, Vinny
Welcome. Thank you. Um, I'm Bridget O'Donnell at 105 Main Street in Wenham. Um, so I was wondering, I went to the, that Beverly Civic Center gathering, um, trying to learn about things. Um, so a question I was
wondering if you had an answer to was if chapter 70 funding is reformulated? Would it impact this school year or the next school year, um, or, or is that something that's just like a hope.
Is there any Yeah, so the, as you know, the state's working on, they're doing their due diligence, if you will, to investigate chapter 70 and some of the impacts that are being reported all over the state and their committee, I
think, isn't due to report until June. Uh, so it really wouldn't impact , uh, the budget only because they'll they'll put out a report . They'll be I would suspect, a year or two of deliberations or maybe at least a year because it'll have
to go through, um, some process of redeveloping the formula, uh, which it's super complex so it wouldn't, it wouldn't happen overnight so what we're hearing from the superintendent's group is that it'll be a while before any realized if any realized
changes would occur, um, we, we can continue to rely on little bumps from the state supple ment al budget, but in places like regional school districts last year they gave us the supplemental budget on June 28th , I think it was, and you can't spend it then, so it drops for
us it drops to excess and deficiency, so it, it's the state is trying to um use the millionaires' tax access to supplement and if you look at the governor's budget, there are a number of line items related to education that are related to that supplemental budget so I
think that's how they're gonna try to bridge the gap, but I'm not sure how long it it will actually take. And about the regional transportation funding as well as that. I know that we've never been, that's never been fully realized of what was promised, the governor's governor's budget
right now is projected to I think 85%, which is, which is big, yeah, uh, it was 57% I think last year. Um, I'm not sure of the number yet this year , but it's, it's, it's not been fully realized in you know, as people know, the governor's budget is step one.
It'll go to the house and go to the Senate. They'll bring their versions of the budget, and then they'll do some, uh, cross collaboration to figure out what the final numbers are, but it's, it's so far it's. transportation is a little bit higher than it was last year. OK . And is there like, I mean,
just for the public to know and um is there a, is there like a message that, you know, that we can share with other people about how to advocate for these things with our reps, you know, like a, a message that, you know , while we're going through this
, and they obviously heard how many school districts are having districts uh districts are having, um, difficulties across the state. Um, if there was a way that we had a unified message from the school districts. Um, I know, well, I know like the MTA has some
messaging, but I wonder if it, if it comes from school committees or if that's just citizens' jobs to be aware and just, I thought it'd be nice to just to like let other people know cause that was something I was not educated about, um, just starting to learn about it. So I think it'd be nice to let other people know that that's
something we're trying to figure out, just, you know, trying to squeak out a a gym divider, you know, if there was something we could do in the future, I think, hopefully a lot of people would participate in in supporting that. Thank you. Um, so I, I can answer a little bit about that.
Um, I, I know it's, you're also ready not to have an answer, but I'm, um, so a little bit, um, so the committee hasn't voted on the budget yet, so we can't sort of say too much right now, but what I want to let you know is
just below the budget agenda item there is an item regarding communication. So just to let you know, we, that is the following immediately following, um, because it, it is going to be really critically important once we have uh
voted upon and approved budget is going to be critically important that um citizens do have some talking points to to understand what this budget provides, why a budget was created this way and so please
know, yes, we're thinking about that and those are, um, and that it is that's really helpful to know that people want to be able to accurately communicate what the budget is providing and um, yeah. I don't, does anybody else have anything else to add on that? Um , I would just add that you
mentioned the MTA is, you know, creating a way for lots of people to sign this fiscal crisis letter that goes to the governor, um, if you, if you search MTA fiscal fiscal crisis. They've invited anybody in the community to sign it. So that's a way to kind of add your name
to a list of names in support of funding these programs better. All right, thank you. And that's for everybody. It wasn't Eric didn't you talk about it in one of your weekly communiques too. So if you're
not, you should make sure that you're subscribed to Superintendent Tracy's because it was, he sent that out. I. She was with us last week at the , at the thing that Hannah Bowen did. Can I add one more thing to it? So you asked a good question
about citizenry, and I think the , the hard part is helping your average citizen understand the realities of the, the budget and how it works in relation to even how the towns were, um, part of it is, as we put things out, we try to educate people even when you're looking at chapter 70 and
just saying chapter 70 has not changed for our district over a 15-year period, more than 1% or 2 right now we're at 10% of our of our total budget in Chapter 78, um, our budget continues to go up 67, 8%, uh,
over time, but that that number never rises. On the other side, the towns are wrestling with unrestricted government age, which is aid, which is called in a slang term AA, it's part of the realities of why the towns
are having difficulty responding to the needs of the school districts because they, unrestricted government aid has not changed the number $1.3 billion was the number in 2007. That number has not changed since then by more than 1% or 2%
over, over that time period. So you're getting it from multiple sides when you start to look at the, the aid and, and where it sits and, and where it where it makes the most impact and, you know, towns are scrambling to try to do the same thing schools are. So when you get two towns, small.
that are doing that, it's really incumbent on the citizens we need to understand the bigger problem, and that's, you know, part of the town meeting process , but part of, I think the torch that we all hold in the next 8 weeks as we move towards town meeting.
Uh, Katie O'Brien, Katie Katie O'Brien Katie, 114 4th Street. Uh, so I have two questions. What will happen if the school budget is not passed at town meeting, and then if it, the budget is passed, what will happen if the override is not passed? Good questions. You want to
start I can do it. Don't do it. It's loaded. Yeah, it's, it's a loaded question there because it , there's a lot of scenarios, um so we don't know 100% the warrants haven't been set yet, so we're not sure how the budget itself will be presented. We have been in conversation with
both towns and they both seem to be splitting, which is what they've done in the past, saying , here's what fits under the levee, the part of the school budget that fits on the levy, and here's the piece that's the override. Um, and those numbers will be different, depending on how much
a quote fits under the levy. Um when you go to town meeting and you vote, you vote, usually you vote for the town budget, the school budget in one that's under the levye, that's one vote , and then anything outside of the levy is the override amount
that would be a 2nd vote. That second vote, well, actually all those votes have to pass in both communities If an override vote doesn't pass in one community and passes in the other, it fails. Um, the school committee has by law 30
days to determine what to do next, so they have to come back together and decide, do we just accept the the amount under the levy? Do we go back to the towns in another special town meeting with an amount of money less
than, or do we go back and say no, we really need this, and we're going to come with the same number. So, so there's a lot of options there, um, and there's a lot of scenarios because as as people may or may not know, even though you vote for an override at town meeting, you still have to go to the ballot and vote. So even
though it passes one place and fails and there's so many votes that need to occur. It's uh that's why it becomes a loaded question because you're now trying to map out all these scenarios that may or may not be true. but it's, it is, uh, something complex that I think people
really need to get to understand . that help? do Hello Jen Caufield, 25 Juniper Street in Wenham. Do we know the
number of the overrides for Hamilton and Wenham at this point, meaning numbers from the towns. Excuse me, uh, the last number they published was from our quintuple board meeting and at that time it was just under 1.7 million from their end for
Hamilton, sorry if I said something different. uh, which that would equate to about a tu be production from the school district So what would that mean for Wenham? Uh, for their override. how much would they need for their
override just under $500,000 is the last number they told us. Um, I can't know, you can't probably answer this, but do you believe that's going to come down? I believe Hamilton I'm not sure about Wenham's
OK. Point of history for anybody who hasn't lived here. Um, the largest override that has ever passed in the town of Hamilton was $1.28 million. And that was a heavy lift. I've lived here
for 30 years. I've served on those political action committees, all of the overrides . It is not tenable That's a 1.6 or $32 million override in the town of Hamilton . I just think it's irresponsible to try and go for
that at this point. Thanks. Thank you I, can I just say one thing? I think it's important for people to know that no nobody's budget is final. We're the town's um
don't finalize their numbers and their warrant until the end of February, early March , and that's when we really hone in on here are the exact numbers so there will be some movement in in numbers because sometimes we're waiting for an insurance
figure. Sometimes they're waiting for a payment from uh excuse me, a, a, a number for their insurance company or their health insurance, I mean, so those are all things that will impact along the way. It might be less. It, it might be a little bit less, but it is, you know, it's, it's, um.
and it depends on what they move under the levee and what they're willing to move. We've had conversations to try to say to the towns, the schools, um, you know, right now uh outside the levee, would the towns be with keep some of their asks if you
will, in within the override as well. So that's also helpful because it moves a little bit more of the school side money back under the levy, so there's there's good conversations going on. I have to say the five boards have come together more than we usually do to try to
work through some of the process questions on that so we'll finalize numbers. It will unfortunately be after. break when we actually can say this is what it's going to be because the warrant book will be finalized at the select board meetings.
OK Anybody else on a provide us with any budget questions, comments? OK All right
Everybody good? All right, um, at this point we'll close the public hearing portion, um, of the meeting. um, we are at it's 653, um, so
we normally start the meeting at 7, but just so everyone knows that time's on the agenda are always estimates, um, but we've, I hope I'll just look to the committee without objection. I'd like to skip over the citizen's comments , um, and do that at 7 o'clock,
um, just because our citizens we do have people that like to offer citizens comments and we do, they have come to expect that that happens at 7 o'clock, um OK, um, would, I didn't hand it out. Would someone be willing?
to read, um, school committee protocol number 10, which without me having printed it out I printed this one out for you. Oh, you want it? Sure, I can do 10. Kristen, thank you. It's, it's loading. Hang on. Um
Fortunately, I can't scroll down . Here we go. Oh, it's up there OK. Oh, great. Um, members will refer constituent concerns and complaints, including issues relating to district personnel to the appropriate person within
the district chain of communication. Thank you Um, next up we have a portion of our school committee, uh, mission statement. Amy, the Hamiltonyham Regional School District school committee's mission is to ensure our schools create graduates
with a passion for lifelong learning, together with the critical skills needed to maximize their potential The Hamiltonunnerm Regional School Committee will lead and inspire a district that attracts and retains high quality educators by acknowledging and respecting their expertise and
professionalism. Thank you. So right, I know it's very quire. Um, next up, uh, is the superintendent report . to you, Eric. Sure Thank you. Just a couple of
things, um, I did talk about, um , a couple last week I was at. Oh sorry. Well, actually it's, let me take the share off because it's, you're not gonna be able to read it anyway, um. last week I went to, uh, I was
part of a um panel of local uh educators and uh people within the communities of Beverly and Hamilton Wyndham uh, to talk about the budget, school budget stuff, uh, related to chapter 70 unrestricted
government aid, all the things we started to talk about a little earlier. Um, Representative Hannah Bowen, uh, hosted. We had a number of uh state reps in the room with us, a number of people from the press and had a good conversation about, you know, some of the things that we're
all working on, people were on the panel that were representatives of local PACs, uh, CPACs, which are the special ed parent groups and we had our own union president, the Beverly Union president, just talking together as one about some of the issues
that we're facing and give us a good opportunity to give, uh, feedback to uh several state reps and uh and a person who represented the senator, Senator Lovely's office as well, so it's really a good opportunity for us
to get out, get information out, get them to hear kind of from the ground, what's going on we had a good conversation with everybody in the room Um, started out as a panel and broke into small group discussions, so it was, uh, I think it was fruitful for everybody. and I think it's, it's one of
the things that we should probably look at doing in in our own community, um just, just within Hamilton and one of them Uh, this, this week, if I was only able to get to 2 out of the 3 this week, but the kindness
concerts at the, uh, elementary schools always amazing. Um, I wanna thank our music staff, Ella Martin, Kate Hayashi, who did a wonderful job preparing the kids, uh, the, the interesting thing we dealt with was everybody was worried if I was
going to call a 2 hour delay on the half day, which, you know, wasn't, wasn't feasible, but the uh the concerts went off without a hitch. Parents were able to get there, um, and I think everybody I talked to was like just just loved it. So it's a great way for our community to get into our schools and see some of the things the kids are
doing. Um, also in talking to some of the high school and middle school kids, they reminded me that course selections will be getting right after vacation for next year, uh, fast, I was kind of blown away. I caught off guard as many years as I've been a principal, I forgot that that
was the timeline, but um you know, the middle school has already worked with 8th graders to help them to understand what the process is. They do it all electronically and then uh what the course selections are teachers will do, uh, course recommendations over the next few weeks and then
right after vacation I think starting on the 26 kids will start to go into the portal and uh make their selection, so kind of a fun thing and um I think the uh the one thing I do want to mention that people need to pay attention to, and I will send this to the, to the
committee members, um, the statewide graduation standards have been ramped up. They're, they're really moving forward at a fairly quick pace, but, uh, as you know I'm on uh a I work as a sub com m it te e member of the
legislative, uh, mass Legislative Committee working with the graduation council and um we've really decided to push back on some of the issues related to the graduation standards and I think, um part of it has to do with some
of the logistics, you know, it, it generally will come down to money at some point because if you're going to add courses that are required, we got to be able to pay for them. We got to fit them on a budget, so we're trying to help the state to remind the state that we're all looking at some level of deficit this year. Almost every
surrounding community is looking at some level of deficit and I think it's important to keep that in mind, um. we also want to make sure that the graduation requirements as they come out and get released from the state, um, are, are open and available to all of our kids, uh, specifically kids with
disabilities who tend to get kind of left out when these, these lofty goals are set, um, and they're also, uh, really, uh gives us an opportunity to say, OK, what kind of uh outlook or assessment would the state be
leaning into to say kids are meeting the graduation requirements. I think I've said this before. Many of the schools around this area have worked for years with Nask in their accreditation process, the the high schools working on developing what what what was graduation standards, uh,
portrait of the graduate, and in our case portrait of the Learner , um, a lot of the schools around here have done that same thing and now we're concerned that the graduation requirements that come out from the state level will push all of that work kind of in a different direction and
um we really want to be able to recognize the work that our kids and our staff members do already related to that. So, uh, I will send out the, the paper from MASS to the group. I'll post it in my weekly so people can see it, but I think it's important for people to be
aware that there is a state level push for a graduation standards. um and we're not against having the graduation standards. I don't think any superintendent is. It's just a matter of making sure that they're tenable for districts and manageable for kids and families. Um, there are
a lot of things in there like uh every kid has to sign up for FAFSA. Well, that's not realistic because some families know that they won't qualify, so why bother? But tho those, so those are some things that we're working with within there as well, um, the one thing I want to mention about the governor's
FY 27 budget that was released, uh, as people know, we are a minimum age district and the governor's, uh, budget, current budget that was released , uh, only, uh, gives us again minimum aid, nothing more. We are pushing for she's currently
got a $75 per student aid number in there uh in her budget. We're looking for 150 or more. Um, we ended up getting that number last year in the supplemental budget, but as I said, it was too late, so the, the, the money basically falls for us to eat END. It's not
usable, um, so just keep your eyes open, but there is a huge budget impact this year. Um as I think I said earlier and maybe last meeting or the meeting before 15,000 students are no longer in the state of Massachusetts. That will impact
the finances and the resources available for schools. We are one of a small number of districts that have seen increases. We had a 39 student increase. It doesn't sound huge, but when you're looking at 1700 kids, that's a big increase for us, um, a lot of the bigger city
schools have lost a lot of kids talking to this the princi the uh superintendent in Lynn the other day. they lost over 400 kids and have a $10 million deficit, so it's, it's, uh, it's gonna be interesting because when you, you're, your state aid is based on the number of students you
have at the time a year out, so next year this will cause a problem for several of the schools in our area, including you know, people that are close by, so just keep our eyes open and I think it's important again to have those budget conversations to help the
community understand the impact of what's happening at the Statehouse. That is all Thank you. People have questions is do we still have Julia? She's , I can't see her um. people have questions for superintendent? I don't think so . Um, I just had a quick
question. Even though the on the um graduation requirement, even though even though the state has adopted sort of a faster timeline than we had anticipated. This is not impacting students who are
graduating in 26, correct? I just want to make sure students and parents of students graduating in 26, they're not gonna get that nothing is gonna get changed for them. Earlier in the year we approved the graduation requirements that impact 26, so we're all set. We,
uh, we actually just got approved this week for that, so. um, we, we're good for 26. I, I, I think you'll start to see it in 28 and 29. I just Excellent. All right. Anybody else have anything? No
OK Um so it is 7:03, um, so, I don't know if we have any citizens on Zoom, Eric. Oh, that's why I'm looking. OK. Um, so, uh, this is the
opportunity now for citizens' comments, um, so any citizen who is wishing to speak before the committee can come, um, and offer a comment. I'm gonna just, before I give my whole spiels is , anybody here interested in giving us citizen's comment?
OK do we have anyone on, oh, we're waiting to get our visual on Zoom here. No one on Zoom, and there's no one on Zoom. You are clear Um so we always do like to hear from citizens. but it doesn't look like there's
anyone this evening, um, so at this point we'll close Citizens' comments at 7:04. um, and move back down to the consent agenda. Um, so the consent agenda is, um
, typically items, um, that we, um, don't anticipate would have um discussion, um, or debate, but certainly they are all things that if any member of the committee has any item on the consent agenda that they would like to discuss, we can do that.
Does anyone have anything that they'd like to hold from the consent agenda. No. Um right, uh, John, would you like to do our secretary honors? It's hard to do on Zoom, Julius, on
Zoom. OK. Yeah, no problem. I move that we accept the consent agenda as written. Second, seconded by Kristen, um, because we, uh Kristen Noon, because we have a remote member will vote, um, all votes will be
roll call votes. um, Kristen, yes. uh, Dana's a yes, Amy, Jen, yes, Julia. Yes. And that is unanimous of the 5 members present and the motion passes.
Thanks to the Ed fund and New England Biolabs, some awesome donations there. Those were some great donations, um, and look like some exciting field trip and an exciting field trip, um right. Thank you for that
All right, next up. uh Curtis, we have a state of the buildings report and I think Curtis Whiteman is gonna give us some information on that
Good evening members of the school committee, Mr. Tracy, Mr. Leoni, um, we, uh, every year, uh, the facilities department puts together a state of our facilities, um. so it's a sort of a lengthy uh
living document from year to year. We update status on the buildings. I don't think it's a big surprise that the the theme is just aging structures, aging buildings, um, insufficient for our needs, uh, but we were busy. We were busy in the last year, um.
you know, notably one of the bigger projects that we completed the athletic field complex, which uh I'm happy to report last night we received our certificate of compliance from the Hamilton Conservation Committee So, um, that was a, it's been a
long uphill to get that done. We're certainly working on some items that have continued to uh require maintenance, but we're, we're shifting into that mode which is nice. It's a good place to be. uh, the high school still, still talking about things there. My
first year here, we had a major failure of the hot water system and so, uh, quite an extensive battle on that front bringing in temporary boilers and getting the new ones in. I'm happy to report we're on the punch list there, um, really just minor issues at this point
that pop up to be expected of a project of that magnitude, but we've had a warm, warm classrooms, maybe too warm in some areas, which is great. Uh, it's a good place to be this time of year, especially when there's especially cold winter. Um, other highlights, so, you
know, on the, on the front of accessibility, we, we do have a lot of work to do here. Um, over at Winthrop, we had a ramp that was insufficient, uh, it was. uh, too much of an angle, really wasn't great. Uh, we were able to replace it with one that was
there, um, which is a lot safer. Um, last year we actually had a student get injured on the one that was there prior. and we had done some repairs on some of the ADA ramps and the new bleachers, believe it or not , at our first home game, we snapped off one of the ADA
railings, and we were able to get the parts quickly from our vendors and get that repaired. Um, on the mechanical front, again, I talked about the boilers. Uh, that was quite a, quite a, a project, um, one of the other highlights that I'd like to discuss is with working with the town energy manager. We
talked about this at our last meeting. We accepted this grant is through the MassEP we have the grant that's coming our way for the rooftop units so we'll have that library, we'll have that cooling space that all started last year. That's been about an 8 month project to get us to this point. Um, and finally, one thing that
I've been working on on the back end using the software that we have is our ability to put a PM plan in place. So what's been really nice about this is that um through our asset Essentials software we're able to look at each piece of equipment and now
track the maintenance on it so every 6 months, for example, we have the reoccurring maintenance comes up on our univets Our water fountains, you know, that's the filters, that's what's soon to cue us up for that. We've also put all of our inspections that are required in there. So it's a very visible thing. The work orders get
generated and it's a good reminder for the team to to jump on these things. On the safety and security front , this is a big goal of ours for the district, uh, we replaced 104 smoke detectors over a Cutler, uh, that was going to happen whether the new school
went through or not, they were expired. It was something that we had to do. Uh, we put in 8 cameras on the new amenities building and one over at Winthrop. Um, again, we wanted to be able to capture the spaces and protect them um as we were uh.
you know, new areas we want to make sure that they're safe, um, we had an issue with signals coming out of the fire box at the middle school and high school. So when I first took this job, I think the first week I was here we had a popped sprinkler head we could not find it. Um, the worst part was that the
signal never went out to the fire department, so they didn't know. The only reason that we found out is because the flasher outside the building was going off. Police caught it. They called, ended up being in the tunnel underneath where the like language office
offices and uh it was actually best case scenario because it was actually a 12-inch pipe there that kept it from leaking out and going into the boiler room. Um, but we worked with our fire alarm vendor. We put in uh an antenna. so now anything that happens at the high school, middle school, that signal goes right out, goes right to the
fire department, um, so that was a a big win there. um on our challenge course, so we did go through uh amount of extensive repairs that needed to be completed. Those have been done.
We had security alarm systems that were repaired, including at this building here, um, the plan is is to put that into uh starting over vacation so when we come back, hopefully after school community meetings we're not setting it off, um, we shouldn't uh we'll have
processes in place for that. Cutler's alarm is ready to rock and roll, and we still have some work to do over at Winthrop. So right now there currently is no system installed there as part of next year's budget request is the money to put in a very simple system that will at least allow us to
arm the building, keep it safe. Um, on the roof and structural integrity stuff. So we obviously are entered into the ARP program for the high school roof. We'll be talking about that a little bit later tonight. um, right now, long and the short of
that is that the next thing that comes up we have to discuss is that the April 11th vote we'll talk about the vote language tonight. Repairs were made for the middle school roof awning, uh, believe it or not, I know that's our newest school, but yes, it does require maintenance just like the rest of them. The awning was
drooping and we'd actually marked it on the wall with some chart, uh, chalk. and over the past month, the couple of months that had gone by, I noticed that the marking had actually disappeared because I thought I was losing my mind one day. Anyway, we had that come in that's been replaced on the same time there
were some roof leaks that were actually causing that. We were able to repair that roof as well . 72 windows were replaced over last summer at the middle school complex. That's pretty much all the windows there. We think there might be a couple remaining on the end towards the basketball court that we've got
to address. And we were placed in the locker room doors at the, um, on the high school. Couple of things that are in this report that I'd be remiss to not mentioning as we did two abatements over the summer. Uh, we did one over a collar. We removed 1400 square feet of
asbestos containing material going out to the modular wing. We replaced it with an epoxy poured floor and we removed 1200 ft from one of the high school classrooms and replaced with an LXT tile. Um, the beauty of that , that was the type of material that is used in new schools does
not require waxing, so it, uh, very simple to clean, very um good on maintenance, so it's it' s something that I'm hoping lasts for a long time. All right, um, so looking forward to this year we have a number of areas that we're looking at. This is what I'm
focusing on right now. Um, obviously with the direction of Vinny and Eric as things come up . First thing is looking for grants, right? So we are engaged with MSBA core program, um, right now. we're. issue back that up. We're
submitting a statement of interest for the 3 elementary schools, um, which we will talk about the future school committee meeting, but we are going through the groundwork now of getting those applications ready for approval by the committee. um
there's a school water improvement grant. It's called SWIG. Uh, it gives up to $10,000 for improvements for water testing, water fixtures, that is a grant that uh I've jumped through the first hurdle of, and now it's the process of filling out the paperwork. Uh, so we'll be we'll be
pursuing that um we're going to continue to work with the MSBA for the high school roof. and I do have a meeting on some energy management grants coming up during vacation over at Cutler, so we're gonna look to do some work at some of the fixtures there that are dated.
Again, we weren't at the time when we were moving forward with a new school, we weren't gonna look at replacing those fixtures , but we're going to take a closer look at that now. From a safety standpoint, um, we're gonna continue to monitor our, our, uh, asbestos in the schools that's in every six
month inspection. Our 3 year report was actually due is due, um, last month uh, our vendor is working on that. They'll have it in hand for us. every year we tend to do an abatement or two. We're gonna continue on that pace to continue to remove it from the
schools. Um The indoor air quality report. So this is something when I first joined uh the school district. There were two big things that came out of the committee. One was water testing, and that was from Trent. The other was indoor air quality from um Dave.
and so we've been gathering data , we've been doing indoor quality indoor air quality sampling. We have enough data now where we can start to generate um some usable data in my opinion. And so I want to get that put together and I'll work that
with Vinny with Eric and uh see if we can help guide some of our maintenance activities based on that. um we have some critical repairs and inspections of our sprinkler systems that need to occur. I think we talked about that at the last school committee meeting I was at.
Um, one thing that I think that we need to address is the chair lifter Cutler. So again this would be something we probably wouldn't pursue due to the cost, but now that the school's not moving forward, I think we ought to look at that chair lift and I'll look at replacing that. It's been locked out by the state.
I'm pretty sure that things over 20 years old, so we'll, we'll work that through the Capitol Committee and um see what we can do there The third is Green initiatives, so a lot of the projects that we do , um, we usually have Vicky not
too far away, um, talking with us and so I wanna continue to bring the green initiatives to this into the school, um, one thing that we, Eric is working on long before I started, and it seems to just it's something that's just going to continue and hopefully we'll
have it at some point is the solar canopy at the middle school. And so, um, the cost savings on that are I mean, Eric knows better than I do, um, but that's something that we want to work on Uh, we have a new vi um vendor
for environmental controls. I'm meeting, I've met with them a couple times now looking at the high school for some opportunities. Right now, uh, we're on a a primarily pneumatic driven system there and if you spend any time in the boiler room where the air compressor is located. You'll notice that the air compressor fires off about
every 30 seconds. Huge, huge, huge energy waste and so I'm working with BCM right now to try and figure out if there's a way that we can electrify our thermostats, our equipment that's pneumatic driven and trying to figure out an ROI on that type of stuff, um, on the same note, there are also grants
available for that that they're going to help me with and again anything that I move forward with there I will present to the committee. um, and then finally we did talk about the fluorescent fixtures over Cutler. and really that is kind of the highlights of kind of what I'm
looking at over the next year. Um, by no means am I tied to any of the things that I'm focusing on, um, per se, obviously there's a whole lot of other things like that pesky snow that keeps falling that uh seems to railroad some of this really quickly, but um
you know, I, I'm open to suggestions and I hope that at least this plan is in alignment with what the school committee, Eric and Vinny are trying to do. Thank you Um, does anybody have any questions? No.
Um I will, I, I will just say um thank you for that. It's gonna work, yeah, you know, said, was that? Well, I just it's really a thorough report. I always appreciate it. It's a lot of thorough. I know I took the time
and made myself read it really slowly because it really takes some time to see like each one of the bullet points is big and important, and it, it's easy, I think, to
if you don't really read it, I, I guess I'm sort of encouraging anyone who's listening to take the time to read it because we get asked a lot about maintenance and the state of schools and it's and this report
was really comprehensive and helpful, um and also a little overwhelming. It's, it is a lot. There's a lot going on, but I've had good support. We've got a great team here and um fortunately, you know, we can take the good that
came out of the bad, right? So we did have a very thorough report on the Cutler site. um, as part of the school project which is referenced in this report as well also on our website so anybody listening, you know, the state of the school report will be there. All the information from the school,
um vote in all that information that was generated is there highly recommend people take a, take time to read it. And I, and I can't, I can't tell if Julia's trying to say something. No, you're, you're very far away
for me to see, so it's hard for me to tell. If you see me I'm doing anything, I'm coughing. Yeah. The thing that I think it is important for everybody to understand is this is what's known. with the age of our buildings there are a lot of unknowns. I
mean they're, they're, we know that there is a a water pipe at Cutler that was temporarily repaired in the middle of the night last year that needs to be fully replaced. Um, we know that there are lots of um opportunities for failure
given the life cycles of our current equipment both in our buildings and on top of our buildings including our roofs, our HVAC systems, our ventilator units, um, in, in Curtis is really trying to do that day to day, every day something new, I, you know, we talked about, um,
ice dams and Curtis and his guys have been mopping water for, it seems like 3 weeks straight because we can't beat the ice dams. They just keep coming. Uh, it's been cold and crazy, but um there's just so many other things that this report does not highlight and does not bring out and I think it's important to
note like Curtis is the only guy that I talked to at 4:30 in the morning because we're trying to figure out if snow is going to get moved enough if we're going to be able to get ready for school and they appreciate the work he's done. I told him when he got hired you're gonna be drinking out of a fire hose. I'm
pretty sure he still is, um, and it's been more than a year, so I think, uh, you know, it's important to note that he has got a lot done. He's organized a lot of things. This is just, I think, snapshot of, of some of those things. Uh, there are a lot of things going on behind the scenes, like looking into
using our our Brightly system to manage our rental fees as I talked about last, last meeting that's part of, you know, kind of Curtis behind the the scenes dealing with this issues with transportation and operations also fall into this. So this is a small piece of what he does, even though it's, it's extremely
comprehensive. There, there's still other ways he's running around, um, so I just wanted to note that thank him for his work and his team for keeping us up and running and keeping us um moving forward as much as we can and we'll just continue to pur pursue options where we talk
about grants all the time. We talk about finding ways to come up with, uh, different ways to do things, um, Curtis has been able to just investigate and willing to turn and look at different way to say, hey, maybe there's a different way to do this, so we'll continue to do that and continue to help move this whole
process and problem along. Thank you. I appreciate that. There was no way I was missing my son playing the drums yesterday. I hear you so schools are opening. Oh, thank you. Um
OK. Anybody else have anything? Thank you Um, next up is, uh, the high school roof. Um, guessing you may be just staying. I'm gonna, I'm just
gonna hang here. All right, so one of the exhibits, um, that was on tonight's agenda is a letter from the MSBA. and this is the um letter giving
us or letting us know the grant amounts. So you'll notice in paragraph 2, the board approved an estimated max maximum total facilities grant of 4,445,185.
um, which does not include any funds potential for eligible eligible owners and construction contingency expenditures. They also reference a number of $4,675 933.
and um so that, that really based off the cost of the roof, um, which I think is around 10.2 right now , yeah, 10.2 million. So maybe I should back up. So, what we're doing for people that are listening in and who may not
know is we're engaged with the MSBA ARP program. to replace 128,000 square feet of high school roof. This includes all of the high school and the athletic hallway and locker rooms. Uh, it's important to note that
those if you look at an aerial, you'll see that the high school roof is mostly a white material, PVC material, and those were done at some point during the middle school renovation, um, where those are part of the high school we were able to include
them in this project. Um, the history of this is actually Tom Geary started this uh statement of interest and um this was back in 2024. The statement of interest was accepted We got assigned. I finished that
statement of interest. He started it. I finished it. We were signed an OPM, so the MSPA is part of the ARP program, works a little bit differently than the core program they assign you an OPM, they assign you a designer. The OPM we were designed is a company called P3 and we've been dealing with a gentleman named
Rob Tudocodesco. The designer is actually the same designing firm that did our high school field project obviously different engineers. I don't know if we'd want a high school field on top of a roof, although that would be kind of cool, um, and the gentleman running that his name is Brian Neely.
So, um, we met back in June of 2025. We did our kickoff meeting . We met on site. We took a walk around, we showed them the roof, um, I have to admit between that time and and October there was a few moments I was up there and I was doing, covering my eyes as they were cutting into our roof
for test cuts and pulling it up like a nice piece of wedding cake. And so they do that for cross-sectioning. It's a little nerve-wracking, especially when you're already dealing with roof leaks, but they're professionals . They had roofers there. They patched them, patches have not le ak ed Um, so
this activity went on in September we were told by the MSBA our reimbursement rate was 45.52%. October, we received our estimate cost um total estimated cost of 10.6%. The numbers were
massaged a little. That's how it came back down to 10.2. We submitted to the MSBA on October 23rd. and then we received this letter on the 12th saying we were we were accepted in. I'm making this sound like there wasn't a lot of work by a lot of people. There was a lot of things, a lot
of activity going on in between there, uh, but that's basically the highlights of it Moving forward, what we need to do is, um, now that we've been accepted in is we're entering this the phase of the project for the construction documents and bid documents to be generated.
So that's what they're working on now. They're finalizing drawings, they're getting bid documentation ready. and we're kind of getting this ready and the parallel effort to April 11th, which is a town vote . Um, once we're approved funding, those bid docks will hit the
street. and then away we're gonna go. That's, I think I have that right, Eric. Um, and I think tonight what we're here to discuss is the vote language. Yeah, essentially, the process,
uh, is initiated MSBA to the towns we work with our OPM, uh, to, to formal kind of formalize everything, get our numbers. Right now we're looking at $10.2 million for a total roof project , 128,000 square feet that will take approximately 6 months to complete. so we want to start it in the
summer because it's gonna overlap into the school year unfortunately it's just a big, it's a lot of roof, um, so this, this letter determined that that we'll get approximately 4.6 million between 4.4 and $4.6 million. There is a comment in
there. It says it could be less and it's only because of the price of the, if the cost of the roof comes in if we come in at 9.3 they would adjust their numbers, um, but that, that's this is where we sit now. What we need to to move forward from here is uh we
tonight we have a motion that I'll put on the screen in a second to approve the the funding for the tent, the total $10.2 million. We have to, uh, at the MSBA request at the request of our attorneys at the
Crest of a request of our bond council has to have the whole amount on there. so that everything's transparent . So we were to approve the borrowing tonight, that would move to the warrant we would send to the towns, uh, the warrant language, the warrant
motion, and the ballot vote because it would be a debt exclusion in in both towns, so the, the um the the vote tonight is to secure the funding. and then we'll move it on to the towns for the
addition to the warrants There'll be 2 votes in each town that we want at town meeting on the floor, and then there's one at the ballot. because it's because it's uh static solution.
Questions Um, can you speak a little bit about just I guess I'm modeling this after the questions we got regarding the elementary school building. We have one number is was there a place to
I know we bid out to the construction later, but like, is this number um, are we able to get other estimates, I guess is the question. Yeah, so what will happen is the, the number is the not to exceed number just like
the field project. So the 10.296345. That number $10,296 345 becomes a not to exceed number. As Curtis said, we'll put this out to bid and that bid process could come in at 9.4,
you know, so, um, we just, we just have to have a number transparent enough for the towns to know they're voting on this number and we're not gonna there's no intention to to exceed it. There is, however, I want to be very transparent and clear. Vigi Massoni and Curtis have
worked together to get a grant for the rooftop unit which you, you've already approved $148,000 grant for approximately $200,000 300,000 dollars, $300,000 unit. Um, we are trying to push that
off. to the same time the roof gets done, so if the roof gets approved, they're gonna take the old unit off anyway, and we're hoping they can just replace it with the new unit to save us some more money, so, um, those are, that's the only thing that that is different than this
$10.2 million. Thank you. Anybody else questions? Um so the, oh, here it is.
It's up already. um She's Amy's got it. I married it. Are you gonna read it? But I have a question about it. Yeah. Uh, it says voted Should I say voting or should I say moved? Yeah, you started with, yep, just checking Are we ready Get a
not because I have to read. Mhm. OK I move that the Hamilton Munham Regional School District, the district, hereby appropriates
the amount of $10,296,345 for the purpose of paying costs of the roof system replacement at the Hamiltonunner Regional High School, located at 775 Bay Road in Hamilton, Massachusetts, including the payment of all costs, incidental or related
thereto, the project, which proposed repair project would materially extend the useful life of the school and preserve an asset that otherwise is capable of supporting the required educational program, and for which the district may be eligible for a school construction grant from the Massachusetts School Building
Authority, MSBA set amount to be expended at the direction of the district's director of Facilities Operations and Transportation. To meet this appropriation, the district is authorized to borrow set amount under and pursuant to
chapter 71, Section 16D of the General Laws and the District Agreement as amended or pursuant to any other enabling authority. The district acknowledges that the MSBA's grant program is a non-entitlement discretionary program based on need as
determined by the MSBA and any project costs the district incurs in excess of any grant approved by and received from the MSBA, she'll be the sole responsibility of the district, provided further that any grant of the district may receive from the MSBA shall not exceed the
lesser of 145 and 5200%. 45.52% of eligible approved project costs as determined by the MSBA or 2, the total maximum grant amount determined by the MSBA and that the total amount
of borrowing authorized pursuant to this vote shall be reduced by any grant amount set forth in the project funding agreement that may be executed between the district and the MSBA. Further, I further move that within 7 days from the date on which this vote is adopted, the
Secretary be and hereby is instructed to notify the select board and the finance committee of each of the member towns of this district. As to the amount and general purpose purposes of the debt herein authorized as required by the district agreement and by
chapter 71, Section 16D of the general laws. Do we have a second 2nd, 2nd by Kristen Noon. Thank you, Amy. Um. are there questions or further
discussion? So no, all right. Looks like we're ready to vote. Um, we'll start with you, Julia. Yes. Kristen. Yes Amy, yes, Jen, yes, Dane is a
yes. Uh, that is, uh, unanimous of the five members present and the motion passes. Thanks for all that work for all of that work. We still got a lot of work to do. Yes. Thank you. Well, well, we'll see
. OK Um, next up we have, uh, back to you, Eric for the some formative evidence. Thank you
Um I think everybody about Kristen's familiar with the process. So just so everybody understands the process is twofold for me uh as a superintendent, I have evaluated yearly on the superintendent, uh , evaluation instrument and
rubric that is um offered by the state. We've used the same process for this is my 5th year here, so we will, we continue to use that. My evidence submission is at two points, midcycle, which is what you see here, and then at the end of the year it'll.
be in May so that there can be some discussion about the final evaluation, which is generally presented by the committee in June. Um, this is really the uh some of the information, not all of it, it is intended to be that way purposefully. We're only halfway through the year. So
when you look at some of the, the, the things that are on here , it's set up initially, uh, about my goals that I said that were approved back in October by the committee. There are a number of goals including improving excuse me, improving
instructional leadership. uh, completing the strategic plan. examining start time changes. and active advocacy and networking on behalf of the district and that's both in within our local communities and
at the statehouse. and then the, the next part is broken down by the four standards that are required as part of the evaluation required by the state . I'll use standard one as an example. Standard one and
instructional leadership under each of the, the overarching umbrella of the standards, this in this case instructional leadership. There are indicators for different segments or sections, um, so the the information under each of
the segment is is for you to to look at as evidence. Again, this is a partial submission uh, about to the point of where we are at the school year now. There are things still ongoing. There are things that will be added between now and
then, and this document will probably double if not triple in size by the time we get to the end of the year mark in, in which the committee will use that to determine uh among other things to determine my final evaluation in June, so
um. just wanted to make it available to you, make sure you had it, and start to start reviewing, start looking at now because the process is a bit daunting and uh it does come up all at once and, and certainly I am available at any time to answer questions
about this or about anything else that we're working on in the district. so I just wanted to make sure people had it now to start looking at it. Thank you. Thank you. People have questions
Um, I, well, I have a question that's not really it's more about the rubric, I think in the past couple of years we thought that the rubric was changing. Do you happen to know whether it's the same or not. The current rubric that is
on the link is the same is the same. This is the one they're using. Excuse me, sorry, this is the one they're using this year. I had to double check myself because I think you and I had that conversation about the rubric, but this is the one,
that they are using this year. OK Um. uh Thanks. um and I guess, um, I don't know if anybody else has any questions. I just want to say I, I just
made a note, um, soon, maybe at our next meeting, we should just talk about the schedule for the evaluation. It's, um, we usually make sure we and like Eric said, the final evaluation will likely be in May, um, and, um.
we should just have that as a discussion about the timing. Um, but this is helpful to have now so that you can start reading it and kind of asking questions and it's a good opportunity that you know, you can ask Eric directly if you have questions about
OK. Under goal 3 on page 2. of the 4th bullet point down. Um, is that done? The review existing survey data and current data from previous
submissions. It's he was one of the few that wasn't worked marked. Yeah. Oh, sorry, I didn't mark it, but yes, it is done. We, we did that at the beginning of the process for the school start times. OK. Thank you.
Great. Thank you for that, and it is a lot to go through a lot to put it together. um. OK, uh, next up, we had discussed um we still had a
couple of vacancies on our school committee liaisons, um I don't know if Eric, if you can put it up there. um, but, um, so we talked about filling this. So when I looked
at this list here before we get started, one of the things I realized at the bottom too, I think we actually discussed, but we just didn't actually remove it, that Hamilton Master Planning and when a master planning, um have been were on what were going on when we created this and it was, I
was the representative to Hamilton and David Frankel was a rep representative on them, but both of those processes are complete, so. we should have removed those, you know, but we didn't, um, so
the other positions that are currently vacant for liaisons are the Wenham select board, um, the wellness committee CPAC. um and I believe those were all previously
um filled by David Frankel. Um so I would say. Oh, Dina. Yep. Dana ? Yes. This is Julia? Yeah. I'm on the wellness committee. Oh, OK. I've been going to their meetings either via Zoom or
excellent. I think now that you say that, I think we do that. um All right, so we really just have two. Does anyone want to pipe up and say they've actually been going to CPAC. No, but we can remove athletics
facilities, improvement building committee. Oh yes. It's still we're we're gonna leave it just because the project's not fully complete, just so we can finalize it and say everybody's in bit in a loop . OK, but that's good to think about in after the election in
the spring when we revisit this, that would be something we can, um, so I guess when I look at this oh good to know about the wellness committee. So really we're looking at Wenham select board and CPAC, um. I
don't know if anyone is interested in either one of those. I'm only a liaison to one committee, so I'm happy to do another one. So I, I don't mind doing either of them or um I mean, I live in one of them. I
could do one select board. I could do CPAC, you know, whatever it seems excellent. So I heard Kristen being open to doing one or both of those. I do think I obviously could be anyone, but I don't think it does make some
sense to have a Wenham resident be the Wenham. select board representative. um anybody else have any other thoughts that they want to jump in or a nomination.
I'm on 3. I'm a, I have 3 liaison relationships. Yeah, well, again, these were, yeah, these were all held by these were, I think that 3 is kind of I think I'm happy to keep my 3. I only have, I, I only have
one at this point. Um and is that true? I only have the fin comb, I think, yeah. um, oh yeah, because I was on master planning. um, so you know, I
you know, I think 3 is plenty. Um. yeah, so I think everyone should I'm happy to if nobody else wants to do CPAC, I could jump in. I'd rather, I don't, I don't think I'd be the
right person for the Wyndham select board, I think. Yeah, I'm happy to do that one. how many are there altogether? I'm trying to think if we're sort of divide them up, you know . Well, like, like Jen just mentioned, they do sort of some of them change, you know, and
some of them are more um busier than others. It's just the soul I board and CPAC if Julia is taken, yeah, that's all that's left. Um right, so this point somebody make a nomination. We'll see how this
goes. I nominate Kristen Noon for the position of liaison to the Wenham select board. Second, OK, I heard a nomination in a second. Kristen, is that something that you would accept the nomination? Yes. All right. Are there any other
nominations for the Wham select board liaison? Is there any discussion It looks like we're ready to vote Um, Jen, Amy, Dana's yes,
Kristen, yes, Julia. Yes. All right, um, and is unanimous that the five members present, and congratulations, Kristen. Thank you. Um, does anyone have a nomination for CPAC?
It's not, I mean, Kristen and I could fight it out. Do you have an interest in being on CPAC? I can, I can do it. I have a a child that was previously a special ed student. So I've never been to a meeting. I'm not sure what I mean, I think as a liaison right, as a liaison, it's great
if you can attend some meetings, you're certainly not required to attend all of the meetings, um, but also could just reach out to find out what's going on. Um. It's also helpful for them to know, hey, I have somebody I can reach out to the school committee to ask questions. OK,
sure, I'm happy to do it and uh not that I wouldn't, but. All right, does anyone have a nomination? I nominate Kristen Noon to as the liaison to the CPAC. Second,
seconded by Jen Carr, and that is something that you would accept, yes, OK, um, is there any further discussion? No. All right, uh, Julia. Yes. Ana yes, Amy Jen, and that is
unanimous of the five members present. um, and Kristen, thank you very much. We're putting more work on your plate. OK, excellent figure itout. Thank you. um. OK um, and I
I mean, I'll just say I have, you're already paying quite a bit of attention, I think, to the select board and the FICO over there in what I do, yeah, that won't be too bad I know from conversations um OK
Um, thank y'all for that and uh next up is a report as um we knew was coming. A report on the community conversations, um,
that took place. Eric Teo. Thank you the, actually, I'm going to back this up. give a little context. The, uh, community conversations, as many of you know, were um
in, in the month of January we did two different dates. um one related to uh, a daytime event which it snowed and rained and iced and
everything and we still had more than 50 people in the room. Uh, the second one was done, uh, on the January 29th, which was at night at the high school and it was a little smaller crowd, um, a couple of people that came to both, but it was a good
opportunity to collect data and get information from different types of people within our community. It wasn't just school side it wasn't just townside. It was a it was a really nice. I thought a really nice mix of people who had uh varying degrees of like or
dislike for the process of the school building construction, the school building. consolidation idea, etc. So for, for me, um I had to try to figure out a way to organize uh this whole
process, so I dipped back into uh the 1980s and dug up, um, something called the bono six hats, and this really gives us an opportunity to focus in 6 different areas with a group
that is specifically divided in in a lot of ways and try to uh maintain order and keep things uh moving kind of pointed in a positive direction. The way I framed it for people was that we would start kind of before
the project and walk through the steps before the project to the project after the project, and looking forward because ideally we need to look forward, um, so this process was specifically designed. to dig into those, uh, different
segments of the school consolidation project and and looking at far forward to see what happened. We had over 90 people attend both sessions, um, the process was really specifically around hats, so I'll use an example of the white hat. That's how we opened it. The white hot hat was dedicated
to grounding the conversation and objective reality. We were looking at neutral data, um, trying to take away the speculation, the speculative stuff and try to figure out how what what influence, what are the facts around what influenced
the vote around the school project, uh, I spent about 15 minutes, between 10 and 15 minutes on each hat in this process, uh, moved into the red hat and that really had to do with emotion and that was really just give me one word that describes
how you felt. during that, that voting process or during that that school process that was, that was pretty powerful. Uh, the third one was the black hat. That's really the, the, the things that we have to look out for. What do we need to, what do we need to be cautious about, um, and also
talking about some, some critical thinking uh along the way. After that black hat segment, we moved to yellow hat and said started to look towards the future and exploring some of the benefits and the shared values in the room. As I said before we started this, there is
one shared value that our schools need some care and attention, and I think that's one shared value that came out very clearly here. On the yellow hat was completed, excuse me, and completed, moved on to the green hat and trying to figure out creative new solutions, what
types of things, how might we have not thought of? What types of things, um, may be beneficial to this process, and I'll give some examples. People said, what about Penguin Hall? Why didn't, you know, why don't we look at Penguin Hall? So those, those types of things came up. We're trying to
push people to think out of the box and look beyond some of the obvious things that were out there and then we brought it all around with the blue hat. and the blue hat was really how to synthesize it all, but really put uh the question in front of people that the question
that I think drove that whole segment. I could support a future plan if. um, and that was something that we got some amazing answers, amazing people really took some time to think about it, and it was just a writing exercise. I
gave them a half sheet of paper with that question on it, and they wrote out um the things that they were thinking about, what could I support and it was lots of great information. I think um as you go into this uh
report you'll see that the hats come up as organizational pieces of the report as well so kind of what happened under the white hat conversation? What are the facts there? What were the information gaps, uh, Red hat, what were the dominant sentiments? I mean, you know,
you can, you can see in the report, the community feels the process was predetermined, manipulated, disingenuous, um, and then what are some of the emerging positives. People were more hopeful. People want to be included, and they think it needs to be student focused
moving further into the black hat. People were really concerned about unsustainable tax burden. We heard that a lot, uh, particularly the impact on our seniors and middle class, as we said, throughout the process, your house isn't paying your
taxes. and what that means is you might have a million dollar house, but you might not have the money to pay the taxes on the million dollar house because of lots of factors. You bought it 50 years ago for $35,000 and it's gained a lot over time. Um
things like that where people's people's, uh, value house value has outpaced their, uh, income. Uh, they talked a lot about the megacho concern and what happened with larger facilities and how they imper they can be so so much more impersonable.
excuse me, impersonal, um, and then back through the yellow hat , really looking at high-quality education, high quality education, we want to be top in the state. Uh, that came out very clearly as part of this report, and then uh
we dug into kind of inclusion and special education as a separate and they there was a real good consensus across the board of we should have uh inclusive improved spaces for special education students across the district to ensure equitable education. Um, green hat looking at
alternatives, there were, uh, proposals included a lot of renovation, uh, conversations around renovation, different, different phases of renovation like do a little bit here, a little bit here, a little bit here, replace one whole school, remodeled two others, so there
were, there were different suggestions, um, throughout the information that we got, got, and I talked about, uh, Penguin Hall as one of the suggestion. Gordon Conwell property and iron rail. Um finishing up with the blue hot hat, we really started to say, you know, what, what is safety
and modernization look like. People talked about, uh, air quality heating, security in 24 21st century educational layouts , um, and then really what was there, what was their driving force and transparency and
integrity came up a lot, uh, really, people are looking for an independent architectural design assessments of all buildings, uh, when you look at the data, it really pokes out to say, let's look at all of our schools, school buildings. We have 6, including central office. Let's get
somebody to give us an idea of the different levels of renovation that are available and then let's decide within our communities of how to attack that um and that, that seemed to be the sentiment across the data set as we as we dug into it, um,
we looked a little bit about what is the cost of inaction, so that whole section is, is fairly , uh, straightfor ward We've talked about this a lot, escalating operation and maintenance costs, um, legal compliance and liabilities. You heard Curtis tonight talk about
ADA compliance, um educational and specialized service costs out of district tuition, are there opportunities for us to bring some of these kids back in if we have uh specific program, program spaces available, and then equitable access for all of our kids and
talks about special needs students in this report, which is really what got highlighted in a lot of the data, but really equitable for for all of our kids and then, uh, the big one is community and real estate impact. What does that look like? And um
we talked about it through the process, but it came out again in this data set substandard school spaces are recognized as having a negative impact on the town's overall property values, um, outdated facilities make it difficult for us to compete and and with private schools or to
maintain top school in the state status. Um. then we, we pushed in a, in a different direction and try to say, OK, what does all this data tell us about moving forward, which was ultimately why we did this. We wanted to know where people were at. We wanted to get a foundation or baseline, but we also wanted to understand
uh, the path forward. Uh, one of the things that was very clear was that students will always be at the center and uh I kind of said thank you for that because I wasn't sure how that would come out, but um it was really clear in the data
looking at safety accessibility and inclusivity. um really looking at the ideas of how to approach it, I think is, is open for further conversation . There were a couple of different uh angles if you will.
mostly pointing to a hybrid phase plan. So looking at either doing a larger scale renovation on, and I'll just use this as an example, it's not in the report on the Cutler School, excuse me, it isn't the report on the Cutler School or looking at it from the perspective of all five
schools doing a little bit, a little bit, a little bit. So that hybrid approach rather than saying let's build one giant school and, and, uh, consolidate our schools. There was a lot of call for pride, what are, what is our need
priority to be able to modernize our schools and then what is the most critical site we've identified Cutler as a critical site. The state has identified Cutler as a critical site. So, um, I, I put that in there. It's like Lee Cutler. Um, they're respecting the town identity
entity ident ity and this is really talking about the community small school preference. We heard it, uh, kind of way out throughout the process and. it was really part of the beginning information when people said, you know, when we were digging into it and said why did you vote the way you did
and it was, you know, I don't want a big school. I want to keep the small town value of a small school. And then um proving the value, like what's the value to the community and how do we deliver results while looking at still other projects
because we know there are others , um, truth in cost, there was a lot of emotion around the process, um and again, there was a call throughout this data set about
looking at independent architecture designers, uh, to determine the cost of renovation versus new build for all 5 schools and then present this as different stages to the community so that the communities can decide. Um, what was interesting was that a lot of opposition
uh statements within the data set were about the fact that they felt the costs are being inflated uh, cost of repairs were being inflated to cost to to force a new build. And then um the regional collaboration. There were, there were a lot of
suggestions about looking at different properties. We have looked at a lot of them as people remember through the process, we can dig deeper and and try to figure out some different approaches. and then um the conclusions are really around the middle path. We really want to prioritize
safety, special education, inclusion as non-negotiables for moving forwards, um, framing the project around needs versus want and offering a plan that keeps the household tax impact within a clearly defined threshold of support. The key here is how do
we find that threshold of support? Where are people comfortable in spending in relation to keeping up their schools and their school buildings. um there's some, some trust factors that came up quite a bit in the,
in the data, and I think part of that is continuing to work to build trust and rebuild trust. That was part of my reasoning for doing these community conversations. um, the door was wide open for anybody that wanted to come. Say
what you got to say, put everything on the table, and that all is part of the data that's held here and here, and I think it's important to look at the last paragraph where it says we're not just looking for a yes vote. We're looking
for a project we can all take pride in. We're committed to a process that's honest and inclusive. By focusing on our shared values, educational excellence, fiscal responsibility, and community care, we will build schools that serve our children today and protect our town's values for
the next 50 years. I think that really sums it up, um, and people might say, well, that's not really a direction. I think there is a direction. Look at um created, um, putting out the uh request for studies on the
buildings, gathering the information, outlining their requests for proposals so that it shows different levels of renovation or repair for each of the buildings versus a new build at each of the buildings, um, as well as some other ideas, architects and designers may come up with other ideas, but I
think then put it all out to the communities, uh, both of the communities and let people weigh in on that and then at the same time try to figure out a way to figure out how what that balance is, what's the balance point for where people would buy into renovating
, updating, or upgrading our schools, and I think there are some things that are clearly non-negotiable in this report and other things that we can look at, and I think that's uh gives us at least, uh, uh, somewhat of a direction forward. It's not crystal clear, but I, I never thought it would be because there is still a lot of
factors like the kind of the threshold factor of where people are comfortable. Just so people are aware if you scroll down into the appendix, all the data that was collected in all the sessions is the next 20
something pages. It's everybody's response, everybody's sticky that they rode out everything we took down on paper, paper is in the appendix and available. Um, and just so people aren't worried that we interpreted, made our own interpretations. We also
have a website on our site that has all the original pictures of all of the the data that was collected. So there are pictures of the posters with the, the actual stickies on there so people can look at those as well and um certainly wanted to put it out there too to give people an
opportunity to come to some conclusion as well and maybe weigh in on this report and give us some idea. I'll release it tomorrow to the, to the, the general public through my email, send it to the towns and see if they can get it out as well. Um, and then start to get some
feedback from various groups. Oh. All right. Thank you for that. Anybody I appreciate this. I'm glad you included the like raw
data in here. It's helpful too. That's actually very interesting to read. You got time, just kind of go through it. It's, it's, it's pretty telling.
There's a lot to unpack here. I wish I could say I was more. like there was an answer that just was like, yes, this will work. Yeah, but there's not, there's not. Yeah, even in dipping through
the day, I spent hours and hours digging in through to try to figure out like is there is there a direction that absolutely glows and, you know, is our North Star in this data. It's not, it's not perfect, but I think we do have some good steps
that we can take. Uh, those steps takes time. So if you, you know, say, OK, let's do an RFP on all of our buildings, that still has to go to a town meeting and it's not going to be ready for the next town meeting. So there's, there's some time factor involved here too which buys us that some time to do
some other work. Um, I think it's important to try to, to work within the community to figure out where that threshold lies you know we were coming out if you remember, uh, the average cost, I think in Hamilton was approximately $2000 a a
household on an $860,000 house. uh that was a lot of money. That's beyond the threshold, clearly because that excited people to come and vote uh against the project. Where is the line, I guess, is, is the question. I think in looking even when you look at tonight's budget.
if you take the the debt that we're already paying, we're we're looking at, you know, a million dollars here and a million dollars there, that's starting to add up for the towns . So trying to find that threshold over a 20 year period is gonna
be of primary importance to to move anything forward, anything at all, um, and I'm, I'm not 100% sure what that number is and I, I certainly welcome the opportunity to have conversations with people about what that might look like to figure out a process.
because you still have people up on all sides like, yes, let's build a new school I want, you know, I had a guy approach me at the event and I just moved to town and I moved to town because I thought you were building a new school. you know, and I, I get that and then uh we also had uh a person
in our second night who's been in the community for 50 years is fixed income and is like, please don't blow me out of my community by raising my taxes, so this is. I understand it. I see it, and I think the process for me gave me
uh some good perspective as well as talking to people from the various sides of the whole debate, if you will. Yeah, Julia, can you hear me? Yeah, we got you.
Um, I, I like that we have sort of our non-negotiables, which is safety and special education inclusion. I think that will help guide any decision that we make, and also having um a framework around needs versus wants. Um, I really do, I, I
think that because there's so many variables and opinions and things that need to be considered in this project, having at least one or two things that we can sort of all agree on, I think is very, very important uh, moving forward, but this this is fantastic work. It's
certainly a lot of like food for thought. Would it be worth while to also look at switching our three schools, so like one
school is kindergarten and first grade and pre-K. Then we got 2nd and 3rd and 4th and 5th because that way everybody in the town. has a peace invested in each of the schools, and it's not going
to end up being like, well, when I won't vote for anything in Hamilton and Hamilton won't vote for anything in Wenham, uh, because every town is gonna have skin in the game for all three schools. Yeah, I mean, I think that and other things are worth
investigating. The restructuring piece has been a conversation for many years within the administration and teachers and talking with even teacher leadership about what types of ideas that you have as
we enter the stages of uh budget difficulty. Are there some things we can do to to save money, and that's part of looking at what is restructuring look like? what is, what is kind of rejiggering the way schools are set up look like, how do we approach um
different aspects of you know, the how schools run. So there's, there's, there's definitely opportunity, there's lots of opportunity. I think we're out of blank blank slate state where we're here, we have some ideas, we have a little bit
of direction we could start in that direction and build on it as we move forward. a lot on
knowing the costs of different options in detail. It would be it would behoove us to communicate to the community that if that is truly what you want, it ain't going to be cheap , right.
Uh you know, just doing one school. in detail with $7 million or several million dollars. I Yeah, if you do it, if you do, if you do a study um
I was talking to our former OPM, now in the school building process, but they we've, uh, stayed connected and had some good conversation, but they were able to get me copies of uh requests that other communities have done so other communities have done some similar things. They've they've hired architects
and designers to do that thing. OK, we want to be able to look at each building give us some different levels of approach and then take all that and bring it forward to the community and get an idea of what direction to go in. So
there are other communities that that have done that and are currently doing that, um, and those studies range from 3000 to $500,000 and you know it it it gets expensive, more expensive depending on what you what you want to include, how much information you want to include,
how deep do you wanna go with the data, what do you, what do you really wanna know? I mean, the advantage we have is there is so much information that's already been dug up on the Cutler School. That one's almost done, but all the other schools will, will take some time to be able to figure out that direction and
again it's going back to the towns. and saying we, you know, we're gonna do this, but right now we don't have MSBA support. so it's on 100% on the communities and we will bring SOIs, Curtis alluded to earlier. We will bring statements of
interest forward. uh on the elementaries because I think those are were our greatest needs lie right now. um to vote because the window is opened and will be open until about mid April and what we have to submit and we'll submit again and we may or may not get
selected, but I think it's incumbent on us to continue to try to get some state funding to offset some of these costs.
OK. That was great. I'm glad we have that information. and and there were good sessions and I was, I, yeah, I mean, I, it was, it was great to see the number of people that were
willing to come out especially on that crazy day um. and really engage and I don't know about I think all of you, everybody, I , I don't know, I, I sat at a
very diverse group of people got to meet people with lots of different ideas. It was really. Mhm it's good to have those conversations. I, I do think a key piece of this will be I don't want I, I don't want to
say better numbers, but just that piece of the cost of renovations. So I I feel like that just has come up so many times that no matter what happens next, I feel like answering that question. will be
I'm just a like a keystone to going thereafter, so I, I think for next year's budget planning or whatever we have to do trying to kind of fund some of those studies, I think will be important, but I also think it'll be the process for how we do that because I feel like for
me, one of the things that seemed challenging for the community was the long committee nature of this where it seemed to all of a sudden come out of nowhere that we were voting for a new school, for some people, not for other people, but for some. So how do we
have those studies and share that information with folks in a way that they are believing the results of those studies, that those are real numbers that they understand the process, they understand the need for OPMs and designers and prevailing wage
and all of the detail of this, and I don't know how we do that if we need a subcommittee or different kind of grouping of people more community conversations about a process. I don't know what that looks like, but I think that kind of process, I think
will be key to that, those numbers being accepted. Mm. as as real numbers. And I think working closely with the paper to get that out because that goes to everybody and it's pretty much our only way of making sure that we're
communicating with everybody. um, which we didn't have last time. No, that's true. Yeah. yep Yeah and to yeah somehow to have
some ability earlier on in the process, I think that's what you're talking about to have not just people be aware but become sort of invested if there were some way to be like you know, I don't know what that is, whether there's some way to
have us straw poll or have a non-binding question at a town meeting or something where people could be actively chiming in on yes, this is the direction we want, um, but I think it's after or hopefully
with the information. you know, that Eric's kind of talking about having this framework of you know, these are basic renovation cost or basic ideas of what the renovations will cost. I mean, for lack of a better term
I think we need some sort of like ranked choice process of like, this is my first choice. This is my second choice, so that we can kind of see where the most consensus lies, um, I also, I'm gonna be
really curious to see how the overrides go this year because I feel like that is going to be kind of a litmus test for the investment that people are willing to make in the schools because I'm having a hard time in my own mind trying to wrap around.
the sort of feedback that we're getting that we need to invest more in maintenance and so we're making some investments in that regard, and it's, it's going to be one factor in a two community-wide override and similarly also being told that that override is at risk of not
passing because it's too large. So I think kind of to Eric's point, like where we're trying to sort of also triangulate in on what can the taxpayer bear, you know, and, and I think, yes, we should apply for grants. We should do all these things, but, you know, those are applications, not
guarantees, like, you know, so I think, yes, explore every possibility, of course, but also knowing that there's no guarantee that a grant application is granted favorably and, and things like that. So I think trying to hone in on what can the tax base really actually
pay for. is so the other I think answer here, you know. Yeah I mean, I think there was the way the process worked there, it wasn't really a possibility to,
but I think every everyone, if you, if you could have it, everyone would have wanted, here are 5 completely fleshed out choices. Like everyone would want that. It's just that like reading through that that's what people
and, and like I think me too, if we could have afforded to come up with 5 completely fresh fleshed out choices, but I understand that and so somehow we need to get some information so that people have
choices that they can give indications about OK. this is the level that I'm Right. the level that I'm able to invest and what direction that would look like, you know, like, is it this level and I
want uh we want to put it all in one school or is it this level and we spread it out or right. So but sounds like people definitely are interested in
in having uh in pursuing information about what it would look like to do. I mean, we didn't get a message that that the answer is just forget it, we want to let our schools fall down. That's not the answer
that we got, so. OK thank you. Are we're ready to move on? you are OK Um, and now, to the budget. One more. That's
it.
Well, tonight is the night we've been building up to this for the past 4 or 5 months. Uh, we are here to uh take a final vote on the superintendent's final FY 27 debt service and operating budget request.
Uh, just as a brief overview, there are a lot of exhibits on the agenda. I just want to take a minute to go over them. There are 7 of them, uh, then we're gonna do a brief review of the FY 27 uh budget take our vote and then look at next steps, uh, just kind of like the public
hearing. I'm not going into a full depth of the budget. Uh, we've all gone through it in the past 4 months. Uh, this is really just a formality, uh, to take a vote on it. Uh, we do have one minor update that I will get to in 1 2nd. before I go over, I just want to say thank you to a whole bunch
of people. Obviously, you guys, the entire school committee, uh, Eric Tracy, our superintendent, our entire leadership team and my business office, uh, both town administrators, managers, and their whole finance team, uh , both towns select boards and
FICOs, uh, for working through the budget cycle with us obviously both our communities and all of our, uh, teachers, ESPs, admins, custodians, and food servers workers, uh who help keep our buildings running during the year.
Uh, so in terms of our exhibit, uh, our exhibits tonight, the first exhibit is this presentation that you're looking at now. Uh, the second exhibit is the full account detail and assessment calculations. This is the list of all 40,050 of our
active accounts, uh, the FTEs and all of the budgets for each line item, their changes year over year, uh, and some historical data of the budgets that were set prior and their actuals uh and also how we come up with our assessment calculations, uh,
exhibit number 3 is the full detail of all of our year over year operating changes, uh, broke out by school and by DESE category. Uh, exhibit number 4 is a summary of all of those major operating changes, uh,
just summarized into categories over $5000 or under $5000. If I had a direct, uh, members of the committee or members of the public on which exhibits to look over, I would really stress to look at exhibit 3 and 4. That's where you're really gonna find most of your data, uh, most of that
detail on what our changes are year over year. Uh, but moving on, I did include exhibit number 5, which is a summary of all of our staffing changes broken down by schools so you can see where all of the movement is from FY 26 to 27, uh
, exhibit number 6 is our, is our operating budget to budget DESE expense summary. Uh, it's another way to look at our budget. I realize everyone absorbs things different. Everyone learns a different ways . I just tried to present it in a different format, uh,
maybe those that helps click to somebody on how the budget works . Uh, last, our exhibit number 7 is a budget to budget revenue and assessment summary again just another way to view our budget. Uh, so just from a real
high-level view, our FOY 27 budget cycle really was a difficult year. Uh, this is the 14th budget cycle I've been involved with in Hamilton Wyndham, and I can say that this probably has been the most difficult budget year, uh, and that really relates to what's
going on with our salaries, how our coalas, our step increases, um, have formulated this year as well as the use of END last year . Uh, but just in terms of expenditures, just our coal is our step increases in our columns, uh, amounted to
over $1.3 million which really makes up more than half of our overall increase year over year, uh, when you combine that with our insurance increase of approximately $600,000. You're almost entirely at our budget
increase year over year, uh, but we do have increases to maintenance outside of salaries, uh, increasing $588,000. Uh, this does incorporate changes to our utilities, uh, as well as new investments, uh, in some, uh, capital projects, uh, and
additional funds for preventative maintenance during the year, uh, because of these larger than normal increases, uh , it's led us to make a lot of difficult decisions this year. Uh, one of them in the main one being to reduce our overall staffing by 7, instructional
staff members lowering our budget to budget by 418,000. We have also reduced or deferred purchasing a lot of our new technology. Uh, this has reduced our overall budget by 153,000, uh, and last, we've reduced our
athletic user fees by 5% or roughly $35,000. These are not all of our reductions or all of our increases. Obviously just our top 3 in each category. Uh, what you see here is our operating budget broken down by DESI category. Uh, this is the
way the school district approves our operating budget during the budget cycle. This is the this is the same numbers broken out by school or department. When you roll all these numbers together, our ultimate town assessment is coming in at a
5.25% increase, uh, which broken down by town is a 6.58% increase to Hamilton and a 8.54% increase to Wenham Um, now this is the, uh, budget vote, but there is one update I
have for you before we take this vote. Um, yesterday, uh, sorry, last week I had my final meeting with Harvard Pilgrim in regards to our premium rate increase for next year. I uh, posted this exhibit, uh, Friday or Monday morning and
then just yesterday we met with our PEC group, uh, and within that meeting, uh, they voted in a ceiling, a premium not to exceed amount, uh, that percentage increase that they voted in, uh, correlates with what Harvard Pilgrim has quoted
us, there is still more work to be done. I'm still in negotiations, but what we've done is established a ceiling from both sides. That premium rate increase is 3% points lower than what is placed in this budget and what and is what is incorporated in that
number here. Um, so what I'm recommending tonight is that we actually change our overall budget and change the motion to reduce our health insurance, ultimately by that 3% points, uh , that reduction accumulates
about just over $150,000. Um, I, I had a whole thing to say that a budget is your budget up until the point where it's your actuals. We have a 5 $1 million budget in even just yesterday, numbers are changing. Tomorrow, more numbers are gonna
change all the way up until 17 months from now when the budget we're planning on now, some of these expenses will come to fruition in June of 2027. Um, so a lot of these numbers do move around during the year. Uh, it will be final until you guys
vote on it, uh, but tonight I am recommending that we realize that 3% decrease and do anything we can to try to lower our overall assessments to the district. I have included a corrected motion at the end of the slide, uh, that I can go
into, but I really wanted to stop and give you guys the opportunity to ask any questions about that or if you agree with lowering the budget, uh, we don't have to like I mentioned, a lot of things move between now and the end of the year, um, something could increase between
now and then, but I do recommend that we decrease the overall amount by those savings and health insurance costs I can answer any question if you have it. Yep, I have a question. Um, would that, um, affect anybody's coverage. It does not
No, it's just a change in the year of a year premium rate increase that I projected. OK, thank you. Um, if no one does object to it, I can pull up the new motion that I prepared just in case you wanna do it or we can go over
the other slides. I mean we, I had a question. I'm just looking. Of course, of course, there are a lot I can give you a second. I can kind of just go to my next steps if you want, just to give you a minute to this exhibit or one of the other exhibits? No, it's one on
one of the detailed exhibits. Yep. yep, I can just review the next steps just to give you a second to do it. Um, so if we do vote on the final budget tonight, the next step will be Kevin Myers, our district treasurer. Uh, we'll review all of our documents tonight and certify
the budget. On Monday, I will drop off that certification to the town administrators, the select boards, and their FICOs. And then at that point, it really sits with them. They're gonna determine how the warrant's presented. They're gonna determine how it's funded. Uh, so they're the ones that set
how much might be needed for an override or how much might not be. That decision lies with them . We won't know that number until it's final, until they close their warrant, uh, towards the end of February, beginning of March. I could come up with a
lot of scenarios on what might happen, but I really think it'd be better to serve our time to wait to see what that warrant looks like. Uh, wait to see how it's worded and wait to see what those final numbers are. Once we get those, uh, as long as it's OK with you, I plan on presenting some scenarios on
what some of the outcomes might be and what some of our options might be, uh, depending on those results, uh, but I really don't want to develop that until we see what the warrant looks like until we see what the numbers are. Uh, in the meantime, the biggest thing is we need to
prepare, obviously for town meeting and educate the public on what this budget does, uh, what the consequences of maybe a levy only budget might be depending on how that warrant is worded. Uh, that's why we really need to wait and see how they present it
, uh, before we move forward, um , but that would be the next steps is to prepare for town meeting and wait till the end of February to see what the warrant looks like. I will go back to that amended. uh changed motion
OK, so I found it. It's on the one that shows the increases and decreases over $5000. Yep. There's a lot, there's the Colaba, but then towards the end there, there are cola stipends. What I know there's the difference
between those obviously, but what is the difference? Yeah, so sometimes you can have uh one coher for your base salaries and one cola for your stipends. Um, when I break out a budget, I try to be as detailed as I can and give you what the color is based on just your base salaries, um,
so if you think of the teachers salary schedule, uh, the, you know, a master step 5. What is the cola on that, uh, compared to what's the difference on the cola on a stipend, uh, or on your longevity. It's just a different way to look at it. I certainly could have added both together, uh,
and just called it our cola overall. I was just trying to be more detailed and show you how much cola is generated from base salaries versus how much is generated from stipends. Then the additional, uh, FY 26 cola
that's stipends, right? Um, the additional FY 26 cola would be colas that were issued in FY 26 that were over our budget in FY 26, um, so think of it this way, even if you're cola was 0 in 27, you
would still have FY 26 cola presented in that budget because we have to make up the gap from 26 to 27. Does that make sense? Again, it's just trying to be as detailed as possible telling you where all these different numbers are coming from. Uh,
it's not just, you know, cola on your base salaries you have kind of three different categories of ohler, at least from what I consider. It wouldn't be wrong to lumbaldos together and just call it one big hole, it was 3, it was there 3 times, so I just
wanted to understand the difference. Yep. Um that was my only question Um so, uh, if anyone, unless anyone
has any questions, my thought is maybe we have a motion and then an opportunity for discussion. um I'll read this motion. Yes. Yeah . I move that the Hamilton Munham Regional School Committee approved the final fiscal year
207 general fund expenditures budget of $47,251,917. This includes general fund operating expenses after offsets in the amount of $45,290,653 and
General Fund debt service expenses in the amount of $1961,264. Furthermore, the gross operating expenses of the district before offsets have been allocated by the DESE defined chart of accounts
according to the summary by DESE category chart included in this budget presentation and is detailed in the exhibits with the exclusion of $153,983 from the benefits and fixed charges DESE category. Second, seconded by Jen Carr.
OK, um they discussion So two concerns. Uh, one is what Jen. talked about during the hearing. fact that she's concerned that it won't pass in Hamilton.
um and the other one is, can you explain exactly how the towns are thinking about presenting this like are they seriously committed to doing under the levy limit and then over the limited la. That is what I have
been told again, which is why I wouldn't, why I don't want to make a presentation on what scenarios we could have until they finalize it, uh, but what we have been told is there will be 2 votes at town meeting, uh, 1 for the budget at the levy
limit and then one for everything over . Um, so we really need to uh, educate you on what a levy only budget implications are, but again, I really think it'd be wise to see what that number
is, uh, the last number I was told, uh, like I believe we've mentioned earlier, uh, Wenham was talking about 1.7 million. I believe that number has changed drastically, which will change our conversation drastically, so I think we should wait until, uh , we see the final numbers.
Those those Hamilton. I keep saying that, sorry. The other thing underneath that is, is a way to make sure that it's not just school committee costs that are going in the part that's over the lame ladi limit.
Can you say that again? I'm sorry Right, if they're going to put money, right, they're gonna do a budget for under the levy limit and then a budget for over the le levy limit that budget that is over the levy limit. I don't want it to just include school
committee costs. Like I don't want us to be the only one with skin in the game. I don't disagree. Unfortunately that is not our decision. That is, that's that's up to the towns, but we should do everything we can do after to educate the
community on uh, what those amounts actually equate to and but I would wait to see what it is. Um, so I'm just saying if they matched what they were at our quintuple meeting, uh, it would mean that
Hamilton allowed us, uh, growth of 0.36%, well under the Prop 2.5, that would be up to us to educate the community on what that number means, but again, I wouldn't do any of that until we see the number, um, because maybe that's not how the
final number looks. Uh, maybe they share in the bur I'm just gonna jump in and say we don't know and we do know that both towns are still working and and it's
All three of us that both towns are still working All three of us received updated health insurance numbers this week. So I'm sure they're even gonna be updating their budget based on what they got. It could go up, it could go down based on what they've, what they've been
told, so. I guess my concern with how they're suggesting that they do this is that if it's just school committee, school district prices in the over the Ley limit then if that fails, we're the
only ones that get smacked around I agree. I would just wait to see because I don't think that's how the final result will look. I think they are going to share in the burden, but that's why I would wait until we
see what the warrant looks like. Yeah. Um anybody have? I I, I don't know if anybody wants to, I mean, it didn't sound like there was a lot of
discussion about the lowering due to the insurance. I'm in agreement. I just wanted. to put it out there like I understand that I I feel like that's the right thing to do even though I heard your as I'm just putting that out
discussion point. I think that's the right thing to do even though I, you know, we don't know a million things could go up or down in the budget. It's all an estimate an excellent estimate, but
um I think it's the right thing to do and I, I think you know, in talking about the way that the towns are looking at their budgets and the work that the towns are doing. My hope is that
like this is what we would want everyone to do is when you make your best estimate and then you discover that it's actually going to be lower or, you know, to do this kind of thing even though there is some risk. I guess that's just that's part of the work that the towns are also doing right now
and I hope hope they experience something similar where they're able to find some so. um yeah, I mean, I, I guess I'm confused. So we're, we're looking to vote on this final
budget as presented. Correct. with the caveat that everyone's going to get their healthcare expenses, updated this week? Um we got our numbers updated and
I'm requesting that we incorporate that update into our final budget. I'm not sure if the towns will do the same, but I do know they received, uh, updated health insurance numbers . Now, whether that increases their budget or lowers it, I'm not entirely sure.
Does that answer your question? Well, just what, so you're looking, but you are looking for us to vote on this budget tonight. Uh, that's correct Yes, and I wasn't sure if it was waiting for more numbers, but just so you know, Vinny has on
the screen, he had an original number, but changed it, uh, yes, yes, yesterday afternoon. I was literally this morning maybe, yeah, this morning reduced the, you know, we had a final budget presentation that he had posted that was coming forward. He has
reduced that number by $153,983 because of a lower cost of insurance then was uh originally budgeted so it's in our favor. and in theory we could say we don't want to vote to lower the
budget. We want to keep that 153,983 in the budget and reallocate it to some other category. Of course theory. just for the sake of clarity. I, I don't, I'm not I'm not advocating that, but just to be clear like that of course you can or you don't even have to reallocate it now. You can leave
it in that DESI category and allocate it at some point next year. OK. Um, you do have that option. I do not recommend doing that. I do recommend lowering it, but you have that option. I think it's important to to use that money to lower the budget because if there is an issue
with Lackman over, I'd vote that plays into our favor down the road where, you know, cuts are reduced by that amount. So I don't know if other I mean, I, I I guess I
I feel like it's important to discuss. I mean, we haven't gotten a ton of feedback from the public. We've gotten very little, we got a little bit tonight we've gotten maybe 2 emails, maybe 3,
and over, over the whole budget process. I, I guess I'm really worried because I sort of. I'm sort of I don't know what other people I think this that we're doing
the right thing. I hear the concern that it isn't going to pass. I guess I'm sort of unsure about , I, I think that's real. I'm very worried that it won't pass, but I'm sort of unsure about
whether that means that people think we shouldn't bring it forward, because I feel like we have to bring it forward to say this is the budget that would be appropriate It's certainly not the dream
budget. No. I guess I hear people saying I'm concerned it's not going to pass , but I'm not really sure whether I'm not really heard anyone say, I, I don't know. I, I I don't know if someone can help
me out on what I'm trying to say is, I agree with you. I don't I I am very worried that it may not pass and uh I don't see any way to not bring this forward and bring it to the people to say this is what I think this is
what we need. Yeah, OK. I don't know. you know, I, I have heard again, very limited. but I did hear a couple of you know, that it's too much
you've cut too much. So. I don't know I feel I'm feeling a little adrift. I really had hoped and dreamed for lots and lots and lots of people coming, giving all kinds of
visions about the budget in the past two. hearings Well, I think to maybe repeat like a phrase I said before, I think I think this should go forth as it is.
as somewhat of a litmus test. to see where the taxpayer is in saying that they want to support the schools , they want to support teachers, they want to support teacher retention. They want to support maintenance, and they want 3
elementary schools. by and large This is what that budget accomplishes with minimal impacts to you know, the delivery of our educational program. Yes, we are losing 7 FTEs and I don't mean
to make light of that, but I think Eric and Vinny have gone back and forth on this at our direction a number of times to try to find savings. And I think short of us saying the cuts need to total 23 million, which we decided pretty early on in the process was too
much. Um, I think we have to put this budget forward. and to Vinny's point, see where the town warrants end up. and then you know, weigh what the
scenarios could be if the overrides do not pass. I, I don't think we should, it's hard to know how much time we should devote to spending on that. I think I'd almost rather spend my energy trying to encourage people to dive into the detail behind this budget request and to understand why they should
really think about supporting the override if they can, as opposed to like, well, we did this, but we also have this other plan over here that we can just do, you know, because I don't think that is the right message either. I think it's this override supports a number
of things in the community. I agree with Jenn's comments that it's difficult when these things are positioned just for the schools because as we've said many times and times in this meeting, everything that we choose to budget for is a choice, and I think that applies to the municipalities as well
and that there can be prioritization. as communicated through, you know, the override that we want to maintain, you know, trash service, schools, public safety, all of the things that people expect and that that will require additional levy capacity this year.
So. so And some remind me the part of the budget that's under the levy limit. does that mean a 2/3 majority, or is that a simple majority?
I think it's simple. at town meetings, at town meetings a simple majority. But above the levy limit is 2/3. Uh, not a town meeting. The 2/3 only applies to debt exclusions. OK. But it also has to go to the
ballot the ballot ballots. It also has to be a ballot votes instead of 2/3, 2 votes. Um and yeah
and there's a lot of ifs. I mean , Vinny is sort of, you know, somebody asked a good a great question that I've asked a whole bunch of times. What happens if this fails in one town and this and like there's just so many permutations of what could happen Yeah, I think Vinny's
been good about being clear about let's, let's see what the numbers are and then strategize from there about how to approach that, you know, because there are a lot of different scenarios and and there's a lot of different ways to approach them. depending on what happens both
at the ballot and in the town meetings. OK. Other people have other discussion. This is your opportunity. Questions. Sure.
Mhm I mean, I speak only for myself. I feel like we've been well prepared. This is the same number from last, meaning just minus the 158, which is a total
separate thing that happened. Right. I make sure everybody's ready. Can we see Julia? Julia's there. You ready to vote Yep. OK All right, again, it has to be a roll call vote.
um John Yes Amy, yes, Anna's a yes, Julia. Yes Kristen, yes OK, and that is unanimous of the
five members present and the motion passes. Thank you guys. Thank you appropriate to clap for you, I would, but. No. Thank you. Thank you for all of that work. I might seem like that was the
hard part, but I think the hard part is now educating everyone and it's the next agenda item. Thank you guys. Thank you, thank you. Um
so um, as promised when we had the question during the budget hearing. the next um sort of step forward is to start talking about
um communication regarding the budget. Um we still, there's a lot of information, we still are like don't have because we need to talk about. and we need to hear from the towns and talk about what it's gonna look like, um
and well I actually have a question. Sure . Let's say the part of the budget that's over the levy limit, passes in Wenham. but it fails in Hamilton. It
fails. Aren't we then in violation of the regional agreement. It fails. You would have the opportunity to reconvene and either vote in the levy budget. and then you have an approved budget or you would have to
bring back bring it back to whatever town failed it or not, um, and except you're saying because it would be 22 different numbers, right? And, and I do think part of that is a question about how it would be
structured like, could it be structured so that I. these are questions I've been asking these like could it be structured so that like, first the towns would pass the levy limit budget then they, so that you'd actually have a
budget passed in both towns, but it would have to get, we voted on this budget. now so if any different budget gets passed, it would have to come back here for approval. here or for this committee to choose
to do, take any other action. So if the piece of the budget that's over the levy limit fails in one town, it basically fails in both, correct. So Wenham can't approve or Hamilton can't
approve the extra money and OK right, and it's, yeah, I just needed clarification on that. And remember, if you go back. to the, the committee comes back together and says OK we're gonna reduce.
from you know, say I'm just saying it uses the round number 2 million down to 1 million. that still changes both numbers, so you're gonna need a special in both places. Yeah.
Um But, uh, ideally you wouldn't have a situation in which one town or both towns didn't pass a budget at all. Like that would be really not ideal because then you wouldn't have
a budget at all, so. um OK Um so I don't really know how we want to structure this conversation. I about
communication, um. I'm open to what the committee is looking for. I'm just gonna offer my thoughts and say in the past, when we've talked about this, what we've talked about is the sort of the one pager that's
been created. Um, I will shout out to Amy has done really nice work in the past, creating that visually so that there's a one page document that can be circulated ahead, um, and then produce a town meeting. um.
I want to give another shout out that when I, when we um Eric and Vinnie and I were ahead of we were going to um talk with the 5 chairs meetings,
um, and we were looking for input and Kristen sent some, I will just say some really helpful talking points, um that we shared with the um the other
chairs and talked about and those talking points were really about messaging moving forward and how to create sort of unified um messaging to and let me forgive me if I don't get
the word, but basically to convey to the citizens of both communities that these budgets, which are you know, the town to town budgets and the school budget that these have been thoughtfully created.
to provide what is needed for the citizens. um, and that is a wide array of things. It's education, but it's also all the other things we just talked about, you know, police and fire and um DPW and trash collection and all of that. Um.
so, I was a long-winded way of saying that I think we have some resources here on the committee of people that have excellent abilities to communicate. I don't I'll stop talking, but like I, I have thoughts about what moving
forward, but we can't create some we're not going to be able to create a plan right now, but I think we should create, in the past we've designated a committee member or two um. so I'll stop. Thoughts I'm happy to make whatever
visuals we need to help. help teach everyone about the budget. Um I don't know if this time around it would make sense to like hold a couple of info sessions.
um either maybe like partnering with other community groups, senior centers, friends groups, things like that. Um I'd definitely be willing to do a couple of those. Well, and we did our liaisons earlier today.
It might make some sense. to uh you know, to have to whatever extent possible to have people thinking about maybe going to some of those groups. that whatever groups you're a
liaison to or other people could do, you know, I know in the past we've done certainly gone to friends groups to present as or just be there for a question, um, I don't know , is that the kind of thing you were thinking of where you were thinking of, yeah, I also think
it'd be helpful if we could to record one so that it could be shared. you know, for folks that can't make it to something like that. The organic questions that come out of things like that are important rather than us just deciding. you know, all of the information that needs to be shared, like
answering questions for people is important too. So, and I will say as part of the, I can't remember where that that came up in the chairs or was that in the quintuple board where there was in the chairs, so I don't know if anyone had a chance to see it, but
Hamilton at one point put out um . a video about it was not question and answer, it was just , um, I think it was just the chair of the Hamilton select board put out or maybe it was a couple of people, uh, anyway, they put out a nice video about explaining
the Gordon Conwell, um, situation and the vote and explaining and it was, I think a little bit about what you're saying was just sort of informational short and um, and it was something that people could share. Like if you're, it was kind of ahead of the Gordon Conwell vote and
people could share it and just say, like, are you wanting to know information about the guarding. So I'm thinking it could be something like that, and we did the um we talked a little bit about. was there an opportunity to do something like that, um.
to jointly, yes, I was just gonna say that um you know, but I like the idea too of, I mean, maybe you do it somehow with questions or I don't know. how that works, but you could ask people to provide them ahead
of time, maybe, or just maybe use one of the events that we hold if it's, you know, not too long. I could record that and then record like the question and answer part. But maybe sending questions ahead of time is more because I do think that a recording needs to be super
concise so that people can, you know, I, I, I don't know how long they want on Gordon Conwell was, but it wasn't long and I didn't, you know, it was quick, you could watch it and you didn't, yeah, you know, it's like. um, I think before we produce something like that, I'd like to get a better sense of what questions people have too. So I
think it you know we're so deep into this budget process. It's kind of hard to guess up what the key points are and I'm not sure how to get those because like I said, we haven't gotten
and I know like I know Eric has you know, alerted people in the newsletter that the budget is underway and we haven't gotten a ton of feedback. It would be good to get. Well, I'm, I'm happy to work
with Amy on like, you know, some of the, um, messaging and things we could put out there and to talk about. how we could put together that kind of a video or videos maybe of like short you know, FAQs or something like
that, um. I do wonder how we distribute that because I know we don't have our own like social media channel, and I'm not necessarily saying that we should, that could be a bigger discussion, um , but I just, if we can
how, how like what is the best way of getting that content out there. We could certainly ask the Hamilton select board what they did, how they, I mean. yeah, how, you know what they. how they pushed it out um
I don't know the answer to that question, um, yeah, I, I We had school level socials we can, I mean, we can put on the school level socials. We, we have quite a pretty, I mean, one of, one of the, one of the things we've gotten with all the tension over the school project is a lot more
people have signed up for the newsletter who are not school people, which is what we were trying to do. We were trying to get more people so there are a little more people getting information rather than just the school people, so it's hopeful that way.
Um so I think this was helpful. I mean, so I guess what I'm wondering, I don't, I don't know if do you have more I think we need to think and
brainstorm a way to clearly communicate what happens if the part of the override budget doesn't pass. And I, I do too, and I think that Vinnie was sort of indicating that part of what we need first
is the towns that give us uh more but yes then yeah, yeah, I think I'm just saying that we've never done it this way before. So like, Right. No, it'll need to be clear about what what's what's provided.
under the levy limit and what's provided over the levy or in the override um. it might be, it might be good to have Kristen and Amy brainstorm and come to the next meeting that we'll we'll have it on the agenda that, all right,
here's, here's the brainstorm. Let's start the conversation and that way we can do what we, we've done in the past, assign people things to do because then you'll have 4 meetings. I mean, I do, I mean, I think, I mean other people can chime in, but I do think 2 people is a nice cause then you're a working
group, you're not a subcommittee , you're not just talk to each other. regular people, regular people, um, so, um and yeah, we, I mean, I don't just, I mean, I guess we should vote on that, but does that seem
like something you too? Yeah, I was gonna say we usually like appoint. I mean I guess it would be a working. I, I would say it's a working we were a working group or we would just appoint you to come back to us. That's fine. I don't even know if it's called a working group. I duo just ask
you I think we're just, I think the key would be to just task you with doing that, the two of you, um rather than even calling it anything. Um. I don't know if anyone has the motion to that effect or if you
want me to try to do it. Jen's got it. I can see I move that Amy Kunberger and Kristen Noon, a establish a working group to determine and
implement the best communication practices to the people of Hamilton. and Wenham before and during town meeting. Second, all right, I heard a 2 by Amy. Are we, are we comfortable with working group? I'm not really, the reason I'm
hesitating is I don't know whether working group that formal. has a legal legal requirements then maybe just maybe protract that emotion and maybe make another one to say the school committee designates the two of us to designate a good,
just a friendly amendment. You can just friendly amendment. OK. I move to amend Jen's motion. Now we have two motions stacked on. Um, you can, it's a friendly amendment, so you can just say to her friendly amendment. OK, so just say maybe um I move
that the school committee designates Amy and Kristen to develop a recommended communications plan. for the school committees. budget and override, something to that nature. And my, my second stands right, yeah, looks
like that was accepted as a friendly amendment and OK, um, all right, any further discussion on that? Uh, I just have questions, um, should Eric be involved and yeah . I feel like I'm always involved.
It's a nice way that the nice way that this is worked is that, yeah, you guys can work with their um you could consult with Vinny. You can work with, yes, and I just wanted to put that out there and also um in the
boards meeting, the quintuple boards meeting, we talked about select board members and potentially FinCO members. teaming up with school committee members to have this communication. So is this something they should be involved with, should we just provide them with this
communication? Should we reach out to some key members. That's a great question. Um, I mean, I I mean, we, uh, we did a little bit of that in the chair's meeting. There was some discussion, I think because we
go first we probably ahead just because we have to, we go first, so I think it could be, I think open and like the more we can share the better. Like if we can share it with them as we, um, but we can ask whether they have a
designated person that they want . or whether it's just, but yeah, I I don't think it could hurt to run things by them and I think that, I mean perfect opportunity for liaisons you guys bring it forward to say, OK , here is the suggestions, right , this looks like a good
suggestion to invite. some select board members or FICA members to do a video or whatever then you can just as a liaison liaison reach out and make that connection. Right. I mean, I think you know, um well, you, I was gonna say it's perfect because you're the I
just looked it up. You're white board and you're the one who's whiteboard and Wenham Fincom and you and I'm actually, I'm actually Hamilton Fincom, but um in the CPAC whatever CPAC CPAC whatever, whatever CPAC CPAC whatever, whatever, um, we're
electing new people soon. Yeah, I'll get reshuffled in April, um OK. um did we vote Um, no, no. It's not.
Um, all right, and, uh, is Julia , Julia's. She's gone. OK. Um, all right, Kristen, yes, and yes , Amy, and yes, yes, and we, that is unanimous of the 4 members present, which is enough .
for this, but would not have been for the for the budget here so. um, excellent. Um thank you all both of you Um, all right, next up committee
reports, uh, Capital Finance, we did not meet. We had too many people out of town, so we're gonna reschedule for after sometime after February vacation . OK. And it sounds like you guys have a lot on your plate. We do. We really do need to meet. Yeah,
you do, um. OK. um, and do you meet on Zoom or in person? In person, yeah, but I'd be fine swapping hybrid, we've been hybrid because when members had to come in on Zoom, so yeah, I mean we, I'm just
hybrid wasn't a criticism. It was just a curiosity about um, OK, thank you, um, policy, we have a meeting scheduled for March 16th, um, with no agenda yet. OK, and you had something that didn't make
it to that was didn't make it on this agenda, that was my fault. That wasn't my fault. Well, I reviewed the in reviewing the agenda this morning, I didn't I realized that under policy I didn't bring one of the policies that they approved. It was actually an update, so we're fine. It just, it was an annual
update, um. there'll be a couple more coming as well Well I'll still go to the committee. Full disclosure. Eric and I already, yeah, he, he told me he forgot that and I did not add an executive session on today either, which I was supposed to do, but I did already add it to the next our
next meeting. It was a big agenda, um, yes, um and you guys have, I'm sorry, you're meeting one? policy? I'm sorry, I think you're just 16th at 2:30.
um in um negotiations, um, we met this afternoon. Um, we're continuing to negotiate with the ESP, uh, union. We met this afternoon, um, or
moving along and um we'll have some updates for you guys, um. uh in executive session at the next meeting and my apologies for not putting that on this one and our next meeting is on
26th. Um and yeah, everyone is working both the association and we are working hard to be collaborative and um
negotiations when you do them sort of thoughtfully and methodically or not quick. Um, so there we go. Um anybody have any questions about that OK, uh, our secretary is not
here, so we'll look for a secretary report soon, but we are, I think in general, doing a better job at keeping up and we're in better shape in terms of minutes. um
and I would just remind everybody on your subcommittees that um right after your meeting, you can go ahead and submit a draft to Janelle. in the minutes, um always better to have a draft
that at least is waiting there with Janelle, um you know. a quick draft is better than nothing. Yeah, she said she would format them. She's, if that's what's holding you up if that's exactly, if formatting is holding you up, then
worry not to send it right over to Janelle. Um OK, uh, Amy, do you have anything in your in our inboxes? Inbox has been very quiet, has been quiet. OK um
all right, I think I have exhausted everything I wanted to say, I think already I don't have more to say. Um, on the chair's report, unless anyone has questions for me. Mm right
um, topics for future meetings. You have to do it, uh, 26 forecast. Hopefully I'll have it on the next. OK. The year end. Yeah. Yeah. Um
that policy in the and the forgotten policy. I know our policy. find the. That's a, that's a first reading or that's something that you guys have already reviewed. That is a first reading for this group. but you guys have shooting, yeah
. OK. OK Um anybody have anything else No? No would entertain emotion if someone has one.
I moved to adjourn 2nd, 2nd by Jen. Uh, discussion. No discussion. Uh, all those in favor, we're nobody on remote. and that is unanimous 9:09 p.m.
At 9:09 p.m. and we are adjourned. Thank you, Vinnie. So I'm a smile when somebody said motion to adjourn. I don't
know. Oh not tired, are you? So tired the whole meeting. You didn't have your cuff job