##VIDEO ID:QWK_U-hH9rQ## e e good evening how are you okay good evening all right can everybody hear me Julia can you hear me yep okay um um all right I call to order the meeting of the Hamilton Wenham Regional school committee um at 7 pm. on Thursday December 19th 2024 and I invite you to join us in the pledge of allegiance to the flag the United States of America to The Republic stands one nation under God indivisible liy for all right um before we get started I just want to remind everyone that this meeting is um being recorded and live streamed um by HW cam on and you can watch it on YouTube um first up we have uh an opportunity for Citizens comments um Mr Tracy do we have anyone on Zoom who looks like they might want to offer a Citizens comment we do not I am not sure I'm guessing that we don't have any citizens comments in the room please let me know if you do want to make a comment okay um seeing none I will spare you all my Spiel regarding citizens comments um and we will uh go ahead and close the opportunity on zoom and move forward um first up we're going to have a review um a read a portion of our school committee um protocols uh I'm going to take my turn to do that um as elected members of the Hamilton onam Regional school committee we including the superintendent accept the high honor and trust that has been placed in us to ensure that the students of the district receive the best education possible to that end we hereby commit to the following in the conduct of our business number seven Administration will endeavor to make materials for school committee meetings available the Friday before the meeting the school committee will recognize that some circumstances will not always make this possible in any event we recognize that having background materials available for school committee members is a best practice okay um next up we have a reading of a portion of the mission statement Trent the Hamilton Wenham 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 Hamilton Wenham Regional school committee will lead and inspire a district that supports and guides the superintendent to execute and achieve the approved 2024 2025 District goals thank you um um I realized from my opening uh remarks I forgot to mention that we do have a member um Julie Campbell is on uh is here with us virtually this evening um so she is present um and just so the members know that we mean we'll have roll call votes when we take a vote um and Julia how are you doing in terms of hearing us yeah I can hear great and thank you yep and we can hear you very well so that's good um all right next up we are uh fortunate to have our student representative Anderson craft is here this evening to give us a report about what's happening in some of the schools in our district uh thank you for having me um I'll start off at the high school so last Tuesday the high school hosted its annual winter art show and concert the students were able to show off their art through showcases that their visitors were able to see following that the band jazz band choir and Harmony performed for the guests uh last Saturday the stuffer Cruiser event happened this is an event where people can donate toys to the Hamilton police station for the shinest hospital in Boston and then for sports and clubs recently winter sports have begun where tryouts and first practices started the Monday after Thanksgiving many sports such as girls and boys hockey and wrestling will be combining with Marblehead for Oort and Salem our school is proud to have many clubs but to highlight a few we have Deca Student Government science club Spanish culture Culture Club robotics club and ping pong club last week Deca competed in the District 3 qualifiers where I'm proud to announc that 108 students have qualified for the state conference for the Middle School our middle school has many different clubs and inters that fit everyone's liking some of the many clubs are the art Club Junior Honor Society and student council some of the music clubs are Corral and jazz band that performed at the Winter concert the inals that it offered are basketball dodgeball and indoor soccer currently the middle school students are participating in the spirit week last night the win through up fifth graders um band performed in the annual concert tonight Cutler students have their winter solstice read aloud tomorrow after buer afternoon buer has their car's concert to end the week before we start our winter break thank you any questions thank you um anybody have questions for Anderson um I I don't really have a question but I did just want to comment on I think you said 108 students are going from Deca onto the state is that correct y um thank you for highlighting that that's such an exciting program and that's a huge number from our school thank you um all right anybody else have anything for Anderson no thank you um it means a lot that you come and get this report it's really important for us to get to hear it straight from the students and it's nice for that that of you to come you are absolutely welcome to stay and you also are not required to stay we know that you probably have other things to do this evening um so it's up to you and if you want to go that would be okay thank you for having me thank you thank you much appreciated yeah thank you okay um next up is our consent to agenda um does anyone have any items that they would like to have held from the consent agenda all right seeing none uh David uh I moved that the hamilt wiam regional school committee accept the consent agenda as written in tonight's um agenda second second by Jen uh there is no discussion on the consent agenda we will do a roll call vote starting with David Frankle yes Jen yes David yes yes Dana yes Trent yes Julia yes and that is unanimous uh and the motion passes okay all right next up we have some fall um a athletes to recognize and Mr jaldo I think it's to you thank you so much uh good evening and happy holidays to everybody thank you for allowing us to highlight um some of our fall athletes here who are either on teams that did exceptional things or themselves that individually exceptional things um but all of them are part of wonderful groups and I think we had maybe 35 to 40% of the school participating and fall Sports so uh it's a great way to kick off the year we had tons of good stuff to happen we're hoping to highlight that for you tonight a lot of kids had practice or different things tonight so they're off doing their winter stuff but uh we're grateful for the ones that are here and we're going to highlight everyone whether they here or not um and some of the best stuff that we've done over the last few months um the first team uh that we would like to so I'm going to go in a weird order just to kind of build suspense um but uh uh the first team we'd like to highlight is the girls volleyball team um with captains Ava day in busy Island they made the sweet 16 um they took I switch to the brink they they lost the IP switch who won their fourth consecutive State title but uh if you look at the state tournament scores and all that stuff they pushed them further than any other team they played so it was quite a year for them um so congratulations to all of them uh with highlights to Captain Ava day in busy Ireland um the second team would like to acknowledge is the football team who won their second Thanksgiving Day game in a row um captains were Martin bomb excuse me Jack Cook Kaden McCollum and Kaden shck with Kaden shck uh a thousand yard rusher being a first team Allstar uh would like to next go to the field hockey team uh who had their second best record in 15 years um they had a wonderful season uh with a brand new coach um who did a great job uh and their captains were Samantha nans Skyler Murphy Emma Ryan and Rowan sheel um they played a state tournament game down in New Bedford they didn't play New Bedford but it was out New Bedford and um they were a low seed against a much higher seed and they almost pulled it out I think it was like two to one and they almost scored at the end it was really exciting um the next team would like to honor is the boys soccer state tournament team who made the sweet 16 for the fourth year in a row uh their captains were Andre Gario and Nick Stein excuse me Andre Gario and kin Clark goldfeld and their first team cape and League All Stars were Andre Gario and Nick Stein um they two had a wonderful year uh moving on the next team we'd like to highlight is golf uh golf was the capan league regular season champions for the second year in a row senior Cooper Miller was the Cal player of the year and he was a cal Allstar and he was a captain along with Cam McIntosh um so now we're in the first page here uh the next team we'd like to on anounce that's getting really long uh because these teams did a really really good job um the next team we'd like to honor is girl soccer who four years in a row you won the Cal five yeah I knew it was a lot um five years in a row they won the capan league pretty incredible I don't think they've lost a regular season game um in like 600 years or something I don't know it's been forever uh especially in the league um they were the State final four and runner up um and this senior class all the seniors are played if you look at their kind of four years they had two final eight appearances a final four uh state finals um in a state championship and that's pretty incredible run uh pretty dominant over those four years um coach wadell was the cape and league coach of the year again um just off the presses found out about 20 minutes before walking in she's also the Boston Globe coach of the year not the first time that's happened um so congratulations coach really grateful for you um thank you for being here um also some of the kids that did some great things this year Georgia Wilson was the capan league player of the year uh had quite a season she's a heck of a track athlete who you're going to be hearing her name again in the coming Seasons uh First Team capan league Allstars Georgia Wilson Annie MOA hint Savannah gor Annie's an exceptional case um she was an offensive player mostly and sacrificed a lot of who she was as a player and and and all kind of the glory that goes with scoring goals and all that stuff to move back to fill in for other players that were injured she's an incredible incredible young lady and uh you know she's one of the reasons why we were able to make it to the state finals despite losing some really talented kids to injury um the captains were STI gamber who's at basketball practice probably Tessa hunt Annie moan and Matty wood who's going on to play in college as well um I think that's them um the boys cross country team members of which are here um and we're excited for you to be here thank you um I often see them I'll be driving home and I'll you know be tired from a long day and I'll be about two miles into my drive and I'll just see them running along and I don't know how like if I had a drive as long as they run i' think I'd need a nap um they're quite impressive young men um they won the division well they won the capan league title they also won the Dual uh league as well as the open Invitational at the end where the large and small participate they would division 3B Champions which is essentially like the old eastern Mass stuff um and they were the division three state runner up now the ironic thing about that is the team that they competed against that actually won the State title for division three was so dominant that um the top two scores the team that won in our team the scores were relatively close and you looked at like the third place team and they may as well have not even ran it was so I mean they just blew them out of the water I think their score was so good they would have won the division two State title had they not competed against this one team uh with really kind of strange looking green Mohawks but we'll give them credit because they won and they're really good um but on our team uh Ben Rich was uh the capan league Runner of the year as well as the individual division 3B Champion me meaning he came in first in division 3B uh out of I don't know how many schools that is but it's a whole lot um so Ben congratulations man um some of the other uh coach Sawyer won coach of the year if you asked him how many times he's won coach of the year he also won Globe coach of the year which for any coach would be a once in a lifetime accomplishment I asked him the other day he goes I don't know it's I said is it over 20 he said yeah probably so to him it's no big deal to anyone else it' be like an achievement of a lifetime to do it once um that thank you coach I appreciate you you know that um it's the best part of my day when he comes in at two o'clock and just sits down and we just start talking about who knows what um the capan league Allstars for the boys cross country team Ben Rich James rean Cole Regan Seth Glidden and Clark Glidden um some of you that are seniors that have been around for a while we're going to miss you quite a bit um quite a bit it's fun seeing you in school and it's fun seeing you run around so thank you for all that you've done I really appreciate it um and the captains were Ben Rich James rean and Clark ly now one of the things uh if you could click on that note who's ever doing the screen here sometimes um we strive to win and we we honor our state champions and we honor the teams that do well what's way more important to us is how we go about our business um whether we win or whether you win or lose in high school is completely irrelevant in my opinion I honestly I you'll never hear me use the word win once if you look at our handbook it says success I don't think the word wind should exist in high school sports um stuff like this if you notice so you get to picture the scene right it's a long day these guys have been working for four years to to achieve a goal that's never happened in school history right and they just ran the race of a lifetime and lost to just a juggernaut of a team it's late it's cold uh it's emotional um for some of them their careers are have finished for some of them their older brothers are going to be going on to college and this is the first realization that their older brothers who they love and care about aren't going to be there it's an emotional time when you could imagine people kind of thinking of themsel a little bit right and kind of having a moment for thems well they do the podium stuff and all that and they take the picture of the number one team up there and all of our guys run over to the other team and just individually hug them and say congratulations and in that moment that selfless moment is everything that we strive for uh we probably don't reach that kind of heights very often because that was special but that's what we look for and so their coach had their whole team sign this letter uh for those of their home that may not be able to see it it says coach Sawyer and boys cross country wanted to reach out and congratulate you on an outstanding season you guys and elite team and alltime team as demonstrated by your performances All Season thank you for setting the bar so incredibly high and pushing our team to places we weren't sure were possible after the race you were full of class and High character and we hope that you are extremely proud of your season you're the best team our team has ever faced um this stuff means a lot uh and it's special and so I'm incredibly grateful for Coach who certainly had a hand on that even though he'll never say he did uh but for how you acted in that moment that that stuff is legendary so thank you very much all right uh yes uh and then we have members of the girls cross country team who I think girls cross country has won the league 19 out of 20 years uh which is mindboggling they were also division 3B Champions they were regular season dual me Champions they were end of the year Cal open Champions ASA Lael who's here um was the capan league Runner of the year like I said coach has his box at plaques for coach of the year he doesn't even know where they are but he was Coach of the Year again ham um rinse and repeat uh the cape and League Allstars for the girls team was Grace Rich Ace Lael Charlotte Madden Talia Lael anelise abers I hope I said all those names right and the captains were Charlotte Madden Sarah eladia and Sophia hle they went to the um they went to the all state championships the same day as the boys and they won and they didn't just win they absolutely left the other teams in the dust they were first by like a 100 miles they had a million Runners cross early and finish and it was it was over before the race was halfway through um it was an incredible day to watch both of your teams but that was something special and you guys I know you know to just think oh what do you do after school well I go running and we all know that it's not just that right you're doing Hills you're doing all kinds of siles Hills or whatever they're called and all kinds of stuff uh that I don't even understand but um you guys are special and so thank you for a wonderful wonderful season um and that's it and uh on behalf of all these kids and their captains and their coaches thank you for allowing us the space to celebrate this with you to celebrate wins to celebrate leadership and to celebrate uh things that we strive for every day so thank you thank you and thank you for sharing all of that with us it's so meaningful to how to get to see in detail the way that Hamilton winham is getting represented out there on our athletic fields um and that was really touching and um let anyone else um Mr Tracy do you have anything to say sure it's always fun for me as each of these Seasons begins and end that you see all the the amazing things that occur along the way the coaches who support our athletes our student athletes um throughout the year and it just keeps happening over and over and the commitment is obvious the hard work is obvious and it's great to uh see the power of Hamilton whenham both inside and outside of school representing us all over uh basically all over the state now that the state has moved all these tournaments all over the place but thank you all congratulations to each and every one of you and your teams and your families because these are great opportunities so than thank you thank you um I don't know if the group is willing it would be great if we could get a picture um if you guys are willing to all come up what do you think right here yeah we can do it right you got to wave your hands before these lights go off and uh so if you're willing come on up take a picture let's get our our coaches come up in the front of you come on come on we getting out of the way I'm come on awesome I shake my head every day yeah you and me both all right where are we compliance all right well that was a lot more fun maybe than the rest of the meeting but um all right um all right next up uh to you Mr Tracy for msba initial compliance certification thank you and as we announced in earlier meeting we have uh been invited once again by the state uh Massachusetts school building authority into their accelerated repair program for the high school roof finally after I think seven six or seven years of trying to get um the the roof on the repair list we have finally been invited in to the process this letter um is very similar to the one we just did for the the uh School building uh Elementary School building it just outlines that um um we'll follow the rules of the msba we'll make sure we hit all of the deadlines um and then we will work with in collaboration with the msba through the entire process um and basically following there there they have a very prescribed process of uh that's very similar to the elementary building process where you have um we start the process on January 2nd it's the official kickoff date for this project and then it's a number of months of um you you bring on board a designer and a an architect excuse me a a project manager and an architect who will do the design work that are basically assigned by the state in this process because it's a it's a a truncated process it's really much faster than the school building project um so this basically outlines our commitment to them that we'll follow the rules and we'll do all the things um that are related to um the expectations of the msba and essentially uh Dana and I end up signing it somewhere here on the bottom it's a quite a lengthy form um down on the bottom and there are two signatures that um I signed because I signed as a Regional School District they require the chief executive officer and the superintendent in a Regional School District so it happens to be the same person um and then Dana would need approval to sign uh on behalf of the district uh we don't know the full length of the process yet because uh we will Curtis Whitman is managing this process our our uh facilities director he'll be meeting with the contact through the msba to start determining um some of the essential things like what's a good number to put in for the estimate for just the design work what's a good number to put in for the estimate for what you pay the project manager and then it'll go from there so he'll continue through through that process and we'll bring those numbers back to the committee as we get them okay um uh trying to think whether we want to start off with a motion for me um the mo the motion would be to authorize authorize that's the word I was looking for um David would you be willing to start us off with a motion um am I authorizing Eric and I yeah uh I moved at the Hamilton one Regional School commission uh school committee authorize uh superintendent Tracy and danaa to um apply for the msba initial compliance certification approval um as presented in tonight's meeting agenda do we have a second second second by Amy um all right uh do people have questions Julia no no I don't have a question okay Sor David you a question yeah I've had some advice in the past that msba is not necessarily the most cost effective route um it may be I'm not saying it isn't but I wonder whether we shouldn't get um a major Roofing contract attracted to give us a comparative number that doesn't come through the specification restrictions and other loadings that that msba tends to put on projects because as I understand it's just a replacement for the roof not a not a necessarily a newly designed roof or am I misunderstanding what the St right would remove the current roofing materials and replace the the entire roof yeah with up-to-date materials and there's also now an option uh to have your building solar ready so if you want to put solar panels on the building they they are paying a fairly substantial cost of the of the solar Readiness if you will um and again we don't know what the reimbursement would be because we don't we don't have any numbers yet but because they're only inviting us in they have not agreed to say yeah we're going to work with you yet we still have to go through the first stage which is about four months long January uh 2nd till I think April 2nd and then we'll go through the process of vetting uh people to give us some some idea of what these things will cost us okay yeah okay thank you just to follow up to that um at what point in so the the designer and the project manager um at what point in time do those individuals enter the process is that before the quote phase or is that after the quot quote phase and before the project start phase it's it's before because they'll like the building project they'll do the design they'll they'll actually design the the roof with the material and any um enhancements like solar Readiness then then would see a cost so the designer would do the actual initial cost layout for us very similar to the school Building Product like here's an estimate then they'll do the kind of real here's the real number and then they move forward from there and then the project manager manages the project for us they don't so so those are essentially sunk costs before we know what the cost of the project is correct correct okay just like the the elementary school project we had to have uh 1.2 million approved ahead of time for the first four phases of the process well five actually of the process so this is very similar you'd have upfront costs for a designer and OPM and then they would give you an estimate and at that right around that same time you get the um reimbursement rate from the state do we know what that reimbursement rate has looked like historically like do we have a ballpark have historically 39 so 39 in previous projects I did not know that yeah yeah it it not an eligible cost eligible cost again it's not it's not it's not an exact split kind of what made me ask the question was I'd had some Roofing expert give me uh their ballpark at a couple million dollars to replace that roof and I know that we the formal estimate that you got previously was five and the difference was the choice of materials and the labor involved with the the more expensive materials but the roofing expert claimed and I I'm not a roofing expert that that that was an unnecessary premium and those kind of roots would normally be used on a pharmaceutical Factory or or something that was different in purpose and not on a school so I'm just throwing up that caution flag yeah that we may be over may end up over engineering um and and paying more than we would but um with or without the subsidy right and I think I think it's part of the process like learning about what the options are you know I think I don't know when it was done 28 years ago or something it they selected that a white material that is uh substantially more expensive than a regular roof I think they thought it would be long longer lasting I'm not sure I wasn't around when that decision was made but yeah I think we could definitely look at those options like same with the building like oh what if we did this what if we did that Soh it'll be the same similar process just much more truncated fair enough okay other questions discussion can I just want to just make sure everybody understands we're we're not we don't have an agreement this does not bind us to the msba just says yeah we're willing to work with you so we'll go through the first um kind of check boxes from January 2nd to April 2nd and through through that timeline if we meet the the the things that we need to do then they would make a decision to say okay we're going to work we want to work with you so just it's not guaranteed yet it's just it's just uh we're just letting them know that we're interested in pursuing the process project my understanding is this is mostly mostly committing us or you to jumping through a lot of Hoops mostly that's at at this point that's what we're committing to ready that's what we'll be doing all next week and the week after okay okay poop jumping all right yeah um anybody have anything else on that one no it'd be just nice not to have a leaky roof say it again it' be nice not to have a leaky roof it would be nice not to have a leaky roof especially that one um okay looks like we are ready to vote uh I'm going to start with you Julia yes Trent yes Dana's yes Amy yes David yes denen yes David yes and that is unanimous um of all members present and the motion passes okay uh next up we have um two calendars to look at the first is a revision of this the 2526 calendar which has been previously approved um and this I'm going to let um Mr Tracy speak to the revision yep excuse me thank you the um as you know through negotiations we had changed our Wednesday schedules and um had to readjust the the school year accordingly uh as well as on the calendar it just gave us a good opportunity to look at the calendar itself through the negotiations not only the Wednesdays became kind of a new thing for us removing three out of four off of the calendar the um parent teacher conferences are uh now built in there there are two during the day two half days um October and November I believe they are um uh also there's also a night uh opportunity for parents who uh work during the day so those were added in they were not in here uh before this and then uh we tweaked um I think in the previous we actually did in the previous change we moved graduation so that it was within the 12 days from the original last day of school um and then the final thing the um piece we're still working on in the change of the Wednesdays we're trying to uh figure out in working with the state whether lunch will be served on that early release Wednesday because now the elementary kids would be getting out a full hour and a half earlier 90 minutes earlier than they would have which uh makes serving lunch and doing classes difficult because it takes about uh about an hour and 40 minutes to to get all the classes through lunches um so we're just waiting uh alen Burns and I met we are looking at Contract implications with our uh Food Service workers but we're also working with the state to try and figure out whether or not we have to um offer lunch or not uh High School's easier they're getting out later so there's more time in the in the day to do it um so basically the opposite happens High School um would probably have the time for lunch and if worst games comes to worst we end up doing something like a bag lunch but we just haven't gotten confirmation from the state of what we need to do so once we do I will uh let people know and just update that on the calendar okay um you will U denen will the parent teacher conferences just be for the grade schools still no conferences for middle or High School correct yeah correct um and those parent teacher conferences I I just th there a whole day correct no okay so no it's early release so I guess I just this is really just I want to make sure for clarity of the document so have that mentioned on I don't know that it is explicit on the document like here in the middle I can't highlight it because it will highlight well so the so it says early release schedule no one sh that's the part we're correct still playing with the everything under that isn't considered early release these are the what we worked out during negotiations yeah no I I think we're fine I think the I just want to say that I I'm a little so like where it says up where you are I think it says October 28th and November 4th parent teacher conferences Elementary only I think that's clear that it's early release but I'll tell you on first blush when I looked at it I just looked at the you know PTC is in red and so I went over to the key PGC it just says parent teacher conferences Elementary only so you think if it said like Elementary only early early release or or something I that's just I just want I'm just talking I'm not actually talking about the actual schedule just about the clarity down here at the bottom yeah well I'm just like it makes it quite clear I think the way it's written right now it's quite clear if you had a high school student you would be clear that they would be going to school that day y but if you had an elementary school student I'm not 100% sure sure that you'd know it was a half day unless you or early release day excuse me I don't know just a thought even though it's listed above it is listed that's just my thought I don't know I understand what you mean I you want to add in the parentheses where where it says Elementary only early release down at the bottom section I'm not sure anybody else chime in with what they think makes it clear I do what you do like I would have looked at the grid first and felt like PTC was just a day off so I know it's we can't really fit PTC SL in the grid but is there some way to could we try that I don't know I guess we could there's room at the last day of school we do that like 180 l so I wonder if we could do PTC SL ER with an asterisk note that it's only for elementary school if I was going to fix it I'd fix it in the key yeah put the p uh par teacher conference early release Elementary only I think that works because the schools are really good about communicating you know what the day is going to be like yeah I actually that's and I actually want to emphasize I do think that Amy is right that schools are really good I actually don't really have visions that you know on the day of that parents and Guardians would be confused I'm more thinking like when someone is planning out the year yeah so you know if they're looking at it months in advance they might think that is an entire day off from school we'll add that we can add that um I will add that in sorry no no I'm sorry um we'll do it on both because there's actually a second calendar that's yeah set up the same I think especially where it's new like parents will need to get used to that of course um um did anyone else have questions I don't think so and the only I just want I will um once I figure out the lunch serve no lunch serve will add that to the calendar okay just need to we need to verify what's the state's expecting yeah and I guess this is not really calendar related but just I'm going to throw in my view is I I do have a concern I've shared this already with um Eric I do have a concern if we don't have a legal obligation to serve lunch I do have a concern at the high school level um and maybe the bag lunch is the answer you're going to have certain some students at the high school who are going to be staying because of sports and I don't I'm concerned like I'm not so concerned about elementary students leaving at 11:15 without eating without eating because they're going to be leaving but if you're a high school student who's needing to stay I would I'm I do have a concern about making sure they have something to eat in my conversations with elany it's more than likely the high school kids would be served because they literally come in get what they want and leave yeah so muchier and and whether that looks like that could look like a bag lunch I'm comfortable with it looking different I'm just not comfortable with kids who've got to go to sports practice maybe not having y access to some and we we still we still have to um I think I think it'll end up that because the high school kids are here to noon time that we'll have to serve something at the high school level just our question is specific to the elementary swap in in time to follow up on that um if a family is food insecure and that's their lunch then not getting it even at the elementary level a good point could be and that would probably be um obviated by the bag lunch solution right yeah and we we would you know s similar to breakfast sign up we'll have it available I think that will probably end up making sense for some families because we had that we had that conversation with some of the people from Accord like okay how do we how do we there are number of families that are food insecure and have that um consistent request for okay I need my kid to have lunch so we we can we can do it because it sounds like lunches will still remain free in in the future I hope but you know we can we can definitely put that together now that we've learned the routine with breakfast great um Eric is there any way to indicate either when final exams are occurring for the middle school and high school or when the semester resending middle and high school um yeah we could have them set it the exams for the high school are always the week of Martin Luther King weekend because that is the usually the end of that week which on this calendar is the 23rd is the final day of the first semester that's that's generally how it works okay I just know I always have to ask my daughter when they are yeah the Dilemma you run into is Middle School is a trimester and the high school is a quarter so they published their own actual dates okay we worried about how messy the calendar could get like how much stuff we could put on get worried about that too um I I just have one more question is that um I know per I'm believe this has occurred but I know per our um our teacher contract that the um Union has or looked at this yep both calendars that you'll see tonight I've been presented to Nick he has given us some feedback our principls have given us feedback yep um all right uh I don't think we have a motion on the table do we no no we don't no um uh I moved at the hamilt toam Regional School District school committee excuse me uh vote on the revised 2025 2026 school year calendar as presented in tonight's exhibit second to approve right vote to approve right what I say vote to vote on I I heard a friendly Amendment there sorry about that um all right uh do we have a second uh second second by Amy um is there any any further discussion okay uh let's uh start with you Trent yes Dana's yes Amy yes David yes Jen yes David yes Julia yes and that is unanimous of the seven members present and the motion passes and now on to 2026 27 so far away that seems like a really long time fromo yeah it it's actually a it's actually a requirement of the teacher contract to have two schedules out there and I think Nick and I both understand that that this one will probably change along the way as we move forward but um we wanted to have it drafted and ready to go it represents the same um adjustments that we made on the previous calendar um we we feel like we got everything uh similarly and again the the lunch piece will will change as soon as we get some information back from the state this is why I messed up that last one because I was actually entering Dante's date of graduation into my calendar and this graduation date actually moved back to June because it would have fallen in the the holiday weekend on Labor Day we can Memorial Lab yeah um all right so is there any do have people have questions comments about this calendar I don't think so um I assume the similar comment about the making clear about the parent teacher convers be yeah um all right David you want to have a motion sure I moved at the Hamilton wiam Regional school committee vote to approve the two uh 2026 2027 calendar as presented in tonight's uh exhibit second second by Jen uh are there any questions or discussion no all right seeing none uh I'm just mixing it up let's start with you Jen yes David uh yes Amy Yesa yes Trent yes Julia yes favor Frankle yes all right and that is unanimous and the motion passes thank you for that work uh Eric and to the leadership team to figure all that out all right set for the next one next oh I'm sorry yes next is the um NEC annual report as everyone probably remembers I am uh one of 20 uh members of the board for the NorthShore uh education Consortium they are the group that um works with schools districts both members and non-member districts to um help to manage some of the more difficult cases that we run into with our students with disabilities this is their annual report they're required to publish it out to the districts and they just asked that we uh give it to our school committee members so this is their annual report from last year I just wanted to make sure it was on the agenda um lots of good information there are currently I think 500 kids approximately 500 kids in that program but which we are we are members and we have um right now I think we have 12 kids in that program um it fluctuates through the year it could it's based on uh need specific type of program and uh seat availability so just a little interesting reading it's a it's a great program for us it gives us a break on a of District costs as a member you get about approximately a 20% uh reduction in the cost of these uh specialized programs and um for us it's it's been been helpful in some difficult cases thanks okay anybody have questions no this is a really nice piece yeah breaks down a lot of info thank you all right um all right uh moving right along uh next up as we discussed at our last meeting there we had an opening on the um policy subcommittee um and I only heard from one person who said they were interested in that position and that was David pedo um what I would be looking for um is any other any nominations or anyone who would be I guess we would need a nomination for David or for anyone else who would be interested in filling the position on the policy sub what led to the opening did somebody drop out one member who was on the policy subcommittee stepped back from the policy committee who Julia okay thank you I move that David pedo take the third seat on the policy subcommittee second all right um technically you need to nominate him I nominate David pedo for the third position on the policy subcommittee second um Again David would you accept a nomination sure I'll accept it all right do we have any other nominations for anyone else or anyone who' like to throw their own hat into the ring can I have a question uh just ask a question David how many subcommittees are you on at this point um I'm I agree to do this because negotiations is basically over at this point but okay and you're you're feeling you're feeling good about that decision okay yeah no that's I TR I asked before I over commit myself yeah yeah so David is currently still on the negotiations subcommittee but barring unforeseen circumstances that work is largely over um for a little while for for for the moment um well that that does imply that the only thing that that the negotiating subcommittee negotiates is Union contracts oh no other things could occur no that could happen the yeah yeah well outside of Labor shouldn't it also be involved in in substantial transaction negotiations as well no typically the negotiation subcommittee does all the collective bargaining agreements and any grievances that would occur related to any of those agreements any of those contracts any of those agreements so it's really more accurately a labor relations uh negotiating subcommittee okay yeah those are the things that okay yeah I didn't understand that um yeah um okay so we had one nomination I didn't see any others Sor right all right any discussion oh I guess yep okay um and you already accepted correct that that you okay um so it looks like we're ready to vote um Julia yes Trent yes Dana's yes Amy yes David yeah yes David yes all right thank you um and uh that is uh unanimous and the motion passes congratulations David um and thank you for that um uh Amy yes do you does policy have a I know that we're just taking it out of order but I just want to while we're on it policy you have a date on the calendar no we don't that's my that's my responsibility I need to email everybody stay tuned yeah so at our last meeting we didn't have a chair but so Amy agreed just to take on the role of scheduling the meeting um so to get the meeting going so then you can all make decisions about that it okay um all right uh moving on uh next on the agenda is um a topic that David Frankle asked asked to have added to this evening's agenda um it's an energy assessment and I'm going to turn it to you David thank you um yeah what prompted this prompted me to start to look at um our energy consumption and and what we could do to can I'm sorry can you talk right in so that I can hear what prompted me to to look at this was um Vinnie last meeting pointed out that there was a 40% rise in our electricity rates and I thought well that's that's a worthy place to to look to see is there's something anything we could do to mitigate that and uh so I tried to look at what we what analysis we've had in the past um and what I did find that I hadn't been a to find before with our previous facilities manager that was and I think it predated him back in 2016 National Grid funded a study for for the high school and the middle school which which is substantial in size and there's a very detailed very technically uh complete kind of study that to show where improvements could be made and in fact a half a million dollars worth of investment improvements actually did take place and that explains how the high school uh has has uh some very good um Heating and uh air conditioning and ventilation and uh CO2 control go s and all kinds of of capabilities I wasn't fully aware of um it didn't do that for the classrooms and of course all of the other classrooms and buildings uh have not had this work done what I then found out was a couple of things one is that the that National Grid will actually fund a study and they call this a comprehensive building assessment where they will um basically provide the funding for a an architectural engineering company or an expert company in this field to come in and study each of the schools and produce this kind of report and the report will identify where there's Investments that make sense from a energy payback point of view um it may also be the vehicle to end up with the kind of heat pump Technologies or um energy recovery ventilators and the heat pumps could end up actually providing air condition in in effect uh in the summer or in the the edge of Summer that we that we have difficulty with um and what else can I tell you about it the it's a process that takes about three months why I had a bit of a sense of urgency about it was that if we started in engage these people in January before the April votes of the towns we could have identified capital projects that would uh would improve the environment of all of the students in all of the schools uh and that would leave open whether you did it in the existing elementary schools or whether that gets supp planted by the the new schools although that still leaves a four-year gap of not air conditioned and and uh not improving the U the Energy Efficiency so I did have a motion uh to that effect and and it reads this and I can provide David PLO with this digitally so you don't have to try and type it it's it's a little longer than normal um that the superintendent be tasked with initiating in early January 2025 with National Grid funding conducting comprehensive building assessments of all five schools with a view to creating capital projects in time for consideration in April 2025 it's understood that these assessments are all fully fun fed by National Grid Mass savings funds what I didn't mention is that turns out that the other thing that n National Grid Mass Save provides is really significant um rebates and uh and uh other forms of funding that that make the installation of these new technologies uh way way cheaper than would otherwise be there I only found that originally myself when just installed a new heat pump at my home office and and um that heat pump was was $11,000 fully installed 5,000 of that came from massave so it's not an insignificant subsidy but there's other tax breaks and so forth and I originally um Eric knows this I wanted to put in a capital um Capital request for doing some of this work and I as I dug in I realized I didn't know enough about what what uh sub subsidies and and rebates and so forth were there in order to put a proper business analysis together this would provide that it doesn't compel us to do anything but it would give us a tremendous amount of valuable information and to finish off um what the the motion would be um these studies should provide the school committee and the superintendent with an evidence-based road map on ways to improve our utility costs which have been given urgency by the 40% rise in electricity rates that raised at the the previous meeting that rate raise is locked in for the next three years no replacement or update decisions on haac equipment should be made without these reports and their recommendations all such update and replacement decision should require a vote by the full school committee these are very significant Investments and I do understand there's a fair urgency with one of the um the air conditioning units I think is it Eric at the high school something that's on on the verge of yeah the one in the um library and that would be an opportunity to swap in heat pump the for context too both of the towns are putting in about $1.6 million each into completely redoing their their hfac systems uh which are going to be I think in their case geothermal pumps which is the most expensive possible way to go and and they are getting the benefits of of um of some of this new technology and some of the the the rebates and and other forms of of uh economic assistance so that's uh I mean I have quite a bit of material that that um the the relevant National Grid manager sent to me uh along the way and he basically I just read you a little bit of the studies typically take three months minimum to turn around hopefully they'll be complete in time for the April Town meetings the C CBA study CBA being um the comprehensive building assessments are fairly new and they are still being fine-tuned that being said I was just advised by National Grid you should be able to cover the costs of the studies without any contribution from the schools so and we can include in that study the three elementary schools so enough said um any any any questions uh or is the second for that motion I guess is the so I'm not I don't well go ahead you have a question I don't know what the motion is oh but it long well I don't um okay so my first question is what exactly you're looking to get done by April that the study is done and that we we have an idea of uh that we could from that if it shows promised um that we could put together a capital plan um with the idea of putting it into town meeting could it could require warrant it might might might be inexpensive enough not even to require warrant I don't know until we do the study because we couldn't put it in I think we have to get our warrants in by January right if if it would if it requires like we need 90 days right in other words right it has to be right if it we're done by April 3D that would be too close to town meeting to but in any event I'd love to be in the position sorry I'd love to be in the position where um where there will be criticism that we're not looking after the the current students any of them with the new building you know not till there's no benefit to any student till 20 um 28 at best and um and that may be a fair criticism that that there you know yes we hopefully we'll get a new roof but there's a lot of other things that could improve the the state of of buer could improve the state of the high school and the middle school um particularly their classrooms so um I think that being so I think we would be all um benefit from from getting this study done and then it gives you a foundation for Capital planning otherwise I don't even know how we would come up with a capital plan to improve the schools over the next few years uh is there a cost to the study no it's no cost it's National Grid funds the whole lot it's massive what is what is the and I'm sorry I know Jen has you go first Jen has a question first arms the arms length cost is typically about 13,000 per school I'm sorry what's about $13,000 per school for for the study that that's what the National Grid would pay the architectural firm or the the Consulting but the study itself doesn't cost money it doesn't cost un money but it does cost National Grid money okay said M it wouldn't cost us what was your question shouldn't this go through the capital projects committee first I was actually thinking that I I remember a few years ago we got um presented a l list of uh projects um you to go through our um facilities that I could see this being a good fit for there sort of prioritizing where we're going there I'm sorry David I can't hear you I'm I'm sorry um but uh a few years ago we were presented with a list of facilities projects and sort of a um possible timeline on that that um you know hasn't been updated in a few years and I'm sure I could probably guarantee it's on um the list of things that he's looking to be doing January y um that I could see this being a really good uh fit for there um if it's not already um in the works I because I would imagine that you know everybody is reacting the same way with that um increase in um you know costs on our on our electric bills on this new updated contract um so I mean I I I like the idea um and you know but I I I think that's the place where it actually goes excuse me to fit into the larger timeline um of facilities based um capital projects mind is just shutting off as I'm speaking Yeah that's I think that's what I was wondering about whether it should go there first yes we we'll have the um updated state of the facilities report which is what you were talking about that'll be coming I believe it's in the second meeting in January that uh Curtis Whitman has been working on trying to put together while also balancing holding all the other things together like boilers um point of order um we're discussing but I is there a motion on the table no no there isn't a motion on the table and I and I guess motion well I did you me a i tabled a motion no second so I don't think I I think there wasn't I think you did read it yeah but I don't think there was a second because I think you were kind of in the middle of everything so I if if yeah if someone is ready to second it that's great I personally would need to hear it again and David Frankle can certainly read it it's his motion there's no or you can whatever it doesn't matter um we can fully understand what the actual motion is I I I can read I don't mind one it sure um I mooved that the Hamilton Regional school committee moved that the superintendent be tasked with initiating in early January 2025 with the National Grid funding conducting comprehensive building assessment of all five schools with a view to creating capital projects in time for consideration of April 2025 it is understood that these assessments are all fully funded by National Grid Mass Save funds the study should provide the school committee and superintendent with an evidence-based road map on ways to improve our utility costs which have been Ur um which have been given urgency by the 40% rise in electricity rates that uh Vin Leone raised at the previous school committee meeting that rate rise is locked in for the next three years no replacement or update decisions on HVAC equipment should be made without these reports and their recommendations all such update and replacement decisions should require a vote uh by the full school committee excuse me these are significant Investments a lot there yeah do we have a second I have a question because I don't know Robert's Rules if I'm going to make a friendly Amendment do I I second first or do I make the friendly Amendment first you make the friendly Amendment you could go ahead and make a friendly Amendment and it's it's really David frankl's motion so it's up to him whether he accepts your Amendment so given the discussion around um the time frames required to make April my friendly Amendment would be to um give a outside date as opposed to an inside date so by June of 2025 or as an example I know that's not technically a friendly Amendment because I didn't give actual verbiage but no I think that counts for the for the reports not not for the initiation yeah for the um deliverables yeah okay yeah can we discuss or no so yeah I don't want to get too B I mean we want to have a real discussion so I don't want to get too bogged down in the Roberts rules of it all but yeah the motion the that sort of deliverable date in the motion I believe it's April there was a friendly Amendment saying would you be amendable to making June y you're saying yeah if if the circumstances force that sure okay is there a second to the motion second so we can discuss okay second by so now we have a motion on the table and now we're discussing so I'd like to start if if we can start with anyone who has just clarifying questions about the actual motion like does anyone have clarifying questions before we get into an actual discussion I have clarifying questions um I know it's been said before but it Bears repeating there's no cost to the school district to undertake this study that's absolutely correct and having the having had these studies done on residences um they run the gamut of making suggestions around Capital Improvements to making suggestions around how to better insulate against heat loss and heat entering buildings right in fact uh this is assume the schools are being evaluated for air to water heat pumps chill chillers and airto a heat pumps Mini Splits rtus uh for these uh David I'm sorry I'm having and even geothermal ground Source Heat pumps but that's that's what the town halls are doing they're going the most expensive uh pathway which may not be what we want to do but there are there are a bunch of alternative ways to to deliver better heat and and some air conditioning that we don't have at all with with a couple of R but to be within the four corners of the motion that the idea is we would it would be an assessment would provide potential Alternatives potential suggestions yeah and and the impact on uh electrical infrastructure internally and assess you know something Eric's raised before is there sufficient capacity and if there isn't what what can you do about that capacity and and so forth so it would just give us a factual uh Foundation from which to make Capital suggestions you I might concern about putting into the capital subcommitte there is no Capital this is not a capital project it's something that would enable us to make Capital subcommittee submissions but we don't know enough to do it and the facilities manager I don't think is necessarily an expert in this area himself I'm sorry say who the facilities new facilities managers not necessarily an expert in this area either and probably could do with this kind of very detailed um technical assessment technical economic assessment because it they they go through all the economic tradeoffs and and um uh because it's a complex multivari variable kind of problem to solve it's not a static thing you just set and forget okay um other questions I have a question yep Julia Julia was the time commitment addressed based on each staff member that would be required to participate you know the principes how many teachers um and the administrators and is this while schools in session or is this something that happens um after school or on the weekends questions so I'm not sure I don't think I understood so I think her question Julia let me try to paraphrase and you let me know if I'm missing the question I think her question was um what sorts of um uh time does the staff need to spend in getting this assessment done so in other words how many many hours do does principles need to be doing is it during school do they have to um and you may not know the answers to all those question I don't know fully but my understanding would be I doubt that involves any of the teaching staff uh or or um uh maintenance staff either you know the there has at at a bare minimum there has to be some staff involvement who to help guide the assess give them access to to the building you know they know the equipment better than we do um but it I would imagine it would be the new facilities manager that would be the Lynch point with with the people doing the study and and they he would be providing them with access as they need it Julia could you hear that answer yeah can you repeat that sorry I was just a little garbled I think and again I think David is saying he does not know for sure um but that sure his feeling is that it's likely some time commitment on the part primarily of the facilities manager um but it sounds like we don't actually know the facilities director we don't actually know um the details about that um nor do we know I would imagine whether it would take place during the school day yeah or not okay yeah some of it would I imagine because they're looking at at the room loads Peak loads the the they're looking at the at the schedule to see whether the the current systems for example don't over ventilate when the rooms are not occupied there's there's a whole bunch of dynamics that go on and and they'll be looking at well how automated is that in the current system and and what would be the benefit of automating further we've got we've got air ventilators but they're not energy recovery ventilators or how much would you save in energy by making them energy recovery veners so it's that's a lot of that is looking looking at what's there looking at the specs maybe making a measurement then coming back and and calculating what the difference would be if they changed that equipment and it's just it's detailed work it's it's kind of predictable engineering Energy Engineering work um so at this point I was still asked trying to make sure we're just asking questions to make sure people understand then there's certainly room for discussion I know both of you have go ahead Jen um so won't this entire team have to be cored and fingerprinted to come into our schools yes and who I mean I love the idea of the the assessment by itself assuming we don't have to pay for it but it seems like there might be a large number of extraneous charges getting added on pretty quickly I'd imagine National Grid has teams set up specifically for the scenario I don't know that that would be my question is if they do yeah I mean other contractors we work with pay for their own okay we do we we do the Corey checks it's it doesn't there's no cost to that to anyone yeah the fingerprinting the fingerprinting is what we had to any outside contractors any of the the the vendors that we use for any of our utilities Plumbing things like that are all they pay for their own um and if it's like a one-time thing you know something blows out and they need repair then a maintenance man or woman stays with them the entire time time they don't they can't leave them because of the way our policy is read by the way I'm happy to make a a digital copy available to everybody of of that past report of the high school and the middle school to just say see see what the um what the detail is they go into um Trent um I was just going to ask they look at all um electrical efficiency right so like are the lights efficient right including you know whether there whether there should be a swap out of if there's still some incandescent or neon tubes versus versus um LED arrays and so forth yeah and I when we had it done in our house they gave us like here's 50% off on the purchase of these yeah so this is the same this is that that same thing right yeah it's it's it's a really great service that that they provide and and we we we helped to fund that service actually because we you know we pay a percentage of our electricity bill to Mass Save and so this is a way to get some of it back and do something useful with it I really like the idea um I just I'm not comfortable with bringing um the I know we kind of discussed this already with the friendly amendment I just don't want to bring extra something extra to vote on at town meeting when we're not sure about the status of existing building projects anyway so I agree with if we do something like this to kind of push the timeline a little bit so once we know what's going on uh with our facilities yeah no I don't want to force it try to force it to town meeting I was hoping that we could get something sufficient so that when the inevitable criticism comes that there's not not enough being done for current students that we that we had done some diligent due diligence and are prepared for uh for that discussion in a constructive kind of way um so want to give it I do have a couple questions I'm actually gonna ask Eric a question about sure so um in January when our new facilities director comes and gives an update m like would is this is the idea of an of an assessment something that's already on his radar or is this the first time it would be something that like is that something that you've all yeah right um he's literally been bombed since he started no I I guess that's what I'm I that's kind of part of my question is I mean can can can I just offer a comment to help with this Vicki own the the town energy manager um is a resource that would as from my understanding would willing come in and help him uh in this that's that's what her job is you know she's helped put together the town hall things and so I think there is there's legitimate concern that being new and and there being a backlog of things in the facilities with the you don't want to drown the new manager but I think there's willing and and very competent and qualified help that that could be brought to bear on this again without any charge to us well I mean at the same time I I think I'm kind of um along the lines of where Dan is going here is um I would love to say to Curtis this is something that we're actually interested in and see where it fits in to his you know project um list that he's putting together right now um to have him presenting this um you know comprehensive l list to us and then um sort of even just saying well we'll have someone else come in and do this for you sort of superseding everything that he's doing I don't think would be fair um nor would it be fair just to throw it onto his agenda um with the timeline without knowing where he has anything else stacked up um you know but I I do I do agree that it's a great resource that we should be uh making sure we're taking advantage of um um you know and I have no problem sort of um saying that you know I'd like to have him add this to his list where he sees um where he thinks it makes the most sense um you know understanding that of course you know cost savings and efficiency is you know of the utmost priority in his position so but at the same time respecting that he is the expert that we've hired to do this go ahead John are we still in question mode no I think we're sounds like we're moving to discussion go ahead yeah discussion I like the idea of doing the assessment assuming it costs the school nothing but there's a lot more in that motion than just saying let's do an assessment yes I think that motion if what we're going to vote on is whether we're want to put it to Curtis to look at the possibility of doing this assessment that's one thing but there's a whole list in that motion that goes like above and beyond just sending out an assessment and some of it worries me because I do believe that it is meant to bypass how we normally handle capital projects um so I'm just going to jump in because I I actually have a similar concern about the specifically about the motion um that I do think that there was a lot more in the motion uh Beyond just uh the initial part of the motion which I the initial part which I sort of jotted down was to task the superintendent with um initiating a a an energy assessment beginning in January 25 um there was a lot more after that in the motion I'm certainly willing to we're having a discuss we do have a motion so from a Robert's rues point of view like that specific motion is on the table yes so we need to discuss that specific motion it does not mean that someone couldn't afterwards make a separate motion another motion like that could happen after we discuss or a friendly Amendment I'm I'm corre no I all those things I I just wanted to Echo just that like I shared concerns about the wording some of the details in the motion um I don't want to other people have discussion just um I think I think what I'm hearing is that people are comfortable with the idea of tasking the superintendent to direct the facilities manager to explore the feasibility of an energy assessment um and to present a uh determination of of the feasibility at a certain date in January or February or something like that that's that's what I'm I'm I think I'm hearing I don't know if that's accurate no I I think that's good because I think a good time to hear from Curtis about that would be at the state of the facilities report because you know he a he would have a chance to look at it and like figure it out but he'd also have a chance to put it in order in terms of that and other facilities projects that we will find out need to be done because I'm sure they're there and like kind of where this falls in the Pro in his priorities right yeah his priorities in bandwidth because again I I don't want to take our facilities manager or anybody else who's on the school uh on the school staff and say okay you have to do this if it's not something that we're going to act on and while I agree that it would be wonderful to have new ventilation systems in the schools last year when we looked at capital projects we were looking at capital projects that had to do with safety of the schools and so like I think Colin Colin Curtis Curtis sorry I'm awful with names is probably the best person to like take this information and take the other information he's collecting on the facilities and like put it in a more global perspective because I I just hate to do a project an assessment that sits on a shelf for another you know two or three years to the point that we have to have it redone in two or three years I'm just laughing at all the books that used to be in office I saved them all um so other is there other discussion about the motion that's on the table Yeah the other thing is I think if it's if it's referring it or tasking Eric he would naturally choose how he wants to task his own team to do it and how he would interact with these with these um the consults at National Grid fund um so that would be obviously at his discretion so I don't know that that um the new facilities manager is an expert in this area anyhow I hadn't seen any any um evidence of that one way or the other actually is is is is he expert in energy management and HVAC systems I wouldn't wouldn't know that he is an expert okay does have knowledge he's kind of a jack of all trades because of thec the issues that he has to deal with in our district Electrical Plumbing Roofing concrete dirt he's into it all right now boilers right now yeah well that's you know that's why I think ex you know having some concentrated expert help would probably be good doing the service yeah but he would still have to manage the project yeah yeah um that's right so I I just wanted for my own discussion I just wanted to say that for me my own personal discussion is that Trent articulated well but I where I am right now and I sort of wish that I had recorded that so that but I I have I have something written um so try to express accurately I believe where I sort of see and I think David sort of articulated a little bit I I the concept of an energy assessment is something I am very open to I am uncomfortable at having I think this this conversation is really good to have in this meeting I think um this is a good conversation I'm glad we're having it I'm uncomfortable having a vote in this very first conversation saying for me you know tasking specific with specific dates and tasking so I'm uncomfortable with that um but I you know that's just me the technical term by the way is a comprehensive building assessment that's oh it's not energy assessment it's no it's called a comprehensive building assessment comprehensive building assessment um all right is there any further discussion and um and then we'll we can get moving to vote because I know we still have a lot other things okay um it looks like we're ready to vote and our virtual member has actually um departed so we are um six members and we are all in person now um that's correct right correct she's okay okay um so all those in favor we're voting on the original motion on the or this I'm sorry on the original motion that was moved and seconded all those in favor those opposed that is uh five opposed uh those abstaining all right so that is uh uh zero in favor five opposed one abstain on the original motion and the motion fails anyone have anything else to add I'd like to make a motion okay Trent I move that the school committee direct the superintendent to task the facilities manager to assess the feasibility of undertaking a National Grid comprehensive building assessment for the school district and to report on the logistic and financial considerations of completing the assessment to the school committee second okay um second by Jen will say Okay um does anyone need that motion repeated or did you feel like you got it it's a good motion TR good motion um clear all right um anyone have any questions about the motion is there a discussion no I was well stated um I just want to make sure I understand what the expectation is that the idea is that um that we would get back sort of a statement from the facilities director saying yes this is a good idea and here's why D D D D DT or these are the concerns these are costs that are unanticipated something like that is that yes that would be my my goal with it the logistics being around the questions Julia asked and then the financial considerations being around are there unanticipated costs um all right anybody else have any questions Eric do you have any questions about that no not at this time um anybody else have anything you look pensive Jen I'm not sure whether to open this can of worms but I'm gonna anyways is this something Eric or Vinnie that you think calling no I caught him on my head Curtis Curtis can handle with his current load that he already has on top of him because he's starting a brand new job and we kind of threw him in the deep end at the current moment I think it would probably overwhelm him maybe later on in the year are I'm sorry are you talking about doing the assessment or making the determination about the I'm probably doing the assessment I'm not really sure what would go involved in determining I think he could reach out and figure out he could probably figure that that part out okay then get that info to bring back I think that's that's I think that's duable second motion okay that was my question the actual assessment is pretty extensive yeah no I had done at the house but which is a from my point of view it's a good thing that's extensive yeah we've had it done before so 2016 very yeah that's where some of the like even these lights here came as a result of that through the Energy savings program we got retrofitted I think half of this building with LED okay there I think the motion rewarded is is gives us an opportunity to say okay Tren as you're putting together this facilities report I mean trying Curtis I just did it Curtis Colin let's call him Colin for now on Curtis you know to uh at least reach out to National Grid and maybe David if you can send that information to either me or Vinnie we can yeah I will share it with him so that sure that would I think that makes sense I mean pair it with that report that's coming in January as part as part of that same presentation okay all right anybody else all right everybody's clear on what the motion is yes yep all right all those in favor uh and that is unanimous of the six members pres present and the motion passes thank you okay next up budget with Vinnie it's like a Saturday morning special budget with Vinnie like a PBS exactly it is could learn math you guys all missed out um both Vinnie's kids were join the meeting oh yeah on Monday night Monday night yeah I was trying to get Bubba to jump up and so I had I was wonder why we had two extra votes I'm in the wrong what is that that's cute know what that noise was oh yeah got to heavy water okay thank you guys for joining us tonight we are here to update you on the superintendent's FY 26 uh preliminary budget recommendation uh so what has changed tonight there's a there's a a few items we need to go over uh specifically our Essex County Retirement appropriation was received by purac last week uh so we have some updates uh to present there we do have a minor transfer of a 1.0 special education ESP from the buer to the Middle School uh that I will go into it in a little bit more detail that is not a major change uh in terms of the budget uh but nonetheless it's still a change from the prior presentation uh we do have a half a percent uh Coler reduction on the uh budgeted amount for teachers that I will also go over uh as many of you know our teachers contract really drives a lot of what we put into the budget and in that contract uh there is a specific deadline around December 1st uh that deadline really drives uh three major numbers in the budget uh that has changed tonight the first one is the salary scale advancement and any corresponding step increases as a result of those anticipated advancements uh in addition we have any uh retirement announcements and any salary savings we might uh realize there and then last is the eligibility for those retirees uh to purchase uh for the district to purchase a sixday buyback from them if they meet that December 1st deadline after those recommendations we do have a substantial recommendation that came out of our Capital planning uh and finance subcommittee around our expenses uh and offsets to end so kind of as a spoiler that I'll go into a little bit more detail uh as it stands tonight uh for FY 26 uh we are recommending a budget increase year-over-year of approximately 2.3 million or roughly 5.1% uh this is that budget distributed out in Desi category uh like we normally do and then that same chart uh distributed out by location or Department uh so like I do with many of my presentations I try to be as detailed as possible and show you exactly where all those increases and decreases are year-over-year uh I do this as you see in by location and within each of those locations I Break It Out by Desi category uh but looking at this you can see it's very repetitive and and very boring I mean the same thing almost repeats itself on every single slide you can see a half a percent Cola reduction it's not that big of a value uh so not to bore you completely uh in your presentation in your packet slides 5 through 15 is that detail between every single Desi category but like I do with all of my presentations I try to just give you a summary at the end that you can look at in case you don't want to get bogged down in the detail um just going to advance through uh those 15 slides and go to the summary but of course if there's a question about any of the detail in the middle uh please don't hesitate to ask got one more okay so tonight the the biggest change from the presentation uh presented on November 21st is our salary scale advancement uh for this is the December 1st deadline that we discussed uh the budget developed on November 21st did not incorporate any salary scale advancements at that time again because the deadline had not hit we don't enter all of those until after December 1st so the final outcome we had 41 teachers apply for salary scale advancement for fy2 uh6 this totaled uh 128,000 if you're trying to compare this to Prior years to get a sense of this is high or if this is low low uh for fy2 the year we're in now we had 32 teachers apply uh for a cost of approximately 79,000 so you can see this is up almost 50% there's really two reasons for this uh the main one is is because we had nine additional teachers apply for salary scale advancement this year and in addition to that we changed our teacher salary schedule um a lot this year so those values between columns uh have changed therefore the increase uh comparatively from a prior year has has also changed so that is uh relatively high at least compared to last year um the Essex County where we have a lot of our uh employees who are not Desi certified uh their retirement is with Essex County they have I believe until either December 6th or December 15th I forget the exact date to issue us our appropriation letter which spells out how much we have to pay to be a member of the uh County Retirement System for next year in the preliminary budget I did incorporate an increase of 110,000 or rough roughly 9 a. half% unfortunately because of the increase in our ESP contract uh this came in a lot higher than I anticipated uh it came in at a total of $148,000 increase over FY 25 which is a pretty substantial increase uh the net result from the preliminary budget is an increase of 35,000 so the very first budget I presented to you I Incorporated about 110 again it's coming in at 147 so for tonight's presentation that means an increase of approximately 36,000 uh the next is again the December 1st deadline uh we have I believe uh nine teachers eligible for sick day buyback at the end of this school year uh it is based on the teachers contract and represents a percentage of your sick day buyback I believe it's a 5% cap uh if they give us their notification by December 1st they become eligible for sick day buyback uh those notifications we received before November 1st I did incorporate into the preliminary budget this does incorporate three additional uh sick day BuyBacks that have between the preliminary budget and today uh so that is another increase of approximately 177,000 uh due to those salary scale advancements if anyone were to look at our old salary schedule um columns B and M don't have 12 steps so if somebody is on the bottom step and they then ask for a salary scale advancement they actually then get a step increment increase as well so because of those salary scale advancements we have updates to our St step increments for approximately $7,000 there are a few minor updates uh from the preliminary budget to today a few um1 here and there the net result is an increase of 1,800 uh now the last item is what I discussed a little bit earlier we do have a transfer of One ESP from the buer to the Middle School uh the reason for the increase here you would think it would just be a straight transfer our elementary esps average work day is 6.2 hours but then when they go up to the secondary level it becomes 6.3 so it's .1 hour more a day so because we transferred it from the elementary level to the secondary level their salary goes up a a little bit uh on the flip side we do have a few decreases to work into the update today um there are six retirements that we received before December 1st however I have only Incorporated uh salary reductions on four of them that total reduction accumulates to a drop in our budget of 91,000 the reason we don't incorporate all six of them uh a good example I have is our psychologists let's just say we have a psychologist who gave us their retirement it is a very good possibility that the psychologist we replace them with has a doctorate degree you really have to go through a lot of schooling to to be a psychologist most of our psychologists are on the bottom end of the salary schedule so for certain types of retirements depending on what position it is we don't work in salary savings so out of the six retirements this covers four of them we left two of them flat at the moment at least uh the last item I will admit was um I don't know if I'll call it a mistake or an oversight on my part but I was absent for the last teachers negoti ation uh unfortunately wife got in an accident I couldn't make it uh but at that prior to the last negotiation there was conversation around year two and three of the teachers contract I thought we landed on a 3 and a half% cola in FY 26 and a 3% for FY 27 um those were actually reversed in the final agreement FY 26 was three fy2 7 is 3.5 so I reduced the cola for the teachers in FY 26 by half a percent because that's not equal to the Cola in the agreement the result of that uh was a decrease in the overall budget of approximately 92,000 okay so those are kind of the major uh the updates around kind of the re regular uh Daily Business in the budget building the last item I'm going to discuss briefly uh it has a pretty big impact on our budget um at the last Capital planning and finance subcommittee meeting on December 6th uh a recommendation was made uh from this uh Co excuse me from the school committee members of the subcommittee uh and I'm kind of going to just summarize it uh the preliminary budget that we presented on November 21st would have most likely resulted in an operational override in at least one of our communities uh if not both at the April 2025 annual town meeting as you all know at the April 2025 annual town meeting we are already putting forth a debt exclusion for the construction of a new Elementary School uh if an override would be required that would be an additional vote at town meeting that would cause a uh majority share to vote it would also be an additional vote at the ballot uh so the end result of our April 2025 town meeting would be eight votes on either the combination of the debt exclusion at town meeting or at the ballot uh so historically speaking when you have eight chances for something to get voted down and two overrides in one town meeting uh the chances of all of them passing are Slim So so the end result of the recommendation from Capital Finance is to reduce our FY 26 preliminary uh budget by our eend offsets and the nut result is a reduction of approximately 1.1 million uh so we re re we removed the major Capital items that we were funding with eend in the 2025 budget what this ends up doing is reducing our annual I'm sorry red reduces our overall operating budget by almost 3% uh so as we presented it to you on November 21st our original preliminary budget request was an increase of of approximately 3.3 million or roughly 7.12% uh tonight's update with the incorporation of the reduction of our end offsets our overall increase is now being reduced to 2.2 million or roughly a 4.75% increase again that's a reduction of 1.1 or a little less than 2 and a half oh before you go in of course what um did I hear correctly that you're removing number of capital items that is correct what are they uh so off the top of my head I believe it was a transfer to the capital stabilization of approximately 450 uh it was uh reserve for Extraordinary maintenance which is uh was most likely going to be tag to boiler expenses I believe 350 and the last item 350,000 I I think so I can get you the they're in the prelim um actually I think they're on one I is in the other exhibit it's in the in the exhibit sure that's definitely one that should be flagged anyhow for for an energy conversion to electricity did I leave off right here sorry yeah uh so ultimately the town assessment uh the result from the prior meeting we had Hamilton at an increase of roughly 8 and a quarter after tonight's presentation if we move forward with it would be an increase of approximately five in a quarter again a reduction of about 3% uh for Venom we originally came out with an increase of 10% uh now with these reductions that is being uh reduced to 7% again a reduction of roughly 3% and overall for the district uh we are moving to a town net assessment originally uh requested at 3.3 million uh down to 2.1 million or roughly an increase year-over-year of 5.88% um so that's kind of the updates tonight uh just in terms of timeline uh over the next few weeks uh Eric and I will meet with all the budget holders again to go through the um budget uh one more time before the tenative vote on January 2nd uh between now and January 2nd I don't really want to update or change too much uh before the vote obviously so get to know this budget that's in front of you and that's presented on the exhibit uh this will be uh the main one you vote on for the tenative budget there will be at least one update to the tenative budget at the January 2nd meeting uh that is a result of the debt that Kevin came in last meeting and sought your approval on the original uh interest rate I put in for that borrowing I believe was 4% but it came in at just below 2% so we have a little bit of savings uh in our debt service budget which is the second half of our budget um that will I will update you on the second once those final numbers come in uh this week um and that'll be pretty much the only change for January 2nd however between January 2 and the final budget our conversations with the community uh we still need to drop this budget uh a pretty significant amount to avoid uh those additional votes at town meeting uh in April so between your tenative vote on the 2 and the final Budget on I believe February uh 8th I think um you will see uh additional changes and reductions from what's presented here tonight um I can take any questions or yes of course tell me when you're ready yep for those that don't speak um school committee could you translate reduce expenses offset by yep so in the simplest of terms I can put is we have leftover money that has to be put towards your next year's budget um the best financial practice is when that happens is to use that money uh for one-time expenses because usually it's a one-time Revenue source so like we did in the 25 budget and like we did in the um 24 we built in uh Capital items or additional uh contributions to opep uh to offset some of that one-time Revenue Source what we're doing now now is removing those additional expenditures that we put in and using that um onetime Revenue to supplement our operating budget for one year so we're like paying the mortgage with savings instead of our paycheck it's correct yeah um second question Rel to that is Trent can you just talk just so that people are watching the recing they can hear um second question related to that is um if that is onetime money um what is the expected outcome in FY 27 if I had to take a prediction the ex close to the original preliminary budget we presented on November 21st so right now if you if I I think back up one SL uh so to really fund the district from one year to the next uh it would require somewhere around a 7% uh increase year-over-year we are deflating that amount for one year and pushing it off to so we that Force another override at requirement at that future date I can't exactly answer that because a lot of other things could happen between now and then if everything stayed exactly the same it would probably equate to that next year but I cannot say for certain a lot of things that happen happen on the town side will affect us as well so can't quite say for sure certain what will happen in7 Okay um you answered my question already so yeah I I I I don't I I I spend a lot of time saying trust the committee and I I I do and I this is why we have a subcommittee and I'm imagining that this was a I mean Trent was there for the conversation I it this is a challenging recommendation to make I imagine it's pretty so I'm mostly just saying thank you to the subcommittee for doing what I know is difficult and complicated work to make a recommendation around something that's pretty complicated no easy answer there's no and the reason I ask the questions I do is to kind of walk everybody H through the committee here through the thought process that we took um because in the end if we are able to avoid the additional votes at in April we in barring winning the lottery right something unforeseen are likely pushing that off to the following year um but we're not putting them at April yeah it's yeah no I I appre I mean like I said it was I imagine it was a fairly robust conversation that it's not an easy decision and I really appreciate you coming that that the subcommittee's feeling is this is the best option oh yes we we talked about it at nauseum Y and came up with this was the the best approach I think that um the the budget presented here though doesn't get us to a likely avoiding those additional votes and that's what you're saying that there's large additional cuts that would have to be made to get there and we should expect those being presented in later budgets that is correct the January also the the 300 I'm I'm still curious about the 350,000 if if that's something that it's shaky as to whether you're going to be forced to to spend that or maybe a reduced amount on an alternative technology you know the um just leaving it out of the budget may not fully reflect what the risk exposure is if if I'm understanding what the 350 is meant to cover or was meant to cover are you so I I think you're asking like what happens if something happens to the thing we're not fixing yeah yeah and the the feedback I'd had third hand so I don't know how reliable it is is that it that the facilities manager new facilities manager himself is very concerned that can fall over any time but that like I said that's thirdhand so I don't know can't speak authoritatively firsthand of of knowing that but if it's you I assume there's a reason why it was put in there in the first place um and therefore the question is again what what do you expose to the people who ultimately are going to have to approve this so I don't know if it brings you comfort uh in terms of removing that money if something were to happen next year uh there is still the capital stabilization funding if an emergency did happen um so that that would cover that bit depending what it is um and how large you are well let's say it's 350 there is 350 there okay yeah great thank you okay anything else add yeah I think it's I just want people to be clear that there still a lot of work to be done as Trent said there's there's you know the committee we went back and forth and said okay here's what we can get we still need to dig into the budget that's probably between another depending on where the towns are we're still working with them to trying to figure out where they are between 400 and maybe 850,000 that might have to come out of this this budget maybe more but um we haven't heard back from one of the towns on on even their own situation so once we we figure out where the two towns are at will come back around too with some some of those adjustments as we've done in the past we work with them all along the way um to try and present a budget that's that that they can actually afford as well so the next three weeks for the leadership team are chipping away going to be a little difficult be uncomfortable everyone okay with yeah their questions you guys thank you thank you Vinnie thanks a lot thank you Vinnie okay um all right committee reports uh Capital Finance I feel like that kind of was your report I don't know if you had anything else to add um policy covered go ahead covered be sent an email tonight to meet to plan a meeting in January great uh negotiations uh nothing to report nothing to report uh do we have a secretary report sorry all right um and superintendent report Eric yep just a couple of quick items um just so people are aware during the next two weeks central office building will be inaccessible it'll be closed to we were having aestus abatement oh that was found during a a rug replacement we were doing this Summer that uh tore up some tile that has tested positive for aestus so they're removing that next week so the building is inaccessible for the two weeks we are uh here and around we'll be at various buildings so we have some of our staff at the the buer some of our staff at the high school so J if you need us email is going to be the best uh way to get anybody through central office um some people may forward their phones but they're not necessarily in an office um how how extensive was was the find of asbest it was in aric's office in the ti oh that's not good got yeah it was just it was weird it was it was just a to right it was just his and mine somebody Ted you years ago um it's new it's novel today the uh our OPM PMA submitted our schematic design um package which is almost a thousand pages of information related to the elementary school project uh and good news on that front we have um uh better numbers right now it looks like we're coming we're down from the 151 million original price tag down to about 142 million slightly over it's like 142.2 million and uh with a reimbursement uh from the state currently sitting at approximately 48 million um that number can still go up because there are still incentive points that we can get along the way but that's right now uh numbers that are on the table um for submission with the schematic design this is a process that will occur in I believe February where we meet with the msba after they review our submission and we can negotiate for uh some of the other areas that are not currently uh reimbursable considered reimbursable by them to see if we can get them included and then as we get into early March we'll have an even more uh finalized number but right now that's where we're at by the way I forgot to mention that msba are now starting to subsidize heat pumps so there may be a double whammy from Mass Save and and msba yeah yeah and that's one of the so the energy people that work with the Architects um that's what they've been doing all along the way trying to figure out where we can get rebates even with our heat the the HVAC system selection um there are certain rebates that you can get not only from Mass Save but like the town of Hamilton and went with geothermal yeah which is hugely expensive up front but you can you can qualify for some possible reimbursements the problem with the reimbursements from the FED side is there's no guarantee that you'll get it so you have to front the money yeah and hope that you'll get it you know so which is which is a piece that reduced honestly reduced the elementary school project by at least four I think $ 4.85 million right around there that was the the cost of just doing geothermal yeah on top of all the other heating appliances but yeah may be an and then um so that's all that's all in the building front um happy holidays to everyone looking forward to an exciting 2025 I hope our staff students and families have a great um couple weeks off well those who who get the time off have some time off so thank you okay thank you um I well I wanted to on the chair's report I know I'm going to toss to Amy she had a little bit of an update oh yeah um I'm meeting tomorrow morning with Chris Ford the member of the community who has volunteered to help out with uh the visual communications project excellent thank you for keeping us updated um and I don't have much else I do want to remind all committee members that our next meeting is a zoom meeting on January 2nd um so make sure that's in your calendars can you is it a 7 PM 7 PM y Zoom meeting it is a zoom meeting and that is um the primary topic of that meeting will be the presentation and vote on the tentative budget corre so on the tentative budget tentative budget y um so what you see here tonight with maybe a few small tweaks but it'll be very close m um and that just a reminder that we did make that date I know it's not an ideal date um but it's just when you back up from you know the town meeting what dates we need to have the budget in that's there's what weone our hangovers what was that we have to postpone our hangovers exactly it's it's the evening of the second so you know um uh and then I did want to say um that we have on the calendar which I will be attending the first meeting of the to discuss the regional agreement Janelle deserves a metal she um finally done it found um so that is on January 8 um and Janelle finally found a time that everyone all the different parties can come together and we'll start having a discussion about the regional agreement who is that discussion with so this is why it's complicated right so it's the school representative from the school committee both um towns need a representative the legal councils um God need to come um and um fincom needs to come have Representatives so it's a big group um and but it's exciting and I think very timely to open up that conversation about a regional agreement which is quite old um so should bees um yeah um anybody have any questions for me that was going be a question I know I think you were the magic charm which got asked last time and yeah C don't want we got to get it done exactly no she Janelle has been working just tirelessly to get that done so um all right does anyone have topics for future meetings nope if you think of something email me anybody have anything else would you like a motion I would love one I moved that we joh 907 907 second 907 all right uh second by Amy uh all those in favor and that is unanimous of the five member FAS e