I thought I'm beginning to think. >> Mr. Gileiam, can you hear us? All right. >> Sure can. >> Thank you. I did set you up so you're able to share your screen when your presentation comes up if you prefer to do it that way.
Yeah, that'll work for me. Thank you. Good evening everyone and welcome to our committee of the whole meeting. Um and again before we start we just always like to uh share our value here as a board. Uh we respect each other whether
we're going through the agenda or there's public comments being shared. And it is now 6:08 p.m. So I call to order the March 10th, 2026 committee of the whole meeting of the Harrisburg City School District Board of School
Directors. If we can please rise for the pledge of allegiance. The school board met and the solicitor met in executive session at 5:00 p.m. on March 10th, 2026 to discuss the renewal of the assistant superintendence contract. the resist the resision of a
waiver of expulsion hearing agreement and an offer to purchase real estates. U madam secretary if you can please call the row. >> Thank you madam president. Miss Copelan >> present.
>> Miss Anderson present. >> Mr. Carter >> present. >> Miss Hughes present. Miss Johnson >> present. Miss Radcliffe >> present. Miss Robinson
>> present here. >> Mr. Roy >> here. >> Mr. Thompson Leader >> present. >> And Dr. Susky >> present. We have a quorum this evening. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. Uh we'll now
move to our approval and for our minutes and our agenda. So, is there a motion to approve the minutes of the February 24th, 2026 schoolboard general business meeting? >> So, moved. Anderson. >> Is there a second? >> Second, Hughes.
>> Madam Secretary, can I have a roll call vote, please? >> Miss Anderson? >> Yes. >> Mr. Carter? >> Yes. >> Miss Copelan? >> Yes. >> Miss Hughes? >> Yes. >> Miss Johnson? >> Yes. >> Miss Radcliffe?
>> Yes. Miss Robinson, >> yes. >> Mr. Roy, >> yes. >> Mr. Thompson, Leader, >> yes. >> Nine, yes. Zero, no, zero abstain. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. So, hear majority of yeses. So, that motion will
carry for approval. Um, now move to our agenda for this evening. May I have a motion to approve the agenda for the March 10th, 2026 committee of the whole meeting as presented in board docs. >> So moved. Anderson. >> Is there a second?
>> Second. Hughes. >> Um, thank you, Madam Secretary. Can I have a roll call vote, please? >> Miss Anderson? >> Yes. >> Mr. Carter? >> Yes. >> Miss Copelan? >> Yes. >> Miss Hughes? >> Yes. >> Miss Johnson? >> Yes. >> Miss Radcliffe? >> Yes.
>> Miss Miss Robinson? >> Yes. >> Mr. Roy? >> Yes. >> Mr. Thompson Leader? >> Yes. >> Nine. Yes. Zero no zero abstain. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. Hear majority of yeses. So that motion will carry. And uh we will now move to our
presentations for this evening. Uh Dr. Henry, do we have any presentations this evening? >> Yes. U Madame President, we have two presentations being done tonight. Uh the first one will be by the heal the healing garden at the William Penn property. Uh, this presentation will be
done by the CEO and the president of the Empower at the Bridge Foundation, Gary Gileiam. And I believe he should be on Zoom force. >> Yes, I'm here. >> I'll share my screen and get started.
Okay. >> All right. We can see you now. Awesome. Good deal. Okay. Um, happy to be here and give a recap on on what we did at the William Penn Healing Garden.
Our team, uh, myself and, uh, Miss Rafika Muhammad. Overview of what the William Penn Healing Garden is. Uh, an initiative to restore the greenhouse in the 45 foot by 90 foot fencing area. Uh, there at the
William Penn campus. There used to be a garden there. So, we wanted to bring that back using some of our surplus materials from the bleacher garden uh to establish some keyhole garden to grow some fruits and vegetables and provide an environment for local students to use
as an edible classroom. Main objectives promoting urban agriculture and education providing a foundation for some health and nutrition and environmental stewardship. utilizing the space for community engagement as well as workforce development.
Our timeline uh last year we were able to run an Easter egg hunt out there on the William Penn field. Had a couple hundred kiddos come out, have a good time. Uh in terms of our our garden and getting that started, it took a little bit of time to get the proper insurance carrier uh to cover the the garden
itself just because it's had an abandoned building. As you guys know, it's kind of tough to get insurance for those types of things, but we were able to finally get that taken care of by June, which certainly delayed some of our activities that we wanted to get done on site. Uh, also, Miss Rafika,
without giving too many details, had some some personal things going on that prevented her from being as involved as we expected her to be as our farm manager. So, that also delayed some things. But, nonetheless, we persevered and and still, we believe, had a pretty successful uh season. So, I'll go
through some of those details. Uh, where were we? Uh, once active garden and educational space that was neglected for a few seasons. As you can see in this video here, the vegetation was was pretty robust. Uh, this is before, you know, the sun came out and it got warm. I think this is from February of last
year. Um, some road some uh excuse me, some raspberry bushes and things, tires, uh, some old pallets, just a lot of debris left on site. uh some groundhog holes in the ground, some holes in the fence, allowing some pest to get in. Um
so, you know, it was going to be an uphill climb, but nothing that we're not familiar with. So, that's where we were and the process of to where we're at now. Um, in May, we had an opportunity to have a volunteer day from uh some high schoolers from Cumberland Valley
came down to assist with clearing out some of those weeds uh getting the bricks and the stones centralized so we could use them in a future phase of the garden. Um, >> and just doing some great work there. It was actually a rainy day and a muddy day, but uh their their teacher who's
actually volunteered with the bridge over the last few years said that it was a very memorable day for them. and anytime she sees any of these students uh to this day still they they comment about how fun of a day it was to get out there and contribute in that garden. Um had an opportunity to address those
students there inside the greenhouse and talk to them about my upbringing there in Harrisburg. Um the influence that Hershey had on my life and how important it was to give back to our community. So that was a a great opportunity there. Once we got our insurance really taken care of and were able to get some some
equipment and some things on site, uh the next step was to get the ground flattened and leveled so that we could have a a pretty solid foundation there to build up our garden beds. So that's what we did. Partnered with some some local folks who had some equipment to come in. We laid down our weed barrier,
which is a pretty robust industrial weed barrier that will prevent um at least for, you know, a couple years uh to prevent some of those weeds, those trees, and those raspberry bushes from growing back up. We also created a pile of top soil that we plan on using uh in
some of our future phases as well. Continued uh here you see pictured, Miss Rafika, a couple of our younger volunteers coming in. We were able to get some some good compost and some soil uh purchased and and brought in uh to fill up our raised garden beds that we
that we constructed with some surplus materials from the bleacher garden. Um we did notice that there was a a siege from the the groundhogs to attack some of our our young lettuce and things, right? They're looking to eat as well. So had to find some creative ways to
prevent them from getting our things. So that's why you see those those forks there just as a deterrent as they're sniffing sniffing around. and they would get poked hopefully and and get out of there. Just a way of not using poison and chemicals there on site. Um, you know, just kind of kind of a we call it a groundhog diplomacy, if you will. Just
trying to find some passive ways to keep them out of our out of our garden beds. Uh, we continued with our our community engagement. Um, outside of just the Easter egg hunt we did, we also ran our series of 717 Sunday fundays um there at
the Camp Curtain uh field. had a few hundred kiddos come out for each of those events. Uh they were wildly successful as you can see here in the photos in this video. This is from one of our back to school events where we gave out uh a bunch of backpacks, school supplies. I gave out a bunch of my uh
children's books, the bleacher garden. Had an opportunity to to share, you know, what was going on there at the William Penn healing garden and what some of our objectives were. um drummed up a lot of interest uh provided some awareness and then also some education as well as some resources from local
businesses and some other organizations that partner with us on those 717 Sunday fundays. Um so a great event providing a safe, fun, and productive environment there for some of our folks in Harrisburg. And uh our most recent act of service,
if you will, our MLK day of service, uh we had a few kiddos and some adults come out. They wanted to get their hands in, in this case, the snow. And uh gave us an opportunity to continue to bring over some of those surplus materials from the bleacher garden uh to craft some more beds and get uh the the foundation set
for hopefully a successful 2026 season uh as we continue to move forward. Which leads me to my my last slide here. Uh and possible next steps. I know there are some decisions or have been some decisions made there with William and Penn. You know, we don't know the
details of personally in terms of the timelines and the plans there at the site. Uh but if if we were granted an opportunity to continue uh our process there at the William Penn healing garden, much like the bleacher garden, year one was focused on infrastructure as well as awareness, which we think we
did a decent job of that. year two, we'd be able to open up things uh one with the production of of fruits and vegetables, but also to utilize this space, most importantly as an edible classroom. Uh especially considering how in close proximity it is to Camp Curtain Middle School there. Uh we'd like to
make sure that we can open that up. Um provide our our garden seed initiative and our seed this supper programming there, educating the kids and steam. Uh we want to continue to make sure the greenhouse is is in great shape. It's in
decent shape. We want to continue to make sure that that stays the the case. Being able to utilize that for seed starting, extending our growing season, and also installing some hydroponic and aeroponic systems in there, some vertical farming operations that don't use soil. Uh a great opportunity again
for steam uh learning there and educational opportunities. And we'd like to get our keyhole gardens uh you know, installed there. um a pretty a pretty unique uh wellproven technique. Uh Miss Rafika has done a few of these around. I think there used to actually be one at
this location. So, we'd like to use again some of those stones, um some of the bricks that we were able to to centralize there in the greenhouse, get those back out and install some of those uh keyhole gardens. Just uh showing how there can be inground gardening, how there can be raised garden bed
gardening, um as well as some aeroponics and hydroponic gardening. So just different methods that folks can use and be educated um on them. Uh and then also continue with our community uh integration certainly on the corporate side to hopefully pull in some more funds to keep that program uh robust and
also utilize that as a catalyst to spread what we call our garden seed. And seed stands for spaces for education uh empowerment and development uh a network of gardens if you will across the region there. And we'd like the William Penn healing garden to be uh one of the
beacons within that umbrella of gardens. Um yeah. So that's it. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Gilling. I know we have some question from our board. So we um open it up for discussion. >> Miss Anderson,
>> um I just had a comment. Thank you for all the work that you've done, Mr. Gilliam and to Miss Rafika for bringing some sunshine to this um deserted area, right, this neglected area in the city. Um appreciate all the hard work that you've done and appreciate the
administration's support in making this collaboration happen. Um I know that there was some cleanout that had to happen last year in order to make it possible. So I think this is a great example of the way that the school district can collaborate with the community. So thanks for all your work.
>> Thank you. All right. And um I just have a question uh regarding which again thank you for um all you guys are doing and um I do know I did notice you had the 717 Sunday which was um more of a community but I
just wanted you to speak a little bit to how how the outreach is done like in actually the support because I know you talked about the Cland Cumberland Valley students with the cleanup. Um, is is there any outreach towards like students here in our Harrisburg school district
area? Like besides actually doing an event for them to be involved in the helping like what did that look like or is it were you only able to get the support from specifically the Cumberly Cumberland Valley students?
>> Uh, no. Actually, we had um Harrisburg Academy come out, Milton Hershey School came out. Um, and those are more kind of toward the summer just again because of how late it was to get that insurance aligned. Most of the kids were out of school by that time. Um, so that's that was really the biggest barrier going
into this next year if there is a next year granted. That is definitely high on our priority list to get that information out to our local schools. Certainly Camp Curtain or any other ones that want to come out. The reason that Cumberland Valley, Milton Hershey, Harrisburg Academy, they've been partners of ours and have sent out hundreds of kiddos over the last few
years up to the bleacher garden. So, uh, they actually reached out to us asking if there were any opportunities to volunteer. We didn't do much push out to bring folks in. We wanted to take care of some of the heavy lifting and get the foundation put in place first. and and thank you for that because I
just understand like the partnership, but again also making sure that um you know when these are when these events are when you're actually doing any cleanups cuz it's somewhat how I see it is if I'm in the community and I can be a help, you know, there are ways that we
can start, you know, um showing our students how to, you know, help clean up the neighborhoods. So, I totally get it. Not saying that you weren't doing it with other districts, but I guess the outreach is only, you know, my question. But thank you for that feedback. So to know it wasn't just, you know, students
from a different school district. But really want to see our students really get more involved and understand, you know, the help and supporting to help grow the environment when we think about um our Harrisburg area. So thank you.
>> Thank you, Mr. Gillian. All right. We have another presentation being done tonight by our human resource team. So, Miss Lane, if you could come up and you can introduce your team. >> My wellness. It's my wellness for the day.
Okay. Well, first of all, the human resources department consists of more than one person. It takes many people to keep us moving and shaking here in the district. So, we are missing a person. Um, she actually was out recruiting
today. So, I I do want to just say that in advance. Um, but just to start out, this is an abbreviated version of our ACT 141 presentation. Uh, again, it is abbreviated mostly because I think that we have many other exciting topics to
cover today. And Adam, fingers crossed I can use the pointer. It's not working. Oh, there we go. I tried. Um, the first thing I wanted to mention, there are several different strategic models um to use for human
resources. I, this is my preferred model for school districts. I consider us to be partners within the system. It's a good visual representation of how we organize the department and really think about our impact to the organization as a whole. It is a bit technical. I am a
bit of an HR geek. Um, so I I just want to make sure that people have this visual as I go through everything. Okay. So, we do have an HR team and these are the titles. I am the director of human resources, Marina Lang. And if
you could Angie, stand up. I know it's she's a little short so when she stands up it's not as exciting, but um anyway. So, Angie is our supervisor of human resources operations and next we will have Lindsay Sanguanito. She is our labor and employment relations
manager followed by Miss Starisha Williams and she is our comp and Ben specialist. Our recruiting and hiring specialist Hannah Murray is again off recruiting today. So next we have Melanie Turner
who is our HR data specialist. Milani has um she actually started a little bit before me um with the team. So she started in May. I started in September of 2024. And last but not least, uh we have our admin assistant
and this is Maggie. Maggie has been um a powerhouse of resourcefulness because she's been with the district the longest of our team. How many years is that? 20. >> 24. So she So this has actually been um amazing for us u just to have Maggie in
our department. and she has been our second most recent addition only to Lindsay who started in the middle of December. So the one thing about us, we are all mothers. Some of us are small business owners. Uh some of us are a product of
urban education. Some of us have graduated from the system. Uh a few of us are residents of the city. So and and some of us actually weren't even born in this country. So we are a pretty diverse representation. We're and we take great pride in that.
It makes us very relatable with the employees that we interact with on a daily basis. Um this is the organization chart. This was approved in October. Um if you may remember we had uh had to do some restructuring, updated some job
descriptions and created the labor and employment relations manager position here in our department. So, some of the things that we think about in human resources, we think about the role, the impact of it. I know that sometimes I run into individuals who ask me, well, like, what do you really do
there? Do you just like hire teachers and then you have off for the summer? And I don't know, maybe like have like, you know, parties every once in a while. And I'm like, no, no, we actually have several things that we do. Um, not only do we support the mission and the vision of the district, but we are also
focusing on supporting staffing needs that includes recruitment, the hiring, the long-term development and the retention of good employees in the district. We also ensure compliance and that's with federal, state, and other
labor laws. uh and we are always there to support our supervisors in understanding the implications of non-compliance. And lastly, we partner with our schools and departments. Not only is this hiring and staffing, um but it's also
performance management and just long-term planning. Okay, these are some of the strategies that we focus on within our department. We do prioritize improving recruitment and retention and we're always looking at process improvement and how to
strengthen those systems and that includes policy development and just regularly collaborating with a variety of departments um across the district. We also want to ensure that we have accuracy and that is again strategically
why we had to restructure our department. We wanted to emphasize the integrity of our data um and also our processes to ensure accurate compliance and just pulling good information from our systems and um ultimately also
supporting what the um recovery plan uh has asked us to to set and to comply with in its goals. It's not working again. Oh, there we go. So, we're a team. I started this conversation talking about that we
actually do use this scorecard. We think about how our customers see us. Who are our customers? Who are our customers? They're the employees. They're our supervisors. They are community members. They are applicants. Um they are the students. We do know what the end result
of our product is and that is an educated successful citizen coming out of our school system. And we focus again on making sure that we have processes that improve the efficiency and the
integrity of our systems. So again um we've done several things over the past I'll say 15 months. We've implemented what is called the frontline central human resources system. This is a web-based application and a lot of
hours were invested in um implementing this system and this is really the hub of our frontline systems um and it's where we have improved not only our recruiting and hiring processes but we've also implemented automated systems
within it as well as using other systems to support that. And um ultimate and last but not least, it's about compliance and making sure that we're we're keeping up to date with any credentials that have to be tracked. There we go.
So, this will just be a brief overview of some of our processes and Miss Doll, if you could just come up and talk about that. Hey, >> so hopefully that will work and you can hear me. Um so we've spent a lot of time
over uh the past year working closely with the 425 consulting group who've been working with the team through the implementation of the frontline products to really uh document and look at our internal um processes. We partnered with
uh the the groups internally where who were impacted by those processes so that we could really understand how um the system that we were using and the processes that we were documenting impacted the other departments
internally and then ultimately our uh employees as well. We work closely with the payroll and business offices as well because obviously um that's a group that as we're bringing people on board they've um ultimately we need to get them paid
properly. So it's important that we work closely with that team to um meet the needs of our employees and we have done a lot of work documenting these standard operating procedures across many of the items listed here and in some cases
developed enhanced uh frontline central forms andor um other tools for that purpose. Oh, sorry. Sorry. Um specifically um we we also the entire HR team was involved in the
documentation of these processes because that helped us increase our own uh internal system knowledge as well as to be able to cross train across the department so that as people have been on vacation we've been able to cover for one another or doing during leaves of
absence our customers don't um experience any um interruption. they ultimately get their needs met because our processes are in line and we're able to um seamlessly work things through. I'm going to turn it over to um uh
Stesisha Williams, our compensation and benefit specialist to talk specifically about the last two items. >> Hello board. Um, I just wanted to briefly um mention that one of the things that I was wanted to work with this year was trying to figure out a way
that we can make our leave of absence process better, make our FMLA process a little better so we can remain compliant with everything. So, I began to reach out to different school districts to kind of see some of the things that they do. And one thing they mentioned was the EFMLA uh electronic system. So, I want to personally say thank you to you all
for allowing that to even move forward because that has been a big help so far. Um we we do have it up and running. We are working on the process. Uh employees have stated that it's a pretty simple process to go through and one thing that we did was we um merged it with our new
leave of absence process. So we have uh been utilizing the frontline system. We created a leave of absence form that where now employees instead of emailing so many different email addresses or different people they can initiate or we can send the leave of absence request.
And what that does is it's sent to them electronically. It allows them to state what it is that they need. From that point, I can decide is this FMLA, is it a sbatical, is it a military leave? And it's kind of kept all together. And it gives us the chance to be able to track what it is. So instead of searching
through emails, it's one system with one tracking tool. And working directly with the EFMLA, we're able to send things directly to them. We're able to um track the process. They're able to fax directly from the system. So that has been a big help with our HR processes and making sure that everything is
compliant with FMLA. Um the next thing is workers compensation. I just want to touch on this because around maybe the spring of 2024, we had a huge transition within our HR department and what that did was that left certain areas in our um in our department that weren't being
taken care of. We had people that left. Um this gave us a chance to actually kind of cross trainin and learn some different things. So, one of the things that I was tasked with was taking on the workers's compensation. At the time, it was a little all over the place. There was not great processes on uh employees
from the time of the accident to getting to us properly to getting the claims and everything into the system. It was just it was a lot going on. So, I was able to communicate and partner directly with um some of our uh TPA providers just to kind of get a better understanding of
what's needed, what's working, what didn't work, what can we do better uh moving forward. So, I don't know how to use the clicker. So, just the arrow button. Oh, you did it. Oh. Oh, Adam, thank you. Okay. Um, so I just wanted to point out that so far for for this
fiscal year, our average days to notify um or employees notifying staff of an injury has dropped down to like 0.2 days. And what that is is from the time the employee is injured to completing the paperwork and at least notifying their supervisor. Um, it's been 0.2
days. Now, the average days for our office to report is now at 5.4 days, which is really great. When I came in, I was trying to work on um claims that were sitting there for two and three months just trying to get caught up. So, from the time of injury to notifying us
to getting it into the the PMA system is about 5.4 days. So, it's it's been significantly great. Um if you look at the orange right there, what that is is that so far that's like our workers compensation um claims and the cost incurred. So, it's coming down. I mean,
we're still early in 2026, but what this graph shows is that the investigation with the workers comp is is going a lot better. What this means is we are able to um have the the skills, the knowledge, the the opportunity to kind of investigate the things that are going on. And what that means is we're getting
them in to be seen and out and back to work sooner. So therefore, the cost is going down because they're not going to multiple appointments that's not needed or unnecessary. Um we're talking to them and letting them know, hey, what's going on? How are you doing? and do you think you can come back? How can we get you back to work? So, now as a result of
that, our cost is is going down with workers comp. So, that's a great thing to be uh to be proud about. And I'm going to pass it to Milani who's going to discuss position control. Thank you. Hello. Hello. Hello. So, this summer I was tasked with the opportunity to look
into our position control and update it as necessary. And in doing that, I realized that it was going to be a big manual process. Um, it wasn't very clean and needed a lot of updating. So, what I first did, this is the process listed here. I took what we had in the system
currently and I broke it up by building and I also pulled our vacancy so I could see exactly which each building had. Then I was able to meet with each building administrator and go line by line with all their teachers, all their support staff and also any vacancies
that they had in their buildings just to make sure that we can sorry reflect that in position control in our systems. Once I had all that data, we were able to take it to the business office and we collaborated with making the necessary updates in the system to where I feel um
today we can actually trust the position control and use it for its intended purposes. In going through this position control update and all the meetings, we realized that there were um some processes that needed to be defined and tweaked a little bit to make sure that
we can maintain position control going forward such as our creation and position creation elimination of positions and also employee transfers which happen pretty frequently and every time there's a transfer we need to update them in the system. So that's a
big collaboration between our department and the business office. So these processes and forms that we've created has helped streamline this process and keep it all in a centralized place as well. Um and also doing that we have
been able to um use this information to better track our subcontract employees as well and actually give them a vacant position and better track where our subcontracted employees are.
Oh, thank you. Um, so in finalizing and um updating position control, this also allowed me to update our HR system with the assignment data which directly feeds our PIM reporting. So as I made all those updates, we were actually able to
have um very minimal errors this year significantly um from past years and also with the process that we created is going to help us maintain this. So going forward, we can only get better. We can only go up from here. Um and going forward, this collaboration is going to
be between myself and the staffing accountant in the business office to maintain position control going forward. So it's going good. And I'll hand it back over to Marina. So before I jump into this, there's a reason why it was so important for the
team to talk to you about what they do. And that reason is because over the past three years we've experienced sufficient amounts of turnover in our HR department that we did not have necessarily the institutional history or knowledge. So
what you are seeing here is um is really 15 months of growth which is pretty significant in a department and I I'm really proud of them and um I have to say we as of the end of January became fully staffed since I first started in
September of 2024. So, as you were hearing about all of this process improvement and all of this work that has been put together, um there are times where some of us were carrying more than one job and and I'm
that's why I'm so proud and and really just seeing the growth in my team is something for me to celebrate as their boss of course, but also for them to celebrate for themselves. So, going into other pieces related to recruiting and
hiring because um this is where unfortunately Hannah couldn't be here today. She and I um are the ones really tag teaming this piece um which includes of course going out to job fairs, doing outreach to institutions of higher education.
Um we've enhanced our social media presence. We've also started to do other marketing. We are collaborating of course with Kelly Services to help recruit. Um, as of today, we have well over 500 applications in our system, and
that is just for the 2526 school year. And we've also demonstrated growth in recruiting through our student teacher pipeline. Um, as of today, we have six people that we have recruited and and hired um that were student teachers
here. One thing that um I one collaboration I absolutely love is our collaboration with the office of academics and I have to do a shout out to um Kelly Folks and her team. Um this primarily focuses on our teachers on boarding. Um we do one
also for a support staff to be very clear, but for our new teachers in particular at the start of the school year, it's a five-day process the orientation and a lot goes into that. Not only do we have initial onboarding sessions ahead of time, but we work with
um the office of academics to have a very successful and robust um orientation program, which also includes our long-term subservices because if they are going to dedicate that much time to our kids, right, um we
need to make sure that they are also equally trained so that we are not losing instructional time for our kids. And um one thing we're also doing is making sure we're collecting data. Again, if this is also about retention, by the time you're doing an exit interview, sorry, I should say warning
HR geekdom. Um by the time you're doing an exit interview on somebody, it's too late. We need to make sure we're assessing that experience as soon as they come in the door. So this year has been our initial data collection year of finding out what that experience is
like. And we're already learning from it, and we're making changes to our processes. So for us, yeah, you know, um we were talking about um position control earlier. We were also talking about recruiting and hiring, collaborating with um all of our departments. Well,
this is it. Uh we pay attention to staffing trends and needs in our district. We're looking at right now with um Miss Palmer's group, we're looking at a increased demand in special education staff. we are because we're looking at smaller class sizes um based
on regulations and a higher skill set and we're looking at an increased need for English language development staff and that is an increasing population as well. um office of academics has really educated my department on how important of a need that is. And um next just we
always focus on recruiting teachers with uh a background in um in math and reading. And they may not necessarily have that area of certification, but we do look for people with training and background in it. Um, and last but not least is again making sure we're
continuing to develop a pool of qualified substitutes, whether they're retirees or individuals who are beginning to explore teaching as a profession. Okay, so this is my favorite part of human resources, I admit. Um, I really
love the labor relations and employee relations stuff. Um, so again, I'm really grateful to have Lindsay who joined our team because this is also a place where we have to commit a lot of time and energy. This is about making sure that we have a good collaborative relationship with all of our employee
groups. Um, we also have to make sure we're paying attention to a very proactive approach to how we're addressing employee concerns. Again, um if anybody is familiar with labor relations, by the time we're we we are receiving an employee complaint or a grievance, there is something that we
didn't notice before. So to me, whenever I'm interacting with my supervisors or even speaking with labor leadership, I'm looking at ways that my team can help support leadership in preventing those concerns from happening and also investigating what
might be going on prior to that, prior to an event happening. Uh we also handle Title 9 investigations from my department and other compliance related investigations as they come up. Um and of course we focus on improve progressive discipline and grievance
tracking. Oh, there we go. All right. So to kind of wrap it up, these are some of our priorities for the 2627 school year. We're looking at expanding, of course, recruitment. That's always a big one for us. And uh because we believe in process improvement, we will continue to develop
our human resources processes and documentation and always strengthening on boarding and early development of our teachers. So, and last but not least, of course, um looking at workforce data and making sure we're applying that um that data to
improving the organization as a whole. So, anyway, that's it. Anybody have any questions? Miss >> uh thanks very much for the presentation um and uh thanks for you know collecting um the data to like you said intervene
you know or or um start uh new employees off on the on the right foot. My I guess my question was um with the focus on onboarding improving onboarding was that an insight that came out of exit interviews? I guess I was I don't know if you can talk about what happened in exit interviews. Truthfully, it was an
insight I brought from other organizations I'd worked for. I mean, I've been working for school districts since 2000. Um, not to advertise my age, but um, but that's something that I've noticed with each one, my best feedback
came from that initial experience. And I'll tell you, even me coming in the door when I'm the one filling out the new hire paperwork or when I'm watching or or listening to um my my colleagues, my administrators, that says volumes. Um
usually what I identify are potential learning or communication gaps that need to be improved. Um and and it's it's good feedback. Um there's a book that I really appreciate. It's called Thanks for the Feedback. And I use a lot of that whenever I'm talking to my team or
even when I'm reflecting on feedback given to me. Strongly recommend it, by the way. Um, and but it's it it's really about saying, okay, somebody may not be happy with this and um and we have to think about, all right, that's my
customer. That's my customer. And if if they don't understand it or if they are angry about it, then we need to make this better because we're here for them. >> Yeah. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate the continuous improvement, you know, spirit there. Um because, you know, investing in our educators and our staff, our supportive staff is is really, really
important to serving our students. So, thank you. >> Definitely, >> Mr. Carter. >> I had more so of a comment, not a question. I want to thank you for uh um reshaping and rebuilding that process with the uh exit interviews. That's something that we've been asking for for quite some time, especially in regards
to retaining employees. Another thing too is um I thank you too for uh bringing uh the long-term subs on board too with that same process. So I commend you guys and I commend you too as well because I know you spoke on several things that's coming to fruition. So uh thank you. Thank you and the administration for that.
>> Absolutely. >> And I'll just add my comment to say thank you and just to hear the see the team thank you guys because I know it takes a team but just to hear that feedback cuz we don't know the dayto-day what it looks like. So to hear that, you know, we're being a part and the
processes are working better. And then we talked about the cross training because I was going to ask, but she jumped in. So I was like, good, kudos. So thank you for that. And then um I know we know nationally it's been a struggle with just trying to keep administrators and teachers. So to hear
that um we just got hired on six new administrative teachers, that's a plus. So thank you guys for all you do and I'm sure you know you're under good hands, but it's really appreciated. so we can have this when we're out to say um we do
have the supports and we do have the right people in our team. So, thank you again. >> Thank you. So, I know I mentioned that we're parents and everything. I I did tell them that they can leave after this. So, so anyway,
>> thank you guys. All right. So, all right. So, now we will move to our public comment um section for this evening. So, Madam Secretary, we are ready to begin the public comment period for of the agenda items only. >> We have no public comments.
>> All right. Thank you. So, are we able to move then to any non? >> We don't have any. She said we have any. >> We don't have any. >> None. Okay. Great. Thank you. >> All right. So, we'll move to the office of academics. Dr. Henry. >> Right. The administration has
recommended approval of the agreement between the Harrisburg School District and Craft Education Consultant LLC to create a career technical education system for the Harrisburg School District. Amount not to exceed 10,000. This item will appear on the March 24th,
2026 board of agenda for approval. Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion, Miss Anderson? >> Um, yeah, Dr. Henry, could you provide a little bit more information on this? I know that the um statement was attached,
but is this part of the overall CTE plan that you're looking to build? Is this separate? Like, how does that fit into what you're looking to do? So to your point uh Miss Anderson, last spring I presented to the to the board that we are trying to bring CT light to John Harris um with the idea of bringing uh
business cyber security EMT as well as pre-apprenticeship. Um and so one of the thing that we wanted to do is uh partner with craft education to walk us through this process. And so we are going to be walking through this process with this individual uh so we can start onboarding
and bringing these type of classes to our district. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Is there any further discussion? >> And uh my Oh
>> uh Miss Robinson. >> Yes. Thank you. I just wanted to to to know where are you looking to keep to do these classes. >> Mr. Reed, you could tell where in the John Harris the area.
>> Sure. I actually believe it was in your presentation last year, Dr. Henry. And uh there is a wing of John Harris on the first floor. So if you go in the front, you take a left, you go all the way down the hallway. Um there is a section that we are looking to add add these classes.
I can't recall exactly what's in there right now. Um but you but there is an area um for both the pre-apprenticeship and the classes that we're looking to create. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Carter.
>> I have a question. I know uh for quite some time too we had community members that also had spoke about having these programs geared towards middle school students as well. So is this a possibility that we can gear this towards our middle school students as well? >> So I would say right now let's start at John Harris. Let's start lifting there
and and start slow. Now what I think we can do and what we looking to do is how do you start providing opportunity for our kids in middle school to learn about these opportunity then we can bring those type of classes in middle school to start bringing them online so they could know when they get to high school
what opportunity they have. Thank you. And thank you and I think my only uh question will be towards it. Um I do show that you it states the CT it will be uh directed towards business related. Um is this
currently what the students are recommending like how did you come about just focusing on the business perspective of it? So if you recall from the the task the task force when we had the survey and we had the different field that uh kids say they was interested that's how we kind of
developing looking at this with this business one we wanted to start first as we all understand that John Harris camp we have the school of business SBI and for me I say that should be our full a flagship school flagship program and so we want to start there because that program has already been established
it's a easy entry point to start there with entrepreneurship Y >> thank you. And did you think about to like the capacity? What what would that number start off looking like to get the amount of children cuz I know SBI is a separate.
>> So this is what all this part is going to be. We planning all this now with Mr. Craft. So what going to be the capacity on the class? What how many kids we have in there? We're going to have to work on all that and build all that out and then come back and present everything to you all. >> Okay. Yeah. because I would want to
actually have a little bit of that up front before we want to not see not moving forward but to see is this what the you know majority of what students are looking towards. >> That's why I said remember all that came from that survey that was done couple years ago. >> Yeah. So that's why we want to update
one because that was a couple years ago. So we probably got newer students here. So just to get some feedback to see what are the students looking towards now because if we go into a business and say they want to do construction right then how >> that's why you know we were talking about onboarding all this going to take
years it's not going to be all one year so we doing the business per first class first and then we going to look to do the cyber security and then the EMT all this going to be multiple years down the road it's not going to be all next year so we just starting with the business class the entrepreneur that's all we
starting with in the cyber security as we work on building out the rest of the program. So that's where we start. I don't want you all to leave and thinking that next year you all going to see a bunch of new classes at John Harris. >> No, no. I I totally get understand it,
but I want to make sure that the students are involved too because this is their education. So to make sure this is what I don't want to do something just because, you know, it's on our end. Is this something they want to you know move forward with as well and making things with a couple years ago? I would
love to see how we can do it as a administrative team to see the update for a survey of where we're at now. >> Okay. Also, I have one more comment too before you move forward. And just to add on to what Miss Copeland said as well, um if you can also take the initiative to get some of the students feet wet,
like the um fire department has a program called fire starters and stuff like that just to get some students feet wet in some of these career fields. we can take that initiative too to branch out and reach out to them to see what type of initiatives or programs that they already have put in place for our students so they can get that chance to get a little feel for those uh career
fields. >> Could I also jump in? I have a more accurate answer in terms of the location. >> Okay, go ahead, Mr. >> Yeah. Uh Mr. Norhold, if you bring up the map, sorry, you caught kind of caught me off guard there a little bit. So, but we do
have an exact map of the location. Yep. There you go. Yep. Right there. So, that's the that's the floor plan of John John Harris. So, again, if you go in to the front, come on, Adam. you go in the front, go all the way down to the left, you'll
see the area that's highlighted. And uh Mr. Norhold, if you go to the next slide, uh that's an expanded view of it. Um you you'll see the bottom portion is where we're planning on putting the apprenticeship
locations. Um the green and the orange is where the business will go. And we're looking at the IT networking as well as the AMS into the other
various classrooms within that wing. >> Okay. Thank you very much. >> Yep. Thank you, Mr. Rey. So, hearing no further discussion on the we will move this forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. The
administration has recommended approval of the agreement between the Harrisburg School District and Site LLC to provide supervision of a Dr. Lever school psychology intern for the 2026 2027 school year in amount of $8,000. This item will appear on the
March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Is there any discussion on the motion, Miss Robinson? Yes. Quick question. Why are we paying for oversight or supervision for an
intern? If I'm not mistaken, normally it's the school that they're or where they're getting their their um doctorate from. They have I guess um advisors or things like that. Why are we paying for
their supervision? are is this um if after this are they then working for the school district? Are we um are they are they going to become an employee or why are we paying for their
oversight if we're not going to get a benefit from it? >> Okay, Miss Palmer. >> So, um any any psych intern that works um in the district, it's almost like having a full-time employee. they work all year long um aside of a district
psych. Um in a typical situation, the district psych would get a stipen for for um the extra work that it takes in order to supervise the interns. In this situation, the candidate is a doctoral level candidate and so she has to be supervised by um a doctoral level
psychologist, which is why we're contracting. Um many times um the Sykes end up uh coming on board with the district after they finish their internship. >> Is there something where is there something where I know if some of our
teachers were to go to um to get another certification or get another level of of education and we were to pay for that or guess to reimburse that. Is it just something like that where where we're again we're we're we're
going to get the benefit of it while they're here doing their internship, but they're getting a benefit of it and the only one right now that's getting anything out of pocket is us. >> Yeah. I mean, they're they're going to be working for the district for an
entire school year. I I don't know if that's helpful or not. um it's a requirement uh from the the um Canada's universities in order to do the internship. >> So part of their requirement is they have to do this internship and they have to be under supervision and so while
they working with the district we providing that supervision oversight for this person and most likely most of the time these individual once they get done with their internship they end up working with the district. >> Yeah. So, it's almost like an investment in them to try to get them to understand about the great work we're doing here in
the city. >> And just to be clear, >> we're not paying them. We're paying the company for oversight for them. >> Yes. Because we, it sound like from my understanding, we this is part of the requirement. And I'm going to let Miss Lane speak on that real quick.
>> Just to be clear, um, our psych interns, they are grant funded. So, we are not paying for the psych for the stipend. That's the first thing. The second thing is is that the psych intern is not eligible for tuition reimbursement, but we do need to make sure in their
practice they have the appropriate credentialed supervisor to make sure that um we have integrity with our processes >> and I don't know maybe I don't know if I'm not saying this correctly
there. I understand if their internship is being paid through a grant. It says right here, "This $8,000 is going to be paid through our general fund, but we're paying someone else to oversee someone
else that's getting paid by from a grant, not paid by us. We're >> perhaps I can add a little clarity." >> So, right now, >> Yep. Right now in our collective bargaining agreement, we have a stipen
that we pay for psych intern supervision. So anytime we normally have a psych intern, the member of the HA group would be receiving that compensation. Because we do not have a member of our HA group that has a doctorate level
degree as a school psychologist, we don't have somebody qualified to receive that stipen for that supervision. So therefore, that's why we're contracting it. So each time we get a school psychologist, there's really two parts of it. We pay the intern, which the
majority is paid by a grant, but some of it does come out of the general fund, and then we pay a member of uh s to supervise that intern. So, it's different than teach uh than a student teacher um because there's a different level of education and a different level
of hours and work requirements that's needed um for this type of degree program. So, normally you would see this as a stipen in the personnel section of the agenda uh that an H member would be
res serving as that intern supervisor. But so we have always paid out of the general fund. It's just pointed out this way differently because we have to outsource that supervision. >> Okay. So this is just the money was
there for supervision for someone for this doctoral level intern but because we don't have someone of that level is just out. So it's still being paid out through money set aside for this specific thing. not anything extra
coming out of our general fund. >> That is correct. Now, we're developing the 2627 budget, but normally I would be budgeting in my salaries and benefits cost for the HA beeber, the district employee to provide this. Instead,
you'll see it on a contracted service cost under the special ed office for this particular intern supervision. and then most likely in 2728 we'll revert back to our normal process where it comes out of salaries and benefits. This is definitely a more unique circumstance
to have somebody with this level qualification looking to do their internship with us. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. >> Well, thank you Dr. Stokes. And hearing no further discussion, we'll move this forward to
the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry. Next item. >> The administration recommended approval of the addendum to the original contract between the Harrisburg School District and Holly Sim Consulting consultation to provide support for PBIS amount not to
exceed 10,000. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Is there any discussion on the motion? Miss Robinson. >> Yes. Just a quick question. So, I'm I
can't access this right here. What is the addendum for this contract? Is this just an an extension or is this too surp Let me get it out. What is the addendum
to the already existing contract? The addendum is to contract for more of Dr. Holland's time so that she can help support PBIS in the district. >> Okay. So, no, this is just for more of her work.
>> Yes. >> Not different work. Okay. Right. Thank you. That's all I need. Thank you. >> Sure. >> Thank you. So hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent
agenda for approval. Dr. Enry, next item. >> The administration recommend approval of addendum number one present uh present to the agreement entering into the between the Harrisburg School District and Meres Healthcare Staffing Inc. on September 3rd, 2025 at
a cost of $65 per hour. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> I have a question. >> U Miss Anderson. >> U Thank you, President Copeland. I just
wanted to get a little bit more um background on this and like what what are we using the staff for? When I was looking at the I don't know if I was looking at the wrong agreement, but there wasn't a ton of information in the agreement. >> It's full language. >> So, we have Yeah, we have a student who
requires an interpreter and that was not in the original agreement. So, that's why we're doing the addendum. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Sure. >> Thank you. >> Okay. So, hearing no further, let me just Okay.
>> Okay. So, hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh, Dr. Henry, next item. administration has recommended approval of the agreement between the Harrisburg
School District and Renaissance to provide services for Near Park Freckle Star DNA Inspect Premium and Ed Clim for a 2-year term from March 1st, 2026 to July 31st, 2026 and August 1st, 2026 to
July 31st, 2027 in amount of 378,57657 7 cents. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion?
>> All right. Hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommend approval of an increase to a previous approved purch amount for WAZAD
from $69,800 to $85,400 represent an increase of $15,600 for implementation at MA Marshall Math Science Academy for students in grades 6 through 8 during the 2025 2026 school
year. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of agenda for approval. Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on the motion, Miss Hughes? >> Uh, is this um is this to accommodate
more students or what drives the the increase? >> Yes. Well, there was an increase in price from the last time that we had it quoted and there were a few more things that they had added on to it. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Y >> Thank you, Miss Hughes.
All right. hearing. No further discussion. Oh, Miss Robinson. >> Yes. So, you said there's a change in the price from the initial quote and they're adding other things to it. So, we're the
$15,000 is just for what they added on to it, not >> not based off the initial quote >> and the in and the price increase is what I was told that there was a price increase from the original quote for the program in itself. They had an increase
in their pricing. >> Okay. Well, can they can we go back and have them honor the initial quote, which would then possibly um absorb that $15,000 increase.
>> Miss Robinson, I if I'm not mistaken, I think we received this quote over the summer. We was trying to go back and forth to get this uh purchase through the foundation. And so that was some of the hold up on this transaction. Um cuz if I'm not mistaken, we got this transaction almost almost a year ago.
It's probably been around this time last year when we got the initial quote. Um, but again, we were just trying to work through the foundation to see if they could have purchased this for Marshall. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. Good night.
>> All right. So, thank you. Hear no further discussion on the motion. We will move this forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of a out ofstate field trip request to Howard and Georgetown
University in Washington DC on March on Friday, March 2726 to tour each campus in amount of 3,123. transportation and other this item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of
agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Henry, is there any discussion on the motion? >> All right. So, Miss Robinson, >> just a quick question. Um, it was for
How many students were was this for? >> 24. Yes. >> Yes. 24 high school students is for 11th and 12th graders. >> Okay. So, for I'm just looking at the
the amount of that and I know how how much travel is is um that seems the amount seems pretty low for that amount of students and transportation. Are we getting some sort of discount on things, especially food for 24 kids,
transportation back and forth? I I just wanted to know the the amount just seemed really low. Is there any kind of discount that we're receiving for this or anything? >> I'm looking over the agreement. No, it does not look like we we have any discount. It's just like how what they
was able to um get the quote for. >> Oh, I mean, not arguing. I I love a low price, but it just seemed low to me. Okay, thank you. >> Oh, >> okay. Thank you. So, hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting
for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended ratification and order approval of the time away for work request for the professional development as attached to the agenda. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for
approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> Hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommended
approval of the revision of the Harrisburg School District D district calendar for the 2526 school year. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on the motion?
>> M have a comment. I know that uh during the town hall meetings that we have with uh council. I know that community members did they come out and they had a concern about the dates that we have for our schoolboard meetings and the uh dates that we have with council meetings how they are intervening with each other and they wanted to see if we can try to
make a change with our date so they can attend both meetings. >> Well, that would be something that we definitely need to talk to as a board. >> Thank you, Mr. Carter. Miss Robinson. Yes, I just wanted to to put it I guess make it known. So, this right here, the
changes to our existing calendar is only based off of our um snow days or um what do they call them? Um FIB days. >> Yes, this is more or less remember we
removed the early release for the rest of the year because of the the snow days and the two-hour delay. We wanted to ensure that we had our hours and minutes requirements and so that's was removing those early release for the remainder of the year. >> Okay. I just wanted to make that that known because people wouldn't really
understand why we're making changes to a large existing calendar. So, but yeah, I just wanted to make that clear. Thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Robinson. And then I guess my only question would be because and this might
not not be might not be the greatest for others but I would love to see the early release move completely when we talk about um you know cuz this is every Wednesday and it looks like it's it does speak to the instructional piece but I
don't know what you know because if you think about school and they're leaving early every Wednesday, you know, and I'm thinking about, you know, the whole picture when we think about parents who work. we don't have early releases on Wednesday, you know, and I understand I don't know what that looks like moving
forward, but I know we did implement it for the remaining of this school year when we think about um you know, the fit days and snow days, but I did have a lot of parents speak to they had a lot of concerns with just having this these Wednesdays, half a days when it's kind
of hard for them to try to take off depending on their shifts. So, I don't know if we can look into that or what that looks like, but that's just my own partake in that. >> Well, that you know, we just approved uh two-year calendar want to say last week at the last board meeting. So, that's something as we move forward, we could
definitely have conversation. One of the good part about the development of our two-year calendar. Uh we did have input from the community. We had parents, we had community people, we had a a well-verseed round of people around the table when we developed that calendar. Um so, it wasn't done in isolation. So
we wanted to enlist and hear from the community while we developed our calendar, >> right? It's just that I would think I understand we have something for the this the administrator, but what do you have for the students when they leave that half a day? They're missing their, you know, the educational component and
we talk about academics and us standing, you know, to continue to keep them going. And even if it's like uh for example, if we had a program right after they got off after school, you know, something we can just look towards um that's just my own parent hat coming on.
>> All right. All right. So hearing no further discussion, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 committee of the excuse me, uh consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommended approval of the
agreement between the Harrisburg School District and the Sharon Harrisburg Hershey Hotel for the 2026 school of business and industry banquet. Uh the minimum cost is $8,5 plus a bowl service charges. The
agreement is pending the solicitor review. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Hern. Is there any discussion on the motion? Uh, Mr. Hughes, >> um, exciting to see this again. Um, do
you do we know if there'll be transportation provided or, uh, for students who who can't make it easily to this location? I just was curious, did anyone know? >> Typically, we do not provide transportation for the MMA. >> Thanks.
>> Thank you. And my only um updates would be I do see it's uh pending solicitors review. So would that review be completed upon our next uh meeting? >> That's the whole Yes. >> All right. I'm just asking. >> Yes. >> And we're in discussion motion. Okay.
>> Yes. >> All right. So hearing no further discussion, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. Uh the administration is recommending the recision of a relion hearing agreement 252618
was approved at the February 24th, 2026 board meeting as a meter action item. >> Thank you. So do I have a motion to approve the reision of the waiver exposion hearing agreement for the 2025 2026-18
as an immediate action item? >> So moved. Thompson leader. >> Is there a second? Second, Anderson. >> Thank you. The motion has been properly moved and seconded. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> No one.
>> Miss Robinson. >> Miss Robinson. >> Thank you. And I know we can't get into the weeds on on this one, but would uh can Dr. Henry, can you give just a an explanation of what this actually means?
I understand that um the parents of students can uh wave an expulsion hearing. Um does this with the recision of this are are the parents looking to have a hearing? >> Miss Robinson, we um actually took time
in executive session do to discuss this at um at time at length. Um >> Oh, no. I'm not asking for specifics. I just want like just for the public. Would they see these on the We we're not able to share anything. That information was shared during
executive session. >> No, no, no. I'm not >> I'm not asking. >> So, what So, what I can do, Miss Robinson, I I can follow up with you after tonight. Um, just a followup because we did discuss it. So, um, you can be clear if you're okay with that.
>> I'm I'm not asking for specifics on this. All I'm saying is for the public when we see this it says >> that the parent that the people have there's a waiver of the hearing and that's an agreement. I'm not asking for
specifics on there, but when the public says there's a recision of that, just what what that means, not the specifics of students or the situation or anything like that, just what's a recision of a waiver of expulsion mean
>> this be discussed in executive session. You have to trust the board members that actually showed up. >> Well, no, that's that's exactly why I was explaining to it just because it um there was a recision for a reasoning. So this is why and we can I can follow up with you after the meeting to further
discuss it. Okay. >> I'm not asking for the reason for >> well again with you not being here unfortunately that's why we you weren't able to get the full information. So with us having it publicly right now in order for us to conduct conduct business
we're going to need to move forward and we can further have a further discussion. Okay. >> Okay. Thank you. So, hearing no discussion, um, Madam Secretary, can I have a roll call vote, please? >> Miss Anderson, >> yes. >> Mr. Carter, >> yes. >> Miss Copelan,
>> yes. >> Miss Hughes, >> yes. Miss Johnson. >> Miss Johnson. >> Did she say yes? Miss Radcliffe, >> yes. >> Miss Robinson, >> no.
>> Mr. Roy, >> yes. >> Mr. Thompson, Leader, >> yes. >> Eight yes, one no, zero abstain. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. So, here majority of yeses. So, that motion will carry for approval. Uh, we will now move
to the Office of Human Resources. >> One second, President. >> Go ahead. >> I'm sorry about that. Seven. Yes. One no. Zero upstate. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. No response to one. >> Okay. So again, hearing no
further discussion on that approval, the motion carried. We will now move to the office of human resources for new business items. Dr. Henry, next item, please. >> The administrators recommend approval of the agreement between the Harrisburg
School District and a servo code assurance services, Inc. to provide administrative services for the district self-insured program for a period July 1, 2026 through June 30th, 2029. The agreement is pending the solicitor review. This item will appear on the
March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. Thank you, Dr. Her. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> All right. So, I just always like to say for the record that >> we have one from Miss Robinson. >> Okay. Well, I just wanted to say before
Miss Robinson, before the record that I know it's pending solicitor's review, but it will be up uh finalized prior to our next meeting. Correct. >> Yes. >> All right. Thank you, Miss Robinson. Yes. Can I can for the public's
information, what actual services is in serv code insurance going to provide to the district? >> Sure. Um, in Cervico, they're our third-party administrator for workers comp claims. For example, whenever we do
have a claim submitted, they are the ones that process it for us and review the claim. Now I thought that that's what who we had in the HR department. >> The HR department we proc we actually
collect the claims. We do the investigations. However, we do not do the actual claims processing. This is simply replacing another third party administrator which is PMA. Okay. Thank you. Sure.
Thank you. Is there any further discussion on the motion? >> So, hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommended
approval of the attached memorandum of understanding with the Harrisburg Educational Association for the healthc care plan changes effective July 1, 2026. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 for agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on
the motion? So hearing no further discussion on this motion, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the following job description. This item will appear on
the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? And and just to get clarification, so we we already do have these positions.
>> Yes. >> So >> we're updating the job description. >> Okay. So this is an update to the job description currently. >> Yes. >> Okay. Okay. All right. Is there any further
discussion on the motion? So hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval and creation elimination of the
following position per board policy 301 as a immediate action item. >> All right. So, do I have a motion to approve the creation and elimination of the positions as an immediate action item? >> So, move Thompson leader. >> Is there a second?
>> Second, Hughes. >> Thank you. The motion has been properly moved and seconded. Is there any discussion on the motion? Miss Hughes? >> Sure. Um, could we um have an explanation of the changes? >> Sure. And um as I say this, Miss Turner probably could jump in just as equally,
but um this is really shifting positions from one location to another. So because we're eliminating a position at one location, we are then creating at another. So it is neutral. >> So just a quick question too. I I believe we're eliminating the uh safety monitor position at John Harris.
Correct. >> That is we're starting we're bring we're moving that side tech. Correct. Yeah, we we pre we moved a position from one building to another and when we do that we eliminate it from one building budget and we add it to another building budget. >> So, just a quick question. I know we
have a lot of um we have a few concerns that John Harris in regards to safety issues. Um will we be sending somebody else up there or putting somebody else in that place of eliminating that position just to make sure? >> This is actually a vacancy which we moved over there. Okay,
>> that's a very good question and I I know that u Mr. Morris isn't here to speak for his department, but what they do whenever they are trying to balance out staffing needs, they will temporarily reassign a person, even if it's for a day or even a week, um to provide support where needed. >> Okay. Thank you.
>> Thank you, Mr. Carter. Uh Miss Robinson. >> Okay. I'm a little I'm I'm a little confused. So, if you're eliminating the position at John Harris, that position is just done. There is that position no longer exists at John Harris High School.
>> That is correct. >> Yes, we moved the position over to Scitec because we were in need of a third person. >> It and again to emphasize it, it was a vacancy. >> A vacancy at Scite Tech. It was a
vacancy at It was a vacancy at John Harris that we moved over to Scitec. >> So we providing three at Scitec instead of the two. >> That is correct. >> So it's it's just position we're talking about not like the actual job title just
the position like if you had three at John Harris and now you got three over >> um Scitec we're taking over there and putting it over there. Okay. that >> so if there's a need at John Harris there's no longer position available at
John Harris >> but there's a need at Scitec as well and so Scitec right now currently has two and they need an additional one and so right now John Harris been operating without this position because it's been vacant all year so we're going to move that vacant position over to Scitec to
address a need at Scitec >> and I understand that but if there then becomes a need in the next few weeks at John Harris that position is no longer there. >> Well, that's what Miss Lane was saying. If that arrives, that's what Mr. Moore sometime will move some
of the other people from other location to support John Harris. Right now, the school been operating without this position. So, there's not a need for that position right now. >> But we would need to recreate that position in order for to bring another person at John Harris. >> If the need if it rise to that point, we
need to add another one. Yes, we possibly would have to. That is possible or we may need to reallocate staffing from other buildings. >> Okay. >> And can you can you speak to how long has that vacancy been there at John Harrison? Has it been filled? >> Has been at least a year.
>> Okay. So, over a year. And I see Miss Johnson has her question. >> Thank you, President Copeland. Um I may have missed this. Can uh you remind me please um uh Dr. Mr. Henry, how many we have left of safety monitors at John
Harris? How many positions are there now? >> So, I don't have my data right in front of me, but um we do have um approximately five vacancies still at John Harris. >> Five. How many?
>> I believe there's >> we have um I think it's >> have to pop it up. Can I get back to you on that? I'd rather you talk to me. I'm also curious as to why there are five vacancies. Is there um an issue with
hiring about recruitment? Um what's the issue with vacancies all year long? >> Well, Miss Johnson, you know, we always looking to hire safety monitor, but we want to make sure we hiring the right people for the job. Um so, we always have that job posted. I know Mr. Morris is always conducting interviews to try
to hire people for those vacancy. >> Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Um, M. Robertson, that was pretty much the similar question that I had asked cuz I know that we had eliminated the position at John Harris and we was moving that position over to Scite Tech. So, it was just more so of just making sure that if we did have a need for security at um,
John Harris where we had somebody to come over and assist. And that's pretty much what Miss Long Miss Link had answered to him. >> Yes. >> So, my question was pretty similar to yours, uh, Mr. Robertson. >> All right. Um, so my only other followup are maybe more of a comment because I have we've
been going through and doing a little walkthroughs through the school. So to see the um supports for the autistic support um the two being um eliminated and then moved over to foods cuz I know there was a great dire need um of having
autistic supports there. So that's I'm glad to see you guys are already moving in that direction and in preparation cuz I know >> um going through there there's a high uptick with the autistic. So glad to see that. And then I'm sure like I said if we need to re-evaluate some things and
come back we can do that. >> Um Miss Anderson. >> Oh Mr. Carter. >> No that's um you can go ahead Miss Anderson. I was just uh sharing the same sentiments that you did. That's a good >> And just a heads up, Miss Robinson and >> Miss Johnson and Miss Johnson,
>> I think they need to put their hands down. Did you do you have a question, Miss Johnson? >> Yeah. Miss Robinson, do you have a question? >> Yes. >> Okay. My is pretty much the same for the
autistic support teacher. Is there no is there not a need for those two support teachers at Ben Franklin? We were just making some corrections to position control and um it has been this set of numbers uh since the start of the
school year. So that's simply a numbers correction. And also um just to be clear, we had 16 positions total at Scitec at um John Harris. Um by moving this individual, we
will now have 15 positions at John Harris and we have four vacancies with that new change. for the autistic support teacher >> for the autistic support teacher. Again,
that was a correction to our position control from the start of the school year. We do sometimes have to do that just to make sure that our data is accurate and we noticed that we hadn't adjusted that. >> Okay. So, it's not actually an elimination of that where funding is
going to go to Fouse for that teacher. It's just the elimination of of two vacancies. It's a reallocation of positions to correct what should be in position control. >> Okay.
>> We're required to take board action on it, which is why it's on here, but it is not a change in the number of positions we have. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Sure. >> Thank you. So hearing hearing no further discussion on the
motion. Madam Secretary, can I have a roll call vote, please? >> Miss Anderson, >> yes. >> Mr. Carter, >> yes. >> Miss Copelan, >> yes. >> Miss Hughes, >> yes. >> Miss Johnson, >> yes. >> Miss Radcliffe, >> yes.
>> Miss Robinson, >> no. >> Mr. Roy, >> yes. >> Mr. Thompson Leader, >> yes. >> Eight. Yes. One no zero abstain. >> Thank you madam secretary. Hearing majority of yeses. So that motion will
carry for approval. Uh Dr. Henry next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the attach update for the 2025 2026 spring coaches as our meter action item. >> Thank you. So do I have a motion to approve the updated 2025 2026 spring
coaches as attached as an immediate action item? So move Thompson leader. >> Is there a second? >> Johnson. >> Thank you. The motion has been properly moved and seconded. Is there any discussion on the motion? And um my only I did have a question
towards the what was the actual changes or updates to was it just like a staffing? Was it the pos the staffing? >> We just hired all the spring coaches. >> Coach Okay. Yeah, that's that's >> pretty much it. We just hiring all the coaches for the spring. >> Okay. So, this is just an adjustment to
that. >> Yeah. To hire them. >> Okay. For the staffing adjustment is what I'm saying. To the high school basketball coaching program. >> Yeah. Because it doesn't really say that
you're any administrative >> in the attachment. We're rescending three previously approved baseball coaches and we're appointing two new baseball coaches to different positions. >> To be clear, we had some people who
declined the assignment. So, we then went we had already posted it. So, we went to the next person that had applied and interviewed and placed second. So, >> okay. So, they are new people to the position. That's what I was asking if these new actual names on the position. >> Yes.
>> Okay. Thank you. >> Hearing no further. >> I'm sorry. I just had to make this one comment. If everyone is signed in at the administrative content, all that information is in there for each board member. So, if you sign in and read the administrative content, most of the
questions that you guys are asking is within the board agenda for the board members, >> right? Yeah, it's in there, but it doesn't tell us from the original document, the approval of who names was. That's why I asked is these new people or are these the same prior um
administrators from before? So, these are saying they're new people that's taking new positions. That's why I was asking, >> right? I'm just saying overall like some of the questions that have been asked. >> Oh, yeah. Okay. >> They and I don't know how many people knew that. So, I'm just making it clear that if you sign in the administrative
content, I I remember Dr. Henry said to add that so that board members will have a chance to understand what each motion means, but just I wasn't sure if anybody was signed in and didn't see it, but just wanted to let you know. >> Thank you.
So, hearing no further discussion, Madam Secretary, can I have a roll call vote, please? >> Absolutely. Miss Anderson, >> yes. >> Mr. Carter, >> yes. Yes. >> Miss Copelan, >> yes. >> Miss Hughes, >> yes. >> Miss Johnson, >> yes. Miss Radcliffe,
>> yes. >> Miss Robinson, >> yes. >> Mr. Roy, >> yes. >> Mr. Thompson Leader, >> yes. >> Nine, yes. Zero, no. Zero abstain. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. So, hearing majority of yeses. So, that motion will
carry for approval. Uh, Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the attached March 10th, 2026 personnel agenda as our immediate action item. Thank you. Do I have a motion to approve the personnel agenda as attached as an
immediate action item? >> So move to use. >> Is there a second? >> Second, Anderson. >> The motion has been properly moved and seconded. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right.
I'm sorry. Just was looking because I seen a few rec recognitions. Okay. So, hearing no further discussion on the motion. Madam Secretary, can I have a roll call vote, please? >> Miss Anderson? >> Yes. >> Mr. Carter? >> Yes. >> Miss Copelan? >> Yes. >> Miss Hughes?
>> Yes. >> Miss Johnson? >> Yes. Miss Radcliffe, >> yes. >> Miss Robinson, >> here. >> Mr. Roy, >> yes. >> Mr. Thompson Leader, >> yes.
>> Nine yes, zero no, zero abstain. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. Hear majority of yeses. So that motion will carry for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the client service agreement between Harrisburg School District and Arthur J. Gallagher risk management
service LLC for workman compensation brokerage and risk management service effected July 1st 2026 as attached as immediate action item. >> Thank you. Do I have a motion to approve the Gallagher Rick Management Services LLC LLC agreement as an immediate action
item? >> So, so moved Anderson. >> Is there a second? Second, Johnson. All right. >> I have Hughes as second. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. So, the motion has been properly moved and
seconded. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> I just had uh just wanted to say one quick thing. I believe with this one, is this the one where it has automatic renew after a year? Correct me if I'm wrong. >> It is correct. And we wanted to make sure we finalized solicitor review, which is why it was pulled from last
time. We've completed that process. And um and again we can not we can choose not to renew it um if we're not happy. >> That was just one of the concerns just to see how effective it is and if we're not satisfied what if it will we have to go with that one year renewal can we
just step away from that was just >> that is correct. Yeah. And if I remember correctly you'd also asked for regular updates which we are working >> right. Right. Thank you to appreciate. >> Sure. >> Thank you Mr. Carter. Miss Robinson. >> Yes. Um this right here um is for
workers compensation and we also have another outside consultant thing for workers compensation and we also have internally people working at workers compensation. Why is this needed?
>> This service provider they're the individuals assisting us with some of the state reporting that is needed. They also provide us with necessary guidance and legal services to support workers comp claim processing. Um, we did have
another company. This one is replacing it because we wanted to improve our services. >> So, we have the internal people in the HR department that I guess gather the information for the workers comp. have the other company
that actually processes the workers compensation. And then this company is now going to make sure that the second company got everything right and did the process correctly. >> That is one way to put it. But there's a
significant amount of litigation that can occur if not properly monitored. And this does provide us with that layer of support that we would be paying for with legal fees regardless. >> But aren't we also already paying legal
fees to for our district for this actual thing? >> That is actually part of our agreement with this agency. >> Miss Robinson, if I could add a little bit to this. Right now we are self-insured from a workers's compensation perspective. What that
means is we don't pay an insurance broker and have an insurance policy that covers our claims. So our setup is a little bit different because the only money we pay out is for the actual claims cost. So the medication, the surgeries, the doctor's appointments. We pay for an excess coverage. So that
motion will be covered in the next few uh months. That basically is a blanket policy for any high claimants that sit on the policy. Then we pay for this consultant because they are basically the person to oversee our safety committee, ensure we are in compliance
with all of the state and uh workers compensation regulations. So they kind of act as a broker without an insurance policy. Kind kind of think of them as that way. Then the Inserve Co is the actual people behind the scenes who are paying uh Penn State Health, who are
paying CVS, who are processing all the claims when our um uh employees go there. Because we are self-insured, it is a little bit of a different model than what you might be familiar with from different um uh companies that would have a fully insured model in
which you'd pay one company and they would do everything. We have it pieced out. It's a cost savings mechanism. And this model has worked quite well for the district. About five years ago, we moved to a self-insured model from a fully insured model.
>> So, um, how many, and I'm not sure if you you're able to answer this off the bat right here, how many workers compensation claims are processed through from us each year? I would rather get that information and
report back, >> Miss Rob. >> Okay, >> Miss Robson, we will get that information back to you. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. Hearing no further discussion on the motion. Madam Secretary, can I have a roll call vote, please? >> Miss Anderson?
>> Yes. >> Mr. Carter? >> Yes. >> Miss Copelan? >> Yes. Miss Hughes, >> yes. >> Miss Johnson, >> yes. >> Miss Radcliffe, >> yes. >> Miss Robinson,
>> no. >> Mr. Roy, >> yes. >> Mr. Thompson Leader. >> Yes. >> Eight. Yes. One. No. Zero. Abstain. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. Hearing majority of yeses. So that motion will carry for approval. U. We are now ready
to move to the office of operations for new business. Dr. Henry. >> All right. The first one we're going to have is a discussion item and Mr. Reed and then is going to be leading us through this conversation. Uh the administration will present option pros and cons and recommendation for the
board consideration regarding demolition of the William Penn High School. Clear direction from the school board is needed so the administration can um proceed accordingly in one of the two uh processes. the KPN or the public bidding process. So I know Mr. Rei have provided
you all some information at your desk and he's going to kind of walk us through both option. Um so we can have an open discussion about both. Okay. Thank you Dr. Henry. As Dr. Henry mentioned, you do have a handout in front of you. So there really are two options for the demolition of William
Penn. The first option is to present to you a KPN proposal. and that is a proposal through what's called the Keystone Purchasing Network. Uh KPN is an approved cooperative purchasing program. It's run by the
Central Susuana IU and it's very popular. It serves agencies in 48 states and the original proposal that we brought to you um a little bit over two years ago was a KPN proposal to demolish William Penn at that time. As you know,
we bring forth many of these proposals to you. uh they use lowbar to construct what's called a job order contract. That's what you see attached to the motions. And there is actually some motions tonight of job order contracts uh through KPN.
We don't choose to use LowBar. Lobbar has the KPN bid for our region and it's their responsibility to put together the job order contract. These job order contracts will assign a project manager who is usually an experienced lowbar construction employee. The KPN process
makes the use of a project manager much simpler than having to engage with and contract with a specific project management company like we did with Fidavia during the bid for steel. Lobar will often do some of the construction work, but as we've reviewed
in the past, they will also sub out work to local companies such as Ralph Jones and Trumac Homes among others. If you look at the record of success, we've been able to do quite a bit in just the last few years in many of our buildings using the KPN process. This
has been highquality work at a reasonable cost. And there's several advantages to using KPN versus bidding. It saves a tremendous amount of time by eliminating the need to go through the bid process. It's not only administration time, but
it's actual time to get the project completed since it does not have to go through a bid creation process, get advertised, a bid opening, and time and expense through legal to develop a contract. Time was a big issue or a big concern
with trying to do a lot of the things in our buildings over the last 3 years. We would really not have been able to accomplish what we've accomplished without going through the KPM process. going through the bid process is a lot more time consuming. We also have some control over which
contractors are used and as I stated we have used local contractors as much as possible with the KPN process. For the demo project, Lobar would reach out to an experienced company and obtain a solid quote and our expectation would be that they are a local company that can
get the job done in a timely manner that we establish. The KPN process also reduces the amount of change orders for the project. We rarely go back and forth with Lobar at all for change orders. They pick up the change orders generally through a K the
KPN bids unless we add something significant to the scope of the work itself. In many of the KPN projects, things are found and need to be done. And again, lowbar picks up the expense of doing the work as opposed to the change order
process. So option two is a public bid and there are some advantages and disadvantages to a public bid as well. One advantage is that we get to see a competitive environment and possibly a lower cost
upfront. And that's the key word is upfront because a major disadvantage with public bid is that we're likely to see change orders. As you know, with the public bid of steel, we brought change orders almost on a monthly basis to you. And unfortunately, this is what can happen when we're forced to choose the
low bidder. Another disadvantage is awarding the work to an inexperienced contractor who bids very low and financially might not be able to handle the job. And as you know, we generally must award to the low bidder in an in a public bid. And this
could mean possibly a contractor abandoning the job when they realize they cannot make it through the project. The demolishment of a 250,000 square foot building is a big project. Now certainly bonds can assist with some protection, but you generally can't
escape all the legal costs and if a contractor would go belly up, then we would still have the project uncompleted and have to work through that. If we want if you decided to publicly bid it, there would generally be a few
steps involved. First, we would want to contract with a consultant or an architect to assist us in developing the demo bit specifications. For a project of this size, accurate bid specifications are very important again to try to control change orders.
Second, we would then go through all the steps of the public bid process. advertise, have a pre-bid meeting, a tour of William Penn, publish the bid, conduct a bid opening, and create a contract through legal. All of these things will take time and expense. We
would then be required to hire a project manager. We could use a Fidavia like we have in the past or look to some other local project management company that's available. So, a sample timeline with KPN and going through the job order contract, we could
have a proposal to you on the April agenda and we would also have a separate contract through Fox on April's agenda. We would then beginning begin the permitting process and if all goes well, demo could could begin at the beginning
of summer with a public bid. It's a little bit different. We would ask for board approval in March or April for an architect to develop a bid. May or June out the bid June or July to open the bids. The August board meeting, we would
take that to the board to award the bid and develop a contract through legal. August board meeting, we would also look to approve a project manager and then begin the permitting process. And the project would then hopefully begin in the fourth quarter of 2026. So, it is a
little bit more lengthy of a process. Now, I know I went over quite a bit. So, does anybody have any questions on either the KPN proposal or a public bid? >> Yes, Mr. Hughes. >> Uh, thanks very much for laying this out. This is really helpful. Um, and good to hear too that a KPN option does
prioritize local company uh hiring local companies. Um, I have two questions. Uh >> actually, excuse me. Just before you start, I just want to be clear that this is only a discussion. So, we're we're not voting on anything. The board, we're
just discussing the options for pros and cons. So, this is recommendations that are presented to the administrative to demo the building, but we have the option as the board. Do we want to move towards KPN or do we want to move towards the um was it the bidding? So,
it's not set in stone that what we're going to actually do. This is us saying do we would we rather go through KPN, which we know KPN I'll let you guys say your sentiments, but I'm going to say mine. So, I just wanted to make that clear and then I apologize. Go ahead.
Um, Miss Hughes, >> no, no worries. Thank you for clarifying that. Um, so I have two questions. Um, with the public bidding that extends the process by uh several months, um, is there a sense of cost implications for that delay? So, if we were to go with
KPN rather than um public bidding, what would the cost, if any, cost savings be just based on the time frame? >> Well, we would certainly need to extend everything from insurance to security to our maintenance of the building. Um, we continue the liability and the concern
of trespassers and people continuing to get into the building. Uh, so yes, there's certainly a cost there. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, okay. Okay. It'd be helpful to to know that number um roughly and I know I'm putting you in the spot. So um if if you want to get back to us that's that's perfectly fine.
And I know also it's a it's an unsure time frame. Yes. I think you said 3 to 6 months. Um the other uh question I have is I we had asked the district to present some plans for what to do with this with the land. Um and um with if we were to go to public bid,
I'd like to understand the implications of the the time frame change or the delay, if you will, um to any particular plans that the district might put in front of the board. So, anyone speak to that? >> Well, I I
>> think it would just be it would be the delay in which I spoke of in terms of anywhere between three and six months in terms of progressing to the next steps. I mean, we certainly want to get move forward through the demo first uh before we start to really present any next
steps to the board. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you, U Miss Anderson. >> Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Grey, for that overview. Um quick question about the KPN proposal. I know in the past um there were there was a lot of community
input around local um companies using local companies using diverse businesses. Um and I I saw here that you had noted and you had verbalized that sometimes lowbar does sub out work to local companies. What drives that? Is that just because they're looking for a
specific type of work or is it us putting requirements in? Like what drives that? >> Sure. It's a couple things. Uh sometimes it could be the work that Lobar specifically does. So in this case, Lobar is not a demolition company. So they would sub out the demo to a demolition company. At the same time,
it's it's also expectations of the district. So the district has expectations that we want to use local contractors on these jobs that we do. Uh so I meet with I meet with uh the representative from Lobar and we set those expectations in terms of using
local contractors and we refer contractors to Lobar. >> Mr. Thompson leader. >> Um mine is more of a comment than any kind of question. I almost could have answered that for you, Miss Anderson. John Reedi. I've worked with the guy,
talked to him many times, and I know he pretty much has been pushing for local minorityowned, veteranowned, womenowned businesses, and he doesn't toot his own horn. I wish he would because he's got a long list of successes in that regard on many of the projects across all of our
buildings. Um, that is a push. He's even gotten our kids into apprenticeships with them. So it's not just lip service to say that in that process we still want to have a bit of control and he's exerted that on our behalf for the goals
that the board has put forth over my tenure here. Um that doesn't go one way or the other. It's just you do that for us and it should be noted that you are the one advocating. I appreciate it. >> Thank you.
>> Thank you. And all right. So um my my only discussion would be towards pretty much I guess we spoke a little bit about it but I just want to kind of hear a little bit more feedback from because I'm always
thinking of cost effective and I understand that KPN would be the the better uh proposal when we think about or when we look you know considering the um the work and having it completely would
not come in Well, I guess without coming back for a change order request. However, when I think about the public bid, cuz you said you might you you would be able Do you have somewhere of a range of
what this could look like costly from both perspectives? >> Well, we certainly have some ideas in terms of what the demolition would cost. However, we have not received the KPN bid, so we do not have that number. And obviously, we didn't go out to public
bids, so we don't have that number as well. Uh, so I I really can't I can't really detail in terms of specifically where we would be, >> right? Cuz I know a few years ago it was like almost what 7 million. >> Well, that entire >> Well, without the 2 million for the
moving of the asbestos off the building, which took it to five and now we're a few years out. So just thinking about what that cost could I know we didn't I'm just speaking
on my my own thoughts of it because of I'm thinking about cost and is this something that we need to take an immediate action on now >> I I I don't I don't think so. Um, I think it's it's difficult to discuss cost and I don't really like to discuss
cost because then you give the contractors an idea, right? >> And and they get an uh >> you know, do you say it's going to be 100,000? Then that's where the base is and the bids are going to come in higher than that. >> Uh so I think we just got to be very careful in terms of talking about those
those specific estimates. Um I don't think we need an immediate action. Um you know, it's it's really the two options. So, the two options are we could bring back a KPM proposal. We could begin to move forward on this process in April or if it's the board's
choice, uh, we could go out for a public bid. And I think that's really what's up for discussion tonight. >> Okay. So, I guess that that kind of answers a little of my further questions. I was going to think if you're thinking if you brought that proposal and we didn't go you know the proposal came back and maybe the KPN
wasn't the direction that we were looking at that's something that we can then have further conversations. I think Dr. >> Well to the that's what the main thing the reason for the discussion is for you all to give us some direction. So you all probably need to do a strong vote
>> so we can know what direction you all want us to take as a administration. >> Okay. Was that what you were going to go ahead Dr. >> Susky? Thank you, Madam President. The only thing I was going to add, just for clarification, if Mr. Rei can confirm for the board, whatever option they were to go with cooperative purchasing versus
bid, they would both be prevailing wage projects. Is that correct? >> That's correct. This is absolutely a prevailing wage job that would require a project manager. >> Okay. Oh, so either way, it require Okay. Thank you for that information. Okay. So, um we can now take a straw
pull. um stable vote our hand on which enabled the administrator to receive necessary direction to either to receive with a contract um with KPN. So if we
can see who would all be agreement if you can raise your hand who would be able to proceed with the KPN structure. Okay. Is there anyone online? Are y'all hands in agreement?
>> Yeah, I am. >> All right. So, all right. All right. So, the other one would be >> Sorry. Can we just confirm whose hands are up? If you could just
>> like Terasia, Mr. Roy, Miss Was it Miss Robinson? Okay. I don't see her hand. Oh, yep. Her hands up. And Miss Johnson, is your hand up? >> No, it's not.
>> Okay. So, there's three online, one no. And we got Mr. Thompson Leader, KPN, Autumn Anderson, KPN, and Miss Hughes, KPN. >> So, six total. >> Yes.
>> For option one. >> Yep. That's for option one for the KPN. And I guess we'll go ahead and still take it for the record for the um contract with the entity to do um determined by the administrative for
the proposal. I guess it's for the public bid and my hands are up. No, I'm kidding. I just got one. >> Okay. We will begin working on that proposal with U Gordian and KPN and uh we will bring something back for the
April agenda. >> All right. Yep. Because it looks like majority. So based on the hands look like based on the hands the administrator should proceed and bring back to the board. >> Madame President, I would suggest that you do do the straw poll for number two
so that we accurately reflect who is paying what. Thank you. >> All right. So again, I think my hands up. Uh Miss Johnson, are you are you in agreement with option two? >> Yes. >> All right. So that's two two of us and
the only for the public uh bid proposal and then there's one does not agree, Mr. Carter for neither nor. >> He's made his own. No, I'm kidding. So I have six total for option one, two total for option two, and one for neither.
>> Correct. >> Thank you. >> All right. So again, thank you for that madame um secretary and also Dr. Saski, just to get that clarification. So based on the show of hands, the administration should proceed with bringing back the option A uh regarding the contract with
KPN. All right. So we will now move to the next item. >> All right. The administration is recommending the approval for the proposal for the Gordian group to remove a wall between the two room at John Harris High School. This area will be
utilized by the plan business CTE course to begin the 2627 school year. This proposal is through the KP and person. Um the total cost is $25,78300.84. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval.
>> Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on a motion? >> Miss Robinson. >> Yes, I maybe I didn't hear anything. I thought the for the CTE um classes they were going to be using
classrooms, not doing construction. There >> we are doing those. Remember he showed you on the map where we're going to be doing those classrooms. So we have to outfit those classroom and make them designed to be more of like the actual space kids going to be working in. And so for this a the the business one we
are designing to be more of a collaborative space where kids could kind of collaborate better in more of a a setting like in most businesses. And so we are trying to design those spaces to mirror what that job would look like in a few years. >> Okay. and that that I understand that
but I what I wasn't aware of of doing construction there. Um a lot of times when we're doing these kind of programs the programs will be set we may do construction or something like that and then the f the program falls through. So
now we're just stuck with now I don't want to say desecrating but um changing a historical building. So, >> what >> I I can jump in there a little bit. Um,
right now there there's just not enough space between those two rooms. And if needed, uh, we could certainly utilize this space once constructed as a classroom in the future. Um, it would then provide enough space for a classroom. Right now, it's it's kind of
a midsize office and a small classroom. uh by taking out the wall, we would utilize and have a full classroom even if we didn't use this for CTE in the future. >> Okay. That was that was my concern because I I thought that when you when you mentioned it before, we were just
going to be using basically unused classrooms, not actually tearing down or building things. Okay. Thank you for the clarification. >> Thank you. Is there any further discussion on the motion? >> So, just to add on to what Miss
Robertson said. So, uh, even in the same sense, we're not voting on that tonight. Correct me if I'm wrong. >> Correct. So, if we're not voting on that tonight, are you able to get show us some type of picture of what that actually looks like? What the room looks like so we can have a visual of what the room look like. >> Absolutely. I could certainly take some pictures and and show you those two rooms.
>> All right. Thank you to appreciate it. And again, too, thank you'all for even bringing the CTE programs to John Harris. Really appreciate it and look forward to seeing the outcome of them. Thank you, Mr. Carter. And um I guess my only I do have a question towards it. Have we considered
using any other building for the space? Even though I understand the CTE, it wants to be John Harris students, but you could still use the students cuz I thought, do we have other spaces? >> Remember the whole goal was we wanted kids to be able to walk out of algebra 1 and walk right into a CTE class. That
was the whole thought and process behind this is how can we bring it right to John Harris and not necessarily try to have kids go other places. We wanted kids to be walk right out of the classroom and to be able to experience all of this. >> Right. Well, I'm I'm thinking about like when I was in high school and that's
probably some years ago, you still get to like move. You get what I'm like understand you want to see it at that building, but if like say if Scitec had space, you know, they can still we're still promoting that building. We're I'm just thinking about the return of like
savings, you know, the source of funding. Not saying that, you know, we wouldn't consider it, but we can host it. We don't is this the only route that we took upon to say, okay, we're going to you want to see it there, but it's still our students and they're high school, so they they should have enough,
you know, understanding to be able to transport. >> Based off the location of John Harris and this area, this area is not being utilized. We could utilize this space more. And again drive again getting kids to be able to see that when when they walk in every day opportunity to be able
to see these CTE classes this could drive and to help us out with attendance and help us out with a lot of different things. >> Right. But did have that been considered or you just went with this? Did you just did you think about any other avenues? >> No, I have not looked at any other location in the district. We don't have
spaces at a lot of like outside tech. We don't have spaces to do all of this kind of stuff. >> Right. But it sounds like we have the funding to possibly So So you're saying we don't currently have no other space currently? >> No, ma'am. >> Okay. >> All right. I guess that answers it. But
didn't we wasn't there a grant or something that was towards the CTE funding >> using that to kind of use the the build out these rooms. >> Oh. To tear the walls down. Yeah. >> Okay. >> That's what I thought. >> Miss Robinson has a question. >> Okay. Miss Robinson.
>> Yes. If we're moving students out of Roland, why can't that space be used for the CTE without doing demolition on John Harris? >> Miss Robinson, if you recall when we did this reconfiguration, we came to the PL
and told the public that Roland was not a school that we want to put students in for various reason. There's a lot of repairs need to be done to u roll in order to do any kind of work like that. So, from a from a cost perspective, it's easier for us to do it in-house at John
Harris. It's a lot cheaper than trying to do it at Mar I mean at Roland or Scott or even at Site. It's a lot easier because we have the space already there. >> But we also have students already at Roland. >> If you're if there's what River Rock is
over there, you have you still have, you know, classrooms over there. But remember, moving forward, moving forward next year, we won't have any of our students there. River Rock is a program. That's a program that they they could up and use another building if they want
to. Right now, they are using that building, but River Rock is a program. They are not, you know, they're not part of the school district. We are uh contracting with them. It's a program. you know, this is this would want to be a different conversation
because you're >> Go ahead. We'll we'll talk about this a different way, but we're looking at demolishing some things. We have this. Why not go ahead and make use
of the space that we have instead of cramming more students into a space that doesn't fit. So that's the reason why we open up the room so we don't have to worry about cramming kids in there. Again, we are upgrading this facility so kids could get the the experience that
they should be seeing every day when they walk walk into one of these classrooms. >> Miss Robinson, I just want to add a couple things. This is Dr. Stokes. One of them is it's just an interior wall that is not historical. It's simply a
wall made of um you know drywall and most likely metal studs. So it's nothing that we're impacting any historic features of that building whatsoever. This could have been designed as a full classroom back in the day when it was actually constructed and we made it we
subdivided it to have an office maybe for a small group instruction or whatnot. Another thing to keep in mind is when we transport students across a district, not only do we have substantial transportation costs, but that's loss of instructional time. So,
if we're doing a program where they might go one, two, three, period English, math, science, and then they have to go across town, no matter what it is, that might be 30 to 45 minutes a day, depending on how often they go back and forth. That's loss of instructional
time. that means they're not able to take credits towards graduation um because they're not going to have all the full periods available. So it from a logistics standpoint, a student experience standpoint, and an academic standpoint, if we can put this program
where the bulk of our high schooler students are, it does provide greater instructional opportunities both in and outside of the CTE programming. So, we're we're looking at the loss of education on a CTE program that we don't
even have yet. That's my you're you're talking about transporting students on something we don't have yet. Now, if we were to actually establish the program itself, like right now, we have the consultants
that are going to do um to try to build the CTE program. We don't have that yet, but right now we're looking at demolition for a program that we don't have yet. Mr. Robertson, I I one of the thing I
will share with you is that this is why we are going to have these classes. That's one of the thing that the consultant is going to up and get us up and running that we can put submit for at least to have the elective so we can start building out this program at John Harris. >> Okay. We don't have the program yet. The
board hasn't approved the program yet. The consultant hasn't started anything with this program, but we're now we're looking at putting aside money to do to do demolition on John Harris for a program we don't have yet and a program
that we that the board has never seen. >> That's that's what that's what I'm I'm I'm hearing right now. >> So, M. Robertson, if you recall, I presented this plan to everyone in the spring of last year. and we're having this discussion right now and you presented it the spring of
last year and we still don't have a program in front of us to approve for this demolition to to begin to create the classroom. >> That's what I that's all I'm saying. We're we're >> we're putting the cart before the horse
and right now we got the tail wagging the dog. We we're looking at doing demolition on something we don't have. So now if we're looking at doing this demolition now, when would this start? So we we would be looking to tear up a
classroom or so of John Harris for a program that may start 2627, but we don't even have a blueprint of a program. >> If if I may add, we we actually do have a blueprint. We've already met with the
gentleman um and we've been working on it and um as Dr. Dr. Henry had said earlier about CTE light. So, this has always been in the works. Um, starting off small with our um entrepreneurship uh class. So, it may only be one class, but it's in the works. So, we could even
do that as an elective. Say that it doesn't get approved. We would probably still be able to start off by offering another elective. >> You do? I swear to God, I speak four languages and English is my primary one.
We don't have the program that would necessitate the demolition. So, we're doing the demolition before the board has approved a program. You know what? I'll let somebody someone else speak because >> I'm not maybe I'm not um explaining
myself. What well what I would say Miss Robinson speak >> ba b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b b based on the conversation with the board, this is might be something that we'll pull and bring back to the board at a later time. >> So even in regards even if you pull it, it's just more so of I know this talk
happened last spring. We're almost into a whole another year. It's it's been pushed up almost a year. So even if you can just bring it back and just when you do bring it back just give us a little more detailed information opposed to how many students could we be servicing to even see how much space that we might inquire you know even from that
standpoint even also um just so we can see cost effective to see how cost effective it can be also um what's something else that I was going to say um also with um John Harris with the vacancies that we have correct me if I'm
wrong are we utilizing every classroom in that building. So, if we're not utilizing every classroom in that building, is there any possibility that we can use one of those classrooms for these programs? Pretty much. >> But if we still going to if we use one of those empty classroom, we still have
to go in there and outfit the classroom for the program. That's the whole per purpose behind it. If we build the program, we put the cyber security, we're going to have to outfit that classroom for cyber security, for the network drop, for the the business. Again, we have SBI already established
there. So, we already have business classes set up. We're trying to set up a classroom to be more collaborative. So, when kids go in there, they could feel like how they feel working in Google or any of our Fortune 500 company. So, we're trying to design so kids can have the experience and opportunity to have the same experience when they go out in
the workforce. >> Okay. So, if you doing a clear Okay. So if you um targeting cyber security and those different things just when you come back and be more detailed just give us some type of outlook of how many students will we be servicing and how much space will they actually need to service those students so those programs can be effective. Okay.
>> And if I could just say one more thing about that outfitting part of the approval process is approving the space like the space has to be conducive to a CTE program. So I know it sounds like we're putting the carpet before the horse but it's not. the state will not
approve us if it's not a good space for the CTE building. >> They have to also come and view the space and approve the space and make sure and we have to have two different uh groups that we work with. We have to have advisory group, a local advisory group and then we also have to have a CT advisory group and they have to provide
us feedback on everything we're doing. >> Okay, keep going. So, when we're looking at doing this this construction and everyone else comes in there and approves the space, approves all of the equipment that needs to go in there and
then the program itself is is presented to the board and it does not match with what we believe it should be and it doesn't get approved. Then what? >> Could I jump in with a comment to Yeah. To piggy back off what Miss Robinson has
stated, I I think what we're finding here is something that the board has brought up, at least since I've been on the board, which is we require a little bit more information. We don't like surprises to be put on the agenda. Um I think what you just walked through, Miss Fox and Dr. Henry, about why uh or
Kelly, sorry. Um about why we need to have the space approved now and and retrofitted now. That's the type of information that we need when these things are presented to us. Um, I find that we're often having to dig for information or ask additional questions and it feels like some things kind of
catch us off guard. I think I recall back in the January meeting or the February meeting, I had actually requested for a report and an update for the CTE program. Um, so I think again you guys are doing an amazing job. Great work. We're trying to move these things forward, but I do find that sometimes
the board gets surprises on the agenda and I think that we manage it and handle it as best we can. Let's not forget we're fully volunteers with with being on the board. So, I think it's just a communication breakdown of if you just communicate to us what the steps are, I
think it it helps us digest it a little bit better. So, thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Anderson. So, I'm hearing that we at this time we don't have enough consensus to move this forward. So, um we're not going to move this forward until we get some
additional um feedback from our administrative team. Um if everybody if the board's all in agreement with that >> Mr. and just uh Miss Kelly and Dr. Henry, I appreciate all your hard work
and efforts. Uh we I'm looking forward to actually see this being brought to fruition because previously before Dr. Henry came here, we were under the impression that we would have these CTE programs with our middle school students and that's why I kept bringing it up because I know we that was brought up at one point in time in the conversation.
So to actually see you guys bringing something to fruition, we look forward to it. I'm actually excited to see it. You know what I mean? So if we can just get that clarity moving forward, I really appreciate it. And like I said, I appreciate your hard work and dedication. A lot of things that you talked about, Miss Kelly and Dr. can hear me. A lot of things that you guys
talked about is actually coming to for your name. I appreciate the both of you guys. Thank you. >> Thank you. And I'll just add like total in agreement, but I believe we can take a little deeper dive because we do, you know, you just said a difference between a school and a program. So, River Rock
is a program at a school. So, we're doing a program and then another program in a school is there's there's there's not saying we're having another school. But I could understand when we talk about the classroom setting to be able to see it that's totally different. And then we have what we have a partnership
with community evolve right already trades already doing you know some of that work. So how deeper dive have we really went into the weeds of looking at it? But again great feedback and I just will hope we can get a little bit more
so we can be all on one accord. So thank you again and u with that we will move to the next item. Dr. Henry, >> I do apologize. So, are we >> No, we're not. >> So, we're not moving this forward. >> 7.3 >> 7.3.
>> Okay. Got it. Thank you. >> Thank you, Madam Secretary. So, um, next item, Dr. Henry. >> The administration has recommended approval of the proposal from the Guardian Group to clean and purge the wall by the front step of John Harris High School. The proposal is through the
KPM purse interpretive. Um, total cost $16,576.78. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on this motion? Miss Robinson,
>> just a quick question. I don't What is pging? I understand cleaning. What is paring to pards? >> Sure. Purging is the application of a a thin coat of masonry or concrete uh to
to a wall. And essentially that's that's what's required uh in the front of John Harris as as the steps as you're walking up. >> So it's more like like a ceiling. >> It's it's a a thin coat of mortar
essentially and it's to apply a thin coat of mortar to the walls. >> Oh, okay. That was my only question. Didn't know what that meant. Thank you. >> Yep. >> Thank you, Miss Robinson and docu Mr. Rei. So, hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to
our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh, Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration is recommending approval of a proposal from the Gordian group to clean out the old science tab tables from room 208 in Ben Franklin Elementary building. These table have
not been used for many years and their removal will better provide a better learning environment. The proposal is through the KPM purchase incorporative. Total cost is $12,26059. This item will appear on the March 24th 26 board of agenda for approval.
>> Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> Miss Robinson? >> Yes. Just we just quick question for for that price. What special things need to be done to the science tables? It's not something that our uh like facilities or
operations people can can handle. >> Uh no, it it would require everything from capping the gas lines to installing new flooring uh to you know the removal of the the debris. And it's it's not something that
can fit into the bandwidth of our people at this time. Okay. So that that was my question just why it needed to be done. But so that classroom is is just going to be just made into a regular classroom. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> It's it's just not conducive for
learning at a K5 environment. Um those tables are are just old and not necessary for that environment. >> And that's the only room that needs to be done at Ben Franklin or is this just the start of maybe clearing out other things? I don't really I don't I don't
want to completely wipe out science at Ben Franklin, but um are there other classrooms in the works to have the same thing done to them? >> These are old science table, correct? Like for more of like secondary, like middle school or high school, not for elementary kids.
>> Exactly. And there's no other rooms that I'm aware of at this point that we need to do this in. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. >> Yep. Thank you, Miss Robinson. Um, now that you guys provided the public bid, I I would be interested. Is there a reason why we didn't go uh for with just the
KPN purchasing because it's under like 12,000 to do any type of public bid >> for this? >> Well, we wouldn't we wouldn't do a public bid. Um, this is actually at regular wages, so it's not at prevailing wages. >> Okay. >> Um, and we felt it to be a very fair
price. uh we know um contractor that's going to come in and do it and they're they're going to do a nice job and make sure it's done right. >> Okay. Thank you for that because I just wanted to get some clarification. Mr. Carter, >> just to um just to be on the safe side, uh are we sure this is what we want to
do? Because I know with the reconfiguration at one point some schools are elementary schools and then possibly three to four years later then it's a middle school and then it's uh you know just just you know what I mean? It's just a thing constantly. >> We need that space. Okay.
>> Thank you, Mr. Carter. So, hearing no further discussion, we'll move that forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh, Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration recommended approval of a proposal from the Gordian Group to improve several area at Mail Roads
Playground area. The proposal is through the K3 person. Um, total cost is $348,122. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any
discussion on the motion? >> So, I'll just provide some additional background on on this, and this is what we've discussed a little bit last month. Uh, so this project would sad a large area in the back. It will also redo all of the asphalt on the basketball court.
It will clean out the brush back to the property line. It will most importantly install new water lines to control the continual flooding that's occurring in the back and install new 8 foot high fence along the entire rear of the
property line. So, it really will do a very large job in terms of cleaning up the entire back of the Melrose Elementary School. Thank you. And thanks for that because we actually did do a walk through and seeing the the lots of
work needs to be done um that I was able to identify. I'm not sure Miss Hughes, it was a pretty pretty >> need some love back there. >> Yeah. >> We're going to make it great for the kids. >> Yes. And um looks like Miss Robinson.
>> Not a question, but I just want to say thank you to Miss Reed, Mr. reading because you you actually anticipated my question. So, thank you. >> Awesome. >> No problem. >> All right. >> Thank you. Okay. So, um hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll
move that forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for a consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommended approval of the agreement with the in interrate one for the HP switch equipment to ensure there is adequate broadband and
internet coverage throughout the district building. The total cost is 160,56700.50. The district will apply for e-ate funding of $136,483. 85% of the eligibility cost eligible
cost and the net cost to the district is an estimate $24,85 at a 15% matching portion. The item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Herring. Is there any
discussion on the motion? >> Miss Robinson, is your hand up? >> Yes. Just a quick question for Mr. Rei. the um the um power I got to see PowerPoint the the information that I sent you before that I got from um PSBA
will that have well for the board I sent Mr. um information from PSBA as I sent it in the webinar about um possibly expanding like um our Wi-Fi connections and possibly bringing some money into
the district. So, I wasn't sure if that was something that could help us with this rate or is it something that we um I mean I I know we can't do anything about it right now, but do you think in the future the Wi-Fi
connections that um that were in the proposal, the one that the thing that I sent you, do you think that would be able to benefit the district with this net cost being 24,000.
Um, I think what I sent you would actually bring money into the district. I'm not just just not sure how these two connect, but I know they do. So, I'm not sure if Adam needs to um to do this, but
I know we're talking about the e- rate and our funding and our cost, but I think what I sent you could possibly help the district bring in some more money. So, I wasn't sure if that is something that we could do to lessen this cost.
>> We we can certainly take a look at that. We h we have looked at that presentation. Uh Mr. Nornhold and I have looked at that. What that involves is really the installation of cell towers and other type of towers on school district property. And unfortunately, we're really just not one of those
districts that has a lot of extra property uh in which one of those towers could could go. We could certainly take a look at that. Um but in the meantime, in terms of what we get from -ate and these new network switches, it's it's recommended that we just simply move
forward with this at this point. And you know certainly look look at that those proposals and look at those cell towers. >> Uh I was actually involved in the construction of a cell tower in the past. Uh and you can get revenue from it. Uh it's not a lot of revenue. Uh but there is a revenue potential if you have
a lot of extra land that you're just willing to give up. >> Okay. >> Yeah. I saw some of the the designs for them. Some of them were not really big and some could be actually put on top of things. But um it was just a a wild idea when I saw that. I just figured that
would be something that the district could do. >> Sure. We appreciate we appreciate that information and I think it's something we we can continue to look at and evaluate. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. So hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it
forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. The administration recommend approval of agreement with Comcast Cable Communication Management LLC for one-year extension to our Y area
network Ethernet U service agreement. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. R. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. Hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move this forward
to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration would recommend approval of a three-year agreement with the CI solution for additional 12 RFID cap uh capability card reader related
software support in initial order of 10,000 RFID cards. Total cost $33,35 $1,195 annual per system year 2 and three. This item will appear on the March 24th 26
board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> Just a little bit of quick background on this. So this agreement will provide us the ability to have a uniform student ID badging across all stu student district
or all district buildings. We're currently pilotating that right now for Ben Franklin and we hope to have those results back prior to uh the next meeting. Uh so we we are testing those IDs at this point and we will get back
to you in terms of the success of >> um I just want to comment to you. Thank you for that feedback and thank you Dr. Henry cuz I think we spoke about that a little while back just you know the students having the ID especially you know with transporting or being out. So
I'm glad to see that on the agenda this evening and I think Miss Robinson did you have anything >> I just lower my because every time I'm about to ask question already answered it >> so beautiful. >> So we're gonna let Mr. Rey jump. No, I'm
kidding. Okay. So hearing no further discussion on that. We'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the task use of facility request. These item will appear on the
March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> Does anybody have Miss Robinson? >> Hi. Again, there there's no discussion on these mo on the motion, but some of the the links, they actually go to blank
pages. So, it's actually not the um use of facility request. A few that I like the blossom by being graduation and senator Kim far, those aren't the actual well, what I clicked on didn't come up. It just came up as
our use of facilities um paperwork. You you have to scroll all the way down to the bottom, right? >> It's there. >> That wasn't the Okay, we'll look at And what about the Senator Kim's one
>> all the way to the bottom? >> Yeah. When I When did that go? Okay. >> I'm looking, >> right? And when I clicked on it, I went to the bottom. Maybe it just hadn't loaded yet because it when what I looked up was blank. So, I just wanted to make
sure that that was um actually on there, but thank you. >> Thank you. Um so, hearing no further discussion on the motion, um Mr. Carter, did >> a quick uh just not a um a question, but more so of a comment, and I'm not sure if you guys are aware of it, but like
with the Harrisburg Cougar uh football uh teams and stuff like that, how is that being um um how is that information being uh transported to our students to get involved or to our families? Is it like through announcement through loudspeaker or is this like letters that go out to parents to see if their kids want to get
engaged in it? How does that work? Well, I'm not sure if you guys would know. >> I think many of the outside organizations like that they do the recruiting themselves. It's not something that comes through the district. >> Thank you, Mr. Carter. So, hearing no further discussion, we'll move these
items forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh we are now ready to move to the office of business services. >> Okay. We have a discussion item. The administration will provide information um for the board regarding the district prior participation in the local
economic revelation tax assistant program. Um Dr. Stokes will be walking us through that information. I know she also provided some information to you all. >> Yes, you all should have a handout in front of you. And before we even start the conversation, I just want to um talk
about the program. Um, common language that we've been using is LERA. Um, and LERA is part of a comprehensive tax abatement program that was approved by the city ordinance. So, I keep referring
to it as LERA plus because there's more than just the traditional LERA. So, if we use that term LERA, that's fine. I just want to make sure we're all on the same page with understanding that definition. So if we look at where we are today, we
are at a period we were are not participating in any tax abatement/erta program today. That is because the program expired on December 31st, 2025 after it had already been extended by
one year. Um, we do know that we have requested some changes be made to the ordinance and based on things that have happened in those in the city and the time of year that those requests were made, they were never really responded and that currently that position is not
filled within the city. It's vacant. It's currently being um recruited for. So, some of the changes that we requested, we have no idea how other parties feel about that. And by other parties, I mean both the county and the city because it's really a threepronged
approach. So, uh, where we are today is obviously not participating, but based on some of the feedback that we've heard through some of the board members, a conversation really is important to say, do we want to reconsider that position
and and go into a one-year extension? Now, remember, anything we approve in a one-year extension, you're approving for 10 years. or do we want to have this be the negotiation year where we continue to work with the city LERA administrator, work with the county,
work with the city to develop a full comprehensive program more of what the school district might want to see that would then take place at the you know in January 1st 2027 and be able to um fulfill the needs of
the district through that process. So there are some pros and cons to LERA and I think the biggest thing is no one can say definitely that the LERA program is positive or negative for the district because there is not necessarily the
measurable thing to say without the tax abatement would you have still developed and I think one of the things that's even more unique with our situation is that so much of what we have approved in the past is not traditional la it under
the other program that's that we capsulize as LERA when we talk about that. So you don't have the job creation and it's mainly based on residential properties. So of the 73 properties we currently have on the program 55 of them
are residential. So the majority of them are residential. In addition 61 of those 73 properties were approved with 100% exemption for 10 years. So it's not even following the gradual 90 80 70 60 model
that is traditional LERA. So it is a big decision for the board to make especially when you consider our position in our amended recovery plan along with our declining assessed values that are taxable is how what position do
you want to have? Do you want to say I really would prefer to use 2026 to negotiate something that might be better for the school district's uh position knowing the fact that whatever we accept
today is going to impact us 10 years at least into the future or do you want to consider rejoining for the one year um and using the current program that includes all the residential properties and includes the 10 years of fully
exemption. Um, so these are kind of things that you know there is no concrete evidence to say this program through this abatement has resulted in X. I'm not going to be able to make that correlation for you. And some of the
feedback from the solicitor does point out that, you know, districts that are heavily reliant on state aid because they are more high poverty, they serve um more underserved uh populations, they might be disproportionately hurt by
programs such as LERA and other tax abatement programs. So that's kind of a background of where we are and kind of hopefully to lead our discussion this evening. So, thank you um Dr. Stokes for that. So, again, the district solicitor
provided us a letter to the city of Harrisburg to inform the city that the district does not wish to extend the letter program for an additional year. So, since then, the board members have been contacted by the local developers asking if the district would reconsider
its position. um we have asked the administrative to provide the information which that was just provided on how the learner program impacts the district during the last year of 2025. So again this is uh strictly at this time is discussion.
Um, Miss Hughes, >> um, I don't I don't think this was mentioned, but I think one thing, um, that impacted, uh, me is reading that at our current millage rate, 273,76 and annual taxes are not collected due
to exempt status. That equates to approximately 2.7 million in taxes not collected over the 10-year exemption period. Um kind kind of what was mentioned um if we do uh continue with Lerta
um I'm sorry I'm so tired right um that um we're locked in for 10 years basically when we make the decision. Yes. So I just that that was very impressive with um with me. >> Thank you. Um Miss Anderson. >> Uh thank you President Copeland. I have a question for Dr. Stokes. Um but also
wanted to update the statement from the chair for the record. But I think since we did since we since the solicitor provided the letter and it was not we did not extend it I think some board members were contacted as well as the receiver and I don't know if the superintendent
the administration so I just wanted to correct that for public record. Um Dr. Stokes question for you. Um what would the negotiation look like? >> So so currently like I stated that there's three parties. There's the city, the
county, and the school district. We could do nothing and they could move forward without us in which any entity that would get approved would be looking at city tax abatement and county tax abatement. However, most people's largest taxes are school districts. So,
we have a lot of I'm going to say negotiating power um in doing that. What it will do is you're going to have probably if you appoint me to do that, Dr. Henry to do that and the solicitor to be working with the city solicitor, the city lura administrator, the county
commissioners to develop a program in which all parties can agree to just a go ahead. Just a follow-up question. What um what's the difference in how much we lose out on taxes versus the
city and the county? So, we all have the same amount of assessed value that is abated. You just have to take that and calculate it by the millage rate of the county and the millage rate of the city. I don't have that off the top of my head to be able to do, but ours is
substantially more. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Anderson. And um my only uh question to it is because we were presented this information and the last um we heard from it that negotiation ended December
uh 31st of 2025 and we're now on March of 2026. So what does agreement like what what what does that agreement look like if we would jump into it now? >> We wouldn't. So, if you said, "I want to
reconsider the one-year extension." That means that we're not negotiating anything new. You're sticking with what's already been approved 10 year or 11 years ago that's already been extended once, extended twice, but just know anything that would
be approved during calendar year 2026 is going to impacting this district for 10 years into the future. So right now we we're not a party at the table. If someone wants to come and present for a tax exemption, they could get approval
from the county. They could get approval from the city, but they won't receive our approval for abatement of school taxes. If we said, "Yep, we want to join," then we are subject to the terms and conditions that are already part of the city ordinance. If not, we remain at
in the position that we currently have and we look to negotiate for that successor agreement, that successor city ordinance that would be effective January 1st of 2027. >> Okay. Yeah, that was going to be my next cuz I was going to say then we would have to retro back and accept that. And
I think we sent out information to their team requesting information so we could at that point make a decision as a board if we wanted to move forward and we did not get that information timely and now it's coming back. So that's why I wanted to be clear that we had and we weren't
going to move forward at that time. But now we come into an agreement and just accepting it versus us saying, "Hey, um, we may want to step back and maybe 2027 come up with our own negotiation." We got that time to say, "Hey, we want to
sit at the table." So, I just wanted to >> Yeah, that's kind of some of the direction that we're hoping come out of this discussion this evening is if the board would like us to actively be continuing to push as we did last November and December for changes that we want to see to the program, then we'd
be working with our solicitor to be engaging with the city solicitor to get that process going. >> Okay. Thank you. So, I guess that would be uh Miss Robinson. Yes, just to um just so I understand now
just to be above board, I voted no on Lura 10 years ago, 11 years ago. Um so if we're not going to be a part of this right now, if okay, let me just say
this. If we're if we're going to go ahead and go with the extension for a year, how does that really put us in the position to negotiate? If if we're going to go ahead with this for another year, it still locks us in for 10 years. So,
how does that put us in a position to really benefit? Miss Robinson, you are correct. I'm trying not to lead the board in their decision. Um, if you'd like my recommendation, I'm happy to give that to you. But um yes, you you are
following. >> Okay. >> Well, I'm not in agreement with it at this at this time. So, that's me. I'm not sure what Miss Robinson is because we've already provided the information timely and we voted on even the um appointing alert uh um appointee at that
time and we didn't we got back that information. So this is a little new I would say to myself to be able to say hey I want to see what the negotiation look like instead of us saying hey right now we can pause 2027's coming up then
we have everything in order the process and what that looks like as a board then that's my only take I guess be the majority >> to it if we agree to the extension that still locks us in >> no we're not we're not agreeing this is just a discussion so that's why I said
I'm not agreeing to it. >> That's what I'm I'm kind of going pros I'm kind of going like pros and cons. Devil's advocate. If we do that, >> then we would be locked in to what we have now for 10 years. >> Correct. You're correct.
>> So my question was, if we then lock ourselves in and go with this extension for a year and lock ourselves in for 10 years, how does that put us in a strong negotiating position? It it really it doesn't. So,
and just personally, I never thought that Lera benefited the district and this was you while you guys weren't here. This was something that was really pushed through with the mayor at the time and it was at the time even then it wasn't a benefit to the district. It
really pretty much brought construction into the city which then benefited the city but didn't benefit the the district at all. So if we're not in the agreement with Lerta right now,
if we're going to go ahead and lock us lock ourselves in for another 10 years, we're still not getting a benefit from Lerta and we don't really have a strong negotiating position because we've locked ourselves in for 10 more years.
So we won't have any say for another 10 years. We can have someone sit on on the lur board. That doesn't really do anything for us because whatever we agree to within the four corners of that agreement, that's what we have to that's
what we agree to. There's no nothing that says, hey, this is this if we do this, the school district benefits. >> Yep. So, thank you, Miss Robinson. I think u Miss Anderson has some discussion on it. >> Uh yes. So if I'm understanding
correctly, basically the lerta subsidizes development in the city. So the question is like for the school district. So it makes sense as M. Robinson was saying for the city and the county, right? Um to promote economic development. It's an economic
development tool. The question is the school district is essentially subsidizing development. Are we see seeing a return on that investment? Right? So if we're if we're providing a tax abatement that is an investment in this development, will we receive
>> a return on investment from that 10 10 years 11 years? Does that mean that we'll it'll bring more people to the city and that means that we now have more residents and now we have more taxes coming in >> for way and we don't know. It sounds like >> well we don't necessarily know but let's
just logically look at where the traditional lura yeah it's supposed to be job creation right so then you're going to get earned income tax you're going to have other tax revenues from creating jobs within your area but with us the majority has been used for
residential. So what does that mean? We're going to get more apartments with more students to educate with no tax dollars to follow those students that are living in those newly developed,
you know, apartment complexes. So, >> assuming that there's not senior citizen development, but yes. >> Yes. So, but basically, yes, residential typically means more people, more children, but no tax dollars that follow
those. >> The lerta that's not that's the true lerta is supposed to really generate not only economic development, but job creation. And therefore, you do have, okay, if you're creating jobs within the district, I'm going to have earned
income tax. I'm going to have business privilege tax. I'm going to have all the other things that would be coming besides real estate and I won't have the students necessarily that I'm educating without the tax dollars following them. So I guess just as a followup question, do we feel I know Dr. Stokes, you've
talked about how we've had a decrease in value in the district, right? Um which we've also seen a lot of businesses close in Harrisburg. We've seen maybe an uptick in some bladed buildings downtown. So to me, I mean this is not
fact, but to me those are indicators of not good economic development that's happening in the city. So I mean that would be concerning from a school district perspective of there not being more investment. Um so I guess again the
question is will LERA help ignite or spark some investment for the future or will it not? And we're essentially investing money into that. So that's all. Thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Anderson.
>> Oh, Miss Robinson. >> Yes. I just wanted to wrap this up with um when this started, like Dr. Stokes said, this was um for economic development. Now, we've had some development in the last 10 years.
Mainly, it was downtown or um Midtown really. And if you're looking at building residential places, things like that, and most of them were not um I don't want to say low income, but um um
affordable housing for a lot of people. And a lot of businesses that were built up then, they take advantage of the lura of not paying the of being locked in for 10 years without paying those taxes and things like that. Um,
when you get to a to right now, a lot of those businesses that were started back then are not here now because they come in, they build, they they take the money out of the city and then they leave before that 10 years is up. So, they're
not they're not paying anything. So, now we're left, like you said, with blighted buildings, businesses that are closing. And again, this has not been, in my opinion, a benefit to the Harrisburg School District. >> Thank you, Miss Robinson.
So, uh, based on the information, the board, I don't think at this time the board wishes to take any further action. I guess we can do another straw poll. So if anyone is um who wishes to move forward, if you want to raise your hand
moving forward with a negotiation for the learner program for the 2026 for us to for them to negotiate. Sure. You want to raise your hands? All right. >> Yeah. So the the one thing would be does
anybody want to resend the decision that was made and participate in a one-year extension? And then the other option would be we could say no for 2026 but yes I'm directing the administration and
the solicitor to ne negotiate or option three would be we do nothing. >> So can you repeat option one so we can talk? Option one would be to resend the decision to not participate in the one air extension and basically say yes,
we're going to participate in 2026. >> Madame President, does just to be clear, it is my understanding that there was never formal action taken because the Florida expired. So there was nothing required of the board to take formal action. So when you say rescending, we're rescending in theory but not
formal action. Correct. Thank you, Dr. Saski. So, does anyone want to us for us to do a one-year extension for 2026? >> Well, participate this year in the program.
>> That's a strong vote. So, is if you want to participate in the program, >> raise your hand. Yes. >> There's no hands up. >> If you no one want to participate in this year, hands up. So, we we want to maintain where we at.
If you want to maintain, hands fingers up. We trying to make sure we got a majority maintain our current status that we're we'll negotiate with them, but we're not participating this year. >> So, no, that's that's that's something. So, option two would be do you want to
direct the administration and solicitor to negotiate for future agreements starting in 2027 and beyond? >> No, cuz that's locking us into it for 2026, right? adoption two or adoption three. >> We've already said we're doing nothing
for calendar year 2026. >> But do you want us to consider and continue to try to negotiate something for future years? That would be option two. >> In person, >> Mr. Cliff, are you agreeing to option
two or I don't know where we're at, but >> yeah. >> All right. So, it looks like Miss Who else is Miss Robinson? >> Yes. I'm agreeing to the do nothing this year, negotiate for next year. >> Got it.
>> All right. Then the third option is to do nothing. We are not participating today and we will not be participating in the negotiation process for a successor agreement. I see three in person. Anything online?
>> No one online. Okay. So what I have is for option one zero. Option two there was two online and two in person. Option three. Three in person. Thank you. Mr. Roy is
>> option two. >> Option two. Now there's five options. >> Miss Johnson has option one. >> I think there's now five. >> So it sounds like you have a majority for negotiating for the future. Correct.
Five. >> Thank you. Go ahead. >> Y just instructing us to convert that. >> Well, I I was agreeing. So, let me take that back then because I was I thought we were going to be moving and the motion. So, I would like to negotiate as
long as we're not doing up now because it's discussion. I >> can we just start all over? I'm sorry cuz there were people online that changed too. So, can we just start again? Option one. >> So, option one. >> Yes. Johnson.
>> So there's one option two. >> Mr. Roy. >> Okay. So >> five total. >> Five total. >> Six.
>> Six. >> Daniel and Mr. Garcia. Yep. >> Six. >> Six total. Yes. >> Option three. two total
>> correct >> we're just giving direction to the administration. >> Okay. So we have option one one option two six option three two majority >> madam president this is not a
>> madam president this was a straw poll vote this is just seeking direction for the board from the board for the administration so what we heard heard was that the majority are interested in pursuing conversations with our solicitor about negotiations for a
future possible lura. >> Okay. >> That benefits the district >> and any of that would be brought back to you in a future time >> and that wouldn't y agree with all this. >> Thank you. I just want to get clarification cuz when you say that it's still it still is not registering for
me. I'm just going to be honest and transparent because when you talk about 2026, we're already in 2026. So if you want to go back and negotiate, you can't do it. That's what I'm saying. So it's not even it's not even a straw pull cuz it's not even valid >> for the future,
>> right? But that would be future will be 2027. We're still in 2026. But if you negotiate in next couple months, we still go back to the agreement of 2026. >> Well, that's Madam President, can I make a clarifying statement that I did not hear made didn't hear made previously,
but I just want to be clear. the developer who has reached out to certain board members and to the former receiver, not current receiver, um was requesting the one-year extension which had been extended for the calendar year
2025 when I was the receiver and that was in discussion with the solicitor because the district had been part of the LERTA for that 10-year period. And so they were just asking for a one-year extension as they kind of, you know, got things together. So that was approved in
December of 2025. Now moving forward, we knew that it expired. So the question then was, did you want to extend it for another year? But the thing that I heard that was inaccurate was extending it for 2026 does not lock
you into 10 more years. I was told by the individual that contacted me and I don't know about those on the board who were contacted that if you agreed to extend one more year in essence it's only going to be for you know 9 and 1/2 months because we're almost you know a
quarter of the way through through this year. So there was no promise that there was nothing that said you were going to be locking yourself into 10 years. So I just want to be clear on that. Now, everyone is saying we only have one person, Miss Johnson, who said she
wanted to extend for a year. So, it's a moot point right now based on the straw poll vote. >> Yeah, I think the concern was if you approve something in 2026, it is impacting you for 10 years out. >> Correct. That part is correct. That part is correct. But I I think the way it was
phrased before by a few people was that it was locking you in. And is that if that's what they meant was locking you into the 10 years for whatever decisions are made in 2026, that part is accurate. Correct. But I thought the reference was to another new agreement. And that's
what's not locking you into because the new agreement has not yet been developed. >> See, and that's that's what I'm understanding cuz I was thinking if we cuz if we're going to extend it, Yes. Why wouldn't we? If we're not going to be locked in to another 10 years of it,
then this is just them finishing it out for this year. It's still not going to hurt us. It to say it's not going to hurt you, I think, is a inaccurate statement because if you have six properties that get approved in calendar year 2026,
those six properties will be exempt for 10 years. >> Correct. LERA once they get the exemption it's good for 10 years. So there's two 10 years going on. One of them was the ordinance when it was first developed was good for 10 years. >> Okay?
>> But any property that would be approved under that gets exempt for 10 years. So think about it when when this was approved back in 2015 those properties are exempt through 20 you know 26. They go back on the tax
roll. If I was approved in December of 2025, right before this expired, I still have 10 years of exemption, even though the we're not participating anymore. The fact that they were approved while we were participating
makes them have 10 years of exemption far beyond. So, that's the risk that you take with a one-year extension is is not that the agreement itself, the ordinance is going to be there for 10 years. It means that everything approved in
calendar year 2026, you're not going to see back on your tax roll till at least 2037. >> Okay. >> What? >> I I still I still would like to see the numbers, but well, I guess I'll do my own research.
>> All right. Says a lot of stuff on the board tonight. Oh my god. >> All right. So moving on to Dr. Henry. Next item, please. >> The administration recommended acception of the following 2025 2026 grant award and amount listed below. The 2025 20226
Metroid Heist J product grant is $11,770.13. The 25 2020 20 26 PCCD safety and security grant is $249,346 and school to work grant is $250,000. These item this item will appear on the
March 24th, 2026 board with Jennifer for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on the motion? Miss Robinson, >> just a quick question on the PCCD safety and security grant. Now, with that just
being for one year, what there's there's no link to that grant in our system right now. What does that cover? Is that just our is that security for buildings? Is it security for people? Is it what what does that cover for that amount?
>> Yes. So, Miss Robinson, in the administrative content section, it says that the grant was written for the installation of electronic locks at Hamilton. So, that is what the grant was written for. Um, this grant was part of
the governor's budget proposal. So, it was incorporated into our budget through the amendment process. Um, but we still need to go through the formal application process um before we can actually expense the funds. >> Okay. I didn't I'm sorry. Where did you
say that was? >> If you're logged into Board Docs, meaning you've put your user ID and password in, you're not just looking at the public view, right? >> There's an administrative content section, and in there it tells you exactly what the grants are all going to
be used for. >> Okay, thank you. I was looking for a link. I'm I'm so used to clicking links. I'm sorry. Thank you. Thank you. Hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move that forward to and also just um I'm glad to see some
updates on there for some grants going into the 2026. So again, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommended approval of the treasury report for the period ending January
31st, 2026 in amount of 57,64,2165. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. Henry. Is there any discussion on the motion? Okay. Hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to the
March 24, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Um, Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended recognition of the Harrisburg High School Scitec PTA in accordance with the policy 9:15. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board with agenda
for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? And my only uh question please. So this is policy 915. Has this been vetted through our solicitor? >> That's our >> Yes. >> So it's already >> Yes.
>> Yeah. There's no change for the board policy. This is just in reference to it. >> Okay. Thank you. So hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry. Next item. >> The administration has recommended
approval of the following respiratory bids. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of approval for agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motions? So hearing no further discussion on the motion items, we'll move them forward to
our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration recommended approval of the 2627 general operation budget of the capital area intermediate unit. The total general operating budget for the 2627 is
$8,698,81 represent an increase of $320,250 or $3.82%. The total school district contribution is $92,460. Um this the estimate of the 2627 contribution of the Harrisburg School
District is 37,219003. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> All right. So hearing none. So with the increase, we're not so our contribution
will be staying the same. that 26. Okay. So, it's still it's just an increase for the capital area for their is that for their um >> it's their general operating budget which is one of their smallest budgets
that they develop. >> Okay. But it stay Okay. Thank you. So, hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move this forward to our March 24th, 2026 consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration recommend ratification of the following church region for the
February 2026. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion items? All right. Hearing no further discussion on the motion items, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting
for the consent agenda for approval. Uh Dr. Henry, next item. The administration recommend approval of the revocation of the following payroll total for February 2026. These items will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on
the motion items? Right. Hearing no further discussion on the motion items, we'll move this forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the following fundraiser for the 2526 school year. This the design
ite will appear on the March 24th uh 2026 board agenda for approval. >> Thank you Dr. H. Is there any discussion on the motion items? >> All right. Hearing no further discussion on the motion items listed, we'll move them forward to our March 24th, 2026
meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommended approval of the 2526 budget transfer for March 26 in the amount of 6,859,1 and 61 and 13 cents. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board
agenda for approval. >> Thank you, Dr. R. Is there any discussion on the motion item? All right, hearing no further discussion on the motion item, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh we're now ready to move to the office of
superintendent for new business. Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration recommend approval of the castle agreement to the original contract date of July 1st, 2023. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on
the motion item? All right. hearing no further discussion, but I will just add to show that I do appreciate the up there was well additional five students added um at no cost. So that's good to see there's an increase um in that um
program per se. So hearing no further discussion on the motion item, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. The administration has recommended approval of the Harrisburg School District K12 guidance plan as
attached. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board of J for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? Mr. Carter? >> Um I know um
for uh I'm sorry for this item right here. Is it possible for the board to make any recommendations to uh to well to make any recommendations? For example, um are we able to uh try to see if our counselors or whatever the case may be could make sure that every student every
senior student at least applied to hack even if they don't decide to uh further the education with college? I mean I mean I mean is there any recommendations that we can add to this or no? >> I think we could make that a best practice to try to work with our counselor about working with our student
to apply. Um we can't just put it in our plan and say all >> or just like to critique it a bit. I mean or I mean are we able to give any type of recommendation? >> Yeah, you can give feedback. >> Okay. Okay. >> Well, that's not a mesh. Yes. >> Thank you. >> And remember this was the presentation that Dr. Nohol shared last week
>> question that I had for but I didn't I didn't ask >> well that that was the time to ask those questions so we could have brought back those recommendation at that time. >> So at that time I did ask her questions but I had a few questions that I didn't have at that time. Okay. If you have some more questions about the plan, if you want to send it towards me, I can
get her to the answer. No problem. >> Yeah. >> Well, this is the discussion time. So, >> well, he's saying he has some more questions for Dr. No. And she's not here. >> Oh, Noro. Okay. Yeah, Dr. Noro. Excuse me. Thank you. >> Yeah. So, if she got those question, he can send it to us and we could get those answered by Dr. No.
>> Okay. I think so. I think this is a very long agenda for the record. Um, next item. Oh, wait. Look, I probably didn't move it forward. Lord. Okay. So, hearing no further discussion on the
motion, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the extended agenda for approval. Dr. Henry. Next item. >> Motion uh motion to acknowledge uh the education department of the Foswa Child LLP. The appointed uh solicitor
will be become the education group of Manise Wallace and Manerk McGri LLC effected April 1, 2026. No changes will be made to the term of the representation of current rate structure or personnel. The superintendent or the
business manager are authorized to sign document necessary to uh recognize this change. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? Uh, Miss Robinson. >> Yes, a quick question. So, is this a
um a change in representation or is it just a part of Fox Rothschild? That's are they discontinuing their their education department and then we're going with McNees Wallace for their
um representation? Miss Robinson, if I can. Um, the entire education law practice at Fox is moving and relocating the entire practice to MCNE. So, the entire group at Fox is moving to MCNE. So, we'll have a new
>> we'll have a new home and it's actually a it's down the street will be a Harrisburg based law firm. >> Okay. I I could >> Yeah, it looked like we were switching law firms. So, Okay. So you're basically Fox Roth shot is being absorbed into
MCN's Wallace but out of >> our group our group. Yes. And all the same personnel will continue to serve you under the same terms. >> Okay. Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you for the question. >> Thank you Miss Robinson. Is there any
further discussion on the motion? >> All right. Hearing no further discussion. I'll just make a comment. Thank you that we do have you closer and now you are a taxpayer. So we appreciate that because we like our close contact and connect. All right. So we'll move that forward um to our 2024 March 2020
March 24th 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the engagement letter between the Harrisburg School District and Medis Wallace New Rick LLC. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026
board of agenda for approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. Hearing no further discussion on the motion item, we'll move it forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommend
approval to enter into an independent contract agreement with the Garnett Financial LLC and the Peterson Strategy Solution LLC for the provision of consulting services to the Harrisburg School District. This item will appear on the March 24th, 2026 board agenda for
approval. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> Miss Robinson. >> Miss Robinson. >> Oh, excuse me. Yes. Can can we get a little more information on what Garnet
Financial LLC and Peterson Strategic Solutions will be doing for the district? >> Miss Robinson, all of that was included. Um we send that to you all over the weekend as well as yesterday on the information on this on this um agreement.
>> Okay. But but we're doing this now in public so the public doesn't know what we're talking about. >> They'll be they'll be working with our HR and our um business office to do some consultant work for the district. >> More consultants. Okay. Thank you.
>> Thank you, Miss Robinson. Um hearing no further discussion on the items, we'll move this forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Now, just a quick
question. Are the are I know that we have the information, but aren't the items supposed to be attached to the agenda or no? Cuz aren't these contract agreements because they're not attached to the agenda? But >> okay,
>> perhaps Miss Young can answer that question, but from what we were told by Mr. Sultanic, uh there's no legal requirement to uh include attachments for these motions, >> Miss Young. Correct. That accurate? >> You stated that correctly, Dr. Suski? >> Thank you.
>> Okay. Well, if I could >> Well, I was about to say I would beg the different because then how do we know about what the contract? You know, I understand you said that a little prior, but now that we're here just to view it, to have it, and if we have questions, this is a discussion meeting. So, I I'm
I'm not sure what we can speak a little further behind it, but as a board member, I don't I'm not going back and looking at my emails in the meeting. I'm trying to click on the document. I can view some of it and still kind of move forward. So, if I had any questions, this is a time that we discuss it as a
board. So, I'm not sure what that legal perspective look like, but that would be helpful. >> Okay. >> All right. So, hearing no further discussion on the motion, we'll move it forward to the March 24th, 2026 meeting for the consent agenda for approval. Uh,
Dr. Henry, next item. >> The administration has recommended approval of the agreement between the Harrisburg School District and the Hilton Harrisburg for the annual Cougar Award banquet. The anticipated cost is $3,250. Um, the agreement is pending solicitor
review. Uh, the date changed to May 27th for this event. >> Thank you. Is there any discussion on the motion? >> Okay. So, hearing no further is there hearing no further discussion on the motion. Uh we'll move that forward to our March 24th, 2026 meeting for the
consent agenda for approval. So we are now ready to move to the policy updates. Uh Dr. Henry or who's going to do the reading on the policy? >> Dr. Craig.
>> Dr. Craig. >> Thank you, Madam President. The following recommended policy revision is presented uh for first read and has been vetted by the district solicitor. I also provided a hard copy for you all as I know there was a lot of discussion over email so I thought it might be easier
for you guys to discuss if you had it in hand. Um but this policy includes um several language updates regarding the right to public comment um and the specifics to um submitting um requests for public comment. the
process for requesting um to speak, time limits, uh procedures for addressing commentary um that may violate law or board policy and guidelines related to recording d uh recording devices, cameras, and the use
of signage. Thank you, uh Dr. Craig. So, is there any is there any discussion on here? Oh, Miss Anderson. Um, thank you, Miss Copen. So, I just wanted to confirm
first of all, thanks for updating this. I know that there was a large discussion at the one public meeting um a while back, so I'm glad that we're clarifying the policy. On page two, I wanted to clarify the language
um under sign in and request a comment. So the one paragraph that I I think might have been added to this document where it says individuals wishing to provide public comment on more than one topic must submit a separate request to comment document for each topic. Um I
just want to clarify we did not do that. Did we do that in the past where someone had to sub submit a separate topic? Because I think folks would comment, they would provide public comment and they would speak on more than one comment over the course of three minute or more than one topic over the course
of three minutes. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I mean it had happened in previous public meetings where folks would talk about different >> like usually if folks have three minutes sometimes they don't go up there and they they only talk about one thing. they might bring up, you know, this thing about academics, this thing about
a student, this thing about, you know, this policy thing. So, I just wanted to clarify what the the change was, or maybe this is how it's always been, but we just never enforced that. So, I just want to get clarity on that. I think this is the
way it's always been. We just never really >> held accountable. Yeah. held anyone accountable to it. But um this was based on needing clarification. So I think we tried to make it as clear as possible. Um but you know if you want to leave it
if you guys want to change it to they're allowed to talk about multiple things in one comment within 3 minutes that's that's the board's decision. >> Yeah absolutely. That's just proposed language for your review and discussion. So please if there's good feedback
now's a good time for that discussion. Well, since well, since there's been a big controversy over not having enough time to speak about certain things, maybe this is the appropriate route to take where they can talk about different topics and had different time and I guess to speak about different topics.
>> Thank you, Mr. Carter. Mr. Douglas Thompson, leaders, >> the one thing missing from this document is the ability for the public to provide comment other than a threeminut public statement. I've given public comment prior to being on the board. I have written the
statement out and rehearsed it to ensure that it would get passed in three minutes and I have been asking since being on the board, can we please put it in the document and provide a mechanism by which the public can send in a written document, by email, by postage,
by handing it in at the meeting and then having it publicly attached to the agenda so everybody can read it at their leisure. and their public is their comment is known to the board because in the past that had been something that
prior administrations had done but it was never made public. So it's not a matter of just giving a letter to somebody. There needs to be documentation in board policy that it will be accepted and put into the following minutes so everyone can see
what the public wanted to get across without taking up the physical time of a meeting. I think I mean I still think like if you were even going to do it that way like there has to be a time that they have to submit them because we still have to make the agenda live. >> Well, it would if you're not going to
come and make public comment, your comment should be submitted that night before we start. It should be Yeah, it should be by the by the start. When you fill out the form to say, "I'm going to talk." I mean, if you're filling out the form, you don't know what you're going to say. We're going to hear that. But
usually you know what you're going to say. That's when it should be submitted as a written or by email. So when this goes live to the public, they got all day or 24 hours or whatever it is. They can put together their emails. And we've got plenty of people in the city that
can certainly write and I'd want to hear their thoughts in a wellthoughtout document or bullet points or however they want to get the point across, but they don't all have the ability to come here either. So that mechanism of providing an alternative, I mean, I'd
love it to be a public blog where people in the community could actually update, but we're not there. We don't have that technology. This way, we get their comments, but the public can see what everyone else has said, too. So, if somebody submits something, they can go read it. >> And I was going to say, I think in the
past, we did have that prior to um us coming back into position. It was at 2 o'clock. You had to submit your public comment to your board secretary by 2 pm via email and we never adhere to it. And I noticed that when they came in they just could say their public comment and
I was like do we follow policy and then things have changed. >> We did that for co we actually I know exactly what you're talking about and it was because we were all on Zoom. >> Yeah. But it was it was after co because it was still published right on our website. So, if you go on the website,
that's what at that point, but again, like I said, that's now longer, but my only thing would be to um I know a lot of people talk about the minutes. Um they don't they don't have enough time or um our community doesn't have enough time. So I would recommend I know that
we give them 3 minutes you know on public um agenda on comments towards agenda items but I would also recommend if we can also move that additional 3 minutes maybe on that topic that they maybe talking on the agenda to move it
to the next three minutes towards if it's at the end of the meeting to give them that space because if we think about 3 minutes in the 30 session according to this policy that's only 10 people. So 10 people in 30 minutes can only get comments out in 3 minutes. But
if we're able to extend that, it could be that same 10 people, but again, we're at least giving them the opportunity for the additional 3 minutes to gives them six. And that's where I was always having my battle like I guess we do give them a little bit more, but we're not honoring it.
>> Yeah. I think a lot of this came up when we did the William Penn at Lincoln. And if you guys remember, we were here till like 11:30 at night and and Dr. Saski had to say we're going to stop here and then, you know, we're going to continue. So, we came up with a policy that would kind of work for everyone where we had
one in the beginning and one at the end, but typically everyone does get to speak in the beginning. It's very rarely that we have to use the second one because I'll say agenda items and then I'll say non-aggenda. So, it's very very rare that if you're here to speak about
basically whatever you want to speak about, you're going to get it in in that first part. I mean, the second part is kind of like, yeah, it's it's now non-aggenda, but I in my opinion, I think that we do accommodate the public.
I mean, if you know, 3 minutes is universal pretty much all over. So it it it sounds good while we're here, but if we have about 20 people here wanting to speak, I can promise you guys that none of us want to be here till
11:30 at 12:00 at night, but it's easier to, you know what I mean? Like we don't have that here right now. So we don't per se have a problem with the 3 minute and people talking. We have enough time in that 30 minute. Now, if it's a topic and you guys come in and there's like 20
people, then I think we can probably adjust it. Being the board president, you can adjust the time. That's, you know, maybe we need to say something like you can adjust that time. But for the most part, since we've been here, we've been able to get everyone that has a public comment in the first part. And
if we weren't, what you guys might not know, they look at me and say, "No, I don't want to go." So, you know, behind the scenes there's sometimes there's a little bit of conversation going on or they make eye contact and say never mind or I just want to say this and that's it. So, I just don't see a problem
timewise. I think we're okay. >> Yeah. uh the town hall meeting that we had prior to the one that we had at F. It was um quite a few community members that came out and said they had an issue with the timings because they said that there's so much stuff on the agenda that there's not enough time to go through
every topic on here and give their uh opinion on it. I guess >> I mean I think if somebody's making an opinion about every single topic then they need to call me and schedule a meeting to come in because that's that's a lot you know. So that yeah so that was that pretty much was one of the concerns and then also they also shared the same sentiments that you shared too Doug that
even when they do write something or whatever the case may be it's not in public do it's not in public document so that was an issue too so they shared >> yeah so they they shared those same sentiments too at the meeting >> I wasn't here for co so I'm like that's not I I've not ran into
>> No this was at the town hall meeting prior to the one we had at f >> was it a town hall meeting or was it >> it was a town hall meeting that we had council it was no it was a town hall meeting that we have collaboratively with city council come out and spoke. So, it was the one, not the one at Foods, but the one prior to that one that was at the Omega House,
>> right? I didn't go to that one, but I mean, I went to the one that at Foods and I mean, we've all heard everyone say that they need more time and they need more time, but I honestly think that we have accommodated in the beginning of our meetings and at the end of our meetings. Again, unless we have about 20
people giving me slips, >> I'm going to let someone know, hey, we have 20. What do you want to do? So, it'll be a topic that before you even hit that gavvel that we're going to discuss. Do you want to what are we doing here? You know what I mean? >> It's very rarely that we do have those
>> incidents like that, you know? >> Right. Yeah. That that meeting was uh pretty well attended and I believe >> Miss Anderson and Miss Copeland was there too at that meeting and they were saying that uh they don't feel like they were being their time was being valued and they don't feel as though that they were being um actually welcome to come
out here and actually express how they felt about what was going on in the district and different things from that nature. And it was pretty it was quite a few of them that that actually spoke out. Dr. Craig was actually there, too. >> Yep. And I think Miss Hughes had her hand up for a while. Sorry. >> Sure. Um, so, uh, generally speaking,
town halls, you get people who are most concerned about things. So, I wouldn't look at that as a representation necessarily of the community. I would look at what's actually happened to date at our meetings, how many people show up, how many people below the 3minut time limit. I haven't seen that many, probably a handful, but I haven't been here that long. You guys have been on
longer than I have. So, I just would caution the board against um saying, "Oh, that this is how everyone in the community feels." Um because generally speaking again, people who show up um for particular events like that um have have strong feelings. Um but my other comment is I think it's important to have an identity attached to a person making a comment. I'm very nervous about
a written comment format. Um, I can put any name and any address in a comment and there's no verification that I could commit basically something well I don't know if it's fraud technically but I think that's really dangerous and um also there is a kind of decorum to coming to a meeting and um condensing
your ideas to a a thoughtful statement for the purpose of helping the board understand a different perspective. So we do want people we do want to nudge people towards the behavior we want which is to think about what they want to say you know narrow it down to a particular time frame right and it that's what that's what these meetings
are for we do we have to we have certain rules that we u comply with as board members and the public has kind of certain rules too that they comply with so that's all I want to put out there >> and just to add on to uh what you were saying too some of them said that that's why they don't come to the meetings and I'm not I'm not causing a rebuttal but
you know sometimes you also have people that take the narrative where they feel as though they can't get it out That's how we end up in the news. And sometimes, a lot of times, the narrative they put in the news is inaccurate. But now we got to deal with whatever they put in the news and trying to fix it up and trying to butter it up or whatever the case may be. But I mean,
>> thank you. Um, Miss um Anderson, >> uh, thank you. So, so tired. Um, yeah, I definitely hear what you're saying, Brian. I think I'm hoping or hopeful that the town halls that we're hosting will be another outlet for that because
I think a lot like the purpose of that meeting is for the community to come and be able to speak their mind and provide perspectives and be able to talk more broadly about things that they might not be able to talk about in this meeting. So maybe in terms of expanding the time,
we see how the town halls go for now and then revisit maybe adding time. Um, but I know Miss Robinson has a comment, so I I we we can come back to me, but I I do just want to clarify the number of topics for individuals, but we can come back after Miss Robinson's comment if
that's okay. >> Thank you. U Miss Robinson. >> All right. Thanks. Um going back to what um Doug said about the um written part um submitting written um statements we and correct me
if I'm wrong because we know that when when people come to the meetings they can't just come up come up there cursing us out you know you know giving them pointing fingers at people but if they're giving a written
statement one, I'm not comfortable publishing anything in our board minutes with foul language, um, inaccurate things in there, but we also can't edit
a person's statement to put out there publicly because that's an inaccurate statement. Um but for the meetings, we have the ability to change the policy. So we know when something goes
on the agenda, if this if it's going to be um a hot topic, we know that we're going to get more people in the meeting speaking about it. So we can change the language in the policy. If we're at 30 minutes right now, if we know that we have a hot topic, the board president can say, "Okay, per this policy um and
the topic that we're speaking about now, while we can extend the the time to, I don't know, 40 minutes." But if we're in the like right now, the committee of the whole, this is where we're supposed to talk about things. So, three minutes I
don't think is um enough time. So, even if we expanded that to five minutes because people get their thoughts out, but then when we go to the voting meeting, keep that at three minutes because you've already said what you needed to say at the committee of the whole. You shouldn't go over those three
minutes during the voting meeting. Um, unless there's something new and emergent on that voting agenda. Um, but we have the ability to to change that in policy. And I think that kind of gives people a little more time to say what
they need to say without being cut off in the committee of the whole where we're supposed to talk about everything. So, I don't think it it would be um a hindrance to our ability to conduct business if we then extended it to 5
minutes for the committee of the whole but keep it at 3 minutes for the voting meeting. And like I said, even if we have a hot bet topic, if the time limit is 30 minutes, we would have the ability to even extend it to 40 minutes. That
doesn't say that we're going to do that at every meeting, but if we know, hey, we're this topic right here, we know we're going to get a lot of people in here or or with Miss Drayton, she'll get a whole lot of slips and she go, hey, we this is going to go over the time. Maybe
we should extend the time for this right here just so that people know that they have the ability to speak at the meetings without being cut off because that's where you get where people start to get pissed off and then you start to go to the public. I didn't get a chance
to say what I needed to say and then it becomes misinformation on Facebook. So, I think one, I don't think we will be able to to edit people's written comments, but I do like the idea of being able to um submit
something respectfully. Um, I think we can extend the time to speak and especially for special meetings that we know they're coming for a specific topic. So, we we have no choice but to extend the time. you we know if
they're showing up for this topic right here that's going to be we're going to be there for a minute. So, I think all we need to do is change the policy, but we'll put wording in the policy where we can gauge each meeting. Well, hey, you
know what? I think this might go a little longer. Why don't we enact this right here? But just having that language in that policy, it gives us that flexibility to give everybody that respect of getting their thoughts out if they taking that time to write up those statements and not finish it.
I guess my concern is if we put it to five, then what if people start saying that's still not enough time? So, are we ever going to get to a point where it's going to be enough time? >> Well, but right now when we had the individual meetings, it was one meeting
that's started at 6:00. It was only academics and we could go for two hours and it may not have been a lot of things on the agenda, but people had the ability to to to voice their opinions. The problem now is we're doing everything in one meeting where people's
opinions on those agenda items are limited. So I think having just that extended time just on the committee of the whole because we're again that's where we speak about things. But once it goes to the voting meeting, everybody said what they needed to say already. So
let's keep it at those three minutes. You you're not going to go over that because you've already said it. So I mean it's just options. This is just so we're giving the people the respect to get their thoughts out, but also respect in our time where we know this is the time that we have for it and we're not
going to go over that, but we but if we need to, we have the option to do it. >> Thank you. Um, Miss Anderson. >> Um, thank you, President Copeland. So, I'm wondering if some of this can be resolved on the topic question because
if someone comes in and there there's only one person here who wants to speak for public comment on agenda items, theoretically they could speak on 10 different topics, three minutes each as as the policy is written. They can
submit as many comment or as many slips as they want. Correct. >> But they have to be different topics. >> But they have to be different topics. So they could they could speak three minutes on academics. They could speak three minutes on operations. They could speak three minutes on X Y and Z.
>> But then that's when that half hour because at the end of the day we still have to conduct business 30 minutes. I'm sorry. So at the end of the day like if that's the case and I think that's when that 30 minute will come in board president will say hey you know we're at that cut off time and we need to continue with our business. So what do
we do when I show up prior to receiverhip and I want to comment on every single item of the agenda and I fill out 10 slips but I'm first one here because back then I was the first one here most
frequently. So, I've just taken up the entire 30 minutes of public comment on the agenda items. >> Right. But if it >> That's not fair. That's not fair. No, no, I get that. And I'm saying like if that was the case, then I'm gonna let >> the board president know right away like before I'm going to stop her before she
gets in here so I can say, "What do you what do you want to do? I have these 10 slips for this one person." >> Then we can adjust the time if we need to make it longer. But I think for so many >> one comment per per time, you get three minutes at the beginning, three minutes
at the end. If you have two separate topics to talk about and if you have more, you even pointed it out. >> Obviously, if you're coming here and you have so many issues that three minutes is not enough to talk about it, which is possible because I did,
come talk to the board. Come talk to the superintendent. It's not hard to call these people and get conversations with them. As a parent, I called all the time before I was here. >> So, that's what I mean. There's other alternatives and you've even pointed it out. I say the written one and I agree
with Annie Hughes. There's a lot of like about it. You have to put your name and address on it. If we want to say no email that has to come as written or you have to come in pertinent and show an ID, whatever. But there's just there's plenty of times when you want to get your point across and you don't have
enough time because you got kids, you got your job, you got your whatever. So I don't want to say no to those options, but our time here in in these meetings. This is a meeting of the board in front of the public. It is not an interaction.
So they come to us, they give us their opinions in three minutes. If it is going to take more than three minutes, make that meeting. So in the same instance, we still gonna need that dialogue from what that meeting consisted of because just like one individual that came in here, community member, she said that she never met with
Dr. Henry here. Dr. Henry said he met with her. So it's like you in between what's the truth? Did you meet with her? You didn't meet with her and what did it consist of? Cuz now she's saying one thing and he's saying one thing and it's like we wasn't there for the conversation. So we don't know. >> Well, I I mean that part I can definitely help because I put a special
that's a role for the board to arbiter. That that's not our role at all. >> No. No. And it's just like for clarity because we're sitting here and somebody saying that well this is going on XYZ and this and that and you caught in limbo because you like well this ain't right and they shouldn't be going on because you have individuals who sitting certain job that's got certain job
descriptions who should be fulfilling what's going on because like they said we should not be the ones who are micromanaging and which we don't. But in the same instance when you got somebody saying that XYZ is going on and this is not right something needs to be done about it or about it and we don't actually know what's being done about it
cuz we're not there for it. You get what I'm saying? >> No, I understand that. And and again, if if if there's a question about who Dr. Henry has met with and who he has not, I can certainly answer that question. I mean, if if a if a community member emails Dr. Henry and CC's me, then I can
see it. Or if he's not sure, he'll send it to me. But, you know, I do put Dr. Henry's schedule together, and I mean I put it together. So, >> but you all also see my schedule as well. I share my calendar. So, you all know who I meet with in >> No, no, no, no. It's not about who you meet with. We're talking about the
dialogue of just cuz like when this individual when she came here, she said my son was felon, my son this and that. My son douched so many things to where we sitting here looking at each other like well why didn't nobody ever assist her or why did nobody ever help her or why didn't give her the appropriate resources so she can
get things squared away but here all in all it was mortal. You get what I'm saying? So it's like that's much needed dialogue that we need because it's like there's a way in H know that you're having all these issues and you're not getting no resources or you're not getting nowhere with it. You know,
>> think about it. People want to be heard and that's the thing. They have a right. They elected us into this position to be their voices, but they also have the right to express their own voices. And if they can't do that, we can't. We have the ability to say, "Okay, you know
what? Even if we blocked off 30 minutes for public comment, people have the right to come in. They are voters. They have the right to speak about what they want to speak about and if they don't have time we have the
ability to adjust that which at either way we we get the recognition of you of respecting their time to get their thoughts and feelings out. A lot of times people aren't up people aren't here just complaining just to complain.
They want to be heard but when we say no okay your time is up. we're and they're like, "Wait a minute. I didn't even get >> to to to say what I needed to say." So that that gets that frustration, but they have the right to say what they need to say. And we we need to that's
what we're here for. We need to all lot them that time to say it. Again, we all we need to do is change the language and the policy so that per meeting we can see how many people we have that are ready to speak. We can adjust the time. We have that flexibility to give the
people the respect to say what they need to say whether we agree with it or not. So I don't understand what the what the what the issue is. We have the ability to change it. If we want to change it, fine. If we don't, we're
going to keep getting what we're getting, which is frustrating from the public, >> right? And that's why I would recommend and this is mine. If we I don't know why we're doing two sections anyway. I would say one session on agenda items only and
give them the four minutes and we have a 30 minute time frame. That's just something I'm throwing out cuz we got two different sessions. We need to get through the meeting. 30 minutes is the cut off and then if we if you know at the board president at that time if we if I will extend hey we can give you a
minute or two to say what you need to say because we don't have a lot of people cuz we're saying accommodating what I understand exactly what you're saying as the board secretary we're saying all this accommodation and look tonight there's nobody here so we got to stop talking and saying stuff and show
up too and I'm not saying some have shown up but at this time there's nobody here and then this is a long meeting for me tonight cuz there's a long a lot of agenda items. So, we even got to do better there. >> Right. But I also think that like each board member has their own email
address. All email addresses are online. Correct. So, even if they want to reach out to one of you, that's fine. And if you guys aren't sure and send it to me and I can look into it. I just feel like we we do make accommodations for the public. >> We do >> in my opinion. And that that's just
strictly how I feel. I mean, I get the slips. I mean, there's been days that I have accommodated people that have come in at 602. So, I feel like we we do a pretty good job at accommodating. >> Yes. Thank you. And I think the last one here, Miss Anderson,
>> the we could put that into the policy, >> Miss Robinson. >> Miss Anderson was about to go before you. Hold on one second. All right. >> I'm sorry. I can hear you. Um, so Miss Robinson, building on the point that you said about folks wanting to be heard, I think in addition to that, folks want us
to be responsive. So if you notice, a lot of times people come and they provide public comment on the same things. And to some extent, we're not necessarily always great at following up with folks to say, "This is the thing that we've delivered on. This is the thing that's been accomplished. This is sort of where we are with things." And
so I'm wondering if separately from the public comment, um, if there was some type of, you know, board report or president's report, something at the beginning of the meeting to say, you know, these are the things that were asked about at X and YZ meeting. This is
where we're at. This is the status of, you know, these four things. Um, or, you know, Dr. Henry, can you tell us where X, Y, and Z is? um that that might be a way to be responsive to folks comments and allowing allowing them to be heard
because you're exactly right, Miss Robinson. Like that's why yes, we were elected, but also like we're public servants and we need to be responsive and open to hearing what the public has to say and we're here to receive that feedback. I think the concern is just
timing of things throughout the meeting. So that's my two cents. Thank you, Miss Anderson. So, >> can I wrap this up real quick? You got you got 30 seconds. No, I'm kidding. Go ahead, >> Miss Anderson. I I love that idea. And I
think if we're if we're writing stuff down, I have a habit of writing stuff down what people are talking about, what whatever subjects they're talking about. If we we could even change the um the agenda where in the one part of the
agenda it may be follow-ups to pre to the previous meeting or something like that and you can list this person as a question about this this is the followup to it. So they asked the question in public we're answering it in public. So and >> Mrs. Robinson. I've seen that done at
the superintendence report in different districts where at the meeting that follows after there's been time to review the inquiry, then they'll be if it's appropriate, you know, for a public response, then the the superintendent will respond, >> right? We have the ability to do that. So,
>> so thank you all for the feedback. So, again, that's something we'll consider. We'll hope that we got Oh, could I just You go ahead. >> Um, could we start, if we don't do this already, could we maybe start collecting data? What's that? um it like in for future whether we change the time frame or not we can
maybe start collecting data on how many people um don't make their point in 3 minutes or 4 minutes whatever it is um and so that we can actually let's make these decisions based on data rather than hypotheticals um and I and I like the idea of flexibility and I love the idea of multiple media multiple channels
and reminding the public there's multiple channels to express yourself in the way you want to at town hall you can talk as much as you want you can email people. I think those reminders, it strikes me how few how um community members sometimes don't know the channels they can use. They for or they
forget. That's all. Thank you. >> Did I hear a consensus to add a phrase in about the ability to adjust the amount of time allotted in the meeting at the will of the chair based upon the need? Say that um gets a good number of
slips and we need more time. So, we could add a discretionary phrase into the policy that would allow us to adjust. >> Do we have a consensus for that? >> I'm just trying to see what we've agreed to or not agreed to. >> I I
even I mean clarification even more than that, Miss Young. Like, is it based on a topic or is the decision for extension like someone said like a special meeting? It would be at the visit >> like when they're presenting and they feel like they need
>> no before the at the will of the chair if the chair determines that there needs to be additional time allotted to public comment for example. I've seen that phrasiology in the in policies like this before. >> Yes. And I'll be open to that.
>> Miss Young in in a way you could um massage something and share back with us. >> We um I we won't put this forward for approval yet. This was a great discussion on this policy and I could um put some language into that effect and we could talk about it again. >> Okay. >> How does that sound?
>> Sound great. >> Right. The second item on under policy updates is the P PSBA principles for governance and leadership are presented at the first reading for the first reading and will be adopted um at the March 24th, 2026 school board
general business meeting. And I believe that u madame president is going to lead this discussion. >> Yes. So uh the Pennsylvania School Board Association adopted these principles to ensure that the school board across the Commonwealth operates with integrity,
transparency, accountability, and a clear focus on student achievement. These principles outline the standards that guide how we function. As a governed body, as a board, we are committed to leading responsibly,
preparing for meetings, participating actively, working collaborative collaborative with one another, and respecting the superintendent's role as a commission officer of the Commonwealth. Acting ethically, recognizing the event individual board
member do not possess authority outside of the collective board. Avoiding action actual or perceived conflicts of interest and never using this position for improper benefit. Evalu evaluating continuously making datainformed
decisions, reviewing strategic strategic plans, assessing board performance and focusing on measurable student growth and achievement. Protecting necessary competent, communicating clearly, excuse me. Promoting respectful dialogue, ensuring
transparenc transparency and protecting necessary confidential matters. Advocating earnestly, supporting public education and engaging stakeholders at the local, state, and federal levels. governing elect effectively, adhering to established
procedures, aligning decisions to policy and law, and delegating operational management to the administration. These principles reinforce that government is a collective responsibility. Once a decision is made by the board, we move forward together,
constructively, and in the best interest of the students and district. So I would like to announce that each board member will sign a PSBA principle for governance and leadership at our March 24th, 2026 board meeting and the that
this public assigning will serve as an individual and collective affirmation of our commitment to ethical leadership and responsible governance. Thank you. And now we don't have any public
comments. So now we are ready to adjourn the meeting. So is there a motion to adjourn the meeting? >> So move Thompson leader. >> Is there a second? >> Second. Hughes. >> All in favor signify by saying I. I.
Those opposed. Motion is adjourned.