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Video-1: youtube.com/watch?v=ZJjg-cIf2hg

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Good morning. Want to call our work session to order. Our board work session for budget. Welcome Dr. Hurl. Good morning for your time this morning. >> At this time, I will entertain a motion

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to approve our agenda this morning. Yes. >> Thank you. Like to give the floor to Dr. Hurl. He will be presenting the board's budget. Good morning everybody. Well, today's the second best day of the year behind

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Christmas. It is the approval of the budget. So, first of all, um I believe all of you have the budget document in front of you. Is that correct? Yes. >> Okay. So, if you could open it up to the very first page, the budget message, and I'm not going to read this, but the

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purpose of the budget message is one, it's to encapsulate kind of what happened this past year, but then also look at uh what the ISD could experience moving forward. And you know, as I look

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at um you know, kind of what's going on in Jackson County with all school districts, it really is a tale of what has happened in the past, a very different different reality of what's going on now and a very uncertain future

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and the ISD is not unique in that. So with the budget message, um really I'm going to again I'm not going to read all of it, but a few main points. Um first of all is uh a key po some key points. Number one

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uh our main goal is always academic achievement. So I like to talk about what has occurred. Uh the Independent School District is the only district in the state of Missouri, if you go back all the way to MSIP 5 and now we're in MSIP 6, that our academic achievement as

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scored by our APR, our annual performance report has improved every single year. So if you think of over 500 school districts, we're the only one. And that happened again this past year at an 80.5%. Also, we had the passage of the bond

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issue, which was $60 million, which uh currently is we're full throttle with that. Uh that was a significant thing to occur, especially in light of what's going on in Jackson County. So, something that's very positive.

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Certainly, there's a lot of financial uncertainty and that really hits all three of our main revenue streams. So, if you look at local tax dollars, we have the issue with Jackson County puts every school district in Jackson County

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in a very precarious position. And I'll talk a little bit about that as I get into the presentation. If you look at state dollars, the foundation formula, I typically am very, as those of you who have been on the board, I am very, I guess you'd say, pessimistic whenever I

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go and do revenues. In my 17 years, this this past year, the year we're just finishing, was the first year that we did not meet revenue projections. And that was really because of two main revenue sources. That was because of the

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foundation formula was not fully funded. And then also what was what's going on in Jackson County with local assessed valuation. Um, on a good note, we were expecting some uh withholdings from federal funds, particularly Title One. I

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talked about that, I believe, in December. Those did not come to fruition. So, at least what we've received preliminarily. We're not looking at any major reductions in title funds, but you never know what's going to happen there.

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Uh, we do have a drop of enrollment. So, not only is the SAT not uh being fully funded at 7145, uh we also experience a drop of enrollment of over 500 students, and

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that's something that's unprecedented. Now, we obviously don't know what what lies ahead in the future. Is that a one-year blip and we're going to recover, or is that something that's going to be an ongoing issue? The one good thing about the foundation formula

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is you get to use the current year's I'll say weighted ADA and wham weighted average membership or the prior year or the previous year the highest of the 30. So we don't have an impact this fiscal year when I say this fiscal year FY26 or

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FY27 but what you will see if we do not have a rebound is an FY28 on the foundation formula. It does have an impact though in Prop C, which is the sales tax money that comes from the state of Missouri. That's the 1% sales tax.

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Um, we do have very strong fund balances. And that is really our saving grace as a school district. I am going to preface everything I say moving forward is all school districts are in a precarious

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position because of dwindling resources coming from revenues. So if the school district if decisions are made in which basically you do not abide by the budget and show restraint you're going to have

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serious issues. So, um, and again, I'm going to go into some historic, uh, spending patterns, but, um, there are so many question marks out there. So, uh, maintaining adequate fund balances is

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going to be vital moving forward. Okay. Any questions on the budget message? >> I thought I heard you say that we had a decline of more than 500. Yes. >> 400. >> Oh, I'm sorry. um 400 students, 500

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weighted ADA. >> Okay, >> sorry. Thank you. >> And and I didn't go into Does everybody understand the difference between weighted ADA and students >> in case in case >> Okay, so you all everybody here knows what a student is. um weighted ADA.

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Every student can get additional waitings um whe if they qualify for free and reduced lunch if they are an ELLL student if they're sped. So one student may not equate to a 1.0 FTE. Um that's

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why like I said earlier so 500 weighted ADA about 400 students. Okay. Dr. Ho, can you speak into knowing your tenure here with the district? you may have some good insight as to why we experienced such a decline with enrollment.

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>> I you know what I've I've tried to figure that out. I've looked at everything from is it at particular schools, is it at particular grade levels? Um and and that's the hard thing is you would think, okay, 500 students, can you just do cuts? Well, whenever

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you've got five at one school and and 20 at another, obviously our high schools and middle schools are larger buildings, so you're going to see more there, but there's not one particular thing that I would point to. Um, you know, everybody talks about COVID babies, so this

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upcoming year, CO babies, as in a big increase in the number of babies being born. Um, who knows what's going to happen. You know, the co babies would be this incoming kindergarten class. So hopefully we'll see an uptick. But to answer your question, I can't point to

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any one particular thing. Um I think you do have to look at across the nation, state of Missouri, I think more families are homeschooling their kids. So I think that has to do some of it with some of it. You also have to look at the state

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of Missouri has increased the um availability of for tax credits for people to use um the most scholars to use that money to send their their children to private schools. So I think there there's some pre-work that you've

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done or just maybe some forecasting is if we see two to 400 more students on top of what we've experienced this year that you could caution us on or just what kind of financial implications could that? Um I yes I have I don't have those numbers in front of me. I focus

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honestly more on the SAT. Um but I can certainly get you like for every student here's how much of a of a decrease in funding. It's a little bit tricky just because of the fact that it doesn't hit that particular year like what I said earlier. Okay.

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Okay. All right. Everybody everybody good with the budget message? Okay. If you I'm I'm just going to point out section one as a board member. That is a great section for you to kind of go through so you get to understand how we code

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things. It there's tons of information in there. Um I won't go through all of that unless you'd like me to. Um if you anybody needs to take a nap, uh that could be a great way to to help you sleep a little. So at night time if you want to take a look at it and maybe go

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to bed. Okay, turn to section two please. This really is what I consider the most important part of the budget book. So this is our estimated summary of fund balance.

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So, um, by law, you're required to do a three-year analysis. That's part of your budget. We actually put an extra year in there. So, if you look at this, and I'm going to have you scan down. If you look at

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the column that says incidental fund, does everyone see that? Okay. Go straight down where you see estimated DESIE ASBR operating fund balance percent. Okay, that is that really is the most

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important number and that is at 30.5%. So what that signifies is if you take how much cash on hand we have in fund one and two. So that's operating and teachers fund. Add those two together.

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Okay, divided by your total expenditures out of fund one and two, we have 30 point, again, this is an estimated 30.5%. Okay, this number is a little bit misleading. I would say we're a little

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bit higher than that. Here's why I say that. Okay, as we come to the end of every fiscal year, we have number one, our largest payroll is June 20th because teachers, Brandy knows, she's a teacher.

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Uh I don't know when you're paid, do you guys get paid the 20th? >> Okay, 25th. So you'll teachers will get three paychecks at once. Okay. By far the largest payroll that we'll have in the district. We pay on the 20th. Um,

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also that is the last foundation formula payment we get for the fiscal year. I have not had a chance to look at um our foundation formula payment. I'm assuming our SAT that were paid on was still 6,900, but I'll have to take a look at

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that. Okay. So, the other thing that plays into this is you never for sure know the timing of whenever we're going to get our federal funds in. Okay. We're going to make a claim. Title One is by far the largest um you know that always

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comes as we close out the fiscal year. It may come in this year. It may come in July um at some point. So that's just because of the size that's going to have a play on um the foundation formula fund

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balance. Okay. So we have two things that are coming up that I think will probably cross over into next fiscal year. So I've accounted for it here. one is my guess is the feds probably won't get us our title one um revenue until

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after July 1st and so I have designated that within this document um and also our uh local tax effort and that's actually um that's money that we charge to other students whenever we um have like foster kids drum farm is a big one

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for that so they have to pay us local tax effort so if I were to to tell you what I think once the auditors get done with everything, I I'm going to guess that our our ending fund balance is going to be probably around 32.5

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32.6. Okay. Does that make sense? Okay. All right. Before I go on, any questions on this? No. Okay. All right. I'm going to have

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you flip over to the next Yeah, sorry. The next page. Okay. So, this is um where I project us. Actually, I'm going to go back. You don't have to flip over, but if you remember my what I have said for the last three years of those

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of you who've been on the board, the ISD needs to keep its fund balance over 30%. Okay. Now again, I am very cautious in how I budget. Okay, so if you flip over to the next page,

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okay, the fund balance drops to 22.16%. Okay, now there's a couple things that play into that that um everybody needs to keep in mind. Um number one this whenever we do a budget we always assume

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number one every department spends their budget to zero. Okay we also assume full employment. So every parap position every teaching position that we have those position positions fully staffed.

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Okay we all know the reality people come and go. Some positions um we're not able to fill. there'll be gaps in service. Okay, I always look at that as kind of our cushion that we have. Um, historically, and and this is a good

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thing, I think, for you guys to know if because I track this every month. Um, historically, um, the ISD spends about 97.9% of its budget. Okay, this year we're probably going to be in about 96.9.

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So, our expenditures are not have not been the issue. The issue has been the revenue changes that we've had uh particularly with local assessments and now the foundation formula. Okay, so not the number I like.

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Um but again, this is where you just cannot have your expenditures increase. Okay, that 97 uh 9% that I talked about, you guys need to come in in there as far as looking at the budget. Okay, makes sense.

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>> And Dr. Hurl, how much of that percentage is salaries benefits? >> Great question. Historically, um, we we are going every school district is usually between 75 and 80%. So, whenever you talk about budget cuts,

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I think Jill, that's a a great question for this reason. When people hear that schools are going to get cut x amount of dollars, in their mind, they need to think 75% of that money is going to people. Okay. Um I believe this budget

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we are at 77.22%. Okay. >> I assume Dr. Earl, you're going to shuffle over to the next couple of pages as Okay. >> Yep. >> That's okay. >> Yes. That's where I would have some serious questions. >> If you go to the next one, we are at 12.72%.

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Okay. Now, those of you who have been on the board for many, many years, you guys remember what I always say my goal is that third year out, it's 12.5. Okay? And we're within that threshold. Okay?

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Now, again, there's a lot of question marks moving forward um mostly around revenues. Okay. I'm going to go one more page. Please stay. This is where things get really dicey. And if you look at past

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budget books, this is not unusual. Um, but I do want to, if you go clear down to the bottom, you will see, do you guys see that where it says Nebius pilots? >> Okay. >> Okay. That is the pro that's the first

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projected year of pilots coming in from the data center the Nebius uh project. Um it is total $6.3 million and then moving forward that goes up substantially. Now nobody knows whether

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that means you know is the project going to have that sort of assessed valuation or not. I hope so. It could be more. oftentimes we see that um in subsequent years you're looking in anywhere from 25 to $32 million a year and that's going

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to fluctuate from year to year. I assume it's because um a large amount of um what is tax is considered personal property. It's not the building. That's what people need to realize. It's not the building going in that generates the

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revenue. It's the personal property which are the computers. So the reason I'm guessing the reason that var v there's some variation is because probably some computers go offline they bring new ones on new servers uh they probably have some increase in servers

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in there as well as cost um so there is a little bit of fluctuation but um a good number to use is is 25 at a minimum again up to about 32 million. Okay. All right. questions you guys have for

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me. >> So, there's there's nothing that you see here on this that's out of the ordinary other than the debious pilot. >> Um, what I would say is out of the ordinary is what I would consider um the

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potential risk for all school districts due to the foundation formula um and then also assessed valuations in Jackson County. And to speak to the um to the foundation formula, here's a great example of of how this is impacting

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schools. And again, if you those of you who've been on the board, I've been talking that this was coming three years ago. Um so if school districts were fully funded this year, the SAT or the student adequacy target should have been

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$7,145 per student. Okay. I'm assuming when I look at the payment transmittal, which it should have come in on the 20th, um we probably got paid on about 6,900. Now, that doesn't sound

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like a lot of difference, 71.45 to 6,900 in relation to funding for just the ISD. That's a difference of about 4.1 million just this year. Okay. And um for FY27,

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the number that I used is 6820 per SAT. And um I thought I was being fairly cautious because the governor's recommendation was was to fund the SAT at 6,900. Um you know, I've heard, you know, Steve

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Carroll, I think, talk to you guys. Uh you know, it could get much worse than that. So, I'm hoping that 6820 is still a safe number, but who knows? I I think that's the wild card in the room. >> So, the other thing I've been hearing

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about is the um foundation formula is being sort of rewritten. >> Yes. >> Do you have any idea when that is supposed to be coming online even approximately? >> Honestly, no. because no matter what if

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once it's written and I've seen so many different things um about what it could potentially look like even after that it has to go to the legislature and has to get approved. So my guess is two years out from here that would be my best

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guess. Uh originally they wanted it the goal I think was for next year. I just maybe it happens. Um, I hope that no matter what occurs is that they do a hold harmless provision in there. Like with this formula, Senate Bill 287 came

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in like 2001, they had a home hold harmless provision that when this current formula came in, nobody would get any less than what they were getting. Um, I would be shocked if they have that hold harmless provision in. Um, but just in a fairness to school

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districts, I hope that's what occurs. Good question. Other questions? Is there a point, Dr. Ho, that you would consider us being like, I guess, distressed or

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in some place of very serious caution? Um well there's there is you know the state has a a actual designation of being financially distressed which is if you fall under 3% and you will be taken over by the state. Um long before my

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time at one point the ISD had a a fund balance I think it was in the 90s of 3.27%. I can't remember the year but I remember the percentage looking back through documents. >> And you're you're talking this is not related to 2008. No, no, no, no, no, no.

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Um I again if you can stay above 30%. That would certainly needs to be the goal. Um you can always have that as a goal but and I even see school districts that say

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this is going to be our fund balance percentage. I would caution you against that because you just never know what could happen. I mean, all of a sudden, you have a lawsuit and the AV and or the legislature, even though they um appropriated the money for the

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foundation formula, that's what you budget, that's what you give raises on. Well, then they say there's not the money. Um you know, at 30% you're going to have some runway. Um it's just everything is in such flux. That's why I

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just really caution everyone. Um, I think there are some very tough times ahead. >> My question is, so I recognize that we have this day, but here we are.

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How will we continue to bring in more? >> Uh, I think you can only control your expenditures. And I say that I mean you can pass levies to try to increase that. That may not be super popular at this time with everything going on in Jackson County.

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You just you can't take on any expenditure and every program if things start getting really tight. Um programs need to be looked at costbenefit analysis. Um you know where can we tighten our belts? Um those type of

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things. by August what is >> well that that may be the best trick question out there Brandy um because it fluctuates throughout the year and here's why I mean that's a great question um because understand how much

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money schools get is all based upon the appropriation giving given by the legislature which they've already done what's a little bit of a variable is in Missouri, you never know how many students we're going to have statewide. You never know how many of them are

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going to be ELLL and sped. So while you may have a fixed X amount of dollars for education, that denominator that divides into that, which is how they calculate the SAT is variable, just like what we received last month for our SAT

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calculation, I expect to be different than whenever I look at the payment transmittal today. So, um, and the thing is, even though the state appropriates a certain amount of money, that doesn't mean that they're going to give us that.

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>> But we received around 6,900 all year, right? >> Yes, it's fluctuated, but for the most part, it was higher earlier in the year and then they adjusted it. And typically, those adjustments come uh, you know, we get told monthly kind of why. And it's usually because that

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weighted ADA, those those categorical, you know, your span, your ELLL, um those are coming in higher than what they initially projected. >> So, did you have any others? >> Okay. So for Fairmont, Proctor and

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Corning schools um with those improvements considering the bond that just passed, how are like future operating costs being associated with that? Like do we look for those schools having higher operating costs? >> No. If anything, you may actually have

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lower operating costs. Um hopefully they're more energy efficient, so maybe you'll save some money um on that. it because of the number of students there may or may not fluctuate. Your staffing probably isn't going to change. And

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again, that's going to be 75 to 80% of your expenditures as a school district. I just don't see that the the changes to those schools is going to have any impact on the operating side. >> Specifically, Fairmont, I'm curious because the building was so old,

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>> are we intentionally, you know, being cost effective with LED, etc.? >> Yes. >> Okay. Yeah, we've got a pretty good architect for it. So, I think that we're taken care of there. >> Um, I know you've talked about as

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>> you saying that you didn't think it was right for our community. >> Great, great question. Um, here's the the main reason. I do demography studies on it's not a study I will I will look at it myself on um kids turning out in

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other words um how how we retain them from one grade level to the other not student by student but just by the cohort the reason and which I have demography studies and I've looked at them um they are never accurate with us

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and here's why is if you look in the entire Kansas City metro area both sides to the state line. Um there's only one school district that has a higher transiency rate than Independence and that's Mills. So whenever you have a

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population that's highly transient, a traditional demography study really is not that effective. At least that's what I found. And I'm hoping that this year was just a blip. Hopefully we recover and you start to see that enrollment. We saw a dip

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after CO and didn't recover all the way, but this year was just such an anomaly. >> Any other questions? >> So, back to Jackson County. >> Um, we had a commercial rate. Can you I know Dr. Grant has talked about it in

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her report, but could you just remind us what that's done to us and then also any potential claw cl callbacks are different from withholdings. >> It is. It is great question, Jill. Um, so really there's two parts to the AV

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piece in Jackson County. You have your residential, which people hear a lot about. you have your commercial which honestly and I'll just speak very frankly came as a complete surprise that um Phil Labota the county executive on

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his own decision decided to put a 15% cap on um commercial properties that were $5 million or less and that was not ordered by the state tax commission that was his decision so for the ISD and I'm

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going to give you the number approx approximately. And here's the hard thing. I thought we were done having these withholdings um about the start of May and then all of a sudden they started happening again and I think they've identified more

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properties. So um the last time that I ran this, which was a week ago, we were a little over a million dollars that have been withheld in operating and about 210,000, a little more than that in debt service payments.

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Now then if you look at um the residential okay I'll go back and answer the other part of your question Jill um you know withholdings is just money that's not remitted to us the clawbacks is coming in the future and those are

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going to be in the form of tax credits um that are basically if you're if you would have paid you know $2,000 for property taxes and they designated that 500 should have was by the state tax commission ruling, then you'd only pay

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1,500. Um, but it's supposed to actually go over three years. So, for us, and I actually wrote that down because I wanted to make sure that I figured I would get that question. Um so operating for the FY23 and 24 potential

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withholdings or clawbacks 12,819,844 and debt service $2,976,78 a lot of money. Okay. And I always, you guys know this, I always put things in terms of teachers. Okay? So if you have your calculator, if you want to do this, you know, operating at 12.8 million,

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take 12.8 million divided by 75,000. Because if you take our average teacher salary plus their benefits, we're, you know, I haven't done the calculation for a while, but that'd probably be a pretty good guess. So 12,ou 12,800,000 divided

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by 75,000. That's a lot of teachers and um you know people say well tighten your belt when 75 to 80% of your your budget is people. >> Tell us

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gone are >> good question. Um er funds are gone. you know that that is we we were very strategic in the use of our ESSER funds and those of you who don't know what that is that was the federal money through COVID is you know we didn't use

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those ESSER funds for people we did it for things that we thought would save us money um obviously we had some expenses with with COVID and cleaning supplies but we tried to do things with HVAC systems and and the like so all of those

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monies were completely expended in the pass. So we don't have nobody has any more of those left. >> August of property tax. What do you feel? I know a lot. >> So you're referring I assume you're

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referring to doing away with income taxes. This is property taxes. >> Absolutely devastating. I mean, I I cannot stress enough, guys. It It is not possible. I'm going to get into some

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commentary here. It is not possible to offset the revenue received in income tax. We're already seeing some of this right now because and I can't remember the Senate bill that was I believe four years ago now where we started dropping

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the income tax in the state of Missouri a tenth each year. Okay, that's part of the reason the foundation formula is not funded is our revenues coming in from income tax keeps getting squeezed. You you start making bigger changes on that.

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I mean, I don't even know how schools would function. Either um a you have to put such a large um increase on sales tax, which I don't even think is realistic. Um going from you whatever it

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is now to 15 20%, it's not realistic. And and I know people will say, again, I'm I'm doing some commentary here that other states have done it. Well, other states have different revenue streams than Missouri. You can't compare um an Alaska that has all sorts of of revenue

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from from oil. You can't compare Nevada that has the gaming, excuse me. So, I just I can't see how that could ever work. And two, I've lived through a little bit of that. So is Dr. Stout. Um, you know, I when I

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came in ' 09, um, Kansas was going through the Brownback experimentation similar to this and it absolutely devastated, um, schools, school districts, um, my prediction,

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this is purely prediction from Dr. Hurl. If we saw that, you would see school districts, especially small rural run rural ones, start to close, consolidate. you would see other school districts significantly have to decrease services and probably start to close schools

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just because I we've lived >> it process >> Dr. Dr. Hurl, I have a question. >> Oh, sorry. I couldn't figure out where it was coming from. >> This week, this weekend, um, I saw something about a possible federal law

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that could take effect in January of 27 that would allow that would destroy residency requirements, I believe. Um, if if something like that should happen, wouldn't that cost the school district's funding, too? >> When you say residency, like school

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district boundaries? Um, yes. What it would cause is really a shifting of of where the revenues go. So, I I know a lot of people like to talk about, well, let the money follow the child. Okay? In theory, that's

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great, but you have to remember in Missouri, I'll just talk about us specifically, is we are very highly dependent upon local property tax. Okay? So, think of you all. you you live within the independent school district

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boundaries, you pay taxes here. So, you have students starting to move um across district boundaries. Well, now your taxes are paying to educate somebody that doesn't even live here that may be driving from Kansas City or Lee Summit.

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So, it creates some issues. Um there are issues beyond that that um you know if you have some of those type of things occurring you could have some large large uh swings in enrollment as well which make it really hard for school

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districts to to plan. I've not seen that um but I'm going to have to to Google it now. >> Thank you. Anything else? >> Did you have more to review with us? >> Nope.

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>> You don't. >> I would just ask um going forward as board members and as we see budgets coming and financial things in the future, what what's the most important thing? What should we be watching out for? what how should we

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keep our eyes open? I >> I think the most important thing is um you have to actively engage your legislators to I mean I spend Dr. Stout knows a lot of time in Jeff City um probably not

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weekly but but probably every other week at least sometime and then talking to legisl legislators when they came back home and I was on the phone almost every day. So, I think that's probably the thing. Um, everything sounds great in theory, no matter what it is, but

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whenever you start having it impact people, that's and a lot of times things occur in a vacuum down in Jeff City without understanding the true consequences back home. >> And I'll just add to that real quickly because it's timely. Um just coming back

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from the Missouri School Board Association conference um during the leg legislative update, one of the things that they shared was um that the amendment five um they were thinking, "Oh, it's fine. Schools, if we get rid

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of the income tax, it's fine. Schools will just collect more in sales taxes." And they had to be educated that schools don't receive sales taxes. And they didn't realize that. So education is part of it. Anything

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else? I could talk budget all day. >> All right. >> Yeah, just my my last question really just for the record there. We seem to be in a good financial position. Um, are there any known material risks or

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weaknesses or information that you uh can share with us to be specifically keen on beyond things that you've shared? Anything that we need to be fully a breast of uh before the conclusion of this meeting? I mean, the the main risks, so many of them you

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can't control. I mean, revenues you're not going to be able to control. What I would say is it's going to be really important to track your expenditures monthly. and I've done that for 17 years. Um,

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and and make adjustments throughout the year as you track those expenditures. So, if you see that they're getting higher, start to make plans because a lot of times it's hard to to make changes mid year, but you know, make those changes,

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at least the planning before the start of the next fiscal year. >> And this is something you've referenced for 17 years. you've done monthly. Is that correct? Is there a trackable method that you can >> leave with us or just kind of have in place something that the incoming persons that will fulfill this job? >> Sure.

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>> There is something in place for that. Okay. Fantastic. >> We don't want to call you on your vacation and say, "Can you help us out?" Okay. >> That is all the questions that I have. Any directors have any other questions

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or things to call out? Dr. Stout, please. So if you have anything that you feel that we need to ask Dr. a little deeper into >> I guess the only thing I would ask county me

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>> I have >> thought something myself >> well here's here's where the ISD is very fortunate compared to most school district not I shouldn't say most some school districts there are some school

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districts and I'm going to get into kind of the mechanics of the recruitment process um and I apologize this if I go a little bit get a little wordy on this um some school districts will not be able to do a recruitment okay and and

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understand what a recruitment is so every year school districts fire districts, uh, library districts, we all have to set our budgets based upon the assessed valuation that you are given. Okay? What can happen in some

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years is you're given that number, you run all the calculations and you have to verify it with the state auditor's office. Well, what happens is then you get numbers later after you've already set your levy as a school board and

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it's the AV is less. Well, if your AV goes up, this is really important that for people to understand and this is all being lost in the whole Jackson County situation. As taxing entities AV goes up because of the Hancock amendment, we

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have to roll our levy back this past year. And I'm I am saying this I'm almost 100% correct, but I believe we had the lowest levy in I know in my tenure here and I think probably since

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the mid90s. Okay. So what happens is we roll our levy back because we can receive no more money than what we did the previous year plus whatever the consumer price index is. So the CPI is 2.5%, we can get 2.5% more money plus

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anything from new construction. Okay. So what happens is school districts roll their levy back to get X amount of dollars cuz we have to set the levy based on how many dollars we can receive. Well, then your AV goes down all rolling back our or the the

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clawbacks. Well, that's money that we should have received anyway. we rolled our levies back. So, um whenever that happens, there is a process called a tax recoupment that

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districts, any taxing entity can can get that can recoup that money. They can get the money back. Um we do have that flexibility. You as a board will have to make that decision whether that's something that you want to do. Some taxing entities don't have that ability

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because they're already at their voterapproved maximum. We are not. Our voter approved maximum is $467. Um, and ironically, I believe that was approved like my second or third year in

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the district. Um, our operating levy this past year, I believe was 43255. I might be off a little bit. I can't remember, but it's 432 something. I think it's 43255. So, we have some some movement to do some recruitments. Some

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school districts and other taxing entities are at their voter approved maximum >> 467. >> You would do that at the same time that that you set your ley and it is not I mean it's it's a

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process. Just for future reference and for the sake of my own understanding, uh recently there were statements made that the terms clawback may have been used inaccurately or inappropriately. Can you just guide us on I I asked

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>> by me or No, no, no. I apologize. Let me clarify separately from this meeting. There were public comments made um that um the clawback term or phrasiology is being used incorrectly. Can you just educate us as to what clawback actually means?

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>> Well, clawback is whenever they're taking back money that's already been received. >> Literally that. >> Yes. And and I know you I know we have a a situation where there's I won't go into it. You

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know, that would be a clawback because we've already received the money. Um, a withholding is something that we're scheduled to get, but they just don't send it. That's the difference between the two. Thank you. >> I found the email the um it had to do

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with the national student voucher program. >> Oh, okay. Are you mean in relation to not having school district boundaries? Oh, okay. I haven't seen that. >> Is there a specific uh reference point

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that you can share with us that maybe we can look into further? >> Maybe a website or >> Yeah, that's what I was trying to find. >> Okay, we can we can gather that information. There may be more additional questions for you, Dr. Earl, that we plan to email you. >> Um and if we could include that

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reference there so that he can have access to. >> Okay, fantastic. All right. Any other questions for Dr. Hurl? >> Fantastic job, sir. Thank you. >> All right. Enjoy your day. >> And for the record, I thought about

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wearing shorts and a t-shirt just to shock everybody. >> Have a good day. Alrighty. I'm aligning my notes here, Kimmy. Sorry. Okay.

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All right. If there is no further discussion or questions of clarity, Dr. Hull has already been dismissed. All hearts and minds are clear. Whatever that means, I will entertain a motion to adjourn. >> So move.

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So Sarah was that Sarah. >> Sarah. Okay. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Yeah. No, it's a great great point. Thank you. And anyone else, please again share your additional questions if you have them. I will give those to Cammy

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and Dr. Stout. We will get those to Dr. Hurl and uh we will have those responses back to you before the next board meeting if we have additional questions. Okay, thank you so much for your cooperation. >> Yes. >> Yes.

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>> All righty. We are journed. Thank you.