he he e for please rise for the um St for the flag salute thank you flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one
nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all oh say can you see by the dawn's early light what so
proudly we H at the twilight's last gleaming whose bread stripes and bright stars through the per IS F of the r part
we watch were so Gallant streaming and the rocket red glar the bombs bursting in air G through
the night that her flag was still there oh s us that star spangled B wave of the land of the
free and the home of the bre that was beautiful thank you this meeting is in compliance with the open public meeting law and has been duly advertised in the newspaper as an official meeting roll call Dr Osman here
Mr Walsh here Mr McCaron here Mrs Rivera present Mrs roas present Mrs gordel present Mrs Cass present um before we begin um I have an announcement on behalf of the Board of
Education we wish to announce to the community that the board of education has authorized our legal council to Institute litigation against the state and Department of Education for the inequitable for the inequitable
application to the state's funding formula to the Jackson School District while we held off on filing this action many months ago because of our serious fiscal constraints we have decided that we are left with no choice but to initiate this action now this became readily apparent to us when a neighboring School District just
announced that it was going to be given provided a $65 million loan to fill its budget Gap with possibly tens of millions of more dollars headed their way in the future conversely the Jackson Board of Education appears to be held to a different standard that was required to submit a balanced budget before any
advanced Aid payment was even considered this forced us to sell one of our schools to close our ever widening budget Gap this is sad on many levels while we only want the best for every school district in the state we also believe the state's laws and regulations must be applied fairly and evenly
even-handedly to everyone clearly they are not for this reason we believe that the state needs to be held accountable for the arbitrary and possibly discriminatory manner in which they fund school districts like Jackson a school district that has been fiscally responsible and has been able to sustain
strong programs despite the devastating Cuts we have endured over the years unfortunately we are being pushed over the fiscal cliff with no Lifeline being provided by the state this is particularly troubling because the state and our own fiscal monitor have candidly acknowledged that Jackson has a revenue
problem and not an expense problem we will keep the community updated about the status of the litigation as the case unfolds um in agend um in addition there is a change to the agenda so um for the Strategic redistricting and
restructuring program um items 1D will now read that gets Middle School will house the district upper elementary students to grades five and six and item e will state that mlli um will be closed
and its use will be determined at a later date thank you need a motion for the approval of the agenda with addendum motion second discussion roll call Dr
Osman this is just for the agenda right okay yes Mr Walsh yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs barokas yes Mrs cordella yes Mrs Cass yes I now turn the meeting over to Mrs
pit Melly for her superintendent report thank you Mrs Cass and the administration is in complete agreement with the announcement that you read thank you so nice job by our rot see and that star spangle Banner was that not
incredible what a voice nice job as we do at each of our board me uh board meetings every month we will begin this evening with our high school student reps and so this evening I'd like to start with Katie from Liberty she can come to the podium and tell us about the Liberty happenings
good evening superintendent pril Board of Education members and distinguished guests it's an honor to be here once again to share some of the exciting accomplishments happening at Liberty our winter sports season is coming to a close with some still competing in the postseason play we are proud of all the teams but some have earned admirable
honors we'd like to highlight the cheerleading team kept their impressive record alive and recently won first place and earned the title of grand Champions the boys bowling team won their Opening match of State tournament and wion fans the boys wrestling team also secured a victory in the first round of Central Jersey group 3
sectionals additionally many of our track athletes participated in the njsi daa championship then this weekend the Jackson girls wrestling made history when they became the first girls wrestling state champions their Triumph triumphant win grew with the legacy of Wrestling Legends in this town local
First Responders gave the girls an amazing welcome home by providing a police escort good job ladies in the realm of extracurricular activities our clubs have been very active the Jackson Liberty Science National Honor Society hosted a chocolate covered strawberry fundraiser
to celebrate Valentine's Day the triam Music Honor Society sold Valentine's grams and the class of 2025 held a chocolate rose fundraiser these efforts reflect the commitment and enthusiasm our students have Additionally the leadership academy delivered supplies and handmade crafts to car one of
Jackson they were very appreciated and even gave back their own bags for us it's a beautiful thing to see the generations come together our Performing Arts programs are also thriving the atlet players are rehearsing tirelessly for their spring production of PCY Jackson and the Lightning Thief the show is set for March 6th 7th and 8th and
it's sure to be a crowd pleaser tickets are currently available for purchase as you can see many people are shining at Liberty in addition Kayla Simon and Delany spal have been named seniors of the month while Jacob kofus and Doro halan earned athletes of the month additionally Judy hacket won Li of the
month and she's a joy to everyone she meets congrats to all the honores for their hard work and achievements I'm truly grateful for this opportunity to represent Liberty tonight as we Face chillier weather I hope everyone stay safe and warm I wish you a pleasant evening thank you thank you Katie an excellent report
as always and some wonderful happenings at Liberty uh so next to the mic I'd like to call uh Colin for memorial good evening Mrs Peril members of the central Administration staff and Board of Education members I'm Colin Williams from Jackson Mo High School currently
the student council president I'm excited to be here tonight to share some of the great things happening at jmhs first I want to give a huge congratulations to our girls Jaguar wrestling team for winning States their hard work and dedication have truly paid off and we are so proud of their incredible achievement another
shout out goes to our girls swimming team for an outstanding season they made it incredibly far in the postseason and finished with an undefeated record in the regular season their dedication talent and teamwork were in full display and we couldn't be prouder of their success the interact Club is hosting its annual volleyball tournament allowing
students to form teams and compete in a fun and friendly event all while supporting a great cause March is shaping up to be an exciting month at jmhs on March 5th we have the annimal student versus faculty basketball game followed by the battle of the classes on March 6 both events bring out the best
school spirit and always a highlight of the Year another event to look forward to is the jmhs spring Musical Shrek running on March 13th 14th and 15th the cast and crew have been working incredibly hard and we know it will be an amazing show finally March into Wellness activities are planned for the
week of March 24th with guest speakers trivia during common lunch and a Spirit Week highlighting the importance of mental health for teens the student body looks forward this annual event and appreciates the efforts of guidance director M Mr Palumbo and our student associate counselor Mrs kiano and the
rest of the jmhs guidance staff for all their efforts during March into Wellness week as winter sports come to a close we want to congratulate all of our athletes and teams on their hard work and dedication throughout the season from the basketball courts to the wrestling mats and the ice rings to the track our athletes have represented jmhs with
pride with spring Sports just around the corner we're looking forward to another exciting filled season with competition teamwork and school spirit with the second semester now underway students and teachers are settling into new classes and preparing for what's ahead let's stay focused work hard and make the rest of the year make
most of the rest of the year looking ahead to next year big changes are coming as Jackson Liberty and Jackson Memorial come together whether at Memorial or Liberty while change can be challenging this is an opportunity for our schools to unite collaborate and create a stronger jaction Community if
we approach this transition with positivity and teamwork we can make it a great experience for everyone thank you Mrs PR and the board of education for your continued support I look forward to updating you again next month have a great evening thank you Colin for the excellent report and the wonderful
positive messaging at the end as well um so I too would like to point out some exciting and uh similar items that are happening across the district uh just a few few things for this evening uh you heard about the upcoming musicals and
plays that both our middle schools and high schools are about to launch in March with their um performances I do encourage you to come out and support our students they are amazing uh what they can do and it's just a wonderful um opportunity to get to see our students
performing so please encourage I encourage you to go support them like you would support anybody else they're incredible um programs and I can't wait to see them myself myself I too would like to congratulate the high school Jackson wrestling girls team for their
big win on Sunday this combined Liberty and Memorial team has been operating like a combined team for five years they won the team State title excellent example of the power of uniting together congratulations to the wrestlers and the
coach on coaches on that incredible accomplishment and congratulations to all of our athletes through the winter season so many successes I believe we still have a basketball team that's still moving through as well um up to some some other levels of competition so congratulations to them and good luck we
um are impressed with all of our athletes and their participation I also wanted to mention that we have had 18 seniors earn the Seal of biliteracy which is an incredible accomplishment uh a seal of by literacy some of them are in Spanish
Ukraine Polish Russian and Italian what a fantastic accomplish M for those 18 seniors and I'm so impressed by them uh incredible I also wanted to point out um that the 2425 calendar is being updated
on tonight's agenda due to the recent snow day the last day of school right now will be June 23rd um so please just remember that and I was very pleased to hear that we're not dealing with a major snow Tor storm tonight and into tomorrow um so that that was some good news so
those are some Wonder ful happenings there's many many more I encourage you to continue to watch the Facebook pages the district website um at every school uh provides lots of updates of the wonderful happenings across the district so in regards to our ssrp and
our restructuring plan I am keeping my comments short tonight we have provided presentations we have shared information at Board of Ed meetings we've shared other information online on our website uh we have uh heard question questions
we have heard comments we have read them uh the Q&A document on our website continues to be updated and we will continue to do so through this process um I was asked to clarify about the high school recommendation by the board and so I do want to comment on that and that
the strategic planning committee I did say this once before did not make that final decision of which high school facility they had lots of input lots of comments and toward the facilities But ultimately Administration made that recommendation to the board as I said in our last meeting uh I
really recognized this change is difficult it's emotional for all of us emotions are high everyone here is well intended we're all here for the right reasons for our students we're trying to make the best decisions for our students so that they can have the best programs
available to them the co-curriculars and still make strong fiscal decisions that will set us up for better success our goal in consolidating is to create a United strong community and J uh Jackson schools and opportunities and educational
experiences and strong programs for all and I just ask that the community work together to continue to move forward in the directions that we need to go for the benefit of our students whatever the vote is this evening we will work hard together to unite everybody and to
support our students our staff and our families through the transition that's why we're here and we will continue to work hard in those ways with that I close my superintendent remarks um now we're going to go to standing committee reports and first up
is um building and buildings and grounds Mr McCarron yes uh some Capital Improvement projects that occurred in the district switlick room 7 had a new compressor installed Liberty c125 new thermostatic expansion valve installed
for the HVAC unit Memorial prek installed a new hot water heater m call if installed new walk-in refrigeration unit Liberty uh be kitchen 200 floor floor tiles were replaced by the
maintenance and Grand project update home and Elementary School gym HVAC project is completed budget and finance uh Mrs Gardell yes we met to reviewed the preliminary budget numbers for 2526 um obviously the state aid numbers
come out later this next week at the end of the month and we'll meet again before and have a presentation for the community sometime in March at our next March meeting our ad hoc committees um we have scholarships Mr
Walsh well the scholarships have closed for the students they're in the hands of the sponsors they will make their selections within the next six weeks that is all next up is the state and County School
boards representative uh Mrs Rivera yes next County meeting will be March 31st it it will be 8th grade dialogue at Central Regional High School at 6:30 advocacy Mrs Gardella um I just want to say to the
public in light of us receiving State numbers and discussing a budget if you could just pay attention as you did to the restructuring to how you can help us advocate for funding in our schools that would be great thank you and um then we have the enrollment study committee Mr
McCarron I have nothing to report for that thank you okay I need a motion for the approval of the minutes motion second discussion do I need
to no okay roll call Dr Osman yes Mr Walsh yes Mr M Caren yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs barokas yes Mrs gardo yes Mrs Cass yes I need a motion for the approval of
the bill list motion second discussion roll call Dr Osman yes Mr Walsh yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs Rivera yes
Mrs barokas yes Mrs gella yes Mrs Cass yes I need a motion for the I need a motion for the approval of the treasurers and board secretary's reports motion second discussion roll call Dr Osman yes Mr
Walsh yes Mr McCaron yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs barokas yes Mrs gella yes Mrs Cass yes I need a motion to open the public forum on agenda items only we will hold another public forum during this meeting for other questions
this public forum will be for questions on the agenda only motion second please sign in and state your name and whether or not you are a Jackson resident each person is allowed a maximum of 3 minutes to speak no person may speak more than
once on the topic until all others have been heard um seeing no one come forward I need a motion to to close public forum motion all in favor I I resolutions for Action I need a motion to move the Strategic redist
redistricting and restructuring plan motion second discussion roll call Dr Osman okay so this is what we're doing now right yeah okay um so I'm going to share some thoughts
before I vote so that people understand where my vote's coming from is that okay that's disc it was discussion yeah yeah we're good okay so I wrote out
some thoughts um I think it's important important to share these so we find ourselves in this very untenable position because the state has not given the Jackson School District or a fair share of funding despite the fact that we are fiscally responsible and
compliant with every edict that comes down from the St the state whether we agree with them or not when Governor Murphy took office s years ago he implemented a devastating series of cuts that have debilitated our school district from a fiscal perspective and
we have tried very hard using Band-Aids to keep moving forward and it is no longer feasible for us to do so as our superintendent clearly communicated for years at this point we knew we would be eventually pushed off the fiscal cliff
and that day has tragically C come so instead of funding our schools at similar levels to what had been deemed necessary under prior administrations it appears to me that Governor Murphy chose to take the surplus of tax revenues that the state
has received over the last 7 years and reallocated it to democratic stronghold communities that vote for them the districts who have been affected by S2 funding are majority Republican communities and I believe it was clearly a partisan move intended to punish the
communities that did not vote for the Democrats and Governor Murphy so we tried to play by the rules and it got us nowhere the state just continued to cut more money year after year and when we can no longer continue to cuts through austerity they forced us to
beg for a loan and inserted a state monitor to oversee our finances a state monitor who to be clear is appointed by the commissioner of Education who to be clear the commissioner of education is appointed
by the governor point being the governor is essentially running our district so we now get a state monitor who buys statutes gets to control our school district because we had to borrow money due to the governor's reduction in funding yes
the state failed us and as we heard tonight we I'm speaking for all of us right in this one sentence we um believe it's time to fight back in my opinion the board of edge should do nothing and continue to operate our school in the
fiscally responsible manner we have been doing the Monitor and Auditors have all stated publicly that we are doing it right they have on the record time and time again stated we do not have a spending problem but a revenue problem
it is not fair to the students of this community to have us all fighting with each other for the scraps that the state has left us to be clear this is not a partisan board we have been elected to fight in the best interest of the students of this community and we have
no choice but to finally stand up to this horrible treatment we are receiving from the state our fight should not be about whether we are Republicans Or democrats rather it's simply the right thing to do our students deserve better the
students in this community deserve as much of an opportunity as the students who live in communities that vote for Democrats what has been done is wrong to the is wrong to the community and the students of Jackson in my opinion we should continue to operate our schools as we have and I agree with fighting the
state for our fair share of revenues it's time that we unite against the real problem which is the funding formula which has targeted communities like ours because in my opinion we didn't vote for this Governor our district cannot continue to sell schools one at a time if we do we will be left with no schools
or assets we did our best to be rule followers and trusted that the state would see the errors in their ways they did not we can no longer just say yes and I'm hoping that we move swiftly with this lawsuit and I believe this board does need to sue the Department of
Education the commissioner of Education the New Jersey governor and the state monitor because in my opinion they all failed us the state the state clearly cannot be trusted the Jackson School District was told to create a balanced budget without
any possible loan numbers being included other towns were told the same ignored the directive and were rewarded with millions in loans which I believe is unlikely to ever be fully repaid the Jackson School District was told there would be absolutely no loans
given by the state yet we are told that the state just gave an enormous loan to a neighboring District a $65 million loan but we're hearing it's probably going to be more like a hundred million and who publicly stated that the loans
will most likely not be paid back and that they will never really be in a position to stop asking for loans due to how much they owe over the years which is close to 300 million that's in comparison to our 6 million which we are actively and responsively responsibly
paying back each year as our loan agreement requires in short and as clearly as I could state it the New Jersey state government collected our tax dollars reallocated the money they collected in an unfair manner lied and last year
alone told us that we should expect a cut of approximately $800,000 but instead the state cut us by a shocking $2.4 million this is an additional $1.6 million over what we anticipated based on the untruthful
information the state gave us prior to the release of the actual State a numbers the last year after then last year after a huge waiting period and much begging on our part the state and I'm putting this in quotes rescued us
and I put that in quotes because if you break it down the state really only reallocated the money we already paid through our taxes and what they termed Advanced state aid but that's really just a fancy name for a loan and then allowed us to repay that
loan again because we try to pay to play by the rules we have been paying back this loan on time and in my opinion that's double taxation lastly after taking this loan the state tells us we must pay for State monitor who we pay over $100,000 a year
to enable her to override our votes and let me point out she is not and she has never been an El elected Jackson official and so ask yourself what has this person done for us besides placing
Us in more debt by paying her salary a salary that we'll need to pay year after year simply because we paid her taxes but then that money was not divided fairly one of the state monitors roles is to be meeting with their Boe and they should be meeting with the Boe quarterly and providing train training and
education on how to avoid decision making that led to needing a state monitor we have had no meetings because as our monitor has pointed out we are doing things right and this is a revenue problem and not a spending problem the state monitor is also charged with the
task to report monthly to our Boe and to the public I don't believe she really ever did this in her monitor cap capacity we've only had questions answered and many times even those answers are I can't really answer that
in my opinion this is ridiculous that we're forced to pay for services of a monitor that has changed nothing in the way that the district runs again because it's a revenue issue and not a spending one schools like ours are getting cut after cut neighboring schools are
getting Millions upon Millions other districts in the state get billions with a B billions billions what educational institution would ever need billions ions of dollars to offer a fair level of thorough and efficient education also
known as TNA it's a number that's really insane and you know you've all read the articles they're throwing team building parties these numbers are insane in my opinion it seems like discrimination by the state saying one population of
students is more important than another this is fiscally and morally wrong in a nutshell our monitor has done nothing but saddled us with more de by paying her salary she has not helped us in securing any additional funding has not
offered solid recommendations since as she stated this is not a spending issue I feel that if the state wants to continue to pay Miss Morris that that's the state's choice but as a board I would like to see us make the commitment that we won't be signing those checks
moving forward and I hope to see that option discussed soon we have become a very unique district with a large and rapidly growing private school population this is not a matter of public first private in fighting laws
and mandates have been followed yet they are fiscally unsustainable and outdated Jackson is unique and I call on our governing body Governor Murphy specifically to properly fund our district the failure to do so is clearly
dismantling our Jackson Public Schools it you really need to fix the political hypocrisy as a board we do have a responsibility to continue to make ethical and well-thought out Financial choices we cannot ignore the business
side of Education we were voted into these positions because the community entrusted us to oversee policy and fiscal responsibility but our community also expects us to think about our students the state and Mrs is even
though she's a very nice lady but her role is very different than your boards in my opinion they look at the district strictly through the lens of finance and the goal is a balanced budget with little regard to education as a Boe
member I understand that we must think with a business mind but we won't do that solely without thinking about education and our students well-being in Jackson we are not asking for billions we are are asking for enough to continue to offer TNA to all students in our
district we are on the verge of not being able to offer thorough and efficient Education Without proper funding we will not be able to continue programs we will not be able to pay our bills if we need to cut courtesy busing in a town like ours the health and safety of students will be at risk and
we will not be able to do our part as a district helping Just Produce educated and productive members of our society the governor has offered waivers to improve test scores to essentially look better on paper for schools have you ever asked yourself why could it be that
the state is positioning themselves to defend litigation filed against it in court cases that are based on tne arguments if you look great on paper even if the numbers are inflated everything's wonderful isn't it we must think about our actions before moving
forward in all aspects of running this District since high test scores attendance graduate rates Etc can lead to another excuse by the state regarding lack of funding of course we're Boe our community we want nothing more than for
our students to be highly successful but it appears that the state is using our Student Success against us that's tragic on so many levels so we need to stop the political hypocracy we need the state to stop
punishing students for the way that adults vote stop the double taxation stop sending billions of dollars to any school and stop the reverse discrimination it is my hope that we could take this all the way up the court system in my opinion that's the only way
to fix a system that's so broken is to stop placing bandites on a problem that needs complete and total reform so looking at what we're voting on now I think I have a responsibility to make sure that we're being proactive and doing our job as a board and so I'm
going to vote Yes for one a 1 through 4 but I am voting no for b c d and e thank you Mr Walsh I look at it uh our job is
to provide an education to the present students and the future students not the past students because of that I'm looking for the best facility to be used to educate our
students so I will vote Yes for all Mr McCaron yes I'm going to be voting yes for a 1-4 and I will be voting no for B C D and E Mrs
Rivera yes Mrs baroas I will be voting yes for one through four I will be voting no for 1B no for 1 C and I will be voting yes for 1 D and yes for
1e Mrs Gardella I'm sorry I vote yes I yes for One D and one e right Mrs Gardell she voted yes okay yes thank you Mrs Cass yes yes so uh with four positive votes
the motion carries for um items the Strategic redistrict and restructuring plan motion to move Finance motion second discussion roll call Wa I had a quick question uh for finance number
11 for I think it was 11 yeah for 11 for the appraisals what information was going to be provided within the appraisals for the uh the report was is that to include
Deeds as well or no uh it was not it was a it was a real estate valuation for the property sale and also uh an estimate for what the property would rent for okay thank you roll call Dr Osman Mr Walsh yes Mr McCaron yes Mrs
Rivera yes Mrs barokas yes Mrs Gardella yes Mrs Cass yes motion to move facilities motion second discussion roll call Dr Osman
yes Mr Walsh yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs barokas yes Mrs gella yes Mrs Cass yes that was that was facilities that was fac okay motion to move programs motion
discussion oh second second discussion roll call Dr Osman yes Mr Walsh yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs Rivera yes Mrs baroas yes Mrs Gardella yes Mrs Cass
yes motion to move students motion second discussion roll call Dr Osman yes Mr Walsh yes Mr McCarron yes Mrs Rivera yes
Mrs barokas yes Mrs Gardella yes Mrs Cass yes motion to move Personnel motion second discussion roll call Dr Osman yes Mr
Walsh yes Mr McCaron it's going to be no for 11 B5 yes to everything else Mrs Rivera yes Mrs barokas
yes Mrs gordel yes Mrs Cass yes I need a motion to open the public forum on any topic pertaining to the Board of Education motion second please sign in and state your name and whether or not you are a
Jackson president each person is allowed a maximum of 3 minutes to speak no person may speak more than once on a topic until all others have been heard if there are any questions we will wait until the end and respond respond at once at the end thank you
um my question statements are for the Monitor and mainly I'm repeating a lot of what was said but I really want you to know that as a taxpayer and as a as a resident I'm fully
behind the lawsuit against the state you stated in a previous meeting that we have to prove a balanced budget you also said that no school district in the state can propose a budget for the district that spends more than you have the revenue to support it you also said
the state will not permit you to do this and get to the middle of the school year and simply close the doors and say we can't do it anymore we don't have any money this brings me to our neighboring School District February 6th it was reported that the Lakewood school
district will be unable to pay the teachers other staff members or meet their billing obligations as of February 22nd if the state aid is not provided in the form of Grants Andor long awaited State
loans Lakewood received a promise of 65 million just 10 days before they could have had to suspend classes cancel staff paychecks so essentially end the school year Midway through
the loan brings that school district's State loan debt to more than $230 million and to top that off it has also been reported that the school district they pay their district attorney they
PID 6 million since 2017 this is more than any other New Jersey Public School lawyer makes districts a lot bigger than Lakewoods and to end I'd like to say I'm very frustrated that our district is being
cut off at the knees when we've proved to be fiscally responsible by a state government that is not themselves fiscally responsible how is any of this okay I don't understand I
next uh good evening uh my name is assemblyman Alex siwicki I am a lifelong resident of Jackson a proud graduate of Memorial and uh I'm just here tonight really to again offer uh my support to all of you uh as I have at previous
meetings last meeting I was at was at your July 24th meeting uh it was an interesting meeting to say the least and I'll comment on that in a minute uh but before I do uh again I just want to uh underscore Dr Osman what you said uh in
in uh the state's handling of all this is spot on absolutely spot-on and uh the state absolutely has caused all of this all of it uh and I want to be clear I would be saying this no matter who was in office right now no matter who the governor was no matter what party was
being represented this Governor has absolutely destroyed this school district and school districts like it um inside my district and outside we have neighbors in Tom's river and brick and Lacy all getting absolutely decimated
right now for lot of the same reasons you highlighted uh I wrote an editorial saying your children's school districts are being destroyed and it's by Design I can assure you it's by Design all right absolutely so the impossible situation you've all been put in has been
unbelievable uh the last board as well as the new board Cal reorg has done everything that you can uh I realize that it's not going to be the right answer for everybody uh but I I do realize the position that you're in there is um legislation that I've put in
uh one to eliminate the cost of the state monitor to school districts like ours it's absolutely ridiculous that a school district that's fiscally hurting now because of the state has to actually pay for the salary too for the monitor right so I do have a bill that hopefully will change that going forward uh we
also have a bill and just to give you an idea how I work I I do work across the aisle as much as I can there is a bill right now that would be a replacement for the existing funding form formula that is bipartisan it has four legislators names on it which you have to get the speakers
approval to go above three to make it um to to show the support of it being bipartisan that would help this District it it won't solve it all but it certainly would help this District going forward that you know we are really trying to to push and again I have some optimism because it is bipartisan last
thing I'll remind you of we are voting for a new governor this year make your vote count last thing last thing I I want to point out I left a copy of a letter uh in front of all of you um and probably a weird Twist
of irony uh if if if I can't even think of the word but it it's painful um the the last meeting I was at at the 24th I came here because that very day the acting commissioner put out a press release smearing all of you that day all
right and Miss Morris was good enough to to to validate that it was incorrect all right the the acting commissioner who who we have all pleaded with to help this school district the superintendent this board last year's board and me as well as Su mon Clifton who also
represents this District have pleaded with the acting commissioner to help this district and got absolutely nothing but on July 24th two days after the deadline for the last year's school budget he took the time to put a press release out blaming this board for
missing the deadline all right which Miss Morris confirmed at that that meeting per my questions that it was her in fact that was over to her to to approve that budget she missed the deadline I asked her why they put a PR out her exact answer was I don't know and I appreciate the the answer all
right tomorrow in a senate committee that acting commissioner is up for a a confirmation as a full commissioner tomorrow I wrote a letter to the uh chair of that board which I I I left for all of you strongly opposing that I will
be at that hearing tomorrow Miss Morris you might want to let your boss know cuz I am going to light him up at this meeting so thank you all uh my name is um n Goldstein um and I just wanted to tell you that I agree with everything that was said here about
you know the Jackson's Troubles you know the public school and the state monitor it's not what I came for but I still agree with it um my um my children don't go to public school they go to private school um and we are serviced by the
Jackson board has sent out the transportation to the lsta um last year I came to this board because the lsta is charging uh processing fee just to get your name on
their list it's not to pay for busing it's not for paying for anything just a processing fee last year I was told that this is illegal they're not let to charge any money um I don't know what happened but I was still charged the fee and since I
have a few kids in school you know it it does add up um this year I got a letter saying that they're charging the fee is going up they're still charging it I have a letter here that says we have to
go on to their portal to um sign in to get our kids to be6 to fill it out and before we can fill out the form we have to enter in our credit card number so I cannot fill out my form without putting in a credit card number I wanted to know
did something change over the year is it now legal to charge a fee or is this illegal and nothing's been done about it a whole year and maybe something could be done um that was that was just um my question
that was number one number two was that there was recently a snow day last week um the private schools were not closed the public schools were closed um we did not get transportation that day
uh um I I was told I we were told we got a message out that the Jackson board does not allow Transportation does not allow the lsta to provide transportation I just wanted to know if that was that they're not allowed to or
they don't have to I wanted to know what the real story was that's that's what I came to find out thank you before anyone else speaks I just want to remind everyone that this is a respectful building I told you last time I will ask you to leave if you cannot be respectful
I will not tolerate it thank you neither will this board you can go good evening my name is Dr Christopher vatti and I've been here for quite a few months I'm worked as a teacher I'm now a high school principal I know about budgeting and fiscals I
just want to thank you all for your time Dr Osman made a lot of good points God bless you and I thank you all for your time and getting this done guys thank you very much appreciate it and on behalf of my daughter I thank you Mr patrino for everything for her in schools I appre apprciate it thank you
very much hi um Andrea frangella uh resident of Jackson I just want to make sure I understood something correctly because of course we were all looking at like the original plan and all that so I want to make sure I understand that gets will become the 56 building and McCulla will be the one that's closed so if that's
correct can someone please explain to me why that was decided thank you yeah I I just kind of wanted to Echo that that because um you voted for something that wasn't in the the memo here so there was there's a little it's
a little unclear uh the other the other question and I hope you can address this is um I know there there's a lawsuit uh that's happening right now and I was wondering how binding is your vote uh considering there's an ongoing lawsuit and we do have some time for that action
to happen thanks uh Jeff Hena lifelong Jackson resident I'm not going to talk about any traffic stuff anything like that uh you made your decision I don't agree with it um but we got to move on we got to unite um a
couple questions for you I'm going to go back to sports again it's another passion of mine you the board decides on the coaches am I correct or not miss Peril I'm not sure about that if you do when is that getting voted on um what's going to be
taken into account for selecting the coaches um it should be by probably job performance not who's here the longest and I said that the last meeting um I think it's fair only fair to the coaches and the players to uh or or the kids to know who's where they're going uh I'm
sorry who's coaching the teams um so they could start uniting and getting preparing for for next year what's the what's the how's the process going to be about the name of the school uh the uniforms all that stuff uh are the kids going to be involved with that
um and I think that's all I have for now thank you again sure are there any additional questions seeing no one come forward I need a motion to close public forum motion all in favor
iation that would be great thank you okay so we had a couple of questions we want to make sure that we respond to I'm going to actually ask Mr binsky to answer the L with regard to the woman who got up about the b6s you should you should not be asked to put a credit card in before
filling out the form that's absolutely uh not should be should not be happening we'll make sure that we follow up with the LSA tomorrow about that um however one of the things is one of the agreements with the lsda and this is why the Consortium was created was they have the ability to either pay you Aiden l or
if they can go out to uh bid for a route and if that bid uh if they can add to the bid threshold to make it uh more attractive for vendors they have the ability to do that and that's why the Consortium exists but no uh non-public
parent would be forced to do that um that would be an option and that is something that the lsta manages directly I will tell you that this year we were able to uh provide transportation for about 4,000 students because of the agreement 4,000 non-public students so
uh obviously there's a little bit of a Mis a disconnect with uh the lsta and the b6t portal uh I will follow up on that tomorrow and we will get back to you so if you didn't leave your contact information if you can leave your contact information up here we'll get back to you and then with regard to the
closure on a snow day with the private schools it's been the district's practice that whenever the public schools in Jackson are closed uh we do not provide transportation to uh the private schools during that day as well that includes votch and also all of our non-public schools that we transport to
that is not something that's new for us uh every Jackson resident who we transport their safety is is of absolute uh uh importance on those incent weather days and we make sure that uh whatever we do for not for public students we do for non-public students I will tell you
that it was a tough call that day because the weather did change it started off as snow then it came became rain and in the afternoon uh it seemed like you know you could transport in the afternoon but once a decision like that is made in the beginning uh there's vendors involved and there's and you
know that was the decision that was made so we did uh have a a communication with Township officials uh and what one of the things we will do is we will revisit that in the future and consider it we're not the only ones in the same boat Lakewood obviously and also Tom's River
School District uh sends students to the Lakewood private school so uh we'll we'll continue the discussion about that thank you Mr thank you Mr binsky um I'm also going to turn the mic over to is cast to answer the question about the get
McCulla switch um the board um switched um uh gats and mlli for a couple of reasons um we did evaluation on both properties um mlli had a higher value so we felt down the road that may come into play in addition there was a title
search done um gets has a reverter clause on the property so if it's not used for the purpose of the property it reverts back to the original owner and we felt that that would diminish the value of that property going forward so for a 56 building we felt that it was um
a good choice there was a question about the the litigation and how that could impact the redistricting plan and I would say uh it certainly could potentially impact the way we've redistrict redistricted tonight in the future um but litigation is a a long arduous process
unfortunately and I would say it's too early to tell at this point in time um um but if we are ultimately successful which of course is our goal um we could always revise and um take another look at what we've done tonight in the future
it's not set in stone uh and hopefully we'll get the results we're looking for in terms of the funding and we can certainly evaluate the decision that we made tonight in the future but again it's in my opinion not going to affect what we did tonight for the 25 26 school year I think it's going to take longer
than that unfortunately thank you Mr Z uh and then we had the uh another question about Athletics um so officer hemp I do want to uh let you know that all of those things are being taken under consideration uh we are beginning we
were waiting for the final vote to begin those processes and to communicate with our staff so those decisions and the ways that we will make decisions about um coaches is forthcoming in the next few weeks um and taking into consideration um some of the things that
you mentioned we have already started to begin to form Committees of students and staff members in the process of uh looking at mascots and rebranding so all of that work is to come we have a lot of work to do now moving forward and all
those committee Works will now begin to move forward since there has been a board vote and we will continue to keep the public informed on how things are progressing with our committee work students are a big part of that process I believe those were all the questions tonight so I turn it back to
you okay so we're going to go to board comments I will start down with you Mr W first uh besides the girls wrestling state championship boys bowling won the shore Conference Championship they also won
the division and girls swimming won their division so I'd like to congratulate all of them this whole thing is a very difficult thing to do it's emotional okay in my opinion I look at education the
educational I was a longtime coach okay I would love to stay on the fields that I coached played on I'm a graduate from Memorial too but I look at the schools and I look at uh the facilities that they have and me personally I think
that's more important okay we'll get there we'll come together and we'll make things work thank you I just wanted to congratulate the uh girls wrestling and all the other sports as well um while we're putting in a lot
of time for the restructuring we try to attend as many events as possible um we can't obviously be all the events but uh we certainly see the success that everybody's having we're real proud proud of the kids uh coming together and having that success looking forward to
the uh spring Sports coming up I know things are going to be starting there and uh thank you appreciate it and just want to also acknowledge the emails uh we we were inundated all of us with emails uh I like to just usually send
out received it got it read it uh some sort of acknowledgement it got to the point where it didn't make sense to um but every email was read every email was was seen was seen by everybody forwarded to everybody so I just wanted to acknowledge that now thank
you obviously I said a lot tonight so I'll just wrap it up with I don't 100% agree with how the vote went today but I very much respect the people who are on the board with me and I don't think one way of looking at it or the other way of looking at it is wrong it's just where
we are prioritizing what we see as the most important there's definitely people here who are going to say oh you know it's education and I'm putting that facility first and I could respect that as a teacher I could respect that but I just hope that moving forward um I encourage our board
and I know they will do it is that we cannot be naive to the fact that there is a business side to education and I know we all want to see education as very very pure and we come in and we learn I've been in the field a pretty long time and I can tell you that's great but there is a business side of
Education and we have to keep that in mind moving forward while still thinking about the education aspect and how it will affect children so we have to kind of find that sweet spot it's hard to do we're all doing our best we've read all the emails the comments I've seen the
Articles yes everybody who's writing me emails did you see your words were switched yes I did thank you for the support um I'm sure I'm sure it'll be interesting seeing what people right now um but thank you all for coming out now we need to unite there's no nothing else
that we can do and we move forward from here if we agree with each other or not we have to move forward I thank everyone for attending tonight's meeting and viewing us at live stream and the comments they were really tough decisions and I thank all the board members and administrators for all
their hard work dedication respect and one another even during our hard conversations I hope we continue to unite as we all live in the same zip code everyone have a safe and wonderful evening so we've we've spent um you know many months um sleepless nights I almost
came in my pajamas um but I I do I wanted to say I respect everyone on the board we it's they're very tough decisions um at the end of the day we are one Jackson and I'm looking forward to seeing everyone come together and um
you know the the lawsuit is is also a must and I'm looking forward to seeing what we get out of that as well um we're always going to fight for the school district as one uh I also wanted to congratulate our
uh the girls swimming team our boys bowling bowling team and the Jackson girls wrestling team for becoming state champions I also wanted to uh congratulate Sophia Balo Delany spalt Giana Berkeley and my Paige for
representing us the other day at National girls and women in sports day from both schools and also for those of you that have no plans next Thursday night um on February 27th the Jackson Education
Foundation is has plenty of seats open and we'd love to have everyone join us throughout the community it is a fundraiser for all of the students all the money goes back as Scout scholarships and grants and it helps everyone so I hope to see many of you there and I look and I'm happy that
everyone turned out tonight and it may not be exactly what everyone wanted but at the end of the day we will get through and I think everyone will be for the better of it so thank you all and have a good night I also wanted to congratulate all the sports teams especially girls wrestling um really only my husband and
my kids know but back in the 9s um when there was no girls wrestling team I did put on a pair of shoes and wrestle with the boys um and there's still some employees that didn't appreciate that back at that time so that's amazing and I hope some girls petition for flag
football because I think that would be the next amazing girl sport that we could see here in front of this board um I also wanted to point out it was pointed out to us um uh finan motion number nine there was a donation of
$1,000 to um pay off outstanding school lunches and once again it's a awesome thing that Jackson residents do for our schools uh I'm excited to be you know moving on the other side of working together I'm excited to go to sporting
events and have additional time um and not learning about how to read and audit and looking at other people's financials and neighboring districts and deciding what's wrong or right um you know it's about the kids and us getting involved and seeing the great things so I'm looking forward to making some plans to
get to see the musicals um you know I'm not GNA Echo you know Dr Osman you did an awesome job uh thank you for resonating really what all of our frustrations are throughout um every year that I've been on the board and
even before that uh there are really some Simple Solutions and I appreciate um assemblyman zi you know we speak to him a lot and he is unlike most legislators because he will work across the party lines and you know your board
is sitting around uh looking at articles and reading things is a great article and some very easy solutions that I just wanted to point out and maybe um Miss Morris could bring them back to her DOA and commissioner um you know some of the things killing us are using median uh
aggregate income instead of median income right median income talks about what really Can a district afford um also you know mandating that towns use a p portion of their payment in L taxes for new developers to either go towards schools or take that out if they're not
going to use it then don't include it as part of what our enrichment is and how much we can afford with local fair share um updating transportation and security calculations making the formula public so we can talk about what's happening 10
years out I mean it's kind of interesting you feel really bad but all of us have to say we really don't know we don't know because we don't even know how they're coming to give us these funds and it's really disturbing and disheartening um there's probably so many more things that could we could
talk about that would make more sense and I just hope that the district uh the community members understand that in this District the consolidation was one step towards closing a budget deficit and being a functional District without a state involvement it was just one small step you know essentially if you
you wanted to really do that you would have to really destroy a wonderful amazing town right because you would have to get rid of some of the things that we sat here and fought for Courtesy busing Athletics um maybe AP courses
right or stemies we don't want to do that so we still need the community regardless if they're happy or unhappy with the decision to forge forward to support the state coming and looking at funding for Jackson and surrounding towns you know there's only a couple
need bring towns that are one two years behind us um as far as where they're going to sit and what their deficit looks like um so I appreciate everybody being out here and that was my uh thought on where we
are standing with our budget and finance as always being the last to go um I'm not going to Echo everyone I just um I everything everyone said I'm on board I believe um at the end of the day we did have some disagreements today in the way the vote went but we all do
respect each other um and again I just want to remind everyone how tirelessly every single person on this board worked read the emails did their homework at the end of the day we have different thought processes or different interpretations and different perceptions and we picked based on those
reasons um so we are at this point just looking forward to going forward I think the kids you know it will be a good thing once it happens I think the the anxiety now is over it's done so that's that's always the biggest hurdle to jump it's
just getting there so now we're there so now we can start just building and moving forward um I too want to thank the person for the anonymous donation for the unpaid lunch balances and the sports teams I think they're doing great um I just want to thank everybody for
coming tonight and being here and supporting the district thank you motion to adjourn motion second all in favor I I