housing. Student. Do they believe that student is Do they believe the district has part of it? It wasn't discussed. And so does the community think the district has
adequate space. 39% say yes, 36% say no, 25% say I have no. So as you talk about potential bond referendum, the discussion has to focus because right now for the folks it's a solution
seeking the problem. They know that the kids are there and that it has increased. They don't understand how the actual space is being used and how it is being impacted by that growth. on the 2024 numbers. Um, that the fall
of 2024. >> That was the spring of 2024. >> Okay. Open the fall. Is there a correlation between the previous slide? Like it looked like somehow the district was messaging that
there's more students and at the same time the community started to understand that there's a need for space. >> That was part of the that was part of the discussion in 22. Yeah. I mean that was that was the concerted effort in communication because we saw that okay
they need to know they more understanding on how student enrollment has increased but then how it has been uh impacted on the spaces comparable spaces first off how important is it to ensure comparable
spaces between school buildings you don't have to anybody on this eight out of 10 people believe it's either very or somewhat important. The challenge is the next part. Do they think there are comparable spaces between school
buildings in the district? 61% say yes. Um so once again it you're a half step there. Some districts have to go back and tell people why comparable spaces are important. Um, you don't have to do
that, but you have to talk about and show them where there are deficiencies with comparable spaces for students across the district. If the district asks for a property tax increase, are they for all, against all,
or are they persuadable? It's a dead even tie. 26% or for all, 26% or against all. So, it will come out to the persuadable and how they break on this.
If they hear the district uh was asking for a property tax increase for a bond referendum uh for middle schools, and it was specific on middle schools, what's the dollar amount? 28% say nothing. I always want that number under
35%. So, we're below that. Uh 28% say $10 a month. uh 20% say $26 a month and then we have 14% that say $30 or more. So at the outset the typical resident
comes in roughly about 18 bucks just call about $200 a year at the outset. Um it's obviously the most important thing is the specifics of what's being asked for. So what we tested first, well
actually we we rotated this. So they half the sample got the classroom edition bond referendum. Half the sample got the the construction of the fourth middle school. So there's no positional bias on the $139 million classroom addition
bond referendum. and residents were told the owner of a $500,000 home would see an $18 a month tax increase. 56% support, 34% oppose, 11% are unsure.
Uh if we look at intensity, it's 12% to 10%. It's statistical tie on the intense position. Um and so what kind of surprised me in this is it kind of lines up with where people are at for dollar amount. Um but we don't have north of
60% support at the outset. Um and I think part of it hearkens back to they don't understand the need because we are in right now the environment we're in is people will support have to haves.
They're not willing to support nice to haves. And so right now it looks like a solution seeking a problem. And it kind of comes out on this one, the reason for their position, 29% education's important. That's wonderful. But that doesn't get people
to the polls on election day. Um cost is reasonable. Same thing. Nobody wakes up and says, "I have to go vote." Because the cost is reasonable. Uh they'll get up and vote because my kids are in the school. And they will absolutely get out to vote if it's needed. need has to be
the number one reason for a bond referendum. On the flip side, no children, taxes too high, costs too high, 5% said it wasn't needed. Now, well, 3% said, "I would really want to build a new school." So, when we test
the new school, $25 million middle school and residents were told it would be $30 a month on a $500,000 home. 40% support that, 57% oppose. Uh, and if we
look at intensity, it's 3 to one strong opposition to strong support. What's the reason? The cost is too high. Um, if we look at you have 10%, it's a consistent 10% saying I'm supporting because it's
needed. Um but on this one uh it is the cost and the taxes too high come in with a third of the community indicating that's that's why they would oppose. Now you mentioned earlier looking at taxes and prioritization. This is a
perfect example. We tested some other items got away from the middle school question and went through and just simply asked would you support a property tax increase for these purposes? Um not surprising they lead the list everywhere um across the state
uh facilities maintenance and safety and security 76 and 75 and people would support more for that at that level. Then we drop down to desk and furniture e and preschool space new office space
high school athletic facilities at 59%. That actually surprised me that there was a portion of sports that people we had a majority support. Then we get down to and sometimes people especially the athletic association get mad when I talk
about this. It's a prioritization of needs versus wants and no matter what if you with the classroom versus sports you're going to have this division. Even if you look at YZ's proposal that just came out that was based on the survey
one question for the bulk the big big referendum and then they had to pull out the pool because if the pool was in the main question it would potentially fail even though it's about 10% of the total cost. Um, so the performing arts space
at the middle school 5146, alternative high school space 5043, high school stadiums 4851, and a dome at South High School 3957 hearing all of those components, would they support?
>> So we just asked questions about bonds, not about operating levy increases. We asked, okay, we followed up on the construction of the new middle school >> with supporters and asked, would you because you're going to need money if you want. Um, they're willing to invest
for a new middle school. The problem is is there's not enough support in the whole community. Uh, so where do folks land uh on these other components? 30% say nothing, 29% say $8, 24% say 16.
13% say 24. So on this one it comes in at about $12 a month. Um but obviously that $12 a month if you had safety and security deferred maintenance they're going to support more. If it was focused at athletics uh it would be much less
than the $12 a month. And we asked this question in 2022 and we asked it again because there's this narrative when you have all these needs of let's just do it all at once. And it sounds great, but in the climate we're in with taxes,
um, this is the result that we get. What does the community think? Ask for everything now and be done or ask as needed. It is unchanged from 2022. It was 31% said ask for all in 2022.
This time 32% 61% said as needed. And then finally, where are folks getting their information? Um, very diverse uh uh communication uh
preference. Email, 20, 19% the website, 17% newsletter. Um, normally though, it's interesting, we don't normally get double digits actually saying they prefer to receive their information from other people. Um, um, and 10% saying
social media is actually high. Most people don't want to admit that they really get a lot of information from social media even though we all do. Uh but you don't want to tell a somebody interviewing you on the phone and then the newspaper. So at the end of the day with the
atmospherics in the district and the first part uh of the survey kind of a check-in post your November renewal um things look really good. you do not have the typical regression that we see after
a successful or unsuccessful referendum. Uh the financial part of it is it was a renewal. It's not under the spotlight like like a property tax increase. Um the financial situation of the household of the of the uh households across the district is moving in the right
direction. It's not the macro issue it was two or three years ago. The property tax issue is the issue. uh and you're not unique everywhere uh across the state of Minnesota right now. Um and that will determine uh people's uh
appetite and their capacity to pay. Um just because they don't support a property tax increase for these purposes doesn't mean they don't care. Okay? There are a lot of people out there that would support. They can't afford it at
this point in time. So, I'd be happy to answer questions. >> Yes. So, your opinion, what do you think trumps what? And I'll explain what I mean. >> Um, it looks like 64 to 76% of people
would be willing to look at facility maintenance, safety, and furniture in that order. And then there is some some reservation about tax dollars. So what do you think trumps do you think
the SL or the information you've got on caution trumps people wanting and agreeing to uh facility safety and furniture or do you think agreeing to this trumps tax?
that the the list of components shows you those higher supported ones will people will say will support more for those items. But where we're at um in
2017 uh Richfield uh did a bond referendum. It came in and did a survey just like this. Um and they had like 15 components like like you had. and on their survey back then this the tax tolerance was
about 10 bucks a month. But we went through and those facilities hadn't been updated in 50 years. Uh I think the lowest level of support for a property tax increase was about 68 69%. Going all the way up to 90%.
Um, and so the district looked at that and went all in and put out a question at $27 a month, three times the dollar amount, but because each component was so highly supported, it passed 6535.
Okay? People are still willing to go more, but they're being constrained. Two to three years ago, the constraint was the economy. Now the constraint is property taxes and it it is also not
knowing what the cities and counties are going to do next year and the year after that. There's they they're not counting on the consistency. So on safety and security um if if the tolerance comes in at about $10 a month, they probably go
to 15 or 20. They wouldn't go to 25 or 30 like they would have historically. Even that's been constrained right now. uh because of taxes. >> Question for you. It might be a question. >> I guess my concern looking at some of
this data is middle school issue as well as whether or not what kind of runway I I mean it it varies on how aggressive um you know like I said the good news is you're part of the way there. You don't
have to convince them that enrollment has been increasing. You don't have to convince them that housing is going to continue to increase. Um, so it really is lining up for them to understand
truly how enrollment has impacted the space and why the middle school is at the place at uh, and that's where the primary need is. Um, traditionally, I mean, the runway
it, you know, it can be a couple months, it can be a year. um you know this was queued up uh back in 2022 2122 the discussion was there um so it's not like you're
starting from scratch uh in essence with that it's and you're going back to the community and talking about this is the priority now um whether it can be turned around by the spring
it's you're going to have to cut through Um, and you're going to have to move very quickly in order to establish that. >> Uh, related to that, in your opinion, what are our odds of passing a referendum on middle school additions
and do you recommend going for that? >> The the the spring is is a challenge. Um, the fall is a challenge. Every election's a challenge. How's How's that for a How's that for a
copout? Um, no. In all ser referendums, regardless of the survey results, um, what we have been seeing, uh, if you look at the data, um, May is the worst
time to go right now. um that used to not be the case. Um May used to be preferred. Um it actually turns out April is is is a bit better just looking at past failure over the last six, seven years.
>> Well, it's like why is that doing April? >> Yeah. Um, August is never ever ever. Uh, November is going to be difficult because it might be an interesting election uh with the governor's race and
the Senate race and everything else. Um, that is the challenge of of November is getting through the clutter and and communicating. Um, the challenge though with spring is turnout. Uh and e even
with April, everybody gets stir crazy um in in Minnesota, the minute the sun's out, uh they don't want to canvas. They don't want to get out the vote. They don't want to do any of that. They want to make their summer late plan. Um and
the turnout has just been abysmal among parents in spring elections. Um, so districts have to do a really concerted effort uh in order to get uh the those parents to the polls because young parents have shown for the last 12 years
if there's a reason not to vote, they won't vote. They'll take the kid to baseball, hockey, dance, what have you. That's the priority for young parents nowadays. Um, so I mean that's that's the challenge of 2026 in a in a
nutshell. It's really it's it's picking and going all in on a time um that there's not one that's going to be opt um you know and now I I I'm really starting to wonder the whole November
because of what the cities and counties that September timeline for the preliminary tax estimate like St. Paul school district those residents knew that their taxes were going up 25%. Um, I was very worried about that one.
Uh, but they came through and and even in light of the 25% tax increase from the city and county, they overcame it. There were some districts that could not over that. Um, so and going in the spring, you move away from that. Um,
that's not part of the mix as much. >> And was it the one slide where you said it's like a it's kind of like a if it would pass. >> Yeah, it really is a coin flip. say thank you. >> Yeah.
>> One quick question. Um you said that all of the additional information would be in your final report. When can the board expect final report? >> Uh like to say before Christmas. Uh maybe I'll do is because we're only what
two weeks from Christmas now. >> I don't think it's a big deal. >> Yeah. The the re the report will kind of dive in. We'll look at the demographic breakdown, support, opposition, all of those sorts of things. Yeah. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Good. Thank you.
>> All right. Thank you all. We're going to move on to truth taxation. Bill, nobody wants to stay here. >> Wow, Bill, >> everybody's very excited. >> I be feeling a little self-conscious right now. >> The room's clearing out, Bill.
>> Well, this tends to be a little dry. >> Yeah, the numbers part. >> Okay. Anyway, um, Sheriff Swanson, members of the school board, Superintendent B, um, each year we need to present a public hearing for our
taxes for the next year. Um, and then after that, you'll be able to certify the levy for um, has to happen between November 25th and December 30th at least 6 p.m. or later. Um it certainly can be
part of a a schoolboard meeting which is what we are doing this evening but we need to stop and and allow for uh comments at the end of the meeting and then we can allow for the final levy. U things we had to talk about is first of all the current the current year budget
and of course the proposed property tax levy. So, we're going to take a little bit of time, talk about some background information, then talk about this year's budget briefly, and then of course talk about the levy again, some of the details of levy, and then have the public comment. It's important to note that the
legislature sets funding for Minnesota schools. The numbers we're going to talk about tonight aren't something that I came up with, not something Superintendent Bowman came up with. These limits all come from the state of Minnesota. the way that they choose to um fund
schools is by taxation. This is always important just to take a look at um funding is not keeping up with inflation and you can see the blue line is the inflation line. Of course, the dotted line is what we actually received from the state of Minnesota. You see the last couple years you see a
couple little small blips where we got some bigger increases from the state of Minnesota, but inflation has by far outrun that. If uh if the if the state of Minnesota would have kept up with inflation, the um our school district,
Lakeland School District, would have another $18.8 million um in our budget. The other area that we're really short on, of course, is special education. We talk about it all the time. >> Back in 22, um the state was um short on
giving school districts um special ed funding by $712 million. Now, we have had some new funding um lately. It was great. Um it's helped a lot, but we are still short $48 million statewide when we talk about special ed funding. And for our district, we still have a cross
subsidy of 6 million. I think it's very important to u understand that because there's a change in tax, it doesn't mean there's a change in the budget. Okay. Um all state levies based on um state determined formulas
plus voter approved referendum. Um some increases in taxes are revenue neutral. Either we have increased tax and a little less aid. The state does that a lot or they'll come through and say they have more more aid for us and then we'll change it on the tax side. Uh the expenditure budget is limited by our
revenue that we receive on the formulas. Um we certainly don't have any other areas to get any revenue. So, we can't spend more than what we bring in. Of course, um and of course, like I said, an increase in school taxes does not correlate to an increase.
The city and county have a little different set of rules than the from the than the school district. First of all, they run on a calendar year budget. So the the hearings that they're having right now, their budget starts right away in in January where we the money we're talking
about this evening in our levy doesn't start until next July. We run on that fiscal year. Okay, we're going to shift now talk a little bit about um the the budget and as I just said the the school district and the county city is a little
different. We um don't talk about next year's budget because we don't have next year's budget yet. But so that's why we talk about this year budget that we're in and that's why the county and city of course talk about their next budget. Of course our our uh budget is um based on different funds. You can see our general
fund of course is the by far the majority of our budget, but we have other funds, the food service, community service, and so forth are where those dollars are only spent on those pieces. Here's a bud here's what we just finished up that red columns are from
the year we just finished. So you can see in the general fund our volume there. We had revenues of $28 million and expenditures of just under $200 million. We have a fund balance now, overall fund balance has grown now to $25.5 million. But at the same time, as
we've talked um our un un um our unrestricted dollars, the board has asked to get that up to 10% and we are just now at seven. When we look at the year that we're in, you can see there we have revenues at 212 and expenditures
about the same. So we won't we're not going to see a big increase in our fund balance at the end of this particular year. We'll see some increase we'll see some increases but not what we've seen the last just wanted you to be aware of that. Um so overall our student
nutrition fund um has been very very healthy over the last few years. It spent down last year a little bit but that was on purpose. We we bought some some equipment. We bought some um tables for the for the for the students in the in the cafeterias. Um but we're still
that fund balance at 3.8 million is actually still a little bit too big for what the state wants us to get down to a three-month uh reserve. Uh so again, that's very healthy. Community service um few years back through the pandemic, they had lost quite a bit of fund balance and they're
just coming along now about about even on a yearly basis. our building fund. You see there that it dropped quite a bit this year, but of course that's that's how we we work. We we borrow the money, we put it in the building fund, and then we do our projects. So that's expected to go down. And you see there,
as we talked about LTFM, there will be a bonding this next spring. So that's why you're seeing that fund balance grow the year that we're in. Our debt service fund um is the only thing that runs through there is only our bond payments.
And then our um our internal service fund. We've talked about this in the past that we had quite a bit of usage of our insuranceances in the past spring and summer. You saw substantial decrease in that fund balance. Um it is behaving
itself so far this this year and we're hoping that will remain. >> We are we waiting for any rebound in that? >> I I don't No, we're not. We went through and double checked everything was there and there's nothing missing. Um, the rebates are kind of they kind of hide in
the dollars how we receive them, but they're all there. We verified that we overspent that fund by five million over $5 million. >> Um, important to uh understand that the dollars we're talking about tonight are the tax portion. >> Bill, can we go back to the previous
slide? I'm sorry. Um, I was going to ask the So, you're asking about the the debt service fund or internal service funding related to insurance. >> Oh, yes. Our insurance. Oh, I was looking at our debt. Okay. >> Yeah. Okay. So, let's make sure we
understand this. The internal service fund is our insurance that we that we um that we pay for ourselves. >> 1 point 1.8 8 million started the year at 7.2.
So we've already spent more than this. Oh, I'm sorry. We've already over spent >> Oh, this is last >> in fiscal 25. This this fund was um overspent. So we fund balance came down. >> Our insurance claims were higher than we were anticipating.
>> Yeah, absolutely. So we So our insurance claims came in $5 million planned for which decreased our savings account balance for that internal service fund 7 million to 1.8. Got it. So we don't know
if we're going to spend $5 million more this year. When do we normally find that out or like how do we have guard rails? Because if we because if we can't if it goes in the hole or it goes in the negative, it comes out of our general savings account. >> That's correct. >> Okay. And so if we only have $1.8
million right now, what are like I know this is probably for another meeting, so I apologize, but I just want to make sure we're all same page. Like we're anticipating a 1.8 only we're anticipating a $200,000 increase to that
spot by the end of next or this year. at fisc 26 we're what a third about a third of the way through the year at this point. >> Yeah. >> Um but yes, we we don't expect some big rebound. Um our increases for our our premiums this past year were only 5%.
Okay. So if if we see the same type of usage as we saw in 25 yes >> and that's something that we can't control if it happens it happens. If it happens again in this partic this cycle, that's another potential $5 million that we would dip $3 million into our savings
account. And and that is one of the say the negatives of when you are self-insured and you choose to run your our own insurance operation. So there y that's the risks that we have. It's been it's been great for our our
employees the last few years where we've seen increases of only 5% are in premiums >> the last three years straight running where most insurance that that market is going up 9 10% in a year >> and then was there a reason that we didn't increase uh premiums for the
school year or was kind of too late because the claims came in and we already set the premium for this school cycle. >> There was a when we reset the rates that's in the spring. >> Yep. We have open enrollment in April, right? So all those were set in April and the increases we saw were May, June,
and July. >> Got it. >> Yeah, Bill, we we are funded up to the aggregate stop loss, aren't we? >> Yeah, we have a stop loss for sort of any large >> Yeah, I I know we have a stop loss, but are we funded? Do we have the money so
that we've got money to pay claims up to that aggregate stop-loss? Because once that happens then the insurance company picks up 100%. With that being said we we are funded up to the aggregate right. The aggregate stop loss annual stop.
>> Yes. Is it aggregate or is it just >> but it's not really it's actually per it's per claim right. So >> we don't have an aggregate we just have an individual stop loss. >> Okay. So we have an open end on the back. >> Oh yeah. High high >> risk. Yeah. Super high.
>> Okay. This is this is actually since we started five six years ago. This is the first year that we've seen a decrease compound. It's been growing and we had no expectation that this would happen here this last spring. >> I feel like there's been conversation in
the news and and other employers about the new the the weight loss drugs are major contributor to that. Is is that a true? >> Well, I it's a contributor. It's not the main contributor by by any means, but we
are seeing we are seeing some very very large increases in the um drug payouts for those types of drugs. >> So, what was the main just an unusual year of need or was there a
>> you know, we we don't see you know who got what type of service. We just see the aggregate dollars, right? But we know that we um both um three three months where we had um claims of almost $2 million more than we brought in. What happened in in the spring into the
summer? >> We don't know what type of care is needed for. We just >> Well, we we Yeah, we have a list and I could we can get you those. Yeah. And so if those claims are occurring in those respective months, is anyone
watching to see if those claims are continuing on in this the next >> Oh, yeah. We're watching every single month. >> We like the last the last once this year started now. Um our revenue has been greater than our expenditures, but but
they're not large numbers. Okay. But both in September and October, they were positive. just we have no no guarantee as we go through the year what might happen or not happen. I mean I assume it's summer time and people are getting like >> well they have time or something like
that >> I think the biggest issue for this particular internal service fund because we are self-insured uh and I don't know if there's a policy right now in place where there a set number that needs to be hit so that premiums
need to be adjusted so that there is a fund balance or there is a savings account because If there isn't then comes out of our general fund account. So this is probably it's for another another meeting for consideration on having some
sort of security um a percentage for the internal service fund that now again that would be applied to all of those that choose to elect insurance through our school district. They would have to pay the additional premiums to ensure that there is a savings account so that
it doesn't go below. But that's for another day. Uh but the purpose of my questioning earlier was just asking about the expenditures of $212 million. Is that what was approved by the board in June did the initial budget and is
that and did that all has that changed? >> We we approved the budget was brought to the board in June. >> Yeah. >> Nothing we have not changed the budget. >> Okay. >> Um we are working on a revised budget. We're now, you know, back in June, we definitely had a lot of estimates and we
didn't know who we were going to hire. We were hired all the way through the summer, right? And now we'll bring forward a revised budget um with exactly who we've hired so we know a lot better idea exactly what we're going to spend in particular year. >> But the 212 that that we're seeing now
is the estimate that was provided. Correct. And >> then you're going to come back later to say here's the revised estimate. It could be up or down. We don't know yet. We have to wait. I'm sorry. Yeah, you will have to wait. >> Okay.
Any other question? >> Okay. Important to uh see again when the money we're talking about when we talk about our levy is about 25% of our of our general fund budget. Just to put in context when we look at how the money is being spent, you can see that by far the
majority of the dollars that we spend are going directly to our students. Look at the elementary secondary education all the way around the corner to people support services we're pushing 80%. And if you look at at the at the object
level you can see again we are a people person a people business right so by far 88 you can see 80% of our dollars go to the people that we hire to serve our Okay shift gears. We're going to now
talk about the levy. We're going to talk about the determination of the levy and we're going to do some comparison from this year to next year and then reasons for some of those changes that we see on that levy and take a little bit of time to talk about impact our taxpayers. Now, this looks familiar looks pretty
familiar for everybody. If you own a piece of property, you received one of these uh in the mail between November 10th and the 25th. Every owner of a taxable property of course pays taxes to the taxing jurisdictions as a county, city, school district, etc. Um, each
taxing jurisdiction sets its own levy based like I said earlier on limits on state law. Um, of course the county does most of the work for us. They send out the bills, they collect the money, and then they forward those funds to us.
Each school district uh may have levy can levy tax in over 40 different categories. Now for us we don't have 40 but we do have 26 quite a few uh different revenue streams that we work with on a yearly basis. Uh the maximum levy amounts are set by uh MDE for each
category. It's based on state law and of course if we have order approval on something then that's those limits. uh the property tax process key steps and we're talked about here in the next slide. So of course the city or county assessor determines the estimated market
value on each parcel of the property. The legislature sets the formulas for the tax capacity on each on each school district with the levy limits and then the county auditor calculates the tax capacity for each parcel of property um
as well as the total tax capacity school district. And of course, uh, Minnesota Department of Education, they calculate the levy limits, the maximum of what we can do in all these different areas, all these different um revenue streams. Uh, so the school district really only has
one one piece of this. Back in September, I brought you a preliminary levy. It hasn't it hasn't changed since then. If you remember, at the time, we there was the question whether we would renew the capital projects levy, but we did. So it is the same as we talked
about at that time. Of course, then our county auditor divides the final levy spreads it across everybody. So again, um when we talk about the um the approval that what we do back in se back in September 8th, that's the first
time that we see anything from from MDE and we um work with them to make sure everything is correct by time we bring that preliminary levy uh to the school uh board the end of September. And of course in mid mid November we the statements go out to everybody. We do
our public hearing as we're doing this evening. Then we take action to certify that levy uh for the next school year. Now here's the good news. Um I know we have a lot of different taxing jurisdictions looking at some relatively large increases. You see that our
overall increase for taxes uh for the 27 school year or the pay 26 levy is $326,000 or less than a half a percent at 042%. Now here's where we talk about all the different levy all the different revenue
streams that that we get. These are all different um and they all come through our taxes. Now this first section on top the first third that's our that's where our operating levies uh fit. especially the number four you see there that the operating levy by itself is going to generate almost $25 million
um for this for fiscal year 27 um the local um optional revenue L it's always hard to try to explain what happened here but the state does realize that they're not funding districts like they should uh so they allow school
districts to levy this L in our case we had operating levies already in place so what they've done is taken our operating levy, rolled it into the L. So, we didn't we didn't get more money. It just is now hooked to L. And what's what's frustrating about that is the inflation factor that we had on our operating
levies, we don't get it on the L. That's just the same amount every year. 400 I mean $724. But you see, we have some increases there. And that's based upon number one the inflation rate that's tied to our operating levy and the um enrollment
increases because we get paid per student when we look at these dollars. Now you look on the second section. Now these are all assigned. These are restricted dollars. You see that the achievement achievement integration. This is the portion that is levied about
twothirds of it. We get an aid from the state of Minnesota. So this isn't the full budget for ANI. Our safe schools money. This is for our school resource officers. Um you'll see there that we have safe schools district 917. We're a member of district 917 and they don't
have any type of levy authority. So all the member districts do have some level level of authority then to give to 96 917 for that purpose. So the safe schools you can see there that about $200,000 we're collecting and sending to
them. You see them also under lease levy the buildings that they're leasing um their portion there about $400,000. We're we're leving that money and sending it over to them. You see some of the other areas here. We got the, you know, vocational. There's a there's a small piece that helps us with our
vocational vocational um our teachers and our vocational programs. Uh reemployment. That's not the summer employment that we've um talked about in the past. That's um strictly unemployment where we're able to levy what we have to pay out. You see there
we have a $31,000 piece of the levy. our Q comp funds are are kind of like the ANI funds where a third of it here in the levy, twothirds of it's in aid from the state of Minnesota. Um going down to the last portion,
that's all the capital um components, our operating uh capital. It kind of works the same way. We get about half of it through our levy, half of it through state aid. Our LTFM dollars, they're in two two different areas, too. You'll see a you'll see a general fund
portion which is here at about $8 million. The other portion is in fund six where we actually borrow bonds and do those projects through fund six. Um and then you see a LTFM piece there for 917 also. This is something that
they haven't done in the past. So this is brand new this year um where $85,000 is going district 917 for the LTFM program. Okay, Bill. So, this lists of So, these are all of our tax levies that are part of our general fund. Again,
there are six funds that that that um that we use, but in general, um cost about $285 million to run our operation every year. So, as I look at this list, pretty much all of it is like pretty much required. State says here's what
you have to levy. The really thing the the only lever that we probably as a board control the most is number four the ref. Is that an accurate statement? >> I would say that's a very accurate statement. >> Okay. So when I look at the referendums number four that's $24.9 million. So we
as a board have the ability to request additional funding from our community. and previous boards as well as what we have done just most recently um have determined that at less than 10% of the $285 million that it costs to run our
district, we are asking that additional funding from our community members. So everything else is really not a whole lot that we can control. Um, and there are some districts that might get 30 $35 million from their community members, but at this time, Lakeville taxes less
than 10% of our annual expenditures for from our community members. Is that an accurate statement? >> Yes, it is. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Okay. I'm going to um Well, okay. You see a total here. You'll see then for the general fund uh the the pay 26 levy
here at 58.6 million. Um when we switch over here to uh uh community service um there's a small levy that comes for them every year. It's per capita. It's based it's not based on students it's based on per capita that actually live in our
district. So the basic levy the youth service and after school is all based on per capita. Um early childhood this is something every single year bounces around a little bit. when I talked about the formula, it doesn't mean we have less dollars for early childhood that we
get more aid instead. You see here the levy's down about 23,000. Um the other piece here where it's affecting them a little bit. Uh school age care, you see the levy there at 598,000. That's what they expect to spend on on the four after school daycare program
for special ed students. And you see the year before we didn't use all that fund. So that's why you're seeing that $120,000 adjustment, negative adjustment to that money that goes back to our taxpayers because we didn't use. Okay. And then debt service, of course, this is just paying for our bonds. Uh the basic levy
um you know, the bonds that we have right now that we're paying payments on basics at 7.2, LTFN's at $12 million. Uh so overall again we have a total levy of 78 329 96 with the increase of
326,000 overall. Okay. What can affect somebody's taxes on their piece of property? Of course changes in the value of an individual property. So if you're seeing a big change in taxes on your property that means there's a big change in your
valuation of your property. uh changes in total value of all property within a district. Now, we're seeing that here. We're seeing new properties being built, new properties coming on to the rules. So, lots of times when we talk about a point42 increase on our taxes, most people
aren't seeing that because we have more people paying their piece of the pie. Okay? So, higher market value, you pay a bigger piece of the pie. Lower, of course, you you see a smaller one. So each property
owner pays their their piece of that pie. So what what happens when something changes with your house? Okay. So we have two properties in the district. Both are valued at 500,000. We have total levy at five. It's a simple
example, but $5,000. So each of those properties are going to pay half of that because they're valued at the same amount. But if it changes, say the orange house now increases by 10% but the blue house increases by 25%. We still the state the school district still only receives the
5,000 but the blue house are going to pay more than that half now. And when we look at our taxes over the last few years I think it's important to point this out that from 23 to 26 we have four-year period here. If you look
at the under residential homestead the 500,000 which is pretty close to what our average is now in the value of a home in our district you see that back in 23 that tax was 2803 and you push forward here to 26 and it's 2746
actually a decrease in taxes over the four years um the homeowners >> because there are more homes to spread the >> it's partially because there's more homes that the biggest contributor >> and any increase that we're seeing is
coming from the city of Blinkville and Dakota County. >> And on your on your tax statement, it's very specific. This the county, the city, and the school district are listed separately. So, you can see the changes from year to year on your tax statement >> and and the city doesn't have to go out
to vote. They just raise taxes on their own. >> That's true. They look at their budget and they say, "We need to change the tax rate by whatever to get what they need." Well, yeah, they don't have to go to voters, but Lakeville I I think both Lakeville and Elco Market very
in Dakota County, they're very sensitive to that uh to that situation tax- wise. And I think that Dakota County still remains uh if not the lowest, one of the lowest.
just, you know, I I I work with many of these uh folks to talk to about that. I think there's fiscal conservatism in how they approach it. Um I think as director or Mr. Leatherman shared with
us, uh across the state, there's been an increase in county and and cities. It's not it's anomalous. uh you look over the historic just
>> I think a challenge with county right now and maybe this um supports the survey. So I serve on a county board as well um or a county and our county um
commissioners have not levied much of an increase for the last like five years. it's remained relatively flat, but by doing that they weren't able to keep up with cost. And so there's a huge levy
this time around. And so there's like a balance here of like is it better to just do 2% or 3% or do 12%, you know, out of the gate? And I think that's hard, right, to to figure out. This slide is just a graphical form of
the same data, but you can see on the on the left side there um that's a that's an average home of $500,000 in value. You can see how that changed it actually. Okay. There are there are some uh refunds, deferral programs when it comes
to taxes on the homestead uh credit refund is available to all homesteaded property. that includes a house, garage, and one acre only. Um, it is limited. Um, so if you, you know, the more you make, the less you get, but there's a maximum refund there of 31.40. For
renters is 24.440. There is a special property tax refund. So when you see a large increase in your taxes um of at least 6% and o at least over $100 from the prior year, that refund is 60% of that tax increase. We
are seeing some large increases in your taxes. That is something people can can go back and look at. There is a senior citizen uh property tax deferral program for um senior citizens who are on you know have limited income where they can
lock their taxes in at a flat that doesn't change from year to year. But at the end when that when that house or that property is sold at that time then that tax has to up. Okay. A part of the hearing is we need to take a few minutes to accept comments
on the proposed levy. So at this time I will open it to the floor for anybody who wants comment. Okay, with no comments then um um that's all I have for my presentation this evening and thank you for your time.
>> Is the um board certifies 2025 property tax is that 2016? Yeah, that's the one we just talked about. Y >> uh any board member reports? Yeah, yesterday I had the opportunity and and director Anderson was with me
also to sit in on the teaching and learning committee and um we got to experience a number of things, but one of the things that that I came away with and that I was very pleased with is that Tracy is is looking at creating a
strategic vision for 2030 and then working that back as an approach to making sure that curriculum, teaching, all the things that are involved there are really starting to get a strategic focus. And I
I thought that was really good and glad to see what uh I think it was last Friday um Paris Swanson and I were able to tour Pathways um our ALC and thankful for um the principal there and students and staff
for hosting us. It was great to see the space and to hear what's working well and what changes they'd like to see in the future. Um, I also attended on Friday and Saturday. Um, I served as a delegate for the Minnesota School Board
Association's Assembly. Um, at that meeting, the assembly reviews resolutions from school boards throughout the state and makes recommendations on whether they should become part of the MSBA's legislative agenda. So, we um we reviewed 36
resolutions um in past I should maybe like 20 or so of them. Um and just I think some things to note um we had a presentation on Friday night from a professor at the University of Minnesota from the Humphrey School um Larry Jacobs
who kind of gave an overview of the political climate um both nationally but in the state. Um and I think one of the interesting things was um he had a slide. I should have taken a picture. They're going to email I'll I'll email you all the slides when they come. But the number of mandates that have been
put on school boards from both from all parties in the state of Minnesota in the last 20 years has inc has doubled. And so about 20 years ago, there's about 30 or so mandates that school districts had to deal with. Now we're up in upwards of
the 70 um uh number 70 of mandates. And people kind of asked why. and um he said those are a lot easier for legislators to get behind and to pass because um they're not having to allocate resources or dollars. So um he said both parties
are loving to put mandates on school districts and that as a result we're the ones dealing with how to how to operationalize them and fund them. Um and then the other thing coming out of that meeting was um there's a presentation on the we have a state public land trust that funds some of um
our public education um dollars for schools. So state 100 years ago or so more than that um property was set aside in the state of Minnesota and the proceeds from the mineral rights and from the sales of those properties are in a in a trust
that um provide it's a small amount of money per student but um nevertheless provides funding um in perpetuity for students and um MSBA along with legislators are looking to change the US or not the the state constitution to um
uh allocate those resources slightly differently, spending a little bit more of the um the trust than they currently are. Um and it's um been highly vetted um in terms of keeping the fund sustainable for the long term, but but getting a little bit more resources out of that. And so there will be a
proposal, I think, to amend the state constitution and um I can send more information about that, but it seemed like something that their MSBA is recommending that board members look at and um potentially support if Um, I attended a couple different things this week. So,
I was invited, I think the rest of the board is invited, too, um, to an open house that was at Cherry View Elementary, um, for the special education um, setting three programs that are in that building. Um, my husband and I both attended. I brought
him along with me because our children had attended Cherry View Elementary in those programs um a long time ago. And so it was kind of nice to not only see how the programs have evolved and changed and talk with the staff, but to personally thank them for um their
involvement in my children's education and and success in life. So that was kind of a a fun event for my family. I liked that. Um, and then I also was invited to the girls wrestling um, meet
that was this last Saturday. Um, I got to talk with several of the student athletes and the parents and see several of our um, our student athletes wrestle and um, that was really fun to see, especially since um, I grew up in Iowa
which is very much a wrestling state. We had a girls wrestling team when I was in high school again like a long time ago. Um, so I'm I'm glad to see that Minnesota is uh jumping on that and that um I think the thing that I was most
impressed with with the students was just that it's it's not just like the physical strength and the emotional strength to participate in that sport, but for the women that are in that sport, like the strength of character to um have a sport that's maybe not as
popular for women and and just having that out there that we're we're doing that and they're um building that team up. Um one of the things that I would like a followup with on the district level is that um there were students on
the team that were women from Lakeville North, but there weren't any from Lakeville South. And so I just want to make sure that that's not like an access issue or did they know about the team or because it is it is hard like trying to grow a team and get um get get the word
out about those types of things. So, making sure that all of our girls had equal access to that sport. Um, and then a really cool thing, I attended the um event downtown, the holiday thing on Saturday for the city. Um, was shopping
around and I ran into a a past employee that had been a speech pathologist in Lakeville that is now writing children's books. Um, so I thought that was kind of cool, too. So, our staff, you know, they do great things while they're here, but then they also do great things when um they leave us, too. So, really great
books. If you'd like to read them, I purchased both. And she has another book coming out in two weeks. So, um anyway, that's it. I will add I attended the Well, there's 15 wrestlers. Um and then like north
I I don't think Lakeville Soft wasn't there, but I don't >> they do not have a female wrestling team, but like they could combine with our Lakeville North team and then it would make that team more competitive overall. Also, I just want to make sure that, you know, that's one of the the
bonuses of having two high schools in one city is that um we can combine our forces for some of those um less popular sports right now and try to grow the opportunities for our student athletes. So, um it was just one of those things that all of the girls on the team had
mentioned, too. So, I thought, yeah, it was it was it was really something to see. I really enjoyed it. Oh, Tonyy's waving. Tony, sorry. I just want to highlight uh I think it was uh Tony and Harley and I, a couple
other staff, we went to the Chamber of Commerce uh event and I just want to offer a commendation to coral directors and our encore and now and then singers. It's wonderful. I don't know why I like it so much, but I
just I love it and uh it was a good time. So thank you that is we're business here >> is also really great >> all right onto our recommended actions. I would entertain a motion to approve
>> levy >> second. >> Oh I thought you said you just made a motion. Oh, no. Sorry. I said >> Oh, sorry. I'll make a motion to certify the um A26 tax levy. >> Thank you. There's a motion by Director Cameron. Is there a second? >> I'll second. >> Second by Director Baker.
>> Call for vote to approve or certify the pay 26 tax. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Yes. Yes.
>> Yes. >> Uh moving on to approval of combining polling locations. Have a couple options that presented this special elections only.
Uh so I u I was not present at the last meeting when this was discussed. Want to make sure that this clearly uh again this is for when Lakeville school district needs to do an election or needs to do voting and
it's not part of a general election. So it's a oneoff or levy or whatever it may be. Looking at some of the the financials of these recommendations and Looks to me that all three options,
whether to go with two, three, or five, is going to cost about $127,000, $139,000, and $131,000. So, mid, low, low, $100,000 is how I'm understanding the cost of these three
options. I guess I'd like to better understand what is the overall cost if we didn't make any changes and giving consumers giving our voter voters to continue to vote where they've historically have voted in past meetings
past elections. So I just curious like what is the actual cost saving? Is there any >> savings? I think we indicated there and I don't have the document depending on what the consolidations
are. Um there's two elements. One is is the the total number of polling locations that we have. >> The other one is kind of a a a very different situation because Scott County
and Dakota County are using different voting platforms, I guess, is the easiest way I would describe that. Um, so if we if we operate a site in Scott
County, um, we will realize less savings uh on that. Um, I I don't know, Kim, if you have Yeah. Can you >> Yeah, I see the number of what we're what the uh the spend. >> It looks like u in a presentation you sent like two weeks ago.
>> Yeah. Um for 20 locations it's about 160. Okay. >> Is that right? 160,000. >> I'm looking at Yeah. with 20 >> in the original packet. >> Yeah. >> Okay. So 67.
>> Did you just do that? >> $160,000 is what what we have historically have spent are spent. But with the new Scott County changes, that cost could be higher public and we don't really know how much
higher because we've got to go get the ballots. We got to go create the ballots. We got to test the ballots and program it. >> It's it's really about the uh the the time that our employees will spend to prepare those u platforms.
>> But they'll be two different >> that's not calculated. >> I know. But but is there a cost to that if our because our employees are salaried employees as part of their job? >> Well, there's a distribution where logistically where we are going to the locations. Yep.
>> Uh and those are hourly rated employees usually. Uh and that would be part of the $160,000 >> or expenditure. Okay. And so by dropping down to two, three or four lo five locations, we're saving roughly 20 to 30,000
the proposal >> on special election >> on special elections. Instead of 160, we're spending 130. So then what we're doing in that $20,000 difference, $30,000 difference, we are moving from 20 polling locations to
two, three, or five. >> Correct. >> Okay. And so the $30,000 in savings, is that going to make it easier for our constituents to vote or is that $30,000 savings worth
having a centralized location for our constituents? That that that's how I'm seeing it. It's a $30,000 uh the $30,000 promotion, advertising, marketing expense one would consider as part of
we're doing a levy and we need to make sure it's easy for people to go find where to vote. But that's that's one lens of looking at it. That's how what I'm seeing so far. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. And and I think that's an appropriate lens. Um yeah, we can save a
few dollars, but but here I think is the important. If you look at last fall, not like few months ago, but previous fall, the difference between two candidates were 17 votes. Now, you could say that
that was a full throttle election, but that doesn't mean that couldn't happen in a special election. You look at this last fall, and I think I'm correct in these numbers, but I think the difference 250 to 300, some something in
that range. Again, not a huge number of votes. And there are three options here. And two of the three options uh do not have a a voting spot for Scott County.
I think that Brian, I'm coming back to your point. I don't think we should create an impediment by not having a voting place in Scott County and having all those people have to come up to
uh Dakota County. I have no problem in in Lakeville, somebody going 5 miles instead of two miles, but somebody coming up 10, 15, 18 miles, that might dissuade them from voting that that day
or night. And again, I said 17 and about 250 or 300. Those are close margins and that could be enough to turn an election no matter who who's winning or losing. >> So So I appreciate you sharing that, but I but I don't think those numbers are
I I don't have as much high value or let me rephrase that. Those numbers don't doesn't I don't I'm not looking at the numbers. What I would rather than look at if in a general election we've got 12 10 to 12 13,000 people voting and then an off cycle election it's generally
half as that and so >> with with the 20 location >> did you have a thought >> well he's I'm not going to interrupt >> no I'm just saying that with with the uh
significant reduction of of voters participating ating that that was with having 20 locations for them to even go to. So if we're going to condense it even more so one can assume the border participation might be even half of that
or or will be lower. I'm just I'm making an assumption. >> That's not what the Dakota County judge said at all. >> Okay. That's not what they said. >> Yes, we asked that and yeah that was a concern. >> Okay. >> Yeah. I mean, I I guess what I was going to say is we're not first. In fact,
we're one of the only districts that that does this. And so, I think one thing to consider is there is there are other districts doing this that are not having that. And then also significant
challenge for our staff to set up all these polling locations and managing good reason why. It's not Well, and there's also early early voting opportunities are different. Um, and mail-in voting, uh, unless they
change the law on that, uh, would you not? >> But this is for an offcycle election. This is for levies. This is for >> this is for school district. >> This is school and district related things. And so, we're not going to have 45,000 people vote. uh we would love to but the his the historical data doesn't
show show that and so we might be lucky to get 10 to 15 I mean in in that particular range and so can you guys help me understand like this whole uh got county thing and then versus not got county thing because I thought >> there's different machines
>> that are far more comp >> and then we would take on ownership of figuring that out if we put a polling location over Yes, >> county updated their machines. Okay, >> Scott County is not >> got it.
>> But Scott County machines are still sufficient to vote relatably and I think that's an important >> because I agree. I agree. We've heard that Dakota County has upgraded everything, >> but that doesn't mean that Scott County
is not. I think that's >> um I like to call the question I'd like to make a um motion to approve the combining of five polling locations option three I believe it is
uh no not super doesn't super combine two >> there's super combined two and then there's >> no super combined five the recommended proposal from the school >> is there a Second. There's a second. Is
there any discussion? >> Yeah, I I'm not a not aligned to that. I mean, if you've got, if I'm reading it correctly, you all five polling locations will be in the northeast section of our school district and so there would be no polling location in Is that the one that we're
>> Oh, that's >> Yeah, >> there's one here. >> Yep. So, all five. So, one in the middle and then four on the top corner of Lakeville. There's none on the west side. There's none on the south side. Right. But you also have four polling locations on the northeast side of
Lakeville. So you're you're disregarding the scout county voters. You're dis discounting the the alcoh folks. >> But I think the rationale here, Brian, was this is the most southern keep everything.
>> I I get that then. So then so if that's the case then then we the way I'm thinking about this that you've got a boundary of 194 and the boundary should be like if you're a voter in Scott County or Elco or New Market or all the
way on the far right of Farmington should have the same amount of distance or the same amount of access to to vote and then if you've got four polling locations like literally on the top right hand side that's not fair like what >> because it's higher density speak. So
you're going to have more people. >> Yeah, go ahead. >> I mean I if we're condensing I do have one closer to El got one kind of mid center in district
and then one a little more northern district. Yeah, I do concern if it's extra cost and we don't know what the extra cost is. for removing a Scott County location. Um, but that that's just my thoughts. I
don't >> Yeah, I I'm not sure removing Scott and I I expressed this a moment ago. I don't think it's a good idea to remove Scott County totally. I I like the uh three locations, Scott and Dakota. Um, again,
I don't mind people driving five miles instead of two miles in in Lakeville, but county is a totally different scenario. >> I guess now I'd like to call the question. >> Yes. Yeah.
>> Is this Is this whether or not to stop? >> Yes. >> Yes. >> No. No. Yes, >> with discussion being stopped
on five polling location No. >> Cameron. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> No. >> No. >> So, I make a motion to pass. I make a
motion to have one central location on number four. >> So, the vote fails. >> Yes. Make a motion to pass one location number four for all these offcycle elections. >> What's number four? What?
>> Oh, the >> I'm sorry. In precinct number four >> or wherever that. >> So, Brian, point of clarification, Brian, are you talking about the three locations? So, there's something in Scott and something in Dakota. location. >> No, I'm I'm proposing just one location,
right deck, smack in the middle of our boundary, and if you can get there, you get there. That's where it is. It's equitable. It's fair. Uh it fits everybody. >> I second that. >> There's a second being a first and a
second. Any discussion on that? I I guess like I we don't have any information on that like just a one and it's not one of the locations that was talked about at our last work session. So I don't >> it is the location.
>> It is one of the locations. It's it's so I believe it's the it's one with two locations. We're just removing the one and it's precinct six >> and then just using number four. It centralizes it. messaging makes it
easier communication. Uh, everybody has access to it. Uh, it's equal distance from those that are on the north side, south side, uh, west side, east side, and it's just one. Ideally, I would assume it's going to be probably $2,000 cheaper
from because as I look at the data, everything is about $2,000 in difference as you move down from three to four to five. >> Yeah. Brian, again, I I'm not sure money $2,000 $3,000 is is not a lot of money
when you impede votes. >> Hold up. I mean Tony's good. So would >> So wouldn't that be proposal three? All right, let's one polling location.
>> No, >> no, no. Yes, >> yes. Um, can I have I won't make a motion. >> All right. I I think we um >> we have one left. >> Yep.
>> Let's let's just vote on that one. >> I know. But but I think but the problem with the but the third but the three options from my understanding is that if you put a polling location down in 19 or somewhere in Scott County then the district is is responsible for managing
learning operating a another uh voting machine voting voting system right >> and and so I I so to to make it fair for our community it doesn't matter where you live in our school district this is where you go vote that's where you go
vote. Um, and so having three, one north, one middle, one south, I'm not aligning to it because it it makes it more complicated. So either we do one or we just leave it as is. >> All right. >> I think the two make a motion three location.
>> So we have two options left. >> Yes, because the first one has a north and a southern one. >> All right. Well, I'm going to make the motion to do the combined three locations, Dakota and Scott County. >> I'll second that motion. first and a second. Is there any discussion?
>> I think I'll just I think I align with Director Thompson and I um after hearing the Dakota County um last meeting, I'm not interested in having our staff being responsible for um running Scott County's machines. And
um I live in the way north part of the district and people who live in the way south that have just as far to drive with like the one point. So, >> um I think again I agree with Director Johnson, like one school district, one
um I don't believe we make accommodations because you live in a different county necessarily >> and more people. >> Further discussion. >> Excuse me. Can I get a point of clarification? What are we voting on?
>> We're voting on the second of the two. It's three locations. One No, >> no. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> I think I would have liked it if we it was all one locate. If a one say yes or
no. >> No. >> All right. Any other motions on this issue? >> We have one more to vote on. I'll make a motion. I'll make a motion to approve >> point of information. >> Wait, >> are you What
>> does this need to be done today? Is it necessary? >> I mean, if we don't vote on something, we don't vote on something. >> She's making a motion. >> Needs to be done by the end of the >> If we're going to do it, we're going to combine. >> So, I'm going to I'm going to make a
motion to uh approve the super second. Second by Cameron discussion. >> Yes. I make a motion. Oh, do you want to >> Yeah, it's the motion for the find >> two locations.
>> Um, two locations. It's the first option in the board packet there being a precinct at a voting location in precinct 6 and precinct >> Dakota County. >> Both in Dakota County. Uh there has been a first and a second.
Is there any discussion? >> Yeah. How does how like how would this break up? like who determines which precincts which voters go to number six or is that something decide later or >> county and so and that and that we think that's
going to confuse people with >> we asked about that last >> out where they need to >> and then can someone help me share with me why you want a second location and why have instead of just what would like crowd control
>> I you offer two places go hopefully to divide voters so that >> I think honestly if we are going to go down to one I would just like to work
always moving to one that would be my No. >> Yes. >> Cameron. >> Yes. >> No. >> Yes.
>> Other motions >> to make a motion to do number one one location again. >> We already voted on it. We have to have a two-thirds vote to turn it over. >> Yeah. >> All right. Um, make a motion to table it
the next week. Have further discussion. >> Okay. >> I mean, you can come up with additional ideas, but unless there's another motion, we'll move on. >> Facilities bonding. Um, talked about this at our meeting. are
our planning be just on how how to operate this or how to go about my thought is to start I'm just going to stop with a motion on what I think are is maybe a consensus
item between board members and if we want to what we're doing is essentially right now authorizing the administration to prepare um a review and comments for the Minnesota Department of Education come back
in January uh to schedule the special election, but we have to figure out what items and dollar amounts we would push for with the the review and comment for NDE. Um so with that, again, I'm going
to start with something if people add if we can get that approved and people want to add things after that, that's fine. But yeah, so pursuant to Minnesota statute section 123b.71, I would move that the school board for
district 194 authorize the administration to prepare and submit to Minnesota Department of Education the required review and comment um for the facility following facility improvements. Those improvements would be expansion um and improvements at
Kenwood Trail Century and Magguire Middle School. um as outlined in option two um in the November 11th, 2025 board meeting packet um in the total amount of $135,68,26866.
And just for clarification, that is everything on those lists minus um the updated furniture and the uh tennis courts at Kenwood Middle School. Is there a second to that motion? I'll
second that motion. Second by director Carbone. Any discussion Baker? >> I'm concerned with going out for this at this time given the um survey result
data and the I would say the the climate for passing that in the spring. I think that was pretty clear. um we don't really have even half of the community supporting that and I think that when I look at
what they number one they don't know that we don't that we need more space so we need time to communicate that and number two we need a very thoughtful and detailed plan that outline what our needs are and I don't feel like this plan has that um so I guess even as a
board member I would have a hard time like I I mean I get the additions that makes sense But like some of the other things, I there there are things on there that I can't justify spending that money on right now when I know that people are having a hard time putting food on their table and with the survey
results saying that um that that the community I don't feel the community would would pass it at this time. And I I think I need to be thoughtful on how we do that. Like if we send something to the community, then we're 100% allin on this, including the
board. We know every little detail of this. We feel like it's what we need and then we send it to the community and share that vision. But I I'm not I I guess I just
don't see it yet at this point. I don't think it's fully flushed out. >> Can I just ask it? Are you talking about the expansions including just the expansions in addition to everything else? >> It's there. again, like I don't know.
I just don't feel like there's been We've talked about all these different things. The board has been all over the place on different ideas and and ways and um I'm not even 100% sure on what the district's proposal is because I don't I feel like they haven't said this
is for sure what we are going to do and what we need to do. And then if we go out to the community with the climate the way it is, that's not going to pass. Do you have your carbon? >> Yeah, please. Um, what I thought I heard tonight was if we do it in May, it's a
bad time. If we do it in November, it's a bad time. >> It It sounds like it's a bad time no matter when we do it. But I want to come back to what Lucas and what Michael have said, what I have heard Lucas and Michael say multiple times different
ways. and that is if we don't make a decision as a board and we delay this, there will be and I'm going to exaggerate for a moment, there will be kids hanging out of the windows in the middle schools in I believe two years.
That being said, I think if we allow that to happen, we all wear the badge of incompetence. And we have been I I think very well informed by Lucas and Michael about the
importance of this and what's going to happen in two years if we don't. And I think we really need to keep that we really need to consider that strongly. >> I don't disagree with you on that. I just don't think our community knows that. >> Well, I think we have to have a
communication strategy that expresses the need because what I saw up on those slides tonight is if the community understands the need, the community will sway towards okay towards
>> Oh, I I 100% agree with you on that, but I also feel like >> we've got a quick turnaround to do this. We should have already had the communication plan with this with all the details on what I mean I just don't think it's a very thorough plan. I look at like wayas and they have like all of
this information all the things in their presentation. This is the district's recommendation and I don't feel like I've had that >> but then I also feel like they were waiting for the survey results too. So there's that as well. >> Yeah. Yeah, I think one of the challenges I I I we have already failed
these kids who are coming through who will be sixth graders in a year and change. And so, um, I want to think about kind of what is not necessarily best for this specific class, but what is best for the next 10 to 15 years for
our district. Um, and so it's not that I disagree with doing expansions at some point. But I do think that part of the reason why I asked about the runway question is I don't and I don't want to speak for Grace's team. I I think that's a pretty slim amount of time to get our
um community up to speed on this issue and I would rather um us so I I do want to explain one thing. You know, the last time we went for a levy where we created it um we had and any either one of you
correct me on this, but we had the survey results in front of us. We sat down at a table and we talked about what the various things that the community was telling us from the survey. We talked about what the district felt were the priorities. We talked about what the
board cared about amongst those things and we developed a levy based on the survey data considering the tax tolerance and what the community felt was important and that is just that process is missing here. Um, so I don't
feel like the board has been brought along. It's more and I don't think the community has been brought along in the same way and I would like to pause on this, take time, develop a strategy that is going to be more inclusive so that we get to something where we can think 10
years not the fourth graders that are coming in two years. We have CMS at capacity right now. We have high over capacity. I mean these are schools where we are having manage that. And so
there's there's that happening. I think it's important to deal with it, but I would rather develop a long-term strategy that addresses not just the middle school issue, but other big priorities. >> Go ahead, man. >> Um, I don't disagree with a lot of what
you're saying. Uh, the problem is we are facing what we're facing, right? It is in our laps. The question is whether or not we are going to give the community the option uh to vote for an expansion on these middle schools. I mean, we're not making the decision necessarily.
We're saying, "Hey, we see a need for our schools." And if we do nothing, then we're essentially telling our educators like, "Hey, go deal with those full classrooms." You know, they're just going to keep getting fuller and fuller. And if we just sit on our hands, it's we're going to miss it, you know, and
then all of a sudden then we're going to need a high school expansion, right? Because that's coming down the pike as well. >> Um the population keeps growing. So if we just say, hey, we want to wait for better vision. I mean, these expansion plans are plans that were planned when the building was planned, right? So it's
there's not a lot of complexity to it. I would say it's just, hey, this is where you'd have classrooms. Um again, from a timing perspective, could we have had another you know, six months to discuss this. Yeah. But we had our we also had our levy renewal vote, too. So, I don't know
that you'd want to be discussing both of those to the public at the same time. So, uh again, I think we've had opportunities to ask questions and and dig into this a little bit. I think the expansion part again is the only thing I'm necessarily pushing in this initial
vote. Um because I do think there are questions on all the the other things that maybe haven't embedded as much. Um but my concern is if we do nothing, we're just going to allow the the problem that we're seeing at Century to exacerbate because even if you spread those kids amongst the three schools,
which is going to take, you know, a bigger boundary adjustment, which we know people don't like, uh they're immediately going to be at, you know, 87 or 88% capacity each of the middle schools. >> Yeah. >> You know, which is higher than what we currently for any of our schools and
then it's not there's not going to be a solution because it's going to push out because we need another eight months. November is not going to look great for this kind of a vote um especially with what we have on the horizon. So then we're looking at possibly the next scrim
which is going to push us to 2029. So and then you're looking at maybe a high school vote on that what a year or two later. So, Dr. Baker, >> I I agree with everything you say and I'm not saying that we don't ever do it.
I'm saying that with the community saying that 3% are the people that are worried about capacity issues. If we go out with a halfbaked plan, it's not going to pass. Especially when you have less than half supporting it
and not understanding what the need is. I I just think it does impact more. It's not just additions because it does impact teaching and learning, especially when you have teachers that are teaching multiple grade levels. we're starting to make headway with our academics and the last thing I want is to put our teaching
and learning department back or teachers not having like there's a lot of things you have to think about in there because there are contract things with PLC time and making sure that if you're working with multiple grade levels that you have the time to meet with those multiple grade levels that learning the curriculum that we're pushing out new
curriculum already. So you have math curriculum and reading curriculum that's new and making sure that okay now you've learned it for sixth grade now we're asking you to learn it for seventh as well and and just the addition of there are things that I feel like this is where I'm going I don't feel like it's a
well vetted plan because I don't know what are the other things that fall off with this right and I have talked with teaching and learning so I do know that there's impact there but that's not part of the plan we're just talking about the building piece which is fine but when we go to the com the community the
community has made it aware that they love our teachers, that they think we're providing a good education. So, are we really doing our dil due diligence if we say, "Yeah, that's okay. We'll worry about that later. We just need to get the space and we'll let the teachers figure it out." Teaching multiple grade
levels. I think that we have a great team in place. I just want to give them the opportunity to vet these ideas and and go to the community with something that we're all really excited about. And maybe that takes an extra few months to get there, but at least then we're confident in our ideas and selling it to
the public. >> Yeah, I I think the survey we saw tonight changes if there was a communication strategy and an educational strategy. I I think a lot of those numbers change and I think they >> Yeah. change in the favor of doing this
and and I also believe and and I I do think Lucas and Michael made a strong case for doing this and I think they were very clear in what they were doing and the plan that they have and also um that in two if we don't start now in two
years we will have a huge dilemma and I I'll repeat myself which we will look as though we were incompetent for not handling And secondly, excuse me. Secondly, I also heard uh Lucas say, I write down a
lot of what Lucas says. I like this. Um what Lucas said is that he anticipates in five years to be working on the high schools for all the obvious reasons. So that being said, you you have a domino effect here. And if you don't tip that
first domino, we're going to be in, my opinion is we're going to be in trouble in not too far distant future. And we really better think about that. Any other comments, >> Tony? >> Tony, sorry. You can you can actually
interrupt and say something that might be >> easier. First off, you know, the idea that this has to be pushed like absolutely positively 100% just this minute. Um it's not entirely true. Um you know
was mentioned before in a previous meeting that this all these indicators were could have been seen two years ago and nothing was done. Um the idea that um I think director Baker
kind of hits on it a little bit um is that uh there's a lot of good here. There's a lot of I think there's a lot of you know people on the board want to see something get done. Um, but I mean
there's some other things that we also have to consider. And if we don't fix a lot of these other problems, too. Um, you know, you're talking about looking incompetent. Well, if we don't fix it this time, we're going to look for that as well. Um, you know, like I said, I
went and saw they were making a classroom out of an office closet. Um, you know, Pathways is essentially a basement that they're working out of and they're doing, you know, with the space they have, but it's it's not a particularly ideal learning place. Um,
you know, if we're going to be fixing these things, if we're if we're going to be expanding capacity at the middle schools and we're going to be able to consider these things, I want us to consider these other things to um that we can help solve and resolve problems because then when we when we fix them
now, when we have the opportunity to, it's going to open up possibilities down the road that are going to make things easier for to decide later on. And so that's kind of how I'm looking at this right now. I feel like there's just kind of a rush, you know, an absolute
push to kind of get this done. We got to get this done. We got to get this done. We got to get this done. Um we can we can take our time to get it right. Um you know, if we push through something and then it, you know, doesn't solve all our problems later on. We just end up having bigger problems that grow and
then we end up having to pay more for them down the road. I just have another just another comment. But um yeah, I mean this was the recommendation. It was made clear last week by the superintendent. This was the recommendation in the need for the
district. Uh so yeah, we are going to eat this if we say no. Um we will bear the responsibility for this. If we vote this, if we don't provide the space. I mean, we had a teacher come up today and talk about um classroom size. I mean, we
can't reduce classroom sizes if we don't have the classroom space. So, I mean, that that is one of the issues. Um we can only spread kids so far across a building. And if there's no extra classrooms to do that, then, you know, we'll never be able to reduce classroom sizes. And we know that this our
district's not going to shrink. I mean, we're on a growth trajectory, even if it's only 1%. So um yeah do I wish there was a greater we had this vision for teaching learning already >> sure but we don't you know so this is
what we have >> but we could >> this is our recommendation again but time is time is the killer here I mean I know to Tony's point yeah I wish this decision would have been made last year or the year before when it was first identified you know or bigger plans
again I know that these plans are bad necessarily. I mean, it's just newer to us. That doesn't mean they're new to the district. So, um, but here we are. Again, it's in our lap. So, >> I feel like I would be remiss not to comment that the survey results do
concern me. Um, I think in an an ideal situation, you would not be putting a vote out with these results. now, but I do feel the pressure um in space. And so I feel like it's we're kind of in a catch 22, like damned if we
do, damned if we don't. And >> I I'm curious what the communications plan is. I I it cannot just be the district's department that's responsible for this. we need like substantial
resources put into shifting the 3% that think this is a problem to over 50% that think this is a problem. Um, I mean it was good to see in the survey that a couple years ago clearly there was an effort being made to to educate the
community that there was that this issue was starting, right? And then because of decisions both at this table and in the district that kind of all fell by the wayside. Um, and so I do feel like the current board is put in this position of
like scrambling. Um, and I don't love the answer. It's a twin. It's a It's a flip of a coin whether or not this is going to get passed. >> Um, so I'm struggling with the decision.
I'm just going to be frank. Um, because I want a good plan for our district. I want a long-term plan. I just don't want to be reacting because my my child, a fourth grader, happens to have a large class and that's why we're making decisions. but also know that our district continues to grow and that
there is continued pressure on our on our sites as a result of that. Um, so I appreciate the plan being put together. I think another thing from our conversation last week regarding
teaching and learning when um our three staff members who are presenting said that we are unable to do tier 2 or tier three supports right now in our district. If if our board, if our district, if our community is not sounding the alarm
bells when a sentence like that is said, I think we have serious issues. If we really want to see movement in academic performance, in student well-being, in in um student belonging, we need more support, student support
services. And that money comes from an operating levy. And our community typically isn't one. It's it's much more likely to pass a bond than a levy historically. And I'm concerned that we're not thinking about how to package
things that are mustod in terms of space and bonds because that's what community here tends to support with immediate needs around teaching and learning. Um, and I realize we can't do that in the spring like that that can only happen in the fall, right? But
those those things are coloring my my opinion of what is the tax tolerance in total because a community member doesn't think about these different pots, right? They just think about how much money am I having to pay out total. And we're at a critical point of being able to
support our there's no intervention support in the middle schools as far as that's what I've been told, right? That's what we've been told. And I'm glad they'll have the space, but there's no one to support them when they're struggling. There's no one to to get our to, you know, look at these
numbers and say, "Okay, this kids on the bubble. We need we need reading intervention. We need math intervention." We have no resources going to that. And it's great to build $140 million additions to fit them. Um, but if we
can't educate them, I'm concerned. So, um, I I in the I think we're in a As I said, we're in a tough spot. I'm still pondering like what the right decision is for tonight to be frank. And at the minimum, my hope is that we are
putting together packages going forward that support the identified needs from these conversations, especially around teaching and learning, not just amenities that would be nice to have in our school district. Dr. Baker,
>> I also want to comment that um when districts are looking at these types of proposals, it is almost unheard of for a v a board to be required to vote the same day that they've received the results of the survey. Like usually you
use the survey data to tailor your plan to what the community needs are. We haven't even had time to do that. We just got the survey results. We're not going to get the final report that breaks down that data until Christmas. So, >> again, too late. Yeah. >> Right. I don't like to rush into things,
but I also want to lay it out there. Historically, Lakeville has had periods of growth where we've had to have higher classroom numbers. I had my children in fourth and fifth grade with classrooms of 35 kids. Now, was it the greatest
learning environment? No. But guess what? they had like all of the supports that they needed because we had all of the academic instruction that was occurring in those environments even though they were crowded. And the middle school doesn't have that. And let's not forget that two years ago, the middle
school had significant budget cuts at that level. We cut the second language arts program. We cut some of the wheel classes. We cut language classes. So, I think if we're saying that we're addressing the middle school issue, we're not addressing the whole middle school issue. We're putting a band-aid
on it. And when we go back to the community and we want more money, their tax tolerance is going to be gone because they're going to say, "You already came to us and asked for money. Why didn't you ask for this when you needed it? Obviously, you didn't need it." It is definitely apparent by our academic scores that we need that
support. So, I just want to make sure when we're addressing growth, we're addressing all aspects of growth and not just the space issue. >> Tony, is your hand up? Yeah. >> I'd like to move to discuss the next week.
>> Uh, is there a second on the motion >> hearing? No second. The motion fails. >> Director Thompson. >> Yeah. So, it's a good discussion. I appreciate it. Uh, and I had a chance to listen to the last week's meeting and others. And
I think as a board member, this is my lens. You got to give the community the choice to make make their decisions. Um uh and from my lens withholding that choice. I don't like like what's it hurt? You know, if it if it passes, great. If it
fails, then the community then gets to experience what capacity constraints might look like in in our middle schools and then they can decide, well, maybe the following year we should we should do that. What I'm hearing from others is that uh there are a lot of operational
staffing uh opportunities that we should close the gap on and we haven't had those kind of discussions and the hope and and the and what I'm hearing is that we'd like to pair that with the building infrastructure and if you pair that together then what you're asking for is
two levies to be asked in one election cycle whether it be November or another time uh whether you say if you do this and you vote for this and I don't know the probability of two levies getting approved at the same time during a regular election. And so, uh, I I just
want to be mindful like we need to bifurcate these two topics. One is an operating staffing issue that we still need to have conversations on. The other one is setting the district up so that it can scale for growth with the right infrastructure and the right building and the right capacity for our incoming
uh, students. And and I feel like over the past couple weeks, the district has done a good job in sharing here's here's our gap. They shared with us what the task force wanted. They shared with us what they wanted. Uh and as well as feedback from the from from um other staff members. But we're not adding uh
new bells and whistles. We're adding extra capacity so that our three middle schools are not going to be at 85% in in total utilization. And and while three that we have, one of them is beyond where it needs to be. We do need to do boundary changes. Totally makes sense
that we'll end up having to do that next year. But it sets the stage for us to scale for growth. And the amount of money that we're investing I I think we actually save money because if we're not b we're not purchasing another middle school a new another middle school is like $215 million. So
we're saving roughly 80 thou $80 million by going down this path where if we do this our middle school infrastructure could be set for the next 10 to 15 years. And so if we see growth and and those are at are getting uh uh to full
full utilization, then we can maybe explore another middle school to be built. But for now, like the way I'm looking at this, it's like this is the next 10 to 15 year investment so that we don't need to go beyond uh spending more
than we need to. And and so yes, I get that the tax tolerance in Maine is limited and people have concerns, but you got to give people the choice to say, "Hey, do you want to spend it or not?" And and as a board member, uh this is what the district is requesting. I see the data. The incoming class is
coming. It's going to get packed. And it's one of those where when you realize it's packed, it's going to be too late to make a change. It's too late to fix it because you don't have any additional capacity. It's going to take two to three years for that to get fixed. And so we run two to three more years running hot in those middle schools like
we're running in High View. We're lucky with elementary school in High View that we can make boundary changes because we have capacity in other elementary schools. We only have three middle schools. So either you run hot for the next two years and you take that chance or you let the community decide, do you want to spend money so that we have an
infrastructure for the next 10 to 15 years of middle school or you do not. And if they don't, well then it's it's their choice. like we're not we're not spending $139 million with this vote. We're giving our community the choice to decide if they want to move forward or not.
>> So those are my thoughts. Reenburgger. >> Yeah. I I want to kind of just point out um we're getting thrown a lot of information tonight. Um the survey information we did not have before the meeting. The actual uh motion that we're
voting on was not even provided in the agenda. It was the first time that we were actually to hear what was going to be a part of this motion was when Director Swatson, you know, stated it when he made his motion.
You know, it's a lot from what I'm hear. was like a flat out no way to kind of get to where we need to be. What I would like to see and you know like I said we're absorbing a lot of information from the survey
results tonight. Um, we're we've been looking at the individual options for these these build these uh expansions and what other items might be out there we might consider. What I would like to see is that like you know
we as a board um you know whether informally or as a working group what we want to see you know as part of the motion you know what's going to be included in this or not
you know this outcluded this category exclude this we don't need this and then you know we need to amend things like formally that's perfectly fine. Um, but we got to have
I I really don't like um, you know, a lack of uh, foresight to just like throw it out there in the middle of a meeting and then be voting on all the information that was thrown at us like
an hour later. Um, it doesn't it doesn't show a lot. this really sound process. Um, it sounds like you're pushing things through. Um, and I I don't like that. I
don't think that's that's wise policym. >> Yeah. I I'm not sure this is the first night we've heard about any of this. I I mean, I want to be really clear and fair. Um, we've gotten presentations
about facilities and about the metrics that are coming as a wave of humanity is going to hit here in a couple years or whenever it is. Um, and and I I also keep hearing about we've got a lot of
data that was given to us today in this in this survey and I still believe and I said this earlier but I still believe it. If there was a communication strategy that those numbers would be different and even without a
communication strategy when when you look at the slide that said what do you support public 64 to 76% facility safety and furniture. Okay, it was it was right up there. And then when you asked, do you want to
spend $139 million? um 56% of them agreed or strongly agreed. Um and then you had an 11% unsure. So if with a communication scr strategy you could get even half of the
11% now you're over 60% according to the survey that would agree or strongly agree to $139 million package for for a facility improvement. Um, >> yeah, Tony, I do want to clarify one of
the comments or just respond to something. So, you know, the motion is it's facilities bonding approval. So, what are we going to approve for bonding? >> Um, as I said when I started out here, I'm I'm starting at what I believe is essentially what the district said are the needs of the district, you know, not
necessarily the wants. And if people want to once we establish, hey, there's a base for the need and want to add some of the additional items that we've discussed over the past month on top of that, we can do that. But, uh, my
understanding from our discussions and per the district's recommendation is we need space for our our middle schools. You know, I mean, that that is an issue. We I mean, two things can be true at once. We might need additional resources for the teachers as well. Um but but
that's not in front of us. There's not a proposal on that. So, uh the district hasn't provided one. So, while we can continue to ask for one, um that's that's not going to be up for a vote in May. And this is what we have as an opportunity uh to put in front of the
public. And if we don't, then we don't have a chance to get it approved. So, um >> yeah, director or >> he was first. Sorry. >> Yeah. I'd like to amend the motion and add uh the furniture budget or the furniture proposal to to the to the ask.
>> I second that. >> All right. There being a first and a second, any discussion on the amendment to the motion? >> I think it's important to have all the items that are currently within the motion.
>> Yes. So it's it's it would be every item on the Do you have the list? I don't know if you can see this. >> There are a lot of items. I mean, I could go >> I think we should go, right?
>> It's the whole It's the whole plan option two on the middle school expansions minus the the four additional tennis courts at Kenwood. So, it's >> Can we have it up on the screen or something? >> It's 138,000.
138,900,000 roughly. I mean, it's in the in the packet that was provided. I think it was provided this past week. So, you have the Okay. Do you have that? >> So, I'm in favor of the furniture. Uh
because if we're going to make this kind of investment in building infrastructure and in my mind, I'm envisioning it that it is something that would be again set our district to scale for growth for the next 10 to 15 years. it probably makes sense to make sure we've got the right furniture for the next 10 to 15 years.
So, >> all right, >> that's my recommendation. >> All right, there's a second. Any discussion on that? I'm still pulling up the >> I have >> the reason I seconded that um is because I feel like of the whole plan that is
where I saw the most information about how teaching and learning could really utilize new furniture to improve instruction practices in our schools. And so, um, for our community and for the board, you know, it's not just to have a pretty couch, but it I think it
really shows forthought into how students learn and how small groups can be facilitated within a classroom. um if you have the right infrastructure within a within a room. Um I know this is not part of the motion, but I just like to express that um I
think I think equity amongst the schools is important and if tennis courts are the only thing that we're we're not making equitable, it seems like I I would be interested in entertaining a conversation about that after we vote on this motion.
>> Any more discussion? >> Where is it in the board packet? I'm not >> Is that in the board packet? >> Uh it was in the last week's board packet. >> Um superintendent emailed it to everybody this week too with some notes
on it. >> Point of information. >> Can you amend an can you amend an amended motion? >> Yes. >> Can you amend your amendment to the motion? >> Yes. >> Sure.
You want to withdraw your motion? >> I don't see it in that one either. Withdraw your amendment and then read. >> So there's there's technically no amendment to your motion. >> I can withdraw. >> It's up for a vote right now. >> Got it. That's >> Can I make a new one? >> What's that? >> Can I withdraw? Make a new one.
>> Well, there's been a second and it's up for discussion. >> Got it. >> There was an email sent today. Sorry. At 216 that has that list that you're talking about. Okay. So, yes, >> I'm 26. Okay. Because director Cameron, I think you are right. I mean, it fits capacity.
>> One thing at a time. One thing at a time. >> One thing I want to say about all of this is that um ideally we have every board member voting together on this. Um, so with where we are, it feels very
uncomfortable and I want to commit to us not being in this place again going forward. So for me, this is um it's a failed process in my mind. We
need to do better. I would agree with that. Um, typically when the board comes to the table and we've had discussions about this, we've hashed it out during working sessions or whatever and when we come to the table, we're pretty much all on the same page
and I feel like we are all over the place. Um, I do feel like after having that surveyed data, like it would be nice to hold a working session with the board and go through all the things based on the data that we got from that survey because furniture was one of the
things that was on there. What were other things that were on there? What are some things that we can help put in the proposal to build um community support for it? like I I just don't think we've had time to really talk through as a board.
>> Yeah. Again, I don't know. I mean, we've had a number of meetings. I think at the last meeting we asked like just ready to move forward on this. Is there any more information we need outside of the survey? I don't know that the survey was surprising in any way. Um, but in any event, I want to call
there's no further discussion on the amendment to the motion. >> Wait, did Sorry. Did you >> Did you withdraw it? No. >> No, I did not. >> You didn't amend it. >> No, I guess I I'm not allowed to amend. >> You can withdraw and re >> Oh, can I can I withdraw and make a new one? All right, let's do that.
>> I withdraw and would like to amend my motion to say to include the furniture and and the the Kenwood tennis court, the entire package that is proposed by the district. You're just with withdrawing your amendment. >> Yes, >> she's making an amendment to
>> withdrew his amendments and made a new amendment. >> Yes. Thank you. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> There is a second by Director Cameron, which essentially brings us up to the 139.6 million total. Um that is the option to
>> So we're essentially for the option to correct >> essentially option two with all the items I think. >> Yeah. Any discussion on that? >> I think option two makes sense versus option one. If you're going to do it, you must do option. >> We're voting on the amendment only at
this point. >> Agreed. >> All right. >> I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Sorry. Sorry. >> Any discussion on the amendment whether we're amending the original vote? >> Okay. >> I'm sorry. >> So, we're not voting on the actual >> decision. We're voting on the I want to
make sure a point of clarification. And I need to understand what I'm voting for. I just want to make sure. So I'm not I'm not voting for option two. I'm voting for Brian's amendment. >> Uh which is option two. >> Which is option two. >> It's adding in every item of option two. >> Correct. So we are voting for Brian's
amendment which is option two. >> We're voting to amend the original motion to Brian's motion and then we'll vote on that motion. >> Okay. But >> it all rolls into >> Yeah. We all get we get we get to the same place. All right. Thank you. That's what I need to understand. All right. Thank you.
>> Okay. Any other discussion on that? >> No. >> Johnson. >> Yes. >> Cameron. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Anderson. >> Yes.
>> Yes. >> All right. The amendment to the original motion passes. So now we're on the amended motion uh which is to approve um authorizing the district to prepare the
review and comment um for the Minnesota Department of Education for the improvements set forth in the option two plan in total amount of $139.6 million to improve Kenwood Century and the Warrior Middle School. >> Can I clarify something?
>> Yes. So, we're voting on option two that includes adding tennis courts when sports were at the bottom of what the community wanted and we don't have any teaching and learning supports,
right? That's essentially what we're doing now. So, we're putting tennis courts above. >> This is a infrastructure bill. >> Yeah. >> Not a staffing bill. >> I get that. But you're taking our tax tolerance and you're putting it towards
tennis courts. That's where I said like I feel like as a board we should go through these line items and say yes or no to see where we're all at because >> that's kind of what we're doing right now. >> Oh well, no. We're voting on one proposal. >> Well, the board just approved adding in the tennis courts, which is one
proposal, and the furniture just Yeah. >> Um Dr. Dr. Baker, I I appreciate like how you're feeling and what you're bringing up for me. Um, and I I believe this was said at a previous meeting that the tennis courts are used a lot for
curricular purposes. So like gym gym classes and um you know during the school day for for a space for student um learning. And so I hear what you're saying about how the community wants to support sports
facilities and not as interested in that. Right. >> Yeah. >> Um I I see this a little bit differently because of that. And also I I mean I do believe that each school should more or less have the same like
the same opportunity is the same curriculum. So, like if you're doing physical education at Sentry or Maguire and you're using the tennis courts for pickle ball or tennis or what whatever. I'm not >> So, can I clarify what this is? Because on the proposal it says that this isn't
adding tennis courts, it's just relocating the current tennis courts. >> That's for Century. >> That's for Century. >> And I think at Kenwood it's like they have tennis courts right now that are in bad shape. And so, it's just getting them up to snuff. And I think they're adding. >> We have to add
>> Oh, and adding two points. >> I mean, I stated last week I'd be fine pulling some of these out for question number two, >> but that isn't that isn't the issue right now. So, >> so
are you on trail slide? >> Yeah, there is. >> It's the second from the bottom site edition. So, as I as I'm reading this, you know, the Kenwood modifications would include a gymnasium storm shelter to accommodate the increased growth, new gymnasium
circulation, locker rooms, existing gymnasiums, expansion of the cafeteria to accommodate the additional growth that would come in, kitchen, subury, um parking expansion, storm water management, uh again expanded tennis
courts, dentist buildingwide furniture. Those are >> DC renovations. >> Yeah. Yes. And these are uh operational infrastructure things to accommodate the to accommodate future growth for the incoming middle middle
school class students. Uh when I look at Meguire, they're looking at two team classroom additions. um increased class sizes, add flex, uh making adjustments to the kitchen and servery expansion to accommodate additional students. Um cafeteria expansion, multi-purpose band,
choir, um metal shop and circ and is it circulation. I guess they don't have thought they had a metal shop, but maybe they don't. Uh locker room infrastructure, storm shelter, uh physical ed storage to circulation, uh extended parking, building wide
furniture. Uh and then when we look at the option two version of Century Middle School, the list includes um three team classroom additions, uh increasing the gymnasium, new entry lobby, uh lockers, uh expanding the kitchen, expanding the
cafeteria, multi-purpose band choir, um and then that's generally the list. What's the um what's the monthly dollar amount that will be added to someone's tax?
So, my understanding, and Bill, you can correct me if I'm wrong, that this is within the $18 a month tax tolerance. You know, we actually got updated information from others today and that amount we actually >> again information that would have been
nice to have >> prior. >> I don't disagree with you. I'm frustrated about that. Yes. >> But now we know. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Right. But when you're trying to have these conversations, it's not something
I take lightly when I know that that's how the community feels. That they're overt taxed, that there are people that cannot afford their grocery bills, that we're doing all these things. It's not an easy decision. I have went back and forth on this decision for weeks on what is right because I take this very
seriously. Like I it's not a decision I take lightly. the community has trusted us with these funds and we have to do our due diligence to make sure that we are pro the what we're promoting and what we're providing is not only like what's best for all of our students but
also what fits within what we need not what we want like what we really need. I I just think that that's that's a heavy burden that we bear and if you don't feel that weight like I don't know how you don't because like I said I've lost sleep over it. All
right. >> If if this were to pass tonight, I would like to see regular and we can figure out what that means or at least a a significant presentation about what is
our communication strategy. Um, and who are we using externally to help move the community understanding of the need for this? plus a plan with how we're going to address the fact that teachers are going to be teaching multiple grade levels.
>> Yeah. And a teaching and learning plan that complements the built. Yes. >> And and I just want to make sure that everybody knows like you don't have to say yes. No one's forcing your arm to say yes. Here you've got the we've gotten the information from the district
over the past month or so. And if you don't feel that you have enough information, it's okay to say no. Like that's that's that's >> though because if we're not united as a board, the community is not going to buy into it either. So no, I don't feel that way. I feel like with whatever the
majority is going to go with, I'm going to go with because I want us to make a board decision and be united in that. I I want to give the le I want to give it as much >> of a chance to pass as I can. So no, I don't feel that way. And for me, I mean,
you could say I needed more information at times. I think my bigger question is like, is this the right strategy given given our community and all the needs and this is one proposal that's been that we've
considered, right? And we know there's all these other needs. And so my comments are more about I want to see bigger picture strategy, not reaction strategy. Um, and that's what I feel like this is. And I'm not negating the fact that we need the space. We do.
>> Um, >> fair. I think many of us are in that boat. >> So, so, so let's play this out. We choose not to make a decision today, which is fine, and we just vote no. When would be the appropriate time to bring this matter back up? And then and and
will that jeopardize our student experiences in middle school? So when would be the next when when would you want to like like when would be an appropriate time to make this call? Because we've missed if we missed the deadline. I think the deadline is is it next week? >> When's the next deadline? Like when like
can we not do any levy at all next year? Is like is that the rule? Because I don't know. I mean, we if you're looking for 2020 open on the expansion, it's just we just miss it. Then you're looking at the next year, right? >> So, wait a year. >> Yeah.
>> If we if we don't make a decision by next Friday, we can't do we can't bring it out to the public for for a full year. Is that is that >> we can go in November? >> Or we can go in November. >> November. >> You could go in November. >> You could go in November and do two
levies. >> Well, which then gets you back to the same position. How how likely are you >> as a as a public? >> And the reason I say two levies is that we've been talking about an operating levy potentially with there's additional staffing gaps that we have across the
industry across our district. So over the next three to six months, if we talk about things that that we can use to close gaps with the remaining tax capacity we have available, that that might that would be two levies, an operating levy and a bond levy. So, >> well, and I think my concern, too, is
that we have significant needs. We have our pathways in a basement, and that was never supposed to be a long-term solution. And when is that going to come back into the fold? Because we're already talking about how we need an operating levy. That would probably involve a build or something separate
that we haven't discussed. And when is that going to come back around? And how are we then again failing our pathway students? that will come back around immediately because we're working all of those right now sequentially.
>> If we wait till November, we will not have space to to start the school year of 28. >> That's been known since April of 24. >> Very true. >> I'm sorry. >> We don't have space to start 27. >> Yeah. But does that justify pushing it
out? >> I just mean that's not the reason to not That's why I don't feel like the strategic vision is thinking about all those things. >> Well, we actually are. Um, what we're trying to do is make up for lost time in
um I I went through Dr. Vanzy's presentation of April of 24. Um, which some of these things that we're talking about right now were in that presentation, >> right? >> Um, but that didn't happen for whatever the reasons are. So we are I'm I'm
trying to deal with what's the immediate simple solution to optimize our flexibility and capability into the longer strategy that I think everybody wants and deserves.
Um but getting there first things first and the first thing uh that I think we have to do is create the space we can the teaching and learning process and program. We've done
a reset there that's got to take the time to >> uh develop and we're doing a lot of work there. Um, but I'm just trying to buy us a little bit of time here and be judicious about what our student needs and what our faculty needs are going to
be. And as the students come uh into the district, because we've tried to show what the what the numbers look like out to 2030 and beyond, um, it's a really ugly problem. I I I fully
understand that and I I empathize with everybody's frustrations with this. The challenge is really about the timing that we're in. >> Yeah. >> And I have chosen to confront that. And I I know it's very uncomfortable, but if we
don't, then we're going to have to come up with alternative plans that are still not going to get at the at the core issues, which are the teaching and learning issues, which I think everybody has right >> correctly and properly brought up. Uh,
and everybody deserves more information about that. uh and I think it's a yes and I think we can do this create the space and the flexibility and whether you're doing a a a
model that we have in the middle school that is teameming or something else that the teaching and learning would want to do will have the space to fit that. That's with option two.
>> Yeah. and it also projects longterm what our fill is going to be in the three facilities. So, I've tried to lay that out. I know that there's been a lot of talk about another building. Um the challenges
there are I think financially greater and don't align with what my sensing was and I think this survey validated that our community wants to do as needed and this is a need uh for sure this is a
need and I I don't know any other way to say it. Um, I I I agree with everything that's been said at this table, but I also know that if you look at it from a timing perspective, this is where we're at. And this is a solution that can continue to
set the conditions for all the other things that I humbly and 100% agree with and I have to deliver on that. But it's going to be exponentially more difficult if we don't
have the space. >> That's we can just do one expansion in one middle school. We don't have to do all three. I mean as a as a band-aid. I mean >> Director Victor. >> So I just want to say thank you for all of that. I I appreciate that acknowledgement um of the frustration
and the difficulty of this decision. Um, and I also want to think about um those survey results and what the community said they needed. As we're thinking about if we're going to move forward with this, I really feel it needs to be
a two question ask. So then I think we should be very thoughtful on what that second question is knowing that the community needs some sort of a leeway for what's coming next. So maybe our second question has something to do with high school expansion or something like
that. It's on there. They know it's coming. It'll probably get voted down, but then at least we put them on notice and started that information and that conversation for what's coming down the road. I just think we need to be mindful on how we do that, too. Because there's
more to this than just approving the bond and and moving forward. It's how do we craft those questions to help tell our story and to put some control in the voters's hand with also giving them the information. So to that point, how much information do we have to have in order
to have a second question >> like we have to know specific? >> Well, you have to do a review and comment on anything that you're going to build and you have to have the design and the dollar figures associated with that. So um you know that's what I mean
we itemized the lists here. Um, >> we would have to figure that those details out, but they have to be in review and comment that go to the Minnesota Department of Education for >> be on the list we have right now. Then that's probably not doable in the next week, but
>> I I can't see I wouldn't see how you could um just to answer that question. >> Okay, D. Um, I appreciate what you're saying, Director Baker, and wanting to like help the community understand like the next phases that will come um down
the pike. I don't know if I'm in agreement with using a ballot question to help educate at this time at least. Um, >> I get that. >> I I think I think looking at a long-term
communication strategy is critical. don't get and so that's what I would want to see is like as we start planning this these next phases that it starts now um communicating with families parents community about what is needed but I don't know if the B
>> I don't think a single single question is going to go over well I think we should have two >> and I think we're going to have to really figure out what that second question is going to be >> I call the question have we used question from President Obama. Have we
used a second ballot question before asking >> I believe yeah I would I'd have to go back and look at um when we did that I want to say it was either 2017 or 2019 somewhere in there. >> Okay. >> So we have done it. Yes. >> Do you feel like it worked well as a
strategy? >> It worked that time. >> Did it pass? >> I >> Oh, it just passed. Okay. >> Yeah. >> Oh, the second question passed too. >> Yeah, I think it was both. Now I think while I was away, did you guys not do a two question? And one passed and one passed and one failed. >> It's kind of a mixed bag there.
>> That one was tricky though because it was like increasing the perupal funding and you know you voted yes for the first which I forget how much money let's say $100. It was more than that but then the next one was like do you want to do another hundred and they're like well I already gave some. You know >> you could also put it like the first
question is the middle school expansion and the second question is the early childhood center. You could also do something like that because that was on the survey results too. people were concerned about early childhood. So, >> well, there was also favorable or in people in favor of ALC education.
>> There were. Yeah, I was really excited to see that. >> That's where I think like part of this is when I'm thinking about how strategy here. I think that's what I was more looking for is when we're thinking about going out for bond, what are the biggest needs that we can bundle? And I know
we're not there, but that's what I mean, we're not there tonight, but now I just feel like talk about incompetency. We're failing our ALC or our pathways at this point. >> So, >> we really are. >> And so, >> do you feel like we have a plan for that already in front of us that we can
>> put as a second question? >> My worry is that if we go out for a bond in the spring and next we have to everybody knows we have to have an operating levy of some sort and then we're going to go for another bond or something else. I mean that and then like this is where my concern gets to
that 33 to 35 or 20 30 20 33 to 2035 where we are not going to be able to go for anything >> because we've reached our limit >> because we have well not limit we have all the other levies coming up for renewal >> and so and it's big dollar levies
>> so there's no way we're going to pass anything else in that time period. So we're going to crunch all of this into the next That means we're going out every year for something. >> We're just talking about question one here. I mean, if we want to discuss the question two, we can, but how about we
get our vote on this if that's okay with everyone? >> But I mean, >> then we can discuss additional items. So, I mean, by by the end of next week, you know, we have to figure out what's all going to be on the ballot, right? So, but we're first going to try to
figure out if we have one thing on the ballot. So, And that's where I would like to see like the expansions with like if we can get people behind the expansions, it might be strategic to bundle that with >> All right, let's see if expansions
first. All right. Um, >> yes. >> Can we just receive the motion? >> Sorry. Uh the motion is pursuing to Minnesota statutes 123b.71 uh for school board for district 194 to
authorize administration prepare and submit to the Minnesota Department of Education to require review and comment um for the following facility improvements which are the 139.6 6 million improvements to Kenwood Trail, Century, and Middle School facilities as
outlined as option two um in the schoolboard proposal dated November 11th, 2025. >> That includes the furniture. Thank you. >> We are Yes.
>> Thompson. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Baker. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> First. >> Okay. All right. Um, so that's taken
care of. >> Any additional items people want to discuss from the list? are the proposals. >> I just I don't think some of them are like I
think some I think my concern was some of the things that maybe are considered later um seem more urgent. I don't know how well planned that would be at this point. Like we've we've thrown out ideas
about doing like something on that plot of land by Lakeville South to be like a career combination with Pathways, you know, like >> career pathwaysmies. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> And I think that would be great.
>> I think it would be too. >> But that's where I don't feel like the administration >> but that's that's my concern. >> But we've asked about that like several times. Yeah. >> I guess my concern is like if we're going up for bond
do we do we go a little bit bigger so that we can address multiple priorities >> and I think that's my ch I think I don't think it's a second question. I think >> it's one >> you bundle this you can get the community behind let's say the middle school expansions
>> and the question would also include right some other high priority need of the district it's not >> you're not pitting one against the other or or a sequencing of them >> are there other priorities that you have in mind that you'd like to consider >> pathways
>> what >> pathways >> when you mean pathways what does that mean a new building or a new location or what does that mean to you? >> To me, I think it's um I've never seen it as a program that's just in a
building by itself. Um I think it is encompassed within like a career and technical center where they have access to um and then both high schools have access to learning bringing back like some of those um career and tech things
that are students want access to right now. >> So you want a tech center? >> I do. Yeah. I think it's in there. And then I also see that being um having a gymnasium on it so that they have access to that because they've never had access to that. They can take care of some of
our gym issues with community ed. >> So when we if we had a if we bundled this that has to be decided today or that has to be decided by next week. So, can we >> I just don't know we can get a plan for
a tech center. I just again if you're moving from needs to wants >> I don't see it as a tech center. >> I mean, you could make an argument on the pathway side. Sure. I just don't know that we have and maybe Amber can
speak to this too because we had we went through there last week. I just don't know that the vision we have right now that's been presented to for the future pathways is necessarily the consensus of you know >> I I commit to making sure that it's a
top priority in the next iteration of things that we need to do >> but >> but then I also know that that has been the discussion on pathways for the past 15 years and it's continually been moved down
>> because every time then they say well there's a bigger need it impacts more student population um and it it just gets moved down when during budget cuts like they literally lost their building. >> I see it as more like a challenge of get
like how do we how do like Amber mentioned earlier mentioned this too like how do we bundle this together to get a vote in favor of that collectively. I think it's going to be a lot harder for us to get a vote for that in isolation and then we can keep
kicking the can. >> But there are also issues that we have at both of our high schools that a career center could address given the fact that we have one high school that has a great wood shop and one high school that has great welding, but the kids don't I mean and then the times
don't correspond. So, it's hard for kids to go to different places. But if we had one central location that's career pathways where they could get maybe their CNA license before they graduate, we could also bring back some of those PSA PS PSO students that are doing some of those things outside of our campuses
anyway, which would bring dollars back to the district. >> I think I'd like to see pathways integrated in this future state model that TNL might be putting together that would say, do you want a tech center? What does it include? Does PE, you know, pathways fit in there? Does community ed
fit in there? And and and that might, again, unfortunately, probably won't happen within a week, but I would want to ensure that that is part of the next proposal for whatever the district needs to do. >> I know, >> just that I've been asking about it.
>> Yeah, I was I mean, I was going to say I think figuring out a good solution for the ALC is like one of the highest priorities um for the district. Um, I've been told that the ALC plan that was presented to us a couple meetings
ago now was not vetted by staff and the principal. I heard it from the principal and staff directly. And so I want to see a plan that is um where where the stakeholders involved are consulted before it comes to the board. Um,
and but I don't think I'm ready to like vote for a tech center for like in the next week in the sense that I like you, Director Thompson, I think if there is a tech center, I want to understand how the two high schools interact with that
in terms of moving kids around even like how how is a teacher learning plan foster opportunity for all kids if if something like that is to be developed. And I I I realize that will take some time to figure out. Um but I also think
I think that is one option for the ALC, but I also think in our conversations um um with that Matt and I had there might be some other options too that the principal there has thought about with like other commercial real estate options that would be way less money
than what we're what we've been talking about and would be a great fit for the ALC. So, you know, >> I I'm with you. I think this is a high pri in the top five priorities, top three for the district. >> I don't think we're ready to put it on
the ballot for >> May. It does feel that we are reactive and and 100% in alignment with you guys on that one because we should be thinking nine to 12 months out. So, right now, we should be thinking about the things that we want to implement within our schools in September. But
we've got polling to decide next week. We've got boundary changes that probably need to be decided by end of December, if not early January. Is that true? >> February. >> January, February. >> January, February. All right. So, there are some other hot items that we've got to resolve fairly quickly so that we can
get ahead and do other things, but don't want to discredit or, you know, say, hey, like those are important things, but we also have other things that are unfortunately right in front of us that we've got to tackle. >> So, I just want to say that that's right in
front of us, too. >> Yes. >> Yeah. I And I'm with with Amber on this one. I just would love to see and I know we've asked teaching learning, but I think that the time frame is probably the end of the school year when we kind of see their vision um and
recommendation and I assume have something from um pathways too. So, but again, I don't think what we have in front of us or presented to us is really the ideal option right now. And we don't have a tech center as much as it'd be really
cool to have one. Um, >> I fully agree that it we can't put this together next week, but this is more my my where I've been struggling so much and I know it's all over my face and it's all over my voice and I'm sorry I'm struggling in this meeting a lot. Um,
>> yep. where how could how could we have packaged this in a way and we are not yes that's what it feels like like I feel like the community is pretty easily going to get behind the middle schools it is going to be harder cell to get behind some of these other things that we may have to build for and so yeah
>> it's definitely a missed opportunity >> we are where we are >> y move to adjourn >> I'll second it Oh yes. >> Yes. >> Yes.
>> We are >> I was thinking about it. >> I was thinking about it. >> Yeah. Amber, that's teaching and learning. One of the things that was very disappointing is the previous
directors.