##VIDEO ID:eN3RYAEn8bo## e e e e e good afternoon everybody I'd like to call this meeting to order can we please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance Pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America to the stands indivisible Justice for All Miss Falls will you call the role please Dr Mori here Mrs Roberts yep Mrs Powers here Mrs Russell here pett here he to respect everybody's time we are going to do things a little bit differently today public comment comes first what we're going to ask is if you are not speaking about retiree health insurance I'm looking at your cards and I'm calling you based upon what you put on your card so you get to speak first then we are pulling the discussion of 5.01 to the top of the line we are going to get the presentation from Mr Calderone then the board is going to discuss and then public comment for anyone who wants to speak about retire healthc care so if I call your name right now you're welcome to come up for public comment but it isn't about retiree um Health it is about something else I have Marisol zakera followed by Brendan creger good afternoon ladies and gentlemen of the board my name is Marisa and I'm a local um business owner and parent my SK my kids attended uh um Felix Williams uh Elementary School M uh Stuart Middle and ultimate Jensen Beach High School and they're both um college graduates and hopefully productive members of society thanks to our community the reason why I'm here today is because uh I am concerned for those um information that's coming to me as a as a business uh uh person and a community leader regarding ice enforcement the possibility of I enforcement in um school property in school campuses um we haven't heard and nothing we've been calling the school board and we've been asking several people who are involved in in different aspects of Education as far as whether there's a specific policy that this school board has adopted when it comes to the possibility of ice enforcements in schools against the children of immigrant families mixed status families uh we know for a fact that um this enforcement this kind of intrusive appearance in school campuses has happened in Tampa it happens in penelas it happens happened in Duval County and it's most likely going to happen here in Martin County so my question to you today is what is the school board going to do to protect kids to protect their safety to protect their ability to attend school because as you know there's been an increase in absence in many of these schools Warfield Elementary Jensen Beach um Elementary and uh JD Parker and Indian town as well and the reason is fear fear has no place in education politics should not should not be the reason why our children are not allowed to go to school and this board and and and this educational system is bound to protect and Safeguard our children so I would like to invite the board to put out publicly procedures protocols that are going to be enforced that parents can rely on when they send their children to school so they know they will won't be taken out of their classroom and interrogated which has happened already in Florida thank you very much thank you Brendan creger hello uh my name is Brendan creger I'm here to speak about the same topic I have two children uh a child at Stuart Middle School and a child at Felix A Williams I don't recall there ever being a time where there was even vague consideration in the past where we would send agents in a school to apprehend someone who's suspected of a crime it has never been discussed in my entire lifetime anywhere that I've lived so this is a first uh it's why is it a first because it's it's an absurd proposition quite frankly um uh to send agents into a school for this to put our staff in a position uh administrators teachers and especially children where they're fearing that this may happen um we all work to ensure that our schools are a safe place that emphasize Community empathy love for our neighbors certainly not one where we're where we're forcing our sweet innocent children to witness agents swarming in and hollowing away their best friend or their best friend's parents so uh my eighth grade daughter sent me a message yesterday saying that there's been tons of communication between the kids at Stuart Middle School that ice is going to raid any day they're getting concerned they have no guidance and from everything we've read and heard in the news there's school districts across the country that are that are taking a clear position on this and issuing clear guidance Martin County Schools is a leader in education and we usually take charge in these types of matters and not really wait for others so um I'm just asking that you kind of take this into consideration that we have a clear stance and one that emphasizes the safety of our children where frankly we just wouldn't allow this to happen because we never have before it's never even been a consideration so uh we shouldn't let these rumors and stress continue to grow uh with our kids and we need to just kind of um put that fire out right now and leave zero doubt in their minds so this is also Beyond education Beyond some of the potential legalities of this it's a life lesson that we need to teach to our kids right now and I think that this is uh extraordinarily important time period uh in their lives and this is a time for us to step up and teach them a true life lesson of what we allow and what we don't I've heard uh local uh I I've it's been crammed down my throat that we need local um ability to operate how we want in school districts yet now I'm hearing that in this case we want to wait for federal guidance and then State guidance I I'm not quite sure where we really stand as a board um uh uh if we want to leave that up to us locally to make this decision or not so thanks for hearing me out thank you so much sir can you come back for a moment sure thank you I'm sorry I just wanted a clarification you said that your eighth grade daughter contacted you yes she contacted me and said that there are group texts going around among students at Stuart Middle School that ice is planning on raiding any day and there's concern and fear over that and tons of uncertainty and she sent you that message during school she sent this to me you know she sent this to me yesterday and if that's the point that you took from this message the message is lost on you I'm just asking for she did not send that to me during school than you very much sure uh Sarah contras good afternoon my name is s Paris and I have a child enrolled at Stuart Middle School and another at Felix I too am concerned about the possibility of ice conducting raids in our schools districts in our state and around the country have offered parents and staff detailed plans on how to respond to ice rates our district has yet to do so and I am here today to ask that the district release a plan and offer uniform guidance to staff how are you as a board going to keep our children safe safe from the possibility of being profiled or questioned without a parent present will ice be allowed to put children in handcuffs we deserve transparency and our children deserve to learn in a safe environment without the fear of federal agents dragging their classmates away as a clinical social worker who has worked primarily with women and children who have experienced significant trauma it alarms me to consider the mental health impact ice rids could have on our children I have sat in therapy sessions with children who have witnessed ice raids firsthand the effects of witnessing a traumatic event are long lasting and severe as a parent and a trauma therapist I urge the district to show leadership and compassion towards all of our students and Families regardless of their immigration status thank you thank you okay we are now going to move on to our present in is there anyone else who wants to speak about a topic other than retiree Health okay Mr Calderone please good afternoon Madam chair members of the board superintendent Maine I am Don Calderone I'm the director of risk management and employee benefits with the Martin County School District um I am here today to provide some information to the school board um as a followup to both the September 2024 Schoolboard workshop and the January 14th 2025 Schoolboard Workshop regarding not looking and actually is not allowed to take away any insurance from retirees um Florida statute 112.0 1801 requires that school districts offer the same medical insurance to retirees that they offer to active employees so this uh board policy 6560 the way that the board has had discussions about it is from a budget and funding perspective um nobody is discussing anything about taking um medical insurance away from our retirees okay okay so um I thought that we would kind of do this a little bit differently here since there was so much conversation um a couple weeks ago at the January board Workshop um at following the January board Workshop staff along with the Garen group um took the conversations that were had by the board and um provided a framework of options um for three sets of employees um we presented these options um to the superintendent last week and the superintendent has made his recommendations um I'm going to summarize them first and go over kind of the buckets of um employees and retirees that we've been um looking at since September of 2024 um so the first bucket of um people that we're looking at are retired under 65 and not Medicare eligible um you're going to see a couple of different options um in the in the presentation but the superintendent along with staff and the Garing group is recommending option A which means that all retiree health insurance contributions shall continue as is through June 30th 2030 and then effective July 1st 2030 that the board contributions for retirees under 65 will end um and then we have a next group of employees that are um employees that are in the drop program um and that for those employees in the drop program and also for any employees that may be in the pension plan that retire between now and June 30th 2030 that they be afforded the same um board policy contributions um as currently is through June 30th 2030 okay then the next set of employees um the next set of people that we have been talking about and discussing are retirees that are over 65 so um the superintendent along with staff is recommending that effective July 1st 2025 that the Martin County health insurance subsidy should go from $5 per year service per month 30-year Max to $2.50 per month uh per year service per month and that this shall continue um through June 30th 2030 and then effect of July 1st 2030 that these contributions for retirees over 65 will end um just for context purposes um board policy 6560 um was created by the board um in November of 2015 and at that time there was no end date on there so you know use round numbers we've got 10 years of the current iteration of board policy 6560 our recommendation is you you extend it out another five years as is for those that are under 65 and keep contributing um for over 65 um with a decrease in the amount that would bring that up to 15 years in total okay Mr Calderon why did you pick 250 um $2 $2.50 uh was the the number that we picked because um for the when the board policy 6560 was created back in November of 2015 the board at that time selected $5 uh per month per year service with a 30-year Max to match what F FRS was offering um so you got five $ five a month per year service through F FRS you got another five from Mart County School District you got $10 altoe um on July 1st 203 July 1st 20 23 um the uh the state moved their um subsidy from $5 to 750 so that 250 that we're recommending will bring retirees back to the the $10 that they were getting in total for the first eight years of the way 6560 was written any other questions do my best here to try and get everything on the screen so everybody can can see it here um so ultimately for um the current retirees under 65 and not Medicare eligible we are recommending option a um as I stated that the policy will continue through June 30th 2030 and for this board policy um retirees receive a contribution b a percentage of contribution based on years of service based on the board contribution towards active um medical insurance contribution so the board contributes $6,500 towards uh active employees and based on their years of service they can earn anywhere from 25% contribution to 100% of that $6,500 based on their years of service so we are recommending that option a um be selected um and just a a note here um there was um a presentation um that was given at the January 27th Insurance committee meeting last Monday and some of the information that um I've presented here um or will present or discuss here as a result of conversations that we've we had at that insurance committee um so one of the questions um that that was brought up last week was um if if we ended it you know at on June 30th 2030 how many retirees would that affect so we know from previous um Workshop that there are 117 retirees that are on the district's group he health insurance so they're either on the the HMO the PO or high deductible plan by selecting option a um this will only impact um 26 retirees moving forward um at of the 117 so um at that point um the majority of those retirees will turn 65 and move into that other bucket of over 65 and the backup material um that correlates to the to that is found in appendix I page five so the next slide here is just simply a bar graph that shows um what the cost would be to the district and what the savings would be so um if the board were to select option A as their um as their decision to continue as is through June 30th 2030 for under 65 retirees it would cost the board between now and June 30th 2030 um roughly 1 .8 million it would only save $339,000 and we did that for each of the options B through D okay um so the next group of people are those that are in the uh the pension plan so just as a friendly reminder um when you um are a public sector employee here you have a choice between either being in the pension plan or in the investment plan um it's much more difficult to determine when somebody May retire if they're in if they're in the investment plan because uh once they satisfy the F FRS requirements um essentially they could reti retire at any time however if you're in the the pension plan under drop you let you notify Florida retirement system of when your drop end date is which is ultimately the last day that you can retire you can retire earlier um however you have to retire by that certain date so it's a little bit easier to to kind of plan the uh the liability for that um so having said that um we are recommending option A for not only those that are in the pension plan but also those that may retire um in the investment plan as well between now and June 30th 20 2030 um we talked about this at the insurance committee um and one of the questions was um it was a great question by one of the um the audience members was well you presented a a liability of about 2.2 million dollar um and that was basically assuming that everybody would retire as soon as they uh they enter drop um but that's not really realistic correct um we we know generally speaking that most active employees when they enter drop they typically um work until their drop end date so uh we kind of took a look at the the numbers a little differently which I'm going to get into on the next page here but um just for um consistency purposes we're utilizing um the numbers here based on what we presented uh a couple of weeks ago and then I'll show you how that figure Chang changes as we take a look at when they may realistically retire so um ultimately um we took a look at this and we um said that if all the employees um stayed um until their drop date and the board ended the uh contributions on June 30th 2030 um that out of the um 88 drop employees that are currently under 65 um there would only be 133 employee retirees that may be affected um by um the board selecting option A which would cost the board about $1.6 million for a total Savings of $548,000 could I have a question for you there yeah I'm going to grab my bottle of order while you ask that yeah so you're saying there's 13 I'm counting 27 out of the 66 so perhaps you can walk me through I'm looking at appendix 6 which is labeled drop under 65 and I guess that's hang on a minute which appendix do you want me to look at let me start with that okay um are you are you you want me to look at appendix five drop under 65 option b where you want me to look okay so are you referring to Mrs Roberts are you referring to the current retirees under 65 and not Medicare eligible on this one right here page three I'm referring to the people that you just talked about in drop okay so not which I believe that there's 66 people that are currently in drop that are under the age of 65 correct total currently under 66 under the age of 65 right right now that are in drop correct and 33 of those will be 33 of those will still be under the age of 65 at the time that their drop period the entirety of their drop period ends okay so I I was trying to understand what Mr Calderone said it sounded to me like he said that out of that 66 that using this option b would only and cutting off after 2030 would affect 13 people is that what he said yes I'm gonna C or a I think I think it was option A was it option A so I I guess my first question is which attachment is that spreadsheet we start with that so I've pulled up um page eight here in the presentation entitled revised final and these are the drop employees that are under 65 um and that will remain under 65 when their drop end date ends so if you look in the column that is labeled 2030 to 2031 these people here in this column when when they retire they will still be under 65 years old okay so if you count them up there's 30 so let me so let me stop you with that so I think I am looking at the page that says added as a followup to January 27 2025 Insurance committee meeting yes and it's a page that says expected liability correct yes and it's a page that starts with employee number one that the lines going across say 632 1.68 6 2.0 0.314 Etc correct yes okay so if I draw a hard line after that 2930 number yes and and first of all I want to correct one statement that I think that you might not have said what you meant to say okay you were saying something about um employees this is assuming employees retire right after they enter drop which is not what you meant to say I think you meant to say this is assuming employees retire right now and and quit being an employee and then they would be in a category of under 65 not rece not Medicare eligible and no longer in drop correct yes I apologize if I misspoke um what I meant to say was the the chart that we're looking at right now that um entitled expected liability um we're we're taking a look at those people in drop and we are assuming looking at it from a different perspective if they continue to work until their drop end date ends okay which is typically what most people do when they enter drop they work until their last date okay and I thought I understood you to say that of these 66 that implementing the the ending date of the 2930 year would impact 13 and I beg to differ on that because if I draw a hard line between 2930 and 3031 on page one I have three people number 34 35 and 36 is that oh wait yeah so I see 34 35 and 36 which have an expected liability in the 3031 year correct that would be three and then when I go to the next page and go down I'm seeing number 48 with two years of expected liability I'm seeing 50 and 51 and 52 and 53 and 54 and 55 and 56 and 57 58 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 do you see those same people correct so when I add those that's 20 is that correct you understand what I just did I took anybody who had a number in the liability column that starts with the 20 30 31 year correct okay and those 30 people so now let's back up again using this assumption right the total cost if you ran this all the way out for this 66 people it would the last of these 66 people who would be affected would be get their last payment in the 38 39 year correct one person correct and so if I draw that hard line before I take everything you're telling me that for this group of 66 people my cost from this year through 3839 is 648,000 is that correct and then if I take for all 15 years for all 15 all 15 years all 15 years is 648 and I know that I've got 20 that are affected beyond the 2930 year correct and then if I want to figure the liability for for that I'm adding the 48,000 the 73 the 82 is that correct correct okay thank you very much I'm sorry to interrupt you thank you thank you that was um Gabrielle Swain she's our um benefits consultant with the Garen group who is the math wizard behind this so thank you okay um so the final group of um people that we have been talking about are the current retirees over 65 or Medicare eligible and it is um recommend recommendation that we um we're recommending to the board option b which will um pay those retirees for another five years through the 293 year ending on June 30th 2030 who are currently 65 and retired or who may turn 65 between now and June 30th 2030 and still provide them a Martin County health insurance subsidy but to decrease that amount from $5 per month per year service to $22.50 and we uh provided a cost of that and a total savings um for that um as as you may recall um the school board is paying roughly $1.1 million for the um Martin County health insurance subsidy for those retirees that are over 65 years old and um if you take a look at page 11 here one of the questions that came out of the uh Insurance committee meeting last week was to try and go back as far as we could and determine what the district has um contributed to those retirees over 65 and we we were able to go back um to the beginning of the uh 2122 year and we broke it out between those that are on a district sponsored plan whether they're on a group health plan or a uh Medicare Advantage or Supplement Plan and those that are not on any plan at all and they're just receiving that that subsidy from the district so you can see roughly I'm sorry I want to correct that statement also when you see not on any plan at all not on any District district plan correct yes thank yep so subsidy for retirees on a district sponsored plan is one column and then the next column is subsidy for retirees who are not on a district sponsored plan and we have the total subsidy cost so you could see that the um the amount is rising roughly 5% on average and um based on annual annualization for the 24 25 year we're expecting $1.1 million um and so that is the data that I wanted to bring forward um to the board and um Wanted to let the insurance committee audience know last week that we did provide the information and questions that we were asked to the board and I am available for any questions I guess mine is more of not necessarily questions but kind of how I feel about this whole thing um you know we often say how much we value our employees how can we truly say that and then our actions show differently spoken with several retirees and current staff members many of whom were offered positions in other districts some multiple times and they decided to stay with Martin County because of the retirement insurance benefit if we take the retiree insurance benefit away it will reduce the incentive for employees to remain here this puts the diff The District in a difficult position if teachers are no longer incentivized to stay with us they may leave for a higher paying District in their final years before retirement to increase their effs the result would be losing some of our most veteran and seasoned teachers these teachers are greatly needed and essential in mentoring and supporting our newer teachers losing these veteran Educators would be detrimental to the district this serves as is a key retention tool as well as a way we can show how much we value our employees in their service additionally there are also those individuals who entered the drop program with the understanding that this benefit would be available to them for them this was a critical part of their retirement planning taking it away now would be unfair because they would have likely made a different decision had they known the benefit would be removed we should not place these employees in financial hardship because we are looking to reduce our budget I'm asking for the board to consider that we maintain policy 65 6 as is and explore other ways to trim our budget without jeopardizing the promises we made to employees please let her speak thank you I'm just asking the board to possibly reconsider I know that this isn't ideal for anyone um but I mean I that's my my ask [Applause] um so first of all I don't think that we have anything to consider yet I think that um I think there's two things we have to look at because in we have a lot of data a lot of data and I think that we have talked a lot about um first of all I think we have two groups of people we have that are retired now that I think we as a board should decide right now they're they're grandfathered in their grandfather that we have the 117 that are under 65 and we have the others that are on the his whether we decide to go with the keep the $5 do or the 250 um that's that's another but we I think we can decide that tonight to give them assurance that that is not going to go away they're still going to get that benefit um and then whatever we if we do anything differently because we've talked a lot about our current employees that are in drop but we are not we have not made any consideration for the employees that are in the investment plan and we don't even know what that number looks like we have no idea um how many of those employees plan to retire um we need to plan for them too we are excluding an entire group of people that are not even con it's not even considered in this data and those are our current employees not our retirees um so I think we need we need some additional information but I think that we probably could um have consensus moving forward I did talk to um Terry Harmon before I came in tonight and we talked a little bit about the policy um how it's kind of split up he believes that we need to look at that look at the policy and have more clarity about when in someone joined the district I know we have two 2015 the last time this policy was changed um that we look at how we're going to do this moving forward in the policy before we change it but I I honestly don't believe we have enough data because we have to con there is a group of people that we are not even considering here tonight but I do think we can we can have consensus on at least the current retired employees or former employees um sure so first of all I want to say that when I'm looking at the superintendent's recommendations and I I also I'm going toide divide it into two buckets but then there's sub buckets right so one bucket is the people who are already retired whether that means that you're already retired you're under 65 whether that means you're already retired over 65 you're already retired or you're in drop so that piece is a person that you know what a retirement date is you know what that looks like um with the superintendent's recommendations with the first one being a cost of 1.8 million the second one being a cost of 1.6 which is a total of 3.4 not talking about the health insurance subsidy right now just talking about the existing people who are retirees the ones who are golfing and playing maang and doing all those other wonderful things okay so that group of people right when you're saying that your recommendation is to chop it after five years and you're giving me a cost of 3.4 the way I look at it is is to make that cost instead of 3.4 make that cost 2.8 the way that you would make that cost 2.8 is you would take the entirety of people who are either in drop right now under the age of 65 in drop or the retirees that are retired and underage 65 and pay them all the way out the cost of that is 2155 for the first group the non-rop group The Drop group considering that the drop group people um will most likely work and so your cost is not the 1.6 your cost is the 648,000 correct on correct on I'm getting the math expert here hold on one second best case scenario yes so that is if everybody works their entire period until their drop period is over so when I add the 2.55 to the 648 I come up with 2.8 million as opposed to the 3.4 with the cut off with the cut off I'm coming up with 3.4 because I'm assuming that everybody who's on drop is going to cut come in tomorrow and say I'm I'm out of here I'm I'm no longer working continue under this policy but in reality the history has been they continue to work through their drop period which then means I'm closer to the 648 so when I do that I'm at 2.8 million I think that what that does is um it gives closure and gives some sense of security to the people who are retired and to the people who have made their plans and doesn't put them in a position where I I'm work I get the 6,500 for five more years but I've got a two-year Gap and now I've got to go figure out what I'm going to do for insurance for the two-year Gap or a three-year Gap or a one-year Gap or whatever it is because in reality if they had known that ahead of time they might not have either retired they might not enter dropped when they did Etc so I kind of feel like that kind of like gives some gives some ability to make your planning done and ability to do what you need to do knowing that you're protected your 6,500 is protected under that number um then I think that for the people who are currently employees right the current employees that have not entered drop so the current employees that are either on a the retirement plan which means they could enter drop at any point in time or the investment plan where we don't know if they're going to enter drop at any time we don't know what they're going to do um but they're not retired and they're not in drop I believe that we need additional information for those employees I believe that the information to accurately look at what that employee pool looks like our current employees we need to know their age their years of service with the district and whether they're in the investment plan or the retirement plan I think then you can look at it and see where you where people are and see where our pots of people are does that understand what I'm saying so I think along with I agree with Mrs powers that we can kind of close I'm willing to close the door on the people or leave the door open whichever we want to look at it but to give some finality to the people who are the retirees people who are in drop and people who are retirees that I'm I'm willing to say you you run out this group of people the 117 and the 66 you're running yourself out through that period of time anybody who is a current employee we need to come back and look at then there's the health insurance subsidy piece and I think that's a different discussion as to what we do with the health insurance subsidy piece but for that first piece that's what I think and my 2.8 comes out less than your 3.4 math M Roberts yes you you mentioned employees in drop but you're only talking about the employees that the 66 and the 117 because the ones that are in drop will be we will consider that with all the all of the employees that as we get more data so all of our active employees because if they're in drop they're still active no employees so I'm I'm because what what I will say just really quickly is that just because they're in drop doesn't or they're in the investment plan doesn't mean that they those people are also not planning for are not planning for their retirement we just don't know about it so we need to consider them the same way that we consider all of our other active employees um or the retirement for our active employees because they're planning for their retirement as well I agree I agree with your thinking but I believe that the ones that are are currently in drop now have announced and know the date that they are leaving so imagine if you're in the retirement plan and you and you enter drop and you're planning on leaving in two years your six your eight years is up in two years I also I am in the investment plan and I'm planning on leaving we're twins I'm planning on leaving the same time you're leaving it's just because I'm in the investment plan I don't need to tell anybody but I think and I think when we look at those numbers and we look at what those are we can look at those separately and see who look what we do with those and I'm not saying that everybody who is not retired is in the same boat because I think that's why you need a segregation of who's in the investment plan and who's in the retirement plan but I just think that if you know that you're in drop you don't have let's say we're twins you know you're in drop you don't have the ability to walk back from not retiring correct right because you told me six years ago you're going to retire in two more years so you don't have the ability to do that so as far as I'm concerned you are retired you're working two more years but I know your retirement date me your twin sister in the um investment plan you don't know my retirement date it might be tomorrow it might be in two years like yours it might be in four years and I do think we need to have the grace and the consideration for those people to know how many years of service have you been here have you been here for 20 years have you been here for 25 have you been here for 30 and look at them the same way you would look at somebody and drop because they have a different choice on how they're doing things but I think what we look back at the people who are current employees we divide those employees into groups we invite those those employees into the groups that are drop eligible and the ones that are not drop eligible right but in the end we should be treating our both groups depending on where they fall in their retirement planning the same so I'm not I'm not talking about retirees I'm talking about our active employees so if they came and they that was their only option was to have the the investment plan they don't have the option to enter drop and drop if you're in drop you're technically considered retired anyway you're just allowed to continue to work for the set amount of time but I just want to make sure that the the people our employees that did not have an option or have chosen investment if they're a current employee that they are treated the same and we look at that data consistently for all of our active employees so are you saying you want to hold off on a decision for the 66 until we look at the entire data or are you willing to look at the 66 and say okay the 66 is going to cost me 648,000 let me just run the 648,000 out and I'll come back with the ones and let me look at the people on the investment plan let me look at the people that aren't on the well don't you think that we should look at at it in its entirety from an expense standpoint um if we're going to look at our group of active employees that we should look at that as a whole not decide and say oh well we're going to give them this and then we find out oh my goodness we have a lot more than we thought or maybe we have a lot less than we thought um but I think it's important that we look at it in its entirety and we bring that back to our next meeting I mean we're looking at July 1 for an effective date correct so we have time I just don't want to rush that piece of it because I want to consider all of our emplo all of our active employees right I think what I was trying to say is the same way that you said that if you in drop you are technically a retiree I wanted to I mean I've talked to a lot of retirees I wanted to give some Assurance to people who were retirees and the only people that I'm classifying right now as a retiree is somebody who is currently retired or somebody who's in drop because because if I'm in the investment plan and I'm planning on putting in my letter tomorrow I am not technically a retiree right because they're the the our policies dictate different things for different groups so if you're on the investment plan you're not required to notify F FRS you're not required so if we want to tell people if you want this benefit that all the other active employees are getting you need to give us eight years notice that you're going to retire and we hold you to it like is that what you're suggesting or are we going to look at probability of retirement so at a certain age and move forward that way at least we would have good numbers to know we have data on what historically retirements have looked like like I think that that's just good business for us to look at it in its entirety if we're going to make a decision we need to have all the information and what the financial impact on the district is going to be and how long how long that will beor what are we doing Mr Mr Cal wants to speak I oh sorry yeah and I am by no means pressuring your timeline I think you should this is a sensitive subject and I'm recommending you take the time that you need I just wanted to um let you know that um for any Martin County health insurance subsidy or any contribution anything that affects the cost of insurance for retirees um we have a June 6th uh deadline to upload that file into F FRS for a July 1st effective date so I'm just well I think we've putting that out there I mean I don't know I guess i' would ask the rest of the board if we're ready to add or just get consensus on what we're going to do with the actual retirees because if you have a June there could be retirees that retire between now and June 30th that are still going to get the same hisis and the same um that our current retirees are getting so I mean so just to give you where I was thinking I was thinking that if you you were taking the 117 and if you were taking the 66 and getting that closure and getting that piece out of the way so a retiree a retiree by virtue of the fact that you're in drop and are continuing to work or if you're a retiree and you're you're not in drop but you are technically a retiree meaning that you're receiving the state his subsidy Etc that group The 117 and the 66 right so do the D and drop get the his when once they the 6500 now as an active employee Mrs pow it just dep it just depends on their date uh it depends on their age when they retire so if they're under 65 and they meet those years of service they'll get the contribution based on the board's contribution towards active medical insurance if they retire after 65 and their drop date ends after 65 then they'll get that health insurance subsidy based on years of service that's not what I'm talking about I'm talking about about our current employees that are in drop that this deadline that you're talking about that we have to meet there is no they're not they are not considered in this deadline this is your deadline only relates to our active current retirees that no longer work for the district correct or anybody that retires by a certain date if you change the the amount that you're contributing um we have to send that to F FRS by June 6 so so that so your statement is no but that only impacts the current retirees and if we change the $ five do or you know whatever the board decides we need that we need to vote on well it not only it not only impacts the current retirees right so it impacts the the F FRS deadline in order to make that change right which I thought it was more like months that you needed a monthly way to get F FRS to get it correct it's interest it's nice to know that it only takes um a month and a half but if I retire tomorrow right that I also need to know where I am on this list so that this processing piece can happen and I believe correct me if I'm wrong the processing piece might not independently be for each retiree it's a process piece that says okay Mrs Pritchard you're a retiree that looks like this this is what your piece looks like Mrs Russell your retiree that looks like this this is what you look like Mrs Powers you're not a retiree yet but in two months when you are a retiree this is what your piece looks like and we know where we are moving forward is that yes sorry i' just like to hear from the people here so everybody that came out and I appreciate everybody being here and I look forward to hearing from from you all and in particular um there's a lot of confusion up here and we need a lot of more information but from what I'd like to hear from you all is maybe what you were promised and I would love to hear that we can work this out and that we can get some kind of agreement so that the people in this audience don't feel like the wool is being pulled out from under them because that's the feeling I get from the email and the calls and things because there are good people up here that are looking forward to hearing your comments uh me being one of them and I'd love to hear where we're at um and some more of the history of this because I'm new here I've just been on this thing three months and I don't know all the history and I I'd like to hear with your wealth of experience what has been promised and how we're delivering on that hopefully in a respectful way thank you so just so we can I can clarify what you're saying about your deadline so we need you need us to make a decision on retirees and what their benefit would be so you need I'm not not in drop not our current employees but our current retired um former employees that are not working in the district so you need to know what any are hi the his benefit and also this those under 65 correct and that's if you choose um an action that changes the current funding mechanism that you have in place now for July 1 okay so the decision that we need to make quickly is regarding the hisis and if we're going to remain status quo for our current retirees and for retirees that are under 65 that are getting a contribution based on their years of service because we take that amount and we decrease their premium based on their contribution is this a one-time a year thing or if we decided to implement starting on September 1st do I just need to back it up six weeks yep so so this June date that you're giving me and saying I need to do this by June something or other to have a July one impation correct I can pick any implementation date yes correct and we just back it up accordingly you could pick 1126 if yeah so Madam chair maybe Mr Calderone or somebody I mean I know but I'm sure nobody wants to really hear it from me um knows what happened in 2015 would you like to or you want me to share what happened in 2015 so what happened in 2015 in 2015 um prior to 2015 in 2014 prior to that date it was part of the mcea bargaining agreement it was included in the bargaining agreement um it was also a piece of it that was included in the um ask me agreement so there was language in the agreement that talked about a percentage of your insurance as a retiree being paid based on years of service that was in the contract then in May of 2015 after a negotiation session with the bargaining units that language was changed it was changed and voted on by your memberships in those two bargaining units and then it was ratified by the board it was changed again in November of 2015 the whole reason this came up in 2015 is because it became apparent it was brought to the board's attention that there were in a large number of retirees over the age of 65 that were not on Medicare what they were doing was because the district was putting the contribution for retirees and paying for that contribution the same as they did for an existing an existing employee there was no incentive or no reason to go to Medicare even if Medicare was cheaper even if Medicare was a better policy anything else some people signed up for Medicare and also signed up for the district insurance and were Sometimes using one and sometimes using the other but it was a big mess because people who should have been on Medicare because Medicare is a better more costeffective Insurance we're not going to MediCare at the same time at that period in time in 2015 the cost of regular Medicare was $105 a month the state was paying the $5 a month for years of service which meant if you had 21 years of service that you got your whole the state subsidy would pay 100% of that 105 21 years at $5 a month came out to the 105 um the district decided at that point in time that they would match the H that came from the state to give people a pot of money that maybe they could use to buy a supplement at that point in time if anybody remembers back then there were all kind Donald White was here there were all kinds of seminars all kinds of meetings you could make an appointment come in look at your particular situation see where you were what kind of insurance you were using using compare Medicare to what your current insurance was and see where you needed to land that was the piece that happened in 2015 at the same time in 2015 when that language was removed from the two bargaining contracts this policy for retire health insurance was adopted so it puts it as this policy being adopted it puts it in a position where if the bargaining unit is bargaining off on on the side that isn't something that a normal citizen sitting at home has access to to find out what's happening to their retire health insurance if it's part of the bargaining contract by making it a part of um policymaking it puts it in a position where there will be a workshop or more than one Workshop there will also be an advertising piece where in one with plenty of notice the state specified notice as to this this is what the new policy will be then there will be a final read so it gives the public a chance to come in and say what they want in this case as we're looking at this as policy since that's where it sits this meeting here today is a workshop it hasn't even been yet to the two meetings that it needs to happen in order for it to get to make any change to it there's an advertising review which we call the first read and there's a second final review which is which is the final read so those are the two more pieces that are coming there when right now when the state raised the their state health insurance subsidy to $7.50 Medicare right now pretty much in this area starting out costs $185 a month that means you need 25 years of service and with 25 years of service the state state subsidy of 185 will pay for your basic Medicare the statistic is in the State of Florida that 40% of the people who are on Medicare buy a supplement program the other 60% either don't buy a supplement program and just stay with bare Medicare or they're on a Medicare Advantage plan but that's where we're sitting thank you did you want to say anything superintendent I just I wanted to make sure you all had a had an accurate timeline um if we wanted to in order to get the policy through the entire length to Mrs Robert's uh Point uh April 1st could be a workshop April 15th for first review May 13th second review and then an adoption that does give you some time to be able to work through this would you choose Mr superintendent and those dates are yes you could do that um if you choose those dates um I would just encourage the board to pick a different effective date because because we would not have the time to program bentech and to meet the F FRS deadlines for J uh July 1st 2025 but like Mrs Roberts like I stated earlier the board can make a decision when that funding mechanism were to change if at all at any time in the future so do you want to discuss the hisis supplement and for retirees only or do we want to wait and get more information and have have a more robust discussion at a later time well I think I feel like the only information that we're waiting for is for additional information from our emplo our current employees that are on the um investment plan that's the additional information that we need to make a decision moving forward on our current employees that are not retired so I mean I I Feel Fine I I've already told you what I how I think about the retirees um whether and but I guess the only question in my mind would be is it $5 or 250 is so do we want to discuss that you are we going to have public comment at any point well after we have our discussion if we're going to make make a decision today about the $5 of the 250 after that we'll hear from the okay just because at the first Workshop we had no public comment I I would like to hear from the public before any decision is [Applause] made all right um we will have public comment um it will be one hour and I think we'll be able to make it because we do not have um as many cards as one hour would take up so I if I call your name I'm going to call you the person who speaking and then the next person up Virginia Skinner followed by Christine mesana Madame chair Mr superintendent school board members staff and also all of my fellow colleagues here I want to say first thank you for listening to us and I truly from the bottom of my heart thank you for your comments and what you have shared here um for some of you who don't know me I am a proud graduate of Martin County schools and I say that often and I share that because that is a pride that I carry with me I started in 1991 as a teacher teacher here and I was hired um actually by some individuals in the room who have been here much longer than um the 30 years that we talk about we have many many employees retirees who worked over 40 years in this district and still dedicate their time and energy to the students of Martin County as I said I started in 1991 and part of the hiring was shared with me at that time was about the benefit package that was offered here in Martin County I was at that time being recruited by St Lucy County and Palm Beach County for positions to teach math and English I say that because I was extremely proud to return to my alma moer South Park High School at the time after that I became an assistant principal after several 15 years or so of teaching and that at that time I was responsible for part of the hiring and interviewing process for many of the employees that came to the school district and to the certain schools as part of that I also continue you talked about the history we talked about that in Martin County there was a benefit package that was clearly unique and special to the employees here and so we use that not only to recruit but also to retain individuals unfortunately um I retired a few years back and yes it's hard to say that um leaving a job that you've given 30 years of your heart blood and soul sold to um is an easy thing to do but what I did at that time recognized that for family purposes I needed to retire part of my planning and part of my husband and I's planning was the financial promise at the time that we would have insurance throughout the time until I reached Medicare and there are others I am one of the 26 um that are involved in here that fall into that time frame of where we are I do recognize the financial impact on the District I do recognize the information that we were provided for years um about our retirement and how to help us determine retirement I also recognize that there will be those of us who will give 30 or more years that will fall in that Gap that I appreciate the comments that were made about um valuing us and I ask again as you look at this to continue and to emplore to look at different options for us and for those of us who fall into those different situations that's from my perspective as an individual who falls into that one category thank you thank you I'm going to ask you to please not clap Until the End please Christine mesano followed by Deborah Jones good evening everyone and thank you so much for taking the time to listen to our concerns I am a fairly recent retiree from Martin County Schools after serving special needs students in a self-contained unit for for 23 years I would like to respectfully request that you reconsider your plan to reduce retiree health benefits and subsidies I certainly understand the need to save money but it shouldn't be at the expense of those of us who have Faithfully served the district for many years we have served and have expected to receive this benefit ever since we came to Martin County I have just I'm in the pool that just turned 65 and just started on Medicare and received my first subsidy to have the subsidy reduced now and eventually eliminated would create a financial hardship that is just not fair as you can imagine a lot of planning and calculating goes into deciding when would be the right time to retire and that how things would be structured these plans and decisions were made take into account the promised benefits throughout our careers in Martin County we Faithfully completed our job responsibilities and honored our obligations under our contracts it is only right and fair that the district would uphold their end of the contract now change to policy it is especially hard to have the things that were promised taken away once we are retired in on fixed incomes over the years we stayed in Marton County despite salaries that are lower than neighboring counties and in other Industries because of the promise of these generous benefits while it's true that neighboring districts do not offer this their higher salaries make up for it in addition another thing to consider is that many younger teachers are listening to this and have been with Martin County since they graduated and have stayed beside despite the lower salaries thinking they will get these benefits after 30 years of service I predict that many will go elsewhere if this is phased out please rethink this plan that would cause hardship for so many of us who worked hard to make this District successful for so many years thank you so much for your kind consideration thank you Deborah Jones followed by Missy Campbell good afternoon Schoolboard members it's an honor to be here I've never been in this beautiful building before um I am a a a current retiree of three years and I just loved working for the Martin County school at Port solo and working with the special needs students um what I I'm not a speaker in front of people so this is a big deal for me to get through it um anyway um I just asked that you please not take our subsidiaries away or reduce them because when we I retired it was planned in with our finances and to take it away would be a hardship um I knew it would get like this take your time I'm sorry um I just asked that you would just think about keeping what was promised to the people who were retiring and who were in drop that they would get their subsidiaries and that you would consider maybe letting the new hires if you want to do that to the new hires not give them those benefits then let them decide if they want to work here in Martin County or not I just um thank you for letting me speak thank you missy Campbell followed by Leslie Kingsley good afternoon I am Missy Campbell I'm a product of the Martin County School District and a former teacher here for 34 years I'd like to address some of the concerns with you and first of all I want to say that when I say you I'm not talking about you as an individual scho I'm talking about the Martin County School Board the Martin County School District because this is not really personal necessarily to each of you individually whereas it's very personal to me I began teaching in 1985 40 years ago at that time to be honest retirement was not really on my mind I was told that the school district was small and couldn't really compete with surrounding salaries but they offered a wonderful retirement package so at the ripe old age of 23 this didn't seem important but now I know I was wrong I went to speak to your HR person and your retirement expert in 2014 he explained that I would have insurance for life and a subsidy of $5 a year from The Martin County School District to assist with Medicare I entered drop and sadly for me I was part of that group that could only do drop for five years then in 2015 after I was already committed in drop things changed now I had to go to MediCare at 65 I didn't have a problem with that since I would still have my health insurance and my subsidy to help with supplements I've been told that the subsidy part was negotiated out of contract language and made board policy I guess that means that now you just vote on that at your discretion and I didn't know about this I said I understand it that you said it was posted someplace nobody contacted me even though you have all my contact information to let me know that you might be taking some of my $150 away when I turned 65 Educators by Nature were planners I'm a super planner and I plan for my future based on the information that I had and now it can all be changed I'm 62 and if my insurance is taken away I will have to find a full-time job with insurance so that I can afford insurance otherwise I would have to pay up to $1,300 a month for insurance I've had many discussions with many of you and the superintendent and I know that teacher retention is very important and critical in Martin County and and actually throughout the country if you think it's a problem now you will see what will happen if you go back on your word nobody wants to work for an employer who goes back on their word we have earned what we were contractually promised I know for a fact that I went above and beyond for the children in my care the savings that I have seen of the 2.2 million over 10 years is 220 220,000 a year is not much compared to your overall budget but $150 out of my budget is huge do the right thing and grandfather Us in and change the policy and do it so I don't have to come here every five or 10 years to talk to you about this again thank you so much hold your clapping please Leslie Kingsley followed by Gary Owen hi my name is Lesley Kingsley I taught in Martin County for 39 years I'm also a member of the insurance committee for the last 25 years I'm speaking to you today as a retired teacher I attended my first board meeting in 1983 that was the first time I heard the promise of paid insurance for retirees I continued to hear it when our pay each year lag behind Palm Beach County and St Lucy County don't worry they said we can't keep up with the bigger districts but we will cover your insurance when you retire for decades that was repeated to calm the fears of our low pay serve the children of Martin County for 30 years and you will eventually get your money in the form of retire insurance payments I was also there in 202 2015 when sick leave payout and um when you reiterated that that um you were making changes so please show us you care I don't think you really realize the impact you're going to have on those who gave their best years to the district we've now seen the proposals and heard the discussions and the option is five years you know we're not talking about school desks or paper we're talking about people's lives and this money that you promised us for the last 40 years if you worked here we all upheld our end we gave our best years to Martin County for decades and the district has benefited everyone wants to come here for their children's education we also planned for our retirement on the Decades of lower than average salaries and your promise in this stage of Our Lives now we just can't re-budget because you don't want to keep that promise please I beg you please find a way to grandfather Us in or and I don't even want to say this go to 10 years not five years I don't like it we'll give up lifetime promise for 10 years you still are on the winning end of it of that compromise sell the old school board building that land is a gold mine rearrange funds stall on other expenditures try something anything but please show Martin County that you do have integrity and decency to keep your promise for your employees thank you thank you Gary Owen followed by Marty biki Madame chair esteemed members of the board Mr superintendent thank you for this opportunity before I get started I just want to say thank you to all our Educators for your hard work your sacrifice because if it wasn't for you I wouldn't be here today and I wouldn't be the person that I am today without our educator so know to all of you I appreciate all the hard work that you do so why am I here I am here to be a resource because I've been in this industry for 18 years in the insurance industry Life Health and Medicare I've been here for I 38 40 years on the Treasure Coast so I know Martin County very well I know Treasure Coast very well and Educators come to me and come to my office by the way we have two offices and one's right behind ke West Diner in case you don't know where that's at uh we're right behind the there and when we meet with retiring Educators they are confused as heck and don't know which way to go and they can't predict the future so one thing I am I'm again I'm not an educator but I I do educate on Medicare I am a certified Medicare insurance planner we do help consumers and uh beneficiaries with their Medicare insurance planning because it is complicated I always tell my agent I have 500 agents 12 field managers across this country and and when I speak to Consumers turning 65 the most important thing is the decisions you make today could last a lifetime so it's important to get it right the first time so let me be a resource if I can if you find a a cause for me to be a resource teachers you can always reach out to my office contact me directly because I am passionate about protecting your quality of life your quality of Health if you don't get it right I have seen so many times I could cry the number of times I've seen people make the wrong decisions it's cost them plenty so uh we're here let me be a resource and again thank you so much for your time I appreciate it thank you Marty blei followed by Larry Green I'm also a former student Maran High School school and I came back to teach for 37 years I'm proud of what I did I remember some teachers made an impact on my life remember and Wanda yor uh don wallan Joanne Hunt all made great impact for me just think in your life what teacher please hold your clapping thank you you can clap for me I uh just think about your life what teachers have made an impact in your life now just think about that and then think about turning around and cutting their supplement $2.50 or just stripping this medical siyon most people forget that teachers are out of work force for four years as they get their degree I just saw where there's four choices to abolish or lower our medical sipen there's one choice not listed keep what we have keep the status quo at these five superintendant and the past School boards have signed to have this stien why because they value teachers and what I hear up here I think you also value teachers I really do it is interesting that this proposal came up like this after the election many school retirees which these proposals affect were not notified about these meetings I just found out about it last week Circa night uh Circa back in the 80s the school board was hurting for money and uh we agreed to take no race in order to uh have this insurance like the price of eggs Insurance keeps on going up uh not even our local firefighters or policemen have to fight for their benefits what is ironic is that the majority of firefighters and policemen are not required to have a four-year degree for years we have struggled from poor salaries FL ranks at the bottom of 50 states and Mar County does not rank very well in the state to compensate for this disparity a medical insurance sipon was put in place long ago we live in one of the wealthiest counties in the State of Florida we have the happiest Seaside town in America look at the home values chup Island sus point and even even Citrus Grove 800,000 other homes we have a tax base so the question oh withm field look all the executive Jets where are all our monies the last eight years we have approved an increase in extra school taxes by millions of dollars and the past election in the past election $83 million was approved right we have money to pay for these supplments and um please indeed vote no for all these proposals keep the status quo in place thank you Larry Green followed by Tim black good afternoon Madam chair school board members Mr Maine uh my name is Larry green and I served this school district for 38 years as a teacher and an administrator let me start by thanking you for your kind words and listening to us tonight we're in this situation today because right now our legislators are taking 23% of public school money and diverting it to private private school vouchers charter schools and school choice where would we be and other school districts be if there W if the voters did not vote in a millage every five years that's the issue I stood before the board 10 years ago over the same issue and here we are again I watched a video from last month's meeting and I heard you say about taking it away from retirees that would be harsh and uncaring also you said we don't want to pull the rug from under their feet I agree with you speaking for all of the people in this room we are the people built this school district we are the people that stayed in the school district for all those years we are the people that made the district an a-rated School District that was the Marvel of all the counties in our area we are the people why why PE we are the reason why people moved here once again you did not create this problem our elected leaders in the state have put you in a jam But ultimately it's your task to do what's right and keep the the promise the school board made for retire retire benefits for the great men and women who serve the school district thank you for what you do and for allowing me to share my thoughts thank you Tim black followed by Kelly Ricardo hello my name is Tim black I was a teacher in Martin County High School and South Fork High School and uh taught history and I want to thank Lee for giving us a real good historical lesson from 10 years ago I can remember I was up here making a point of saying we should do the F plan is a and no one on the uh in the administration even knew what that was okay but we do have an F plan for supplemental uh Medicare problem you know I was really kind of tempted you're going to get rid of the uh stien totally for my age group uh I'm going to be 78 and you're going to get rid of that in 2030 which was 5 years just as we're going into actu the most difficult decade of when we need more insurance and we're going to be going needing more Medical Care and you're going to get rid of that so if I can borrow a little inspiration for you tonight from Psalm Psalm 71 verse n cast me not off in the time of old age forsake me not when my strength faileth and that's what you're going to be doing to us in 2030 when we'll be in our 80s and you're going to cut this off that should be considered I understand what you're doing is very clever you're basically since the state gave us 10 or 750 you've knocked our 250 off of us we're basically back we're at square one but then you're cutting off in five years the supplement when we really are going to probably need that actually Lee I think you know that you know we get into our 80s that's when we're going to see more and more medical problems so don't desert us okay don't throw us and you know overboard give us a Lifeboat I'm with Marty I think we should keep what we have but I also understand we had this problem back in 2015 it was a mess okay and we came up with a compromise that work very well for a long time I have the F plan and I have Medicare and is excellent um and I get it from siga from you guys so I appreciate that so anyway think about that robit thank you Kelly Ricardo followed by Mary nuan thank you for giving us time to speak I taught in Martin County School District for 34 years at South Fork High School and it was almost a yearly decision conversation with my then husband whether I would stay in Martin County or seek employment at a neighboring County that paid so much more up Wards of $10,000 um because not only would that affect our daily life at that time it would affect our retirement um for the top five so that decision was made over and over and over again based on the promise that I was given and I see this question not so much as a numbers question we had a lot of presentation about numbers and how many people and how much money and everything but the basic question is a moral one are you going to honor the promise that was made that kept people like me in this District to make it the district that it is or are you not then you can figure out how to work the numbers but the basic question is are you going to honor that promise and that's a moral question thank you Christy duas followed by Joe Flanigan you still had Mary norian in there I thought that was Mary noran no that would be me I'm Mary norian okay who oh okay go ahead okay board members Madam chair Mr Maine thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak today I am Mary noran and I'm one of the 117 and and I am one of the 26 people that would not have benefited from plan a because I would not have made it there um I understand you have budget cuts to make but in this case I ask you to please see the person and not just the budget cut in front of you as a retiree in the under 65 group this will have a negative impact on my budget and I know it will affect so many others similarly skin in the game that is what we were told as we worked through our many years in the Martin County School District the longer you have your skin in the game the more you will be rewarded when you retire work hard care about your community and serve your students and if you retire with 30 or more years you will get 100% of your health insurance paid 30 or more years is something that is not easy to achieve and many do not I am proud that I worked in Martin County School District for those years I worked alongside the most hardworking people I have ever met Educators that worked well past the time it was to clock out in order to meet the needs of their students I participated in many special events including the curriculum nights fundraisers after school clubs summer reading Camp moving up ceremonies even Saturday morning trainings I still care about my community and the students in it my grandkids are part of this amazing District I'm sorry I am very nervous um they're part of this amazing district and I want them to have the best teachers possible I want them to have teachers that make it a goal to stay for 30 years my heart is full when I volunteer at their school and I see our future I'm asking you to continue to invest in the future because when you reward retirees that is exactly what you're doing you're investing in the future of our community thank you thank you Christy Dugas followed by Joe Flanigan hello esteemed board U Mr superintendent my name is Christy Dugas I am a self workk teach uh teacher of 12 years seven of them being here in Martin County thank you Mrs Russell for saying what I've been thinking since this has come out what about me and why should I stay I understand the urgency they address the current retirees and those who are going to be retiring in 2030 but please consider the new teachers I know I'm the only one here that is of um my age and stuff like that and I am thinking about retirement even though it's in 2050 um what I have that my other colleagues don't have behind me is time though I have time to decide whether I'm going to stay in Martin County or stay in the profession alog together I love my students I love my school I love the people that I work with but I need to know that I'm valued please don't forget the new teachers and your decision please don't make this change thank you thank you Joe Flanigan Madam chair if the members of the public could not address uh the board members individually we've had that come up several times they can address us as a board but not individually thank you Joe Flanigan uh 39 years in education I believe 33 or 34 of them um history lesson as I've heard many people Mr biki also and Larry Green mentioned it in 2007 Marton County had 100% of all of our schools were a schools and then in 2012 we still had 16 a schools so again and the people that allowed that to occur are the people that are sitting here and we built the foundation that you had in there my greatest concern too is as Christie just said honestly there is not a teacher shortage absolutely not a teacher shortage there are teachers everywhere in the State of Florida there're just no longer in our profession there are many teachers there but what you need to understand also was and I think it was Marty that said this earlier it was in the late 80s early 90s where the choice was made before class size reduction was in place was the board said teachers we can give you a 3% raise across the board but we will increase your class sizes to 30 to make up that difference and the union overwhelmingly voted no pay raise keep our class sizes small because that's what Martin County education is all about do not do not sacrifice and balance the budget on the backs of the retirees thank you that ends public comment [Applause] want to say anything regarding what we heard or do we just want to move to the next agenda item well I think we have to do something otherwise we're not doing anything because we don't we this is a workshop that's dealing with the policy so I think if we have a board consensus on anything then that can move forward into um the advertising review Etc if we don't have a consensus then I guess we would be coming back for another Workshop I would still like to see current employees their age their years of service in the district and whether they're in the investment plan or the retirement plan I think that will give us some idea of what the what our whole thing and I personally believe that the retirees that are under the age of 65 should continue getting their 6500 until they reach Medicare age so that's the 117 which includes the 26 and as far as the drop people go I believe that the drop people the people who are currently on drop um who I view as retired with a date that they're going to not come to work anymore I think that that 66 should continue to receive the 6,500 for the period of time that was specified on that chart which comes out to um the first group cost it with a cost not adding to the group comes out with a cost of 2.55 the second group comes out at 648 which is a total of 2.83 um if we were going if the board agreed to doing that that we could adjust the policy that would have language that would in essence grandfather in that 117 and the 66 then when we get the information back from Mr Calderone about the current employees which includes employees that are on the investment plan that haven't indicated when they're going to um retire that we can make a decision on modifying the the um the policy again in 2015 we modified the policy twice or we had two discussions to it I guess is what we really did um so that's my preference but I don't know if that has any interest from the board so my preference would be that we go ahead and let our retirees know that their grandfathered in so that includes our actual retirees who are the 117 and everyone who's receiving the hisis they no longer work for the district I think that um as one of the speaker said the majority of our newer teachers are on the investment plan so I think excluding them from this conversation and not having it as a whole so if we're going to develop policy that includes the 66 people that are currently in drop what is that that's eight years is the max right now so then then we should consider a minimum of eight years out for all of all employees regardless of what plan and whether they're eligible for drop or not um but we don't know again we don't know what those numbers are um I'd also like to talk to Mr Harmon I know I posed a couple of questions to him about um language in the policy we need to get our dates right because we're going to have um different employees uh depending on when they were hired so we need to make sure that we get it right um so I think we're we're not going to be able to create a policy tonight I don't think um because there are still so many questions but I do think we can give Assurance through consensus from the board at least for the retired group of employees you're talking about the 117 117 and and then for the his are you talking about maintaining the hisis at $5 that's a discussion that we I think we should have I I didn't bring that up in the last well I wasn't here but I didn't bring up the 250 I don't know who brought that up but um we can have that discussion for sure when I read this policy the second paragraph if you'll indulge me I want to read it and I I have a reason for reading it any contribution toward retire insurance will be at the discretion of the school board nothing contained herein creates a right to Lifetime Health Care benefits or subsidy for retirees their surviving spouses and their dependents the school board May contribute none sum or all of the cost toward retire medical coverage the percentage or amount of payment toward retiree medical coverage has varied over the years and may continue to do so in the future the school district's contribution toward retire medical coverage is subject to unilateral change when I read this it totally doesn't obligate us at all and that isn't my intention we need to create language that doesn't say this if we're not going to make changes so as a fairly new board member when I read this I think to myself at any time we can take it away but if that isn't Our intention we shouldn't have this in the policy so that is my issue with this policy we need to create language that lines up with our intent ention this language shows an intention of tomorrow we can take it away so that is why I have an issue with the language in this policy because listening to everyone out there promised for Lifetime that's not what it says in here we need to we need and I'm not saying what that language should be but this language does not comport with with people telling us that they were promised it for life so that is just my feeling about it that it it if we're not going to be able to bring it up without the the public getting enraged because you promised us our language doesn't doesn't Shore up with that so as a very literal person I would like the language to reflect our intentions these this policy doesn't reflect what we're talking about so that is my my dilemma here I want the language to be what it Our intention is thank you so I think that language was added uh or that language was not developed by the school board but by attorneys and um there you go and I will say I mean we have been not on this issue or anything related to insurance but we have been advised in the past that no board can obligate a future board to something that like so we can't whatever we say if the board changes a new board can change it it's you can't obligate a future board um to a decision that they can never ever ever change um so I think that that language was added that's why I really want Terry Harmon uh the district attorney to look at this because there are so many things and that I think he needs to look at and how we word this so hopefully we will not have to look at this again um and that when it's when it is at a certain point in time whatever we decide as a board um is it going to go away in the future what's that time frame look like um and I have had this conversation with um the superintendent about what what does it look I mean businesses do it all the time when when their um um sales are down which you know our enrollment has dropped considerably as it has as enrollments have nationwide I mean some states like California and New York have dropped double digits in their enrollment and it's um Florida is no different there are a few of our larger school districts that have seen um an increase in enrollment but the majority of us in Florida have seen a decrease in enrollment and in Most states so that that's just a reality birth rates are down um there's a lot of factors that go into why enrollment is dropping school choice is one of those um but I really feel like we need to get the language right with Mr Harmon I think if there's questions then we need to ask those questions so that the superintendent can relay it I don't I just don't think we're going to be able to formulate a policy tonight that is going to you know that is not going to change in the future so the language I was looking at to change the policy was the line that says for retirees under the age of 65 and not Medicare eligible and then goes on to say the school board will pay a percentage of blah blah blah if we add it in there retired onor before February 1st 2025 so then that line would we read for retirees under the age of 65 and not Medicare eligible retired honor before February 1st 2025 the board will pay blah blah blah exactly the way the policy is so that anybody who is in that 117 list who is retired hired that in my head that policy could move forward and that gives closure to that group if we have consensus that we aren't going to take away anything from the 117 right that would take care of the 117 leaving the drop on the side for a minute then on the next page where it talks about retiring insurance age 65 and over or Medicare eligible and it talks about the a b or c qualification a that they're getting mainly that they have insurance and that they retired honor before December 31 2015 if we added a c in there that said the retiree is receiving a Martin County health insurance subsidy on or before February 1st 2025 then it maintains that $5 per month it maintains the status quo for all of these people that have are currently getting a health insurance subsidy the cost of that is that $1 million but it it gives some clarity to people who are retired whether they're G over 65 getting a health insurance subsidy at $5 a month whether they're under 65 and they're getting 6,500 towards their insurance whether they're going to retire whether they're it isn't a fiveyear period it isn't anything it's going until they reach page 65 and you have to be retired I mean I I think if we made those two changes to the policy that anything we make after that is taken care of and I took the drop people out to help you Mrs powers in dealing with the this language includes this we're not we're not negotiating for our active employees we are negotiating once we are we are developing a policy for our retirees correct so all of our current employees would fall under this as well any no matter when they retire if you change the Lang oh sorry Don go ahead sorry I didn't want to be rude and interrupt um my recommendation from staff um being your director of risk and benefits is um I know we've been very focused on these 117 retirees under age 65 and we're very focused on the ones that are currently in drop um as you recall the the figures that we've presented um to you last month and and again tonight is based on a snapshot in time that was based on the reports that we had in September of 2024 when the board first discussed this my recommendation would be that um we also include anybody that has entered drops since September of 24 or those that have retired since September of 24 my my recommendation would be for anybody that uh Falls in this category and would use the date of 7 or 6:30 uh 25 so we would include anybody those handfuls that may elect to retire or have retired since September just because we've had some people that have entered drops since September I understand that and the reason that I was making that a February 1 date Etc was well first of all the reason was taking the drop piece out of it completely was based on Mrs Po's discussion that she wanted to include the people on the investment plan with the people on the retirement plan and not make a decision about those 66 people and I understand that this this policy is titled retire health insurance um and and I I don't think there's anything wrong with specifying that okay if you retired on or before feary 1 2025 I consider you a current retiree I consider that's where you are right now you're getting a f FRS check or you're getting a health insurance subsidy check those are the two things that you're getting right now if you're under the age of 65 or you're over the age of 65 these are the things that you're getting and by virtue of getting those things we've taken that group of people and yes I realize that year 117 might actually be a larger number since that was a September date but rather than cut it off on September I'm willing to say okay if you've retired you know whether you retired because it was the end of your drop period or whether you retired because that was it and you had some other kind of situation that you retired for that that's what I mean I'm I'm just trying to find a way to to kind of give some clarity to people who were kind enough to come out that okay he this is the way that part of the policy will look if you're one of the 117 or if you're one of the group of people who's receiving a health insurance subsidy if the board has some consensus that they're willing to continue that on if you made those two changes to the policy you would have that Clarity that that's continuing on then what we do after that for the other pieces with the attorney's help with adding another um weird paragraph about how we can do whatever we want whenever we want to do it kind of language um that's a whole another discussion but at least if you were kind enough to come out if you knew that this was affecting you if this is giving you heart palpitations Etc you would have some closure and kind of know where you are that's where I was sitting with it so I just would have one question about that date what about are we creating another group of people what about the people that retire after February 1st and we don't have this PO there's no policy that applies to them until until until until some future date so what happens on retirement day and for them I think it should be June 30th because we would have our policy in place by that by June 30th for sure I mean why I mean we're talking about a few months I don't know how many people are in the pipeline some are turning 65 before that are in the 117 so I think it's going to be kind of a wash financially because some will be going off of the 6500 onto the um to Medicare and then to the subsidies so so you're saying change the date to retired honor before June 1st 2025 June 30th jun25 2025 it'll capture a few more people but then it also will not create a gap before we get this policy completed and I'm okay with that and then I'm okay so would you then change the paragraph C on the second page receiving a health insurance subsidy honor before I have a question yes for me after yes I after you answer her did you an did that what were you changing C2 I'm sorry didn't so I added a c after the a at B and I had receiving a health insurance subsidy honor before 6120 it would be 630 2025 correct um and that would cover that that would do the same thing it's covering the same group right correct yeah because we're we're entering open enrollment period we're entering the end of the 2425 school year where we're going to have employees that are be thinking about retirement so if you extended out through June 30th 2025 you're you're making those people safe as well because they making a decision as well correct so that I think that would be great and then I think my thought is if we do that then put that up for an advertising review in February February and then we do a final read for that in March that then we've taken care of people who are retired I mean people who are retired is anybody who's retired before June 30th right correct so if you're in drop and your retirement date hits on May 15th right that you then are included in this group correct correct and then knowing that we are going to get additional information and make a decision more holistically to deal with those after 7125 those after 7125 and then that lets that helps so that people can go back to play golf and not have to come the red shirt well I would I would also think that we could have by our next board meeting have this reviewed by our attorney and have proposed language for that group so we can get the data that we were asking for by our next board regular board meeting and have a draft policy by then um ex except we don't know since we don't have the data right and we don't know what option one two three and four would be for whether you're Dro whether you're not drop Etc I think it's going to take another Workshop to get some consensus on what to do with that but at least if we can agree that anybody who's retired before 6:30 that they we maintain the status quo for them that at least we have a policy that's in place we have some closure on that issue and if the policy and I do believe that if we make those two changes add a c and add a number add a a clause on the first page that it should go to the attorney and with the understanding for the attorney to understand this is our intent that we're covering people this period of time and they may tweak that language a little bit but at least we would know by the first read this is what the language looks like to cover everybody who's retired before 6:30 2025 knowing that we need additional information superintendent has to have a chance to look at it go through it Etc make a recommendation give us several options for what to do on the other thing and if it means that we go through and modify the policy again we modify the policy again I mean I think it's but at least I yeah gotten some I just don't want to create another gap for employees that may retire if we're not done with this I mean I feel I feel urgency to get this policy in place so employees our current employees not just our retirees but our current employees know what to expect and if we that's why I'm saying I don't see why we can't have additional a draft discussion if there's questions if there's issues at our next board meeting why can't we we can still talk about it if it's on the agenda at our next board meeting okay that way that it'll be out there if we have current employees that want to comment on what that language looks like they will have multiple opportunities before it starts the process but I don't know that it's really good to have multiple policies on retiree and then have to start the three-month process all over again to modify the policy so I would just like to put a little urgency on this and have it if we need to have it at every single meeting that we have between now and Adoption of the final policy we just do that's fair the numbers that you have are they very current or are they oh you're referring to what we've talked about yeah um those were as of September 2024 when we first started discussing it so so will we get updated numbers because we're basing decisions on numbers that are well I I like to what Mrs Powers had stated you know it's it's going to be a wash it's going to be similar um okay I can we can do whatever you want um from what I'm he 117 change the 117 yeah I mean you might have a couple more um or less but I think in the spirit of what you're trying to accomplish making everybody hes keeping them whole um if you stick by that that June 30th 2025 date we we've got that under control um and what I'm hearing from the board is that really we kind of need to take a look at those that are in the investment plan who may retire within the next eight years similar to to drop that's how I'm kind of envisioning it that's going to take a little bit of time we we we've got to sore through that um but that would be for something that we can put together for you all um but I think the key is for people making that decision everybody here to make sure that they're going to be taken care of the way that the policy is currently written um as long as you're a retire prior to you know on or before June 30th 2025 okay thank you concerned that there's going to be an unintended consequence with that that it's going to now cause people who weren't originally going to retire by that date to now retire by that date to secure their benefits and so then how many people are going to do that who would have stayed and maybe stayed five more years to work for us were already needing teachers to do that and then to encourage them to retire early because I mean I can't fault them for that well I mean it would obviously be what what do you which part of it do you think would I I mean I think not addressing it I mean obviously the people that are in drop are in drop I think it's the people that are in the investment plan where there's not we we don't we don't know what that looks like we don't know what the Assurance is we can provide because we don't have the data so it's that segment of the population obviously there's going to be depending on the age of the employee where they are U reaching retirement where they are reaching um the minimums for retirement in his and all of the things that we have to if they retired I mean it would obviously be a financial decision on their part if they were going to retire to collect $6,500 or if they were going to continue to work at their current salary and get the benefit and get the 6,500 then so there's yeah it's I mean obviously it's a I think we should be more urgent in getting this policy completed so that people know because you want to make whole the people that are currently retired and then also anybody that enters drop or has retired by June 30th 2025 no that wasn't what we were talking about so we weren't talking about people who were currently entering drop we were saying that that's the one that we need more information on so we're saying the policy right now the way it's written has nothing to do has no mention of anything for drop right okay it just talks about retirees and it talks about health insurance subsidy and when you're saying that the piece that we're missing and the piece we need to look at is just the investment plan piece I don't think that's true I think we have retirement plan people who started working when they were 25 they've worked 30 years they're 35 or 55 years old now and they're deciding whether they want to enter drop at 55 if you enter drop that's going to push you to 63 and leave you a two-year Gap so what do you do with those people so I I think that that's why when you're looking at the data you need their age you need their years of service and you need which plan they're in okay I apologize I I I understand so do you want to are you okay with changing with adding language for that date and then moving it forward because it's still got to come to a a first read now keep in mind that when we started talking about this in September it took four months to get us to this point here the last month to get information so I think when we're asking you for information about the employees the current employees if that's going to take another four months we will have a gap if we change something that starts on June 30th it it won't take four months to get this information so I guess my request would be that we have an an updated presentation on the information at our next meeting okay which would be our regular February meeting and then we will talk about it again at our March workshop and then again at our March regular meeting if we need to and then until we get this done we've got to get it done so can we do a first read in February with the June 30th yes we can we will make adding that language in C and adding that language in we will get with Mr Harmon and Don will get with the gar group and we will make sure that we have a another presentation ready to go for our regular meeting in February and the first read should include any information that the attorney and advises us to add that way we if we take anything away it's easier to take away than it is to add so we want more information on the first read then so maybe instead we get down the line we can't so maybe instead of doing a first read in February we should do the first read in March that will give us a March Workshop to have a discussion on how you know we'll know what the policy looks like with those two pieces added is is there a consensus for that though here I know but we're just discussing it okay that's what I'm asking but if we push it to March if we had a March for a first read and then an April for a final read it gives an extra month and an extra Workshop to discuss it as opposed to discussing it as a board meeting looking at it as a policy with pieces to add to it you think yeah I don't think I'd be on board with that I'll just be honest with you I don't I don't I've listened to all the Educators in the room and you know how they didn't get a raise to preserve the benefits and I just feel like the Goodwill with the teachers is is lacking by adding that date in there feel like Mrs Russell is correct I feel like that might drive people to retirement that could cause a shortage of teachers so I I would be opposed to that just for the record wait which you're opposed to June 30th you're opposed to um us waiting until March or I'm I'm I think it should come in February I'm to June 30th yes so what do you suggest a date or I think I would agree with Mrs Russell and I would agree to keep this uh policy the same for now until something less confusing that doesn't I don't think the revisions we've talked about is anything I would support wait the revisions it we haven't made any revisions we it's all staying the same no but you're saying that on June 30th that people have to retire by that date to get the benefit correct no okay then what was the June 30th date the June 30th date is for to make sure that the people that are in the process of retiring don't get caught in in the in a gap so making sure that before we can get the policy in place for our future retirees because there are two pieces of this there's our current retirees and then there's our future retirees and once we have the data which hopefully we'll have by our next meeting we'll be able to address the future retirees as well so that the people that are currently in drop and then we will address the people that are in the investment plan because we haven't even talked about them and and the future retirees may be exactly the same as what the policy is but it's giving assurances to the people who are retired now that it's not going to change for them it's not saying oh we're going to change it for everybody after this date we're going to only take care of these people it's just making sure that these that the people who are currently receiving something from this policy know that they are going to continue to receive it that's what the June 3 or we could keep the policy the same though that could be another option right if there's if there's consensus to do that is if there's consensus to not touch the policy at all um I I personally think that please please personally think that there's that having dates in a policy and looking forward makes the policy more meaningful for people who are affected by those dates because otherwise 12 years from now we're going to the new board whatever whoever the new people are are going to be right back here having people coming in and talking about this all over again because there's no dates there's nothing tied to it I mean it's I look at that kind of just kicking almost kicking the can down the road of we're not going to touch it we'll let somebody else touch it in the future and I I don't think that gives a whole lot of closure to people and a whole lot of assurance to anybody when it's like yeah yeah we're not going to do it we'll let somebody else take care of it I just think that that's Mrs Russell what do you think if we're not planning on changing anything for our current employees I understand your intention and why you're putting that June 30th date to assure them the ones who are the retirees that nothing's going to change for you and I I completely understand that if we have zero intention of changing anything for our our current employees why would we change this at all if everything just stayed the same because I don't know if it would stay the same I don't know until you get the data whether it would stay the same I mean I don't think you could make a a financial decision on we know what this looks like we know what current retirees look like for a period that goes out 15 years we don't know what anything else looks like I guess I just feel like they're all watching us the current employees and how we handle this of course they are I hope so and if we can't deliver on promises that were made before I'm just I'm worried that people aren't going to trust us we don't handle this correctly okay okay so so and so that's and I understand that and I appreciate that and so that's why and that's why I was promoting the June 30th date so the people who felt for all these years promises were made to them the Virginia skinners of the world all these the Tim blacks everybody who felt that this is what they came here this is what they stayed for this is everything else it's kind of like living up to that promise piece and being sure that okay heard you loud and clear we're taking care of that we will look at everything else and and it may stay the same it may stay the same may get modified something else may happen but at least for the people who had those promises Etc that are retired they would kind of know where they sit I mean that's and I look at it as we're asking for more information if we're not changing anything and we're not doing anything with the policy at all why are we asking for more information that's where I'm coming that's what I'm saying like I don't no why why do we need more information to make an informed decision and you're saying don't do anything at all but we have to have enough information to make a sound financial decision and that that isn't an UNF fair thing to do to just be informed financially how we're going to move forward so before I make any decision I want to know how it's going to impact us financially and we don't have that information so to assure the people in the room that they are not going to be touched we should put something in there that says that if we need to we can remove it at a later time but I want these folks to know that we're not touching them for the time we're looking to get more information I can't make a decision without more information so that it's unfair to expect anybody to just blanketly say okay no problem we'll deal with we'll deal with the Fallout if it financially impacts the district we shouldn't be doing that we're the stewards of the money and I feel like we want to protect our retirees yes at the same time but I need more information so I want to do something that at least assures the people in the room that their retirement is safe that's what I want to do and I don't know that we can just leave it alone completely and then find out when he gives us the information that we need to change something drastically I don't know that so I want to feel comfortable in that in that decision-making process that's all and I want our retirees to know that they're going to be taken care of so how do we do that simultaneously if we do nothing we're not protecting our financial stability yes Don when is the last the drop dead date that that you need direction from the board on we really need to um have the board policy adopted at the March 25th board meeting um because that allows us the appropriate time to do all the programming and to get with FRS for anything that goes into effect on July 1st and um if you use that June 30th 2025 date it protects and grandfathers everybody that's in this room and then anybody that may retire by June 30th 2025 and it provides a piece of mind for those then we can take a look at what some other options are uh for those employees that retire after 71 maybe it's a it's a bonus payout maybe it's based on yours of service there's different things that we can talk about so if the board gives staff Direction now to the point that a couple of the board members have made that will get you what you need to be able to make your deadline so that everybody here in the room and others that weren't able to make it today are whole and allow the board additional time to research this for what we will do moving forward in the future correct okay I just wanted to bring clarification to that because I do believe that it is very important that I hear all of you wanting to protect those that are in the room right now as We Gather additional information but staff has a deadline so we do need to be able to make this policy change at least through March to then be able to buy additional time and we will bring this back I'm I'm okay with staff bringing this back every workshop and every meeting until you get to a place where you all feel comfortable um but I do believe that for the purposes of right now we need to leave here tonight feeling like all of the individuals are good staff has what they need to be able to make the decisions that they need to make and then you also have the option to continue prob working through this I I also want you all to know too I know that there's thought that finances are on your mind as they should be um insurance is separate from from Capital dollars we know this but I commit to the board that as we go through the budgetary process moving forward which we will be starting here very soon uh I will be bringing forward cost-saving measures from the district office to cut in other areas so as you are making your decision financially from a retirement standpoint an insurance standpoint point I want to take the pressure off the board to know that we will have wiggle room in other areas because my commitment is to make sure that we have cost savings from a cap from from a general operating standpoint so we don't take a vote but I would like to know if I have consensus to put the June 30th language in to the policy at this time so I would say yes um but again I'm not exactly sure why by febru by our February meeting we cannot have the data and we cannot have a a Rec recommended language that would include all our current employees our future retirees in that in the in the same policy why I don't know why we can't do that unless there's some sort of reason why we can't get all that information gathered um individual board members will be able to meet with u Mr Calderone and the superintendent and the chair can meet with the attorney we could have propo we I don't see why we can't have proposed language in this policy by our February meeting and I agree with you as far as a first re as an advertising review correct Mrs Falls if we put it as an advertising review for the February meeting and then when we hear it in February that's the first read piece that we would have additional data additional pieces that have for us um option one option two option three option four for whatever language piece that would be and what each of those language pieces look like and I think that that's a knowing that from there we can't make a change in March if that was the final read in March we can't if we're still not satisfied with it we could either have a special meeting that takes care of it well we would still have the febu we would have the February regular meeting we would have the March Workshop we would have the March regular meeting so I think what we would so I think Mrs Falls correct me I think what we would have to do is we would have to also advertise as an advertising review at the March Workshop so the March Workshop would also have a meeting for the first read the same way that this other policy that we have tonight is so that if we do make changes at the February meeting you have a correct thing to advertise for the March Workshop which then puts us on target for a final read because you can run those two things concurrently in March correct does that work for everybody yes doesn't work for me sorry so we do have consensus to go ahead with okay okay thank you Don I have one last question yes um in order to be appropriately um prepared for the February 18th board meeting um Can can the board provide some direction to staff in terms of what options they would like to um see um are are you interested in um some figures as to like a run out of current policy the way that it's structured with years of service contribution based on active um board contribution medical insurance um the health insurance subsidy would you be interested in a a bonus uh one-time re retire incentive like when you retire you get a certain payout yes yes all that and I think one of the options is to do nothing what what does the cost out look like with the assumptions of okay if if you had retirees or if you had current employees that have 13 years of 13 years of teaching experience seven years with the district what does that look like when they hit 20 years what does that look like when they hit 25 years and what does that case look like yeah okay we could do that thank you thank you okay you're back Don updated timeline for employee benefits Insurance RFP for fully insured medical and Pharmacy you never left yeah I know um give me just a second let me pull that up take your time yeah want to take a take a break yeah let's take a five minute break e e e e e e e e e e e e which for go ahead whenever you're ready okay I'm ready um so board um Workshop agenda item 3.01 is the updated timeline for employee benefit insurance RFP for fully insured medical insurance and Pharmacy and um I just wanted to take just take this opportunity and just let the board know that um based on the January 14th board Workshop uh the board had directed staff to work together to see if we could work um and collaborate and work with the payroll department in order to stretch out that timeline for um the RFP process in order to get an additional month of claims that will hopefully be in our favor as uh we negotiate with the RFP uh respondents so just wanted to share this updated timeline and kind of long story short because it's been a late night was that uh we were able to do such a thing and um we now have a date of May 22nd in which the benefits department will provide that open enrollment payroll file that comes out of bentech that um incorporates all of the decisions and actions that employees make in bentech for their active open enrollment um we've got that over to the payroll department by May 22nd they have been amazing and um it will allow them still to make that uh June 5th multi-check uh dispersement date to employees and we'll allow our uh Department Sandy eart um to do that F FRS file upload for any changes um for that so I just want to let you know that um as we go through the RFP process with the Garen group leading that that we will be able to um go ahead and get an additional month of claims thank thank you you hey um controlled open enrollment and choice Dr Miller and Lana baros good evening Madam chair Mr superintendent members of the board Tracy Miller Deputy superintendent I have Lana baros here director of choice and Innovation and we wanted to bring information to you for your consideration about Choice programs for school year 2526 so as you know resident and nonresident parents have options when requesting to attend a school other than the school that is known as their Home Zone School controlled open enrollment allows parents from any school district in the state as long as students aren't subject to current expulsion or suspension to apply through controlled open enrollment in a school that hasn't reached what our board has defined as capacity capacities are determined using the Florida inventory of school houses which is known as fish and we have set that capacity at 75% for the current year all schools all Martin County school district schools have been what is known as a controlled open enrollment School we do have as you know in review there is a recension of a current policy related to school choice and then new policies related to school choice for full-time employees school choice for Resident and non-residents and also controlled open enrollment so there really are four ways that students can attend schools in Martin County the policies that are up for the board's consideration at the next meeting as well as being a student who lives in The Home Zone of that school so just a little bit of information as Dr malham used to always say a bit of an ey chart for you this is the projected enrollment for elementary schools for next year so what we do is we basically roll up the fifth graders into the sixth grade roll up eighth grade into ninth grade roll out the graduates and then duplicate the number of kindergarten to project what our numbers will look like for enrollment next year in our school we also have been through the choice um the con the specialty Pathways options for parents now and so we have students who have been accepted parents have clicked the button and enrolled their students in the new school for next year so we have looked at that information we have also looked at the number historically of students who have come back to us for example in high school from private Charter and homeschool and have projected numbers for you compared to capacity in elementary fish seats what that really means is just the department of Ed looks at what the intended use of each room in each school is designed for whether it's for a gened classroom whether it's a resource room Media Center that kind of thing and they generate the number of students the number of student stations or the number of students who can attend that school without being overcrowded that does not include Portables we know we've had a great push in our district to encourage our students to start early and stay day with us in the Martin County School District we know we're a great option so when we bring them in in prek that has been a great investment for us so we have actually you'll see for elementary you'll see the fish seats and then fish minus prek because when we have prek students those are seats that were defined in fish that can't be filled by a K through five student because we are filling those with the prek student so just giving you a kind of a definition of what we're looking at there and then the percent capacity and the percent capacity the fish minus prek we have three schools that are over the 75% I'm sorry four schools over the 75% capacity staff is recommending that three of them not be considered for controlled open enrollment but that one being Port cerno Elementary be able to continue as a controlled open enrollment school because they do have additional seats or spaces or classrooms in the building that is affectionately known as The Old Port Saro Elementary where there would be additional space for students so that's why that one is not even though it's over the the percent capacity as identified by the board that's the reason staff wouldn't be making that recommendation for you Dr Miller has there um I'm just looking at Port SLO in particular has there been any consideration for moving the VPK students that are at the other building off campus to forso Elementary so that they from the old Sero Schoolhouse there hasn't been discussion to date but that's something that that staff can look at and I my colleague Mr La Barbara for discussions around that we could if that's something that the board's interested moving students over because I know we had talked about doing that at Warfield too as well so that there is that continuity on the same campus so just something maybe a future a future discussion okay thank you yes thank you so for elementary um that was the elementary information and then for secondary schools all of our we have capacity available at every single one of our middle schools you'll see and I should have shaded it colored it red we have we're at 75% capacity for Anderson but because it is a large campus and we have a lot of seats available we would ask that that remain as controlled open enrollment as well as all of the middle schools and then high school that's where where we do tend to have our students really engage in our programming we have students who get excited about our CTE programs we have students who get excited about specialty Pathways we have lots of advanced programming great opportunities for students in the high school and so you can see that we do have quite a number of students we are actually above capacity in many cases in our high schools and then compared to the fish seats we also know for example Martin County High School we do have lots of Portables and I did mention that fish does not include the Portables so I'm not real concerned about running out of space in particular at Martin County but would ask that they just be considered um among a choice program not specifically the controlled open enrollment and then this as you've seen in the past these are actually numbers like individual students what we'll be moving toward in the future is more of an FTE look so for example especially in high school and Elementary it's typically one student is in kindergarten they're there all day all year so one student is generally the same as one FTE in Elementary Middle School very similar with a few students who might leave for some reason and might not be there for the full day and earning a full FTE but it's it's close High School is a completely different story because lots of options for kids we have students who graduate early we have students who take on different programs and so we may not be earning full FTE on all of our students so what we're going to do in the future when you see these presentations for example at the county meeting The Joint meeting with the county and the the village and the city and all of those groups we would be sharing not just enrollment numbers but we would be looking at the FTE because I think there's a little bit of when you see the enrollment numbers and wow we're over capacity it looks like you have so many students when it's we do have a lot of students we just don't have them staying all day and earning full FTE and that's really as you know as the board where we are capturing the funding so we want to make sure that we're able to provide the opportunity for all students who want to attend our great Martin County Schools to be able to do so through these options so our goal really is to fill seats in all cases to fish capacity and in some cases even we are able to exceed that based on FTE not necessarily on the unique numbers of students so one of the ways to ensure because I mentioned there four ways to really attend a school you we have to have a seat available if you move in within the Home Zone of that school we also need to make sure that our employees or full-time employees if they want their child to attend to school that we have a seat available for them so we would like to set aside at the controlled open enrollment schools maybe two to three% of students of of um seats that would be available kind of for those purposes so we would have controlled open enrollment to be able to fill all the available seats except for setting aside whatever the board would choose two to 3% of seats that would be held back so to speak for those students who would be moving in those students who might be transferring or those who might be the child of an employee so just and then don't mind scrolling line I appreciate that this is just to show you what you already know and and Mr Morrison's been sharing with us for quite a while is that we're not just in a a state of of stagnant enrollment we're actually at declining FTE so while we might have some years more individual students than we had prior we don't have more FTE so that's a distinction that you'll be hearing more often and something that we're really moving away from from Individual counting um individual students to really looking at the the way the FTE looks so Dr Miller do you have those what is the projected FTE as opposed to the projected actual number of children or kids so if you like the idea that that's being shared what I would do is work with finance and with Mr Morrison to really look at at a percentage it's varied in the past years somewhere around 93 94% of so if we had a thousand if we had a 100 students typically the FTE generated on those students would be 94 93 to 94 so we would be looking at a percentage for full-time FTE yes so if that's agreeable we would look at something like that for future reporting and then just to share what we typically share this time of year you all know there are lots of neighborhoods and lots of things happening in Martin County we are just not seeing new students materialize from those new neighborhoods we do have several that we are tracking we have several that we have conversations with the county and the city about and we are just not seeing increased enrollment or increased FTE being generated and in fact the projection is to continue without those increased numbers of students for the um near future they are expected not to generate large numbers of students for the next couple year and so in summary our recommendation would be that for controlled open enrollment we would be looking at nine elementary schools with the exception of Bessie Creek Jensen Beach Elementary and Warfield they would remain as a choice school as all of them would be Middle School would all be controlled open enrollment and then high schools being at greater capacity at this point they would still be available for Choice thoughts questions comments from board members sure I have a couple so using the 93% when I take the high schools um for example Jensen Beach High School using 93% if you have 1739 as enrollment 93% of that is 16177 which changes Your Capacity number compared to your fish seat to 104% and your percentages then become 104 91 and 93 which is still well over the 75% using that same calculation if I do the 5562 as your enrollment number correct and then I compete compl com compute 93% so I figure what my 7% extra is to figure out what my full time enrollment is I'm coming up with 5162 so I'm figuring that that's about 400 so is that what I guess is that what it looks like in high school in FTE I guess that would be a Mr Morrison question or is that what you're targeting to that what you're saying I Target to to accept into the program no I'm I'm just saying that um no just as far far as Computing FTE against enrollment so if I know I have enrollment in high schools of 5562 that's 55 5,562 beating Hearts but if I use 93% it means that I lose 400 of that number in order to get to my FTE number so I'm guessing is it about 400 so card Morris an assistant superintendent for finance um your spot on Mrs Roberts the preliminary f te that has not been certified by the state yet um as we're still waiting on the third Cal for high school is the FTE is 51 128.3 okay by your math taking the 5562 and you applying the percentage you would come down to 51 72.6 so comparing that to the preliminary October we be we would be off by about 44.6 3 FTE so that's close Okay um and then so I I just want to understand make sure I understand understand how this process works then so when you're saying that we have controlled open enrollment for example at Anderson Middle School and Anderson Middle School has a fish capacity of 1201 what you're saying is that if you hold back two% of those seats and push 24 seats to choice to the choice policy that's resident non-resident which the new policy looks very similar to the controlled open enrollment that the numbers to get reported quarterly to the state as far as vacancies the numbers that run through the process using the controlled open enrollment piece that's designated by the state by saying yes we're opening controlled open enrollment at Anderson Middle School to 98% of fish capacity means that I have set aside 24 seats that I can use on the other policy it also gives me the flexibility then to move Beyond those 24 seats and to exceed the fish capacity because I'm doing it with a different process is that correct that's correct okay thank you so you're looking at 2 to 3% for each of the controlled open enrollment pieces right if if that's agreeable I think that's fine I don't know how the rest of you feel about it but okay so you would see this back at the regular board meeting this month for board action and then we would begin notifying families and really for families we handle all of these intricacies that we just talked about families just need to know that we are open for choice and parents have options students have options here in the school district and we're we believe your best option thank you thank you okay Kathy Dr perendi and Dr Muto and Miss Cantina Harris for code of conduct good evening superintendent Maine board chair pritet Vice chair Powers our board members our school district community and our Martin County community this evening this the student services office under the leadership of Dr Estes brings to you the code of student conduct tonight we're going to go through our introductions and timeline you will see that this evening I'm Dr Kathy perendi the director of student services my staff is a little sick but they hung in there tonight to be with you so we have Dr mudo our coordinator and Miss Harris our manager of mental health and threat assessment we're going to go through the timeline how did we get here um and this timeline we're going to go through this a little quickly for you we know you had a heavy evening but through this timeline we started this process with the code of conduct with May which may be or seem a little early for you all we started in September asking you for your representatives and we put that together set out the schedule for the entire school year or this school year planning for the 2526 we set up our meetings set up the guidelines We Set four meetings for our focus group we noticed them set everything out we had such a dynamic focus group that we only needed three meetings they took care of every task looked at everything and you'll hear about that in only in just three meetings so you'll see that we didn't need the last meetings which was fabulous the next phase of course is all the board process we are here tonight for the workshop hopefully getting to the next board meeting for an actual approval and then the last or next steps are everything we have to do to prepare to roll that out and that is the translation piece of this I kept saying transcription these guys got me uh the translation piece updating all of our schools um handbooks and then it's the training part the training of our administrators and the first first day of rolling that out for the first day according to policy and aligning that because policy does require that we do so in that first day um we had the recommendation or the suggestion that we identify and acknowledge and recognize the actual members of this focus group because they did they truly did such a fabulous job not only in the work but their recommendations and you'll see the recommendations towards the end something that we put out to you last year called the chart of changes and the minimal charts changes on that chart but we wanted to address each one of them this is the student list I want you to know that we had several students and it was a couple from each of our high schools and these folks ended up showing up for each of the meetings staying throughout had they had a voice and they had a voice in each one of the focus group projects and they participated fully what a dynamic group of students we have some awesome children uh staff members teachers assistant principles um a principal and I will have you know that these folks along with our Community Partners from all over everyone has a full-time job right our parents our partners our police our deputies everyone has a full-time job and they not only did those full-time jobs including our students it's a full-time job right but then they spent evening time with us and they all fully participated so I want wanted to thank them publicly as well for the time that they gave us and they were fully committed thanking our school board attorney he comes and he presents at the beginning and he shares the uh Sunshine Law with everyone and so we do want to thank him for his expertise in sharing that with us as well I'm going to quickly go through this process this is a process because when we started this focus group and getting through this we really want them to understand the purpose why are they here it is not just to voice these concerns or any kind of complaints it's not what this is about what this is about is really why are you here and we want you to actually have the understanding of what the student code of conduct is and that it matters your voice matters and what you do and what you have to say really matters so we give them the purpose we identify why the people matter and the process itself we go all the way back to and I usually always start with i the federal the state and our local mandates we explained that most in this code of student conduct has to do around policy but the part that matters for them and the focus group is that they will cover all the infractions in each of our levels and the corrective action we worked on the four C's so we had the three PS now we have the four C's and so when we talked about the four C's in each of their activities as they rotated each meeting it was about they had the opportunity to obtain Clarity talk about what the board commitment would be in their their recommendations any contributions they would like to make for us and then continued concerns what would be their continued concerns that they would like this board to hear and what did they want us to bring back so one of the situations as we went through that I just would like you to know at the end they did all of that in their work in each activity and then at the end a full group session came together every concern that they had we put up and they voted on consensus what were the items they wanted to bring back to the board and on that chart of changes there are just a few and those were the items that they felt the strongest about talked through provided Clarity and those are the items that were bought through for change so we also had a recommendation and I wanted you to take a look and it was a look back so the board last code of conduct had four initi initiatives and it was the abcv attendance bullying cell phones and what is referred to as vaping but our data collection is tobacco and THC so you're going to see a little bit of that um it's not a heavy detailed of that data piece because it was kind of a a late request that we put those in but I did want to just put up some data do a quick revision I mean a look back at that data and then kind of see is it something that are these initiatives that we want to continue so for for us in the school system we always want to of course and we always will as it's an early warning indicator look at attendance that's something we're never going to let go but as for the rest of them is it something we always want to emphasize along the way um and is it an initiative that the board would like to continue to speak to and address so as we look at attendance the attendance comparisons if you want to look at that graph uh quarter 1 and quarter two are the comparison isons that we have and those comparisons for quarter 1 and quarter two were both a slight increase in attendance from 9.5% to 91.3% um from last year to this year and then it was a very small increase in quarter 2 89.3 to 89.9 and that's your attendance on bullying the way bullying is coded there was an increase in bullying being reported now I want you to take a look at that and just kind of think um as a correlation we emphasized we educated there was an awareness um campaign among administrators among students at schools this initiative brought awareness to all schools and to all students about bullying so there's a possibility that yes it did increase and everybody says well wait a minute what's happening but that awareness may have come to students reporting right so you have bystanders now who may not May no longer be a bystander but may report that bullying feel comfortable in the reporting process of bullying so sure we might have had a little bit of an increase that's not a bad thing that's a good thing the other and I want um we want to let you know that the student services office this team put together a uh committee so that we can look at the processes and procedures of bullying and the bullying investigation and they have already met once and they're revising that plan and aligning that plan so that the investigation building is better aligned for both schools and for the process to see that we can improve that process along the way so we're already taking some action there thank you cell phones uh cell phone data we don't have comparison data because it is not recorded in the same manner um I'm to no one's surprise I do believe you can see that the cell phone data was high higher um as far as infractions at the secondary level than it would have been in high school that I mean than it would be at elementary so we know that our high school students have a greater infraction but here's what I'd like to say to everybody I'm just going to read just a couple of schools to give you examples I'm not going to read the actual school but I will read for you just a couple of numbers so you could see this downward Trend so from August monthly August through December I'm going to read a high school first 218 the first month down to 127 84 the next month 71 to 43 ending in December they got the hint right I'm going to give you a middle school a middle school went from 25 34 32 right fluctuating 28 down to 11 another High School 199 150 108 87 to 69 so the pattern continued with middle school and high school each month right higher numbers in the beginning and going down so it looks like the continuation if we remain consistent we will see a difference in that pattern so the last chart that you will see is regarding data and it's funny because um pal who works with some of our kids that work on the tobacco and The Vaping they have an intervention and they work with us on that all of a sudden um they came up to us one day and they were like wait a minute we're not getting referrals for a lot of kids and we were like no you're not because we're not getting a lot at the middle school level and so you will see the reduction in both tobacco and THC this year so the comparisons are pretty good um the numbers vary there's a little more at the high school this year at 22 in middle school with nine so it is it has been reduced last year the comparisons Middle School had 15 and it's being reduced to nine so you know the numbers are not astronomical but everything is going in a better Direction so we're we're pleased with the numbers but sure I think we you know are going to continue and continue working on all those initiatives I don't think we should ever really stop educating children like I don't think we should ever stop on that campaign so we would like to do that and continue with the numbers so thank you for the recommendation of taking a look back and our last slide for you all in this in the presentation and regarding the student code of conduct really is the time now for you to give us any feedback on the new document on the any of the changes that were made any questions you may have um and noting of course that the new document has a new aesthetic has a reduced number and um it is there for you or for us now we are ready for your comments I'm just curious why is this page marked um for the dress code and highlighted did was that one special well no what was posted initially and the reason yes it is special no uh it was posted initially and then the dress code in the previous um you know dress code is a Hot Topic right it always is and the dress all policies have been moved and linked in the back that would that happened last year but with dress code being a continuous um Hot Topic and hot item especially for most schools we just really wanted to put the dress code in fraction and that piece of the policy which spells it out we just went ahead and included it back right there in as a quick reference so that was added since it was posted so therefore it was tagged and tagged since it was just an updated since it was posted to draw attention to that for you absolutely thank you for that Dr yeah was there any discussion um at all about uh the dangers of energy drinks in uh one of our local Charter Schools outlawed energy drinks uh today and I was just wondering if there was any uh discussion about the dangers that that could have for for children especially um and a possible um Outlaw of that was that at all discussed no there was not I mean it might be something that we caning bring forward discuss with maybe Food Services and and see if there's anything that has come down from that Avenue but there was not in the code of conduct okay because our food services does not sell any of those type energy drinks but uh often times they'll bring them from home and not really aware of the consequences and if you just do a quick Google search there are disastrous con consequences for children so um you know this could be something for next year obviously but uh it's definitely something I'd like to see looked into is uh confiscation of uh these high sugar high caffeine energy drinks uh among our student population thank you so I would just ask Brian do you know what was it a certain age group or was it just across the board I guess to have them reach out to the school too to see why they did it because it could be happening in our own schools we don't even know it or hasn't been risen to the surface I guess I don't drink energy drinks so I don't know what they do yeah I don't either but the American Academy of Pediatrics has advised against them for consumption uh in our children especially under the age of 12 um so they've started confiscating these things so I think this is a serious issue it affects uh attention uh the amount of sleep digestive issues um it's something I I'd love to see this board uh look at I don't know if policy or if the code of conduct might be the proper uh Avenue for this but it's something that I'm very passionate about uh within the health of our children so um just wanted to make that recommendation so Health Services resides in the student services office so we'll take a look at that we will work again with um Food Services and take a look at in our in our department or in our district if we have anything with vending machines that kind of thing so we'll we'll take a well-rounded look and a collaborative effort with all of our systems thank you thank you sure I had a couple things um since dress code is a Hot Topic and it appears on page 12 maybe on your um table of contents between section two and section three you can have an indent put dress code and put the page number just to kind of make it easier to see thank you the second comment I have is on pages 19 and Pages 22 so Pages n I'll go to page 19 first almost to the bottom like the seventh line up okay you have cessor incidents um which is saying cessor codes and definitions right I don't know whether maybe it would be appropriate there to say that the three letter code is the cessor code that is used to do reporting to the state but somehow or other reference that those the cessor incidents get reported Ed to the state under those codes okay and that that would be both on page 19 and on page 22 22 just has cessor incidents with a colon but I think I think you can lose the star in front of it and say cessor incidents and do the FD FLD dooe sessor codes and definitions but put some language in there that says that that's the three-digit code that you know that's how we report to the state so that people will know that under the level three and under the level four infractions if you see that code that's the one that we're reported thank you other than that thank you it looks very good terrific I just had one question can you go back to the slide that shows the attendance graph absolutely I think this looks amazing thank you yeah come on I always have to turn it off and turn it back on oh I can look this I'm curious why Quarter Two is so much lower than quarter 1 is that a pattern that is prevalent in schools that quarter one has better attendance than quarter too um I have not looked at our County over the years we just did the last two years we can take a look back and see if there's a pattern or a trend we do have both two holidays Thanksgiving and uh the Christmas holidays during that time right November December if we did not have the full week off sometimes families choose to take it off sometimes there's a lot of travel so depending on that in you know during those quarter during those times depending if the quarter ran over we can only guess okay um I'd have to take a look sometimes there folks take other holidays off during that time yeah I didn't I didn't think of that but it looked it looked a little bit kind of jarring to me the the so it does depending if if there's you know Jewish holidays during that time there's a lot of things that go on during just that period of time so folks take off quite a few days but I would just have to look at over a fiveyear span to see if there was any sort of pattern or Trend yeah because if there was maybe there's something we could do to lift it up a bit right thank a three to five year would data span of data would only give me those Trends y thank you so much anybody else this is terrific thank you thank you very much and thank you for your input moving right along open to the board anyone I had a couple things I have a couple things Okie doie go ahead Dr Mar yeah during public comment it was mentioned about the uh people were concerned about raids in our schools I don't see Miss shazo here but maybe the superintendent wanted to address that I don't know if you want to do that now or I was I had asked him to do it at the end okay do you want to do that at the end Mr superintendent okay okay that was one and then the other thing I wanted to bring up was uh apparently there is a cell phone tower being built in front of Palm City Elementary and there's some growing con concern in my district about that and the children there uh I reached out to the County Commission and commissioner campy and um he shared with me that basically something like that is done by the state and there's no public hearing and there's really not a whole lot they could do um but after doing some digging where that cell phone tower is being built is on basically someone's property and that person has most likely made some kind of a deal with the cell phone carrier uh who's putting that there so uh I would encourage people it seemed like on this social media post they were saying to uh reach out to the county doesn't sound like the county can help them but uh maybe reach out to the land owner who's Leasing that land uh to a cell phone company if they don't really want a cell phone tower right in front of Palm City Elementary if they're concerned with the health ramifications uh that might be a better uh route to go that's all I've got com sure um I was also going to mention the Palm City Elementary cell phone tower and perhaps ask if we could get Tyson Waters to look into that and give us um something because he's normally the the one the attorney we use to do that type of thing and I'll wait to hear what you have for the ice enforcement because I do think that um if there are any protocols if our staff is being trained obviously that would be in some respects some of that would be a public record and rather than have people have to do a public record request it might be better to just go ahead and do some posting so that people know what it is thank you um I wanted to um wish all of our counselors happy National counselor's week uh thank you for all you do and uh superintendent shared with me today that he was out um giving some awards out so I'd like to hear about that as well and uh that's it good thank you for for the opportunity um Madam chair so we'll start with the awards because that's fun um the h our department invited me on a prize Patrol today as they honor monthly uh you know employees that are that are employees of the month throughout the district we had the opportunity to go to food and nutrition uh honor one of our own Safety and Security Personnel uh Mr John at the front desk we also had an opportunity to go to Anderson Middle School for a teacher as well as Jensen Beach High School and I think that might there was one other employee but the HR team took care of uh that individual ual because he's traveling uh between schools but this is something that we are doing uh through the HR department as a retention piece they're doing an incredible job um Katrina and Marley have have headed that up and uh it's fun so next time we go we will put out an email this was my first time going and invite anybody who would like to join the prize Patrol because it's an honor to see those staff members light up they're totally surprised they get a balloon they get a cupcake they get um today they actually got a $25 gift card to collab kitchen uh next month I'm being told it's a dinner cruise type package uh the staff has gone out to local businesses and are getting donations from local businesses to uh to give to those staff members so it's been a lot of fun they spin the wheel and and then they just they're nominated by their peers um so it's it's going really well and so I appreciate the HR department and that initiative and from there we'll move on to to to ice so to answer your question Miss Roberts and and also Dr Mor Ari we do have policies and procedures and a protocol that we will follow and be more than happy to share that but we aren't doing anything different for ice or Homeland Security that we would do different from a DCF uh person showing up on a campus or an outside agency that shows credentials that would like access to uh interview a student there typically is a warrant or a subpoena or a court order that is required to access uh Student Records if um we have not had any raids and I use that term because I think the public believes that uh we will have our law enforcement officials barging into schools with guns drawn in their ice uniforms or homeland security uniforms and that is not the uh Partnerships that we have with our local law enforcement agencies to include our local ice Division and Homeland Security division our Martin County Sheriff's Office in conjunction with our chief Safety and Security Officer Mr franela is working in tight coordination if we are notified that there is a student that needs to be spoken to or if we have a high school student that is being charged with a federal crime then we will enter they will be made weight on campus uh I have met with all of our staff to make sure that we are doing this in a dignified manner in a safe manner that we are not going to allow law enforcement to barge into a classroom but they will be given a location in the front office a private location like we do with any Outside Agency for one of our staff members a guidance counselor a school psychologist a social worker or a school administrator or in some cases the preferred school resource officer that has relationship with these students to go to the classroom and have the student brought down to the the front office and placed in a private secure location we have always been very cautious about throwing students in handcuffs and placing them in the back of a police car publicly and in front of uh students yes there are times where there is a fight that occurs on campus or there's an emergency that occurs on campus which results in law enforcement having to secure the situation that happens in front of students and staff but when it's done in a controlled environment in a controlled way uh we always have placed the safety of the Student First and the Dignity of the student but we will cooperate with authorities we will cooperate fully with law enforcement and federal agencies that require our assistance but it will be done in a true partnership fashion um and in a controlled type of way adjourned next do we want to take a break before we go or you want to just keep rolling okay we have another meeting okay can I have approval of the agenda I move to approve the agenda uh Dr Mari Ari and Miss po second all those in favor I okay first review of Schoolboard policy 3.01 51133 school choice for residents and non-residents move approval of item 3.01 second Miss Powers motion Miss Russell second all those in can I have a comment about it first please for discussion yeah thank you um I have had three things that I think need to be corrected on the policy on page three of five I talked to the superintendent and I talked to Lana about these today the first one is halfway down the page where the paragraph starts with approved applicants will be notified in writing and shall have 10 work 10 school days to enroll at their chose chosen school if the last day for enrollment falls on a day that the school office is not open for business the deadline shall be extended to the next Daye that the school office is open for business um I believe that should be changed to work days meaning work days of the Martin County school district and the second sentence could be struck so we would be changing the word school to work and striking that second sentence doing that same action on the top of page five where it starts with after an applicant is notified in writing the applicant shall have 10 and then instead of saying school days it would say work days also um after that that paragraph on page five where you have the struck sentence of if the last day of enrollment falls on a day that the school office is not open for business the deadline shall be extended after that one I think a new paragraph needs to be inserted that says late filed applications for high school will be processed on June 1st for the first semester and on November 15th for the second semester so keep in mind that what happens in this policy is that if you apply during the month of March that's considered the normal application period if you apply after March 31st you're now processed as a late application when you're processed as a late application in elementary and middle school it isn't as important you can process somebody halfway through a semester without it being a big deal because they just move from one school to another but in high school because you're getting Credits based on a semester that 10day window piece creates an issue that if if a seat shows up and somebody has offered a seat on say October 1st and they now have 10 days to accept that seat then that has them accepting a seat the middle of October but now they're put in a position where in the middle of October if their schedules don't line up so imagine if you're going from Martin County High School to South Borg high school and that's what you're trying to move from but at Martin County you were taking culinary in the first semester which isn't off offered at South Fork High School but now you've got 10 days to decide if you're going to move you now move in November but there is no credit to make up so by doing this this makes it so that um the applications are being processed by making it November 15th it gives the 10 working days which gets us kind of through Thanksgiving anybody who doesn't pick it up and take their seat then they can give the seat to somebody else and it gives them another 15 days to pick up that seat and then puts them on in line to start the second semester same thing for the June 1st deadline so that means that if you didn't apply by March 31st you would have April and May that you could still be submitting an application getting a number being processed put in a bin put in one of the phases on June 1st you would have the first 10 days and then if you didn't accept it that seat would be offered to somebody else and they would also get 10 days to do it so that's my um thought process to add that there so I would just ask if that's an issue that we need to address is it and those dates work for that's a recommendation from staff I move approval With The Changes oh we already made the I already made the motion but I amend my motion to accept the changes uh that Mrs Roberts mentioned if the seconder agrees Miss Powers motion Miss Russell second all those in favor I I you want to do open to the board again public comment open open to the board I know public comment well there's nobody here did I e