--------- meeting will come to order. Please join me in a flag salute. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and
justice for all. Thank you. Thank you. Uh Mr. Mr. Hastings, would you please call the role? No. Mr. Brady here. Mr. Dalton here. Mrs. Dam here. Mrs. Gilman here. Mr. McGovern here. Mr. Schneider here. Mrs. Miss
Stevens here. Mrs. Terico here. Mr. McCarthy here. Wonderful president's report. So, we have a lot in front of us today. We have a lot of wonderful things that we get to do. Um, I had a I had a college professor used to tell me that leaders
look up, right? And often times we as a people, we tend to focus on what's directly in front of us, all the problems that we're facing, the things that we're dealing with. Very rarely do we stop to look up. And one of the fortunes that we have as a district this week is to stop and to look up at all of
our students who are moving up in the world. Okay? And that's a beautiful thing. We have students who are moving from kinder from pre-K to kindergarten, from kindergarten into their first grade program, from fourth grade to fifth grade, from eighth grade to high school, and we have high schoolers who will be
graduating this week. And with that, it is a time of celebrations. I'm sure our administration and our teachers are looking forward to the end of it all, as well as our parents. But I would like to take this opportunity to give a big thank you on behalf of this board of
education to our teachers, to our administrators for what you have done this year to take all of these students and the future of our town and our country and to move them forward and to move them up. We owe that thanks to you
every year and we wouldn't be able to do this without all of you. On behalf of the Township of Ocean Board of Education, we are greatly appreciative of the legacy that you are instilling in all of our students. It means the world to us. So, thank you very much. And with
that, let's move on. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening, everyone. It's so wonderful to see so many of you here this evening. We are uh so excited to honor our retirees and I'm also so happy to see so many guests here
as well to join in the recognition of this tremendous group of people and the legacy that they have built and will be leaving here in our district. Uh there are many people here that are going to join me in the honoring of our retirees,
our principles. Uh, our board president is going to help with the plaques that are over here. So, if the principles would please come up and Mr. McCarthy, if you could help us here with the plaques and also our Township of Ocean Educators Association President and Vice
President, uh, Ms. Connelly and Mr. Sisiano are also here as well to honor. And if I forgot anyone who's here to to greet our uh retirees as I call them up, you can please join on the side. And retirees, as I call your names and and
talk a little bit about you, if you could please come up this way and and greet your the the leaders that you worked with for so many years. And then you'll come over here to Mr. McCarthy who will provide you with your plaque. Okay. Very good. Perfect. All right. If
we need any help, just just pause. Just tell me to pause. Oh, you can. Okay. Tonight, I have the honor of recognizing this group of retirees who together have
given this school district 394 years of service. It is incredible to think about. I want you to know from the bottom of my heart that you have touched
this district and you have left your impact and you have left your legacy on our students, on your colleagues and on our schools and we will be forever in debt to the work you have done each and every one of you in the various roles
you have played. As I begin, when I call your name, just please come this way and uh allow me to speak a little bit about you. First, I'd like to introduce Mrs. Adalia Amiguel, who began in this district
in the year 2000, serving 25 years as a Spanish teacher at the Township of Ocean Intermediate School. We want to congratulate you and thank you for your service. And Miss Among, if you would just come across the front, then we're gonna we're going to
congregate over here. Maybe maybe principles, this would be helpful, right? If you if you come across the front. Yeah, you're block. Just fine. Keep coming. Keep coming, John. All right. And so, we're going to go across over to the
backdrop. Next up, I'd like to introduce Mrs. Carol Beta, who began her career here in Ocean in 2003. She worked 22 years as an interventionist in our district in a number of our schools, finishing her
career at the Township of Ocean Intermediate School. Congratulations. Next, I'd like to recognize Mr. Kley, who I do not think could be here this evening. However, I would just like to recognize that he began working in our district in 2003, serving 22 years in
our buildings and grounds department as a maintenance employee. Congratulations on your I'd also like to recognize Mrs. Jean Collins who could not be here this evening, but I still would like to recognize that Mrs. Collins began her career in Ocean
in the year 2000, serving 25 years in our district as a special education teacher at Ocean Township High School. Congratulations. Next, I'd like to introduce Mrs. Andrea Donner. Please come on up.
She began her career in ocean in 2004, serving 21 years as an English as a second language teacher at one massa school. Congratulations, Mrs. Donner. Thank you. Congratulations.
This is a good walk to make, right? Okay. Next, I'd like to introduce Mrs. Diana Dunich. Come on up. Beginning career in our school district in 1997,
serving 28 years as an instructional assistant, finishing her career at the Ocean Township Elementary School. Thank you for your service and congratulations. Thank you. Next, I'd like to introduce Mr. Gary
Hempill. Gary, come on up. Mary began his career in 1982 serving 43 years as a bus driver in our transportation. Thank you for your service. Next, I'd like to introduce Mrs. Karen
Cassagenski. Mrs. Cassagenski Mon began her career with us in 2006 serving 19 years as the school nurse at the Township of Ocean Intermediate School for
Oh surviving now. Congratulations, Karen. I'm sure everybody has many years of caring for students. Okay, next up I'd like to recognize Mrs.
Michelle Lesnie. Michelle, come on up. Mrs. Lesnney began her career in ocean in 1994, serving 31 years as a secretary in the maintenance department. She helped many of our directors through their time
here, providing a great service to our district. Congratulations, Mrs. Lesnney. Next, I'd like to recognize Mr. Paul Looney, who I know could not be here this evening, but Mr. Looney began his career in our district in 1989, serving
36 years as an English teacher at Ocean Township, finishing his career at Ocean Township High School. We'd like to congratulate Mr. Looney. Next, I'd like to recognize Mrs. Lena Milling. Mrs. Milling, come on up.
Mrs. Milling began her career in ocean in 2001, serving 24 years in our district in many roles, finishing her career as a fourth grade teacher at Wayside Elementary School. Third grade.
Sorry, third grade. Third grade at Wayside Elementary School. Next, I'd like to introduce Mrs. Kimberly Repco. Mrs. Reco served our district beginning in 2014 for 11 years as an instructional
assistant at Wayside Elementary School. Thank you, MCO, for your service. Thank you. Next, I'd like to recognize Mrs. Michelle Rogers, who could not be here this evening. Mrs. Rogers began her career in Ocean in 2007, serving 18
years as a special education teacher at Ocean Township High School. Congratulations and thank you, Mr. And topping the list of years of service, I'd like to recognize Mr. Carl Schneider. Mr. Schneider served this school
district beginning in 1980 for 45 years as a custodian at Bayside Elementary School. Mr. Schneider, this district owes you a debt of gratitude for your commitment and your service to us. If you would please, you could stay right here. Thank
you, Mr. Schneider. And last, but certainly not least, I'd like to recognize Mrs. Janette Spec. Am I not Mrs. Mrs. that began in a Toyota school district in 2001, serving 24 years as a
social studies teacher at the Township of Ocean Intermediate School, serving proudly our middle school students, raising them to be civic-minded and citizens of the world. Mrs. Spec, here
you go. You're not done yet. All right, we'd like to get the whole group of retirees. I think probably in front here would be best, right? If you would just kind of move to the slide over, you can block all of us. Yeah. Move to the center here and we're going to get a picture of all of you together. That's that's probably good. That's
probably far enough. There you go. No, no, no. That's okay. Go ahead. Yep. Yep. If you would get together and families, you're welcome to stand up and take a photo as well. Few more. Just give it Looks like we're
taking just a couple more. Keep smiling. Keep smiling. Once again, I'd like to Was that all the photos? Okay. Once again, I'd like to congratulate their combined 94 years of service. Congratulations,
Spartans. You will be missed. Mr. President, that concludes my report. Thank you, Mr. W. I appreciate that. He shows me I'll survive neurovirus co. the resets. No, no. Take take the photo. Take the
photo. Yes. You only retire once. Thank you for coming. See, I did. I did. I did. I did. Unbelievable, isn't it? 45 years of service. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Congratulations.
Good to see you. Good. That's your genet. Have a good last two days, guys. Jamie tonight. No. Now. All right. Um, with that, Mr. Hastings, would you please uh give us your school
business administrator's report? I have nothing to add from our workshop report. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Hastings. I appreciate that. Uh, public comment on any item. Uh, moment, please. Apologies. Board of Education recognizes the value
of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest. Public comment is not a question and answer session. Specific questions can be directed to the administration. The superintendent's contact information is
available uh upon request and also on our school website. Uh we encourage you to contact her with any questions. Public participation shall be governed by the following rules. Each statement made by a participant shall be limited to 5 minutes in duration. No participant may speak more than once on the same
topic until all others who wish to speak on that topic have been heard. Presiding officer may request any person to leave the meeting when that person does not observe reasonable decorum. Would anyone from the public like to make a comment on anything at this time? I found the rest of my notes. Alex Hayes
Oakst. Um, welcome. There are four entries. I think it's under the bill list for bus aids. Um, but an outside service. It said four separate entries and it totaled $28,000 and that's to ASS. Um I'm just wondering
if I can get clarification maybe in an email or a conversation tomorrow or sometime probably from Mr. Hastings on what that means. Four entries, $7,000 eachish from ESS about bus aids. Um, I
also saw I had some time off from you guys, so I actually paid attention a little more to to these bills. Um, I saw that we only got $34,000 in Medicaid reimbursement from what I looked at on one of the bills and we were anticipating $100,000.
So that's a $65,000 difference. So, I'm just curious with all the federal grant cutting and federal budget cutting if this is just one of the examples of all the cuts going on in our presidential administration that are finally trickling down to this district.
Wondering if you could clarify or give me some insight on that. Also curious as to the $49,000 judgment against the school district that was on one of the line items on that same um document as page 10 of one of the bills. It said judgments against school
district $49,000. So I was wondering what that really entails. I feel like I haven't seen that in a while, forever. Um and then a few more things. So um we're taking out 135,000 out of the maintenance reserve today. You approved
that I think in the first meeting unless that's officially going to be voted on today. But in the notes it says for required activity mentioned in the plan. Like, so it really doesn't say what the heck you're spending money on or why you're taking $140,000 out. It would be
really awesome for the public if maybe these agenda item descriptions could have a little bit more description in them. And then finally, um I mean I touched upon this probably like two or three times ago when I was here. You keep bringing up we're a board of the whole.
We're a board of the whole when somebody says something in a committee that you guys don't like. Um, and I think Mr. Dalton and Miss Terrio hit the nail on the head tonight. Um, you need to stop saying you're a board as a whole. When you have committee
structures, also when you have committees that only select people belong to, get to meet with others kind of meet in secret. You don't do committee reports. Um, so I agree with Mr. Dalton. Why don't you pick what this board is? Either you're a committee as a
whole or you're not. Um it was also pretty um I'd almost say upsetting to see um um President McCarthy cut off Miss Karico at the very end. You she was mid-sentence
and you cut her off. I mean, her course, I get it. That seems to be what you do generally, but may I advise you maybe look back at the video. um because you let other people speak and you didn't even let her finish her sentence and you said it was under the
guise of we need to finish up for this 8:00 meeting. But I looked at the clock and it was 7:55. It wasn't a good look. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Tes. Do we have any other members of the public who would like to make any comment on any item at this time?
Wonderful. Mrs. Conway, do we have anyone in the queue who would like to comment on anything at at this time? No, Mr. President. There are no commenters. Wonderful. Thank you very much, Mr. Dalton. Approval of minutes, please. Thank you, Mr. McCarthy. Motion to approve item 5.1, approval of minutes
from the executive session on June 3rd. Do I have a second? Second. Mr. Would you call the role? Approval of minutes 5.1. Uh, Mr. Brady, yes. Mr. Dalton, yes. Mrs. Dam, yes. Mrs. Gilman, yes. Mr. McGovern, yes. Mr.
Schneider, abstain. U Miss Stevens. Yes. Uh Mr. Terico, abstain. And Mr. McCarthy, yes. Motion carries. Um Mr. McGovern, personnel. U move to
approve items 6.1 through 6.17. Can I have a second? Second. Mason, would you call the role? This is all items 61 through 617. Mr. Brady. Yes, Mr. Dalton. Yes, Mrs.
Dam. Yes, Mrs. Gilman. Uh, yes to all except 6.10. Uh, no. Uh, vote for Mr. Apeelli. Recuse. So, just as a point of clarity, that was a recusal for Mr. Appelli. Thank you,
Miss McGovern. Yes. Mr. Schneider, yes. Miss Stevens. Yes. Mrs. Mr. Terico, yes. Mr. McCarthy, yes. Motions carry. Thank you. Mrs. McGovern, financial management and resource services. M.
Thank you, Mr. McCarthy. I think this is an item record number. Uh, move to approve 7.1 through 7.39. Do I have a second? Second. Mr. Hastings, would you call the role? Item 71 through 39. Mr. Brady, yes. Mr.
Dalton, yes. Mrs. Dam. Yes. Mrs. Gilman. Uh, yes to all except 718 recuse from Camp David and recuse from Bush Law. And so just as a point of information, I believe that's 724 recusal from Bush
Law. I thought it was under contracts as well. So I believe then it would be 18. That's a point of inquiry then for Mr. would that be 18 and 24 or just 18? I thought it was under uh 18. It's also
under 24. I believe 18 is just the acknowledgement of who we have contracts with. So they're not really approving anybody. It's just an acknowledgement of who has contracts. So um So then to remain to remain safe, you could recuse from both.
Yes. Okay. Thank you, Mr. McB. For the record, that's a refusal from 78. 718 and 724. Thank you, uh, Mr. McGovern. I don't believe I need to. I will recuse from 7.18 and 7.24 on Bush
Law. Um, yes to all else. Thank you, Mr. Schneider. Yes, Miss Stevens. Yes, Mr. Telerico. Yes, Mr. McCarthy. Uh, yes to all. I will also recuse from 7.18 and 7.24 on Bush Law.
Thank you. Motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Hastings. Instruction, Education, Student Activities, Mr. Golden. Thank you, Mr. McCarthy. Motion to approve items 8.1 through 8.6. Do I have a second? Second.
Thank you, Mr. Ac. Would you call the RO? 81 through 86. Mr. Brady? Yes. Mr. Dalton? Yes. M. Stam. Yes. Mr. Skilman. Yes. Mr. McGovern. Um, I'm going to abstain from 8.1, but yes to all else.
Mr. Schneider, yes. Miss Stevens, yes. Uh, Mr. Tel Rico. Um, abstain. Thank you, Mr. McCarthy. Yes. Motion's carry. Do I have any old business from any
members of the board? Do we have any new business from any members of the board? Um, Mrs. Gilman, I just wanted to echo your sentiments and Miss Weldon and wishing my fellow retirees happy days
and relaxing times and a great big thank you for everything that you've done for our district. I know they're probably on their way to a celebration, but I just wanted it to go on record uh that everything that you have done is well appreciated by everybody up here and
parents and everyone in the community. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Skilman. Any other new business from any members of the board? Wonderful. Can I have a motion to adjourn? Motion. Second.
High school. My father Part: 2
All right, we're going to go ahead and get started. Uh, I have nothing for Go ahead and get started, guys. Um, so I have nothing for my president's report. Uh, do we have anything for the superintendent report? Yes. Good evening, everyone. Uh, it's coming down
here to the end of our 2025 2024 2025 school year. And uh I just want to give a shout out to all of the amazing celebrations, moving up ceremonies, graduations, award shows, field days, pool
celebrations, um kindergarten, high school time capsule. I can't remember. I think we've already discussed that one, but there have been uh outstanding displays of Spartan spirit and Spartan pride across
this district for the last month. I cannot thank the staff and the students who made these events so spirited. It's so wonderful to see and it made me so proud to be the leader of this outstanding Spartan community. Uh and
not to leave out the parents because I am certain that so much of the success of these events is due to their hard work and their commitment to their children and to our school district. So, I just am so grateful for everyone and I did write that today in my message from
the superintendent out to the full community and I I did mean every word of it. So, thank you to all. We have a few more things to go. We have our senior clap out tomorrow. All of our graduating high school seniors will return to their
elementary schools for a final clapout. It is a uh very emotional and sentimental uh symbolic day and uh I wish everyone good luck as they return to visit their where it all began for each of them and
it's our last day of school on Thursday where we will have our two graduation ceremonies. The intermediate school graduation is at 2 p.m. The high school graduation is at 4:30 p.m. Both take place at the high school. We are
watching the weather very carefully. Unfortunately, we are uh seeing some concern with the weather, but we're going to keep a positive outlook and we are going to be hopeful that both of these events will take place in Spartan
Stadium on Thursday. But should we need to make an adjustment, we will inform uh the community, the principles will be sending something We will not make a final decision parents at each school for either scenario. Okay. And I just
wanted to make sure everybody was aware of that. That concludes my report this evening. Thank you, Mrs. Balden. Absolutely. positive outlook for Thursday. Fingers crossed. We'll make it happen. Students will graduate.
Mr. Hastings. Thank you, Mr. President. Um, about a month ago, maybe two months ago, the board asked us to look into our use facilities policies and regulations uh to look at our fees and the fees that we're charging. And, uh, there was a
question about what we've charged uh, over time as well. Um I'm going to hand out to the board um our policy and regulation uh as well as a brief slide
that basically really only two slides. Uh I just want to review this with the board. We went and looked at six districts uh including our own. I want everybody to have blue stuff.
Thank you. Sure. Sorry. No, no, thank you. Um, so we looked at our own. We looked at Deal, Freedole Township, Middletown, Neptune, and Shore Regional as uh comparables, pulled all their regulations.
Excuse me. The um policies are generally the same. Policies talk about the desire of the board to make uh facilities available to the public. Uh the regulation is really where you get into the fees and the whatifs and wherefors therefors and all
the other good stuff. Uh it's not really an applesto apples comparison unfortunately when you look at the various policies uh because uh folks break things down into different hourly charges two hours half days full days. Uh some, for
example, Neptune does not rent out its turf field, uh whereas other districts much like our own do. Um some charge for custodial fees, some charge for security andor technology folks for help. So again, we took more of a broad brush
approach to give you a general feel for where we are uh and what these policies include. uh in looking at them. Uh if you look at the second slide here uh on our uh handout policy regulation 77 7510
use facilities. So all of them basically break uh users down into uh classes or priority users and typically the first uh is a nonprofit school related or education related organization. A class
two or a priority two again is nonprofit but it's more typically local community groups and then three is forprofit commercial groups who are looking uh to utilize the uh facilities. Um all obviously have an application process
that we go through. Um it includes a written application that's submitted by the requesttor and it has to be submitted with an appropriate amount of lead time. um fees are assessed based on their classification, their priority status
that I just mentioned. They're all required to provide proof of insurance and list the district as an additional insured. And what that means is that their insurance carrier is the primary for any claims that may arise out of the use. And then of course most of the use
requests require board approval. Uh if you look at the next page, um we have on the left our Ocean Township fees uh for nonprofit and profit. Uh and I've compared our fees to the average of
those other five users. So for example, if someone wants to use the gymnasium uh here at Ocean Township, uh it is considered a nonprofit. It's $180 to $5 facility fee. Uh the average
for the other groups is $275. So there's a $90 difference there between our fee and other and the average fee. Uh again, cafeteria 145 versus 188. And as you go down, you can see the rest of the numbers. Uh the
numbers increase on the profit side or the forprofit side in terms of users. So again, we talked about 185 for us for nonprofits. uh the charge for profit is $540 versus a $559 average. So there the
difference is really only $19. Um so again, our fees are generally in line with what the average is. Uh there's some differences uh where we could tweak them perhaps a little bit. Uh but uh for example um if you look at
the auditorium on the nonprofit, we charge 325 for the auditorium and not profit average is 125. So there we're a little higher than with the averages. So again, generally speaking, we're in line with with with the averages. Um
again, when you talk about the class of users and the fees associated with those users, typically um the nonprofits do not pay necessarily a facility fee. And again, it depends how far you're breaking down your user
group and what your definition of of them is. Um, and typically you would charge the nonprofits uh the fee to cover your custodial costs. But even that then gets into if we have custodians on a shift during the usage
time, we don't necessarily charge them because we have staff there anyway and they're cleaning those facilities and those rooms at some point. So you're not sort of double charging or or charging them for staff you've already got in the building. Um we also were asked, excuse me, about
the fees that we've collected. So over the past three years, you can see in 2023 we collected uh just under $62,000 for the year. In 2024, it was $45,000. In 2025, as of May it was 43,000.
Uh when I look back at the 2023 which was 60 versus the 45s, the basic difference was two one-off users, two profit users uh that use our facilities for an event during 2023 that did not uh
again use it in 24 or 25. So that's why there's a difference of about $15,000 there. Um, in terms of who's using our facilities, uh, we've got during those three years between 25 and 30 specific groups that
apply to use the facility. Uh, the majority of use is really um, done by requests from soccer or basketball. So, those were the majority of of times that were booked by those groups versus some
of the other groups. Um, so, uh, again, uh, it's not strict apples to apples when we look at the comparison, but in terms of the field for what our fees are, we're close to to what some of the averages are. And in terms of the revenues, you're looking at uh,
generally speaking over the last two years, $45,000 the district's bringing in in those costs that I'd be happy to take any questions you might have or any direction. I do have a question just for clarification because I want to understand but the
athletic field right because it looks like it's $200 for two hours is that correct because then the school facilities so the turf field is broken up in various uh components. So I guess that's my
question because there's a seasonal fee for $150. Are we also charging $200 for two hours for each? We're charging the $150 fee because again, some districts look at the oneoff uses as all right, if you're just going to use it for two
hours, it's $200 in this case or $600 depending if you're profit or nonprofit. Uh that also gets broken out into four hours, into half a day or into a full day and it varies again slightly by weekday versus weekend. So again, this is where we get into it's not easy to
necessarily compare one to one because different districts have different um breakdowns of how they charge their fees. Okay. I I just want to make one comment because it looks like the seasonal fee is for many days for the
entire day. So I guess my question is why are we only charging $150 when on here it says 200 for two hours? Well, because that's the board in the past has has reviewed those fees and looked at those and that was the direction that the administration was
given at the time. I know some districts do charge seasonal fees. Uh so for the football season, they may charge $1,000 um or they may charge in our case 150. I noted when I were reviewed the annual
usages um it seemed that the groups that were using our fields were not necessarily seasonal 150 was sort of application 150. So a group may have put in for
August through October they were charged 150. Then they may have put in for indoor November through January that was another 150. So again, it was sort of broken up um not just straight sports season, so fall for football or spring
for baseball, but again in terms of applications. Other questions? What's the biggest um contributor to the fees? Like if you had to guess, would it be the third field or the gymnasium or the auditorium? Like how does it break
break down the mix? Um so initially I asked um uh the business department to break that form down for me in terms of percentages in terms of users. Uh but then in thinking about it uh you can't really do
it that way because while our soccer or basketball folks may use it more frequently because they fall into these other classifications they're not necessarily paying us the most. So the thought or the the feeling is these are local groups uh with our students from
our community. So we charge them accordingly uh based on that association. Our uh regulation gets into uh percentage of Ocean Township residents in certain cases that are on the teams in terms of determining what
the fee factor is. So, um, again, when you looked at 2023 at 60,000 versus 2024 at 45,000, you're really looking at two groups that had very limited use, but because they were commercial or
forprofit groups, they were charged much higher fees. Can you share what those two groups were? I can tell you what. Um, okay. They were a football group that that went to Shore Regional. They didn't get they didn't get charged nearly as much as they got.
QBIQ was one of them. 2023. Um, is that a dance? No, that's football. Football. So, Camp Max was one of them. It was uh $8,600. And then there was TBIQ,
which was almost $6,000. So, I just have one question. In your in your group of people that you got these um average numbers from, did you by chance get their average number of seasonal? The people that do charge seasonal like we do, do we know approximately what they're charging for
those fees? I did not look at that, but we certainly can if that's what the board would like. Uh just one second, Mr. Ch. Anybody else down here that I didn't see? Okay, Mr. It's not my question was um not so much the split of like who but like of our assets when is
the most like usually rented out. Is it is it typically like the turf field or is it the gymnasium or is it a split down the middle? Um again we can we can look at that but those are the two top two. It's going to be the fields or the gym because most of these are athletic groups that are looking for facilities
to use. the oneoffs are are you know dance to teams and those sorts of things that want to use the auditorium. Mr. Acings, first of all, thank you very much for uh for compiling all this. This is this is super helpful and I appreciate it. Um school age service
groups in our policy under use of school facilities. Uh number two, this c category shall include your youth organizations whose memberships and leadership consist of twothirds of majority of Ocean Township residents. Little League, Pop Warner, American Youth Football, Soccer Association,
other similar organizations. Are those organizations considered profit or nonprofit? And and do we even know which I'm sorry. Number two, under our policy first.
[Music] Um, right. facility would be second and third priority. So they would not be charged the facility use fee however they get into that $150 per season fee. Okay. So they're they're
charged a seasonal facility fee those groups. Mhm. If it's frequent and regular use. Okay. And then um I just want to clarify if you look justify if you look at the regulation under fee
schedule and procedure you'll see AB C and D there that sort of talks about our five priorities and where they fall in on on fees that are charged. Okay. Um, and then I just want to clarify, do
do we do we not charge fees or is there not a demand for our non-turf fields? No, we use the soccer fields over at the intermediate. Is that fee the same as the turf field or is that
did I miss that? I apologize. Is that undergrounds and fields there? Yes. So that's that that would be what those fees are. Okay. Wonderful. And then I think that you answered this question. This is my last question. The
the drop off from 23 to 24 and 25 is solely because those two organizations that you mentioned. Yes. Those were not repeated users in the following years. That's why fees were approximately the difference. And a board member stated that that was because we were charging
too much. Do we know if that's factually accurate? Has that been brought to the administration's attention? It has not been brought to my attention. Okay. Just want to clarify. Not questioning what you're saying. I just want to see if it was brought to the administration's attention. Um the the rates,
I apologize if I missed this at a board meeting. When was the last time that they were adjusted for inflation? The last time the regulation appears to have been updated was uh March of 2020.
Okay. So we should probably look into that just to adjust for inflation, right? Or I'm suggesting or recommending it if the board would like that. Yeah. Any any other questions about anything on the policy?
Nothing. Okay. Then so with comments like that, one of the one of the things that has been brought to the floor is considering an adjustment for inflation. Does anybody favor of that? Opposed to that, thoughts about that? Go ahead, Mr. Schneider. I I mean that's that would be something that
you you would do in perpetuity. I think that you'd increase the fees every year for CPI adjustments. But then to get us back to average, I think there's that would be another step that we could take too. Get us back to what average? Our our benchmarks that we have on the right hand side. Yeah. If if if gymnasiums
interpret No, listen, the absolute dollars aren't a lot. You're not going to save the world, but at least we could try to gain some money into the into the town where we're stuck in any way. So, so I would just caution as MCGovern pointed out groups do shop, right? So,
they'll go to different districts and look for a turf field and some may not. As she said, Neptune doesn't offer their field. So, they go to Hazbury or here or or NEP or or some other district u and look at those fees. On the other hand, these are our local community groups
that are utilizing our facilities and we want to keep in mind that they're generating their funds based on fees to parents uh and covering those costs through those fees. So there's a balance of of what's appropriate to charge, I suppose.
Uh and to keep in mind that it's we're not just selling off to, you know, any any particular group. It's it's our local teams and local community that's that's paying for that. M Steven, I just I would agree with you because we want our community teams to have access.
I mean, this is not a big money maker for the board. Um, you know, regardless of the dropout and I think we want our teams to have access so our kids are able to use the facilities. The most important thing, not making not making additional funds here. Uh, Mr.
I was going to say I think keeping I mean for nonprofits those are going to be our local organizations but for for-profit organizations who may be coming from other communities I could see bringing those closer toward the average. I think kind of echoing what
you were saying, keeping it for our local communities as is or maybe just not necessarily bringing it much higher is going to help the community more so. And then Mrs. McGovern, then you're next. I was just going to say one thing I don't see on
the fee schedule the turf fields fees. I don't know if that's it says fields up to 240, but um but half day is for nonprofit. It says half day is 100 and full day is 175. So, I just wanted to point that out because it's not in line with what's on here. I don't know if it's a discrepancy or not. I thought
there was a separate like we had Blackbox Theater, Cyber Auditorium. I thought there used to be a place for her. Maybe I'm not seeing it because I don't have my glasses. Right. So, we have High School Stadium at the bottom here. Oh, see that's why I don't have glasses on right now. Oh, down here. Sorry. Missed that. Okay. Thank you. Um, the other thing that I
just wanted to put out there, and I don't remember whose idea it was years ago, but I'll just throw it out there. Um, one of the things we had looked at because of the of the fact that there are certain groups like um, soccer and basketball that use it more than say I don't know other people that like
football because I know it and lacrosse maybe only use it a certain amount of days. Um, generally for example because I did football it can be in my brain in a season football used it four or five days. That was pretty much it where um, on a Sunday that was the only time they use our high school turf field. um where
soccer's there as we've all heard and we know many many days. So we had talked about possibly a sliding scale of if you use it one to 10 times it's 100 whatever 150. If you use it 10 to 20 it's such and such 20 to 30. And it was supposed to be per season not because you can
fill out a form for the entire year and be done. But it was supposed to be the fall season in line kind of with our sports the fall season the winter season and the spring season no matter what you were and you would the other thing that it was supposed to be was if you're using or we had talked about I shouldn't say supposed to. We had we had mentioned and I don't remember where it stopped or
if it came to the floor or not. Um if you used the high school turf but you also used the high school field up front or the field in the back. Like if you were using two fields at the high school, you got charged separately for the two fields. So you got charged a seasonal fee for the turf and a seasonal
fee for another field. So I'm not I'm just saying those were ideas to maybe do a little bit more. You know, when you have someone using it four days and you have someone using it 400 days, no, not 400, but you know, but you have somebody using it much more to char we we had
said like to charge them the same amount didn't make sense because if you were going to raise the fees, like they're probably not charging as many as much if you're, you know, if you're only a one season sport or something like that. So, that's just another idea to put out there. Um, just so it's out there. Mrs.
Tower, um, when was the last time we were able to update or renovate any of the fields, it's been a long time because we put in lights at the stadium last year. I mean, the turf just, right? So, the turf at the high school
is field turf. Field turf generally speaking says 10 to 12 years as a lifetime. Of course, it depends on usage and how many groups and how often you're using the field, which also then also dictates our maintenance of the field, right? So, we have people come out who
groom the field and do concussion or impact testing on it and then redistribute the little rubber beads that are in there. Yeah. You know, all that fun stuff. And then it's just wear and tear as you know, we look at it and things start to fade a little bit. What about middle at the middle school or
denim? Um, so again, that's all grass. Um it's hard um to it's hard to maintain in that when you have constant use seed and and sort of fertilize and leave it alone for a period of time to allow
the grass to grow and take root because you've got the different groups using it. But so could I mean hypothetically could if some of these fees were raised down the line could we renovate update you know some of these fields so that
they're even and better for the players that are on them. Sure. So any revenue we receive from the use uh can be turned back into maintaining them. And that's sort of what we did. It's just about how much you can turn back in and
so it would be given back to the kids in the long run is my point. Thank you. Other questions or comments? Okay, so we we have uh we have a proposal to adjust for inflation, right? We have a secondary proposal to only adjust uh for
the profit groups, right? And then we have another proposal um that maybe we should consider a sliding scale due to use, right? So, um, go ahead. I had my I had a proposal. Okay. Go ahead, please. No, I said bring them up to the averages because like Mr. Hastings said, like
they can't that's just the uniform. Bring them to the averages and then we can do the CPIs afterwards. So, it's like a hybrid of what stamp said and we've also had a couple people say that they don't believe that we should do anything um to this, right? So, uh
definitely a little conflicted. Um, do is anything uh that is proposed right now something that the that members of the board agree with uh in particular? Does anybody have one of those things that they would say that they lean more towards um to try to get a consensus
here? Because we've got four to five potential routes we can take here. I'd like to narrow it down. I think there's two things going on. I think that there might need to be like a policy change in general of kind of what Amy McGovern was saying about the sliding scale and how
we go about doing that and maybe also saying every three years we adjust for CPI or whatever it is. That's one thing and but then what to do right now with our prices. That's what that's what it sounds like to me what needs to happen. Okay. Um, does anybody disagree with
that or is that so now we have the idea to potentially uh modify for a sliding scale for increased charges as well as adjust for inflation and put that on a time frame in our policy? I I just have a comment that I think a sliding scale seems like a lot for the
business office to be managing and again we're an educational facility not a business facility. Um, so I think in terms of if we're going to maybe look to adjust, as you said, to the average, keeping it very simple so that it's it's, you know, easy for them to manage, um, and a sliding scale and keeping
track of ticks of how many times somebody uses something seems like that that could be become a little overwhelming, especially considering how many how many facilities do use, how many groups do use R. I would just say conversely I I understand what you're saying but the
difference would be it would it would go based upon what you put in for. So when they come in and say I'm putting in my fall season I have 40 dates or whatever or I come in and put my fall season and have five dates. So I don't know that you necessar like you're going by what you put in. So if you put in for 10
dates whether you're there those 10 dates or not you know like that would be my thought unless somebody puts in next week for five more dates in the same season right someone an applicant would have to put in a complete applicant application to to avoid what Miss
Stevens is saying somebody we wouldn't want to receive weekly applications to appear like we might miss to to cut through the fat of this to try to get to maybe some consensus on one thing. So, so a adjustment for inflation
would be roughly 7% increase in the fees currently, right? So, we would just take the fees and then do a uniform adjustment across all of them and increase them by 7%. Sure. Going by just doing the averages, that's easy right now. Then if we have to
adjust it again, we're going to have to go through this analysis again to adjust through the averages. So the work's done this time, but it's going to have to continue doing it. Doing it by CPI, it's you know what the percentage, you know what it is. It's a little bit of a less maintenance of adjusting if we want to
go that route. I just wanted to add that in. I I would I would concede mine to to do the CPI, but it wouldn't just be one 7% on top of a rate that we established in 2020. We'd have to take that from 2020 up to 2025 at 3 to 7%. So it would
be a different we get that. So you you're you're saying that instead of just doing a uniform increase across everything right now by 7% you would rather see an annual compounding increase based on a consumer price index. Yeah. And we get then that's in our policy going forward so we're covered on that. So and then you're
proposing on top of that that we modify the policy so we continuously do that annually. CPI. Yeah. Yeah. So you want to back you want to back for five years going back. You want to increase it to bring it up via the CPI and then additionally increase it via the CPI
annually. Yeah. And I say that because I just did this in my uh my Okay. M I I can't go along with that. Um, if if these nonprofits or excuse me, if the profit organizations are shopping around
for the best deal, uh, I think we should bring that up to the average. So that rather than looking for the lowest price, they look at our facility and say, "Wow, we've got a beautiful auditorium. We've just updated the sound and the lighting. Let's go with Ocean
Township." I do not want to punish our community groups. don't think that we should raise the nonprofit. I would agree to raise the uh profit up to the average.
Another another option for this. Yeah. So, so I think I think that maybe we need to identify and I think I want to remind the board that at any point we can we can you know discuss this policy again. We can put it again on the agenda for a future meeting. Is there potentially one step that we would like
to work towards taking right now? Something along the lines of just increasing the profits to the average. Something simple that that is an action that we can take or is there nothing we can gain consensus on? Do I have any consensus on increasing just the profit group to the average right now? Can I
get a straw poll on who would support that? One just the profit groups to the average in front of us right now. So I have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. So I I have I have a majority. Majority. So I didn't count
myself. Nine. I have a majority. Okay. So uh that being said, we would need to draft a change to policy, read the policy twice, and then make that modification. Okay. So So with that before, I understand
that everyone has questions right now. We'll answer them in a second. So with that what I'm say asking the administration to do is to take our profit groups move them to the average that is presented only modify that to our policy and present that for
consideration to the board at our next meeting for the first reading. Okay. So if we do have changes that we would like to make then we could we can move from there. Questions? Can we go to the average number like instead of 438 be 440? I don't understand the question. Can we
go to like the whole number? Like 438 is the trick though. Can it be 440? Can we just round to like a nice number? So we'll round it to the nearest 10. Okay. Awesome. Comment or questioning.
My accounting brain is just it would nice it would be nice to see the whole picture and not just like peacemeal this which is what it's sounding like we're going to eventually be doing. I mean, I do support looking at the profit and that's great, but
breaking it up and then having another discussion about this and then we might be like, "Oh, well, we should have went about it this way and then we have to go backwards again." Just feel like there should be one larger conversation and have a do it all together. So, previously I had a majority consensus in
favor of this. Do I now have a vote against it? A single vote against it. I thought you were trying to clarify. And we are only proposing a change to policy that will be discussed again in the next two meetings. I thought you were doing that and then going back to nonprofit like I
thought you were just breaking that up in two. I asked for a single consensus on one item just so to clearly articulate again just so we're all on the same page. This is totally okay because it's good to know this. We are asking and and I I am under the impression I got a majority vote in favor of this. We are asking that the
administration moves the district's profit charging fee up to what the average is that they've presented from the entire the the pool of schools that they they requested and that they bring that back to us. That is all that we are discussing and changing to the nearest
$10. Thank you for pointing that out. So let me I'm going to take a straw poll again on that. Can I see who is in favor of that? Please raise your hand. Okay. So I have a majority in favor of that. So we are going to make that change and that's going to be proposed via policy and then we have the opportunity to
discuss this again in the future. Do you have another change you'd like to propose? I just I think that we should listen I am not for charging our children of this town either. I do think that there is if we're going to if we're opening this
up right now and to open it up again in six months or a year or two years and then go back to nonprofit I think is the wrong time. I think you if you're going if people are wanting to even just go up $25 or $50 or no dollars or whatever, I think it should be discussed right now
before we close this for the week that you know whether we do I I don't I don't agree with um I'm sorry, Mr. But the whole like bringing it up to 7% and then doing that, which I think we kind of took off the table. But I'm not against personally either bringing the seasonal
fee up a tiny bit or doing a sliding scale and leaving the lowest one at 150 and then going to 250 and 500, whatever we want to do. But I do think that if if there's a point where a majority of this board is going to want to discuss raising any nonprofit and maybe that is
the straw pole first that if people if you if we have a majority that wants to raise it even just a little bit that that should be discussed now and not in a future meeting. So you're asking the board takes a stroll poll now on if we want to also raise nonprofit. Correct. Okay. Are can I have a a hand
raise for anyone who would also like to raise nonprofit? Can I just if you could just take this vote and then we'll So, so no. Okay. I should have asked for questions to begin with. Go ahead. Because I I hear what Mrs. McGovern is saying, but I think that there's a
couple of points out there. So, going to the shrub pole on the whole thing is not the same as CPI. CPI going back five years and $25. Like, I think that there's a lot of questions in that. I guess I'll go back and say the seasonal
thing if we want to talk about the seasonal thing of changing because those are the people that only pay a seasonal fee. They don't pay this nonprofit price at all. So I'm just saying so may I amend what I was asking is if anyone wants to if we have a majority of people that want to discuss the seasonal fee
for our nonprofit most mostly ch that group whatever be or two or whatever it was of of the soccerers and the footballs and the you know baseballs and the basketball mostly sports. Um do we want to talk about the seasonal fee? If we don't want to talk about the seasonal fee then I'll I'll drop it. I just don't
want to say in two weeks we want to talk about it six months or a year. I'd rather it if it's going to get discussed get discussed now before the next season start. As a point of procedure, I just want to be clear that any board member can bring up any topic that they want at any single time, no matter what anybody would like. So, if someone decides two weeks from now they would like to bring
that up, they are able to do so. That being said, so what is now proposed and we need to we have 20 minutes left to get through the rest of this agenda. So, we need to potentially kind of come to a consensus here or we can table all of this discussion as well. So, so what is
now being proposed is that we consider amending the seasonal fee for nonprofits as well. Okay. So, do I have any members who are in favor of that? Amending the seasonal fee. So, I have one, two, three, four. I do not have a majority in
favor of that. Did I miss a vote? Okay. I do not have a a majority in favor of that. I just want to say, and I know we have to move on, that um uh Mr. Hastings said he was going to go back and find out what the seasonal fees um were for a couple of these other districts. So, I think we need that information before we
even can discuss. We might be very well in line with the other districts. Okay. That being said, we we did have a majority vote in favor of raising the forprofit groups up to the average at the nearest 10. So, that will be proposed in the next meeting. We're
going to move on at this point. Okay. And thank you everybody. I appreciate the questions. We're going to move on. Not a not a question. We're going to move on. We have to move on. We have to move on right now. So, okay. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate that. I thought we were going into a presentation.
All right. Board of Education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest. Public comment is not a question and answer session. Specific questions can be directed to the administration. The
superintendent's contact information is downstairs on the podium and on our district website. We encourage you to contact her with any questions that you may have. Public participation shall be governed by the following rules. Each statement made by a participant shall be limited to 5 minutes in duration. No participant may speak more than once on
the same topic until all others who wish to speak on that topic have been heard. and the presiding officer may request any person to leave the meeting when that person does not observe reasonable decor. Would anyone from the public like to comment on anything at this time? We have no one present here.
Do we have anyone downstairs who would like to comment on anything at this time? Uh yes we do. Sorry. Okay. Um, Alex Hayes Oakst. Um, with the new board since the first of the year, this is like the quickest I've ever seen action in one meeting. You guys are
deciding to raise rates on facilities. I commend you. It's amazing. Um, uh, one board member, I don't know if it was, I believe it was Miss McGovern, mentioned that of the two that didn't return this year that they left because it was too expensive here in Ocean. But
let's let's be real. The QBIQu was coach Klein's camp. He is now a coach at Shore Regional. That's why he left. He didn't You can probably ask them, but I highly doubt he left because of our fees. He left because he's no longer a coach
here. Um regardless, I still applaud you all for uh alleging to raise soon. Um, it's a little difficult to see what you all were looking at because the slides, like there were no slides of the public document that's in front of you. So, I
guess it's just a heads up to Mr. Hastings that I'll be asking for a copy of um the research you just presented to the nine board members today um via email. Um going through my list here,
I saw that in going over contracts, there is a report on all the uh contracts that this district has entered into and I see the Bush Law Firm and Kenning Gross and Crevat. One is supposed to be
just labor uh and special services and the other one is general school board. When I opened all the um legal fees for this year, it did seem like Kenny Gross and Kovat was doing a lot of non labor legal. Um so I'm wondering
why that's the case if this document today states that they're only supposed to be doing labor and special services and not general schoolboard counsel. So, that is a question wondering whether we were having our labor turning during general counsel stuff and in tens of
thousands of dollars to do that. Um, I also saw in today's documents that there will be a $240,000 upgrade to the um high school. I guess that's after that flood or whatever happened or what was it from the rains and it says that insurance will partially offset it. Mr.
Hastings, I'm wondering if you can let me know how much of the 240,000 is going to be covered by insurance. Um, the Head Start contract, to be honest, 40 pages. It was too long for me to peruse. So, I'm just wondering if I
did not see if it said any additional kids. Are we still looking at 30 kids for Aso? That's a question. Um, let's see. I also see $230,000
that we have spent this year in quote architectural engineering services. I'm wondering if it's possible to get a breakdown of that, what we spent $230,000 on for architectural engineering. Um, I think this might be it for right
now. Um, where it says posted checks, there's like over 100 people getting $588 each. I'm assuming that is us paying private school families for their monthly transportation stipend. So
I'm wondering if you could just confirm that if that's what that $588 per month for like what 200 families. Um I think that's it. I don't know if anybody else here wants to speak. Where am I at time wise? Because I still probably have some questions. A minute
and 22 seconds. Mrs. Hayes, you know, I'll use it. Um We have never done the 50% um discretionary deletion of fees to coaches and staff until this year. Um I know you responded to me, Mr. Hastings,
but I was just wondering if the board can comment on why we started doing that as of um January 1st of this year. Thanks. Thank you, Mrs. Hayes. Do we have any other members uh of the public present downstairs who would like
to comment? Uh no. Thank you. Uh, Mrs. Conway, do we have anyone in the queue who would like to comment at this time? No, Mr. President. There are no commenters. All right. Thank you so much, Mrs. Conway.
Presentation of minutes. Mr. Dolton. Mr. McCarthy. Thank you. Presentation of minutes, item 7.1. That will be an item to be voted on later downstairs. Any comments, questions, concerns? Okay. Wonderful. Personnel was discussed
in executive session. Financial Management and Resource Services. Mrs. Stant, thank you. Um, up for discussion 9.1 through 9.12. Nothing specific. Thank you. Anything you would like to comment on, Mr. Any?
Uh, yes, there are a number a large number of housekeeping items on this agenda. These are annual renewals that that go into next year that we're required to adopt. Um, also on this agenda, uh, is the authorization to move forward with
repairs to the lighting and sound systems at the high school auditorium. Um, with the cost being offset by $100,000 from insurance recovery. Um, and following that is the withdrawal from maintenance reserve for the balance of 134,000. So, that resolution is also
on there. Um, we're looking to uh get those approved this evening and that way we can have the auditorium up and running by the end of August uh with all new equipment and upgrades the lighting to LED. So, it's an exciting project that uh we're looking forward to moving
forward. Comments or questions for Yes. Um the summary bills there's an item for all risk inc. I looked it up. I couldn't find it on the agendas in the past. Is
that new? No. So, all if you go back to maybe December, Jan, probably January's agenda. Okay. Um after the or meeting, um you'll see probably in January, maybe February, but probably January the appointment of all risk. They were the um rehabilitation company, the
restoration company that was hired through Mammoth Ed uh Ocean Mammoth Ocean Ed Services Commission to do the repairs to the carpeting and the ceilings and all the other things that were damaged in the leak at the auditorium. I just didn't know if it was
an insurance company or something because I couldn't find it. So, thank you. Any other questions or comments? Instruction, education, and student activities. Mr. Thank you. Uh yes, items 101 through 105 up for discussion though some of these
were uh discussed in executive session. 101 and 104 executive session topics. Any comments or questions on 102 through 105? Annually, the DO NJ DOE asks districts to approve an emergency virtual or remote instruction plan. So you'll see
that there in front of you. And the nursing services plan is approved each year annually. So again, some annual approvals there as well. None. Okay. Old business. Uh I had to stop you before. Now would be a wonderful time if you had a comment to
make regarding what we discussed already. Thank you. Uh I just wanted to compliment Mr. Hastings because I had no idea the materiality of the fees. So seeing it was was great and my old boss just say we're looking for manhole covers not quarters. So the fact that we're able to increase the fees it's not
going to solve our problems but at least we're taking a fiduci fiduciary responsibility that we need to do. So I'm willing to work with the team here and see if there's other ways to do some things. I I want to echo also what Mr. Schneider is saying and just I agree
it's hard. You don't want to increase prices. You don't want to put another burden on the parents and for the kids, but at the same time, a school does need to be run as a business at a certain point, just like we had to go through, especially Mrs. Walden and Mr. Hastings,
through the budget. I mean, that's what we're here for. And again, it's hard, but I think that it is there's a lot more thought that needs to go into exactly how we restructure the policies to the rate. tonight and I think that it does need to be tabled for further discussion but I do appreciate
that we did have discussion and moving forward I just wanted to say that extra piece m I just have one question so in the past we were able to formulate the finance committee so that we could talk about some of this and bring it back to the board for further discussions
there's a lot of you know issues when it comes to this particular topic why couldn't we have a finance committee meeting can I answer that Um, so we operate as a board of the whole, right? So we don't have a need to make a decision in committee or take any actions in
committee. It's actually not authorized. We could, should the a majority of the board direct the committee to do so, conduct an analysis of this. Um, that would kind of require certain parts of the administration's time. And so with that being said, I would
just question I'm and I'm not certain would it be policy policy committee? is a policy change. That being said, downstairs in the auditorium, one flight down, one flight down, maybe
maybe two stairs, two flights. So, that being said, uh does the board desire that the policy committee an uh considers this? Yeah, go ahead. um as somebody who sat on that committee and and had the meetings before. I think that this particular policy, it's actually a negative situation putting it
in committee because it does come back and many people on the board have many questions and different feedback on it. So you end up having a gazillion answers and then you know work that gets done sometimes just ends up getting shot down right then. So I I for this for other
things I may say go to committee but for this particular policy sitting in committee twice on it it is better on this board in my opinion. Did you have a comment? I looked like you're about to make a comment. No I'll reframe right now. Does anyone else have a comment? Okay. So I don't I don't think I'm
hearing a majority board wanting the committee to assess this. Would you like me to take control vote? Well, I just have another comment. Okay. So the policy says that any committee can be um formed or convened if either the chair
of the committee or two members of the committee want it. Not that we have to take this whole vote and structure. Yeah. So that's not part of the policy. Understood. Respect that. I don't see a need for this as a use of the
administration's resources. I would argue that the board is up to decide where we direct the administration to use their resources. So if you and Mrs. Dam wanted to meet in that regard and you decided that and then you wanted to bring anything back, no action could be taken. I don't know that we could consider that a formal committee meeting
because we operate as a board of the whole. Um but because it would be two board members, I don't think we can restrict that either. That being said, I am asking the board here if they would like to direct the administration to support that. It does not seem as though the board desires that from what I'm seeing. Mr.
So, I don't know if the the formality of a of a committee is is what we're discussing, but it does there is a benefit to having a couple people with some varying opinions like you saw that on this particular topic and they could hash it out and come to maybe one or two a caucus that is not official. So, and
we do this board does not operate that way. This is a board of the whole, right? So, if we chose to operate as a board of the committee where we had separate committees that had separate meetings, that would be the appropriate process to take. Yes, that formal process would be the appropriate one to take. Does that make sense? Yeah. Okay.
And just to follow up, yes, of course, everybody's going to have differing uh opinions, especially when it comes to finance, but that's why we meet together here as a whole so that you can put your ideas out there and we can discuss it and we can hear it and, you know, agree
with it or, you know, or not agree with it. And I think that's the beauty of us uh making decisions as a whole. Mrs. Coward, we are making decisions as a whole, but we have in the past because
I've been here for six years met on these committees. So, it's either we meet I mean, why have a policy for committees if we're not going to have any committees meetings? I I don't understand that. That's very confusing to me because it seemed like this has
already been looked at but we don't have any of the information and Miss Dam wasn't here and I wasn't on that committee but Miss McGovern was. So could you share that information with us? I I shared some of the information that came out of that but I like that's
what that's what I'm saying is when you then come like we're not I'm going to pause here. We're not going to bring up old business that was taken by this four-door committees. That being said heard loud and clear. Appreciate your comments, Mrs. Trigo. U Mr. Dton, just one quick question. Worked with multiple boards. You're
either of committee or you're board of the whole. We've all gone through it in New Jersey school boards training. I think what's tricky here is we have this thing where we assign committees, but the reality is we've chosen to work as a board as a board of the whole. And I think it's very tricky when we say we're
going to do two different things. New Jersey school boards would not advise you to be running your governance in two different ways. You choose one or you choose the other. Both can work very well. This board has chosen for many years to work as a board of the whole, but we need to work as board of the whole if that's how we
work. That's just my opinion. I've worked on committees. I've been the administrator working with committees. That can function well too, but we choose to work as board of the whole and we need to honor that. Thank you, Mr. Dolman. Mr. And I agree. I absolutely
agree with Mr. Dalton. I do. But then we shouldn't have legislative committee where certain members go and meet with other members of the community. If it's a board of a whole, then we should all be invited and or just get rid of, you know, the committee. We have to make a
decision. This has been an issue for many years. This isn't new. This was even before you were on. Can we table this and and bring up our board structure at another meeting on an agenda item? Absolutely. I'm intending to move on anyway. So, but yes, we can. I mean, that being said, uh do I have
any other Do I have any other old business? Do I have any new business? No. Okay. Can I have a motion to adjurnn? Second. Thank you.