Sorry for the de we were at an executive session. So um I'll call the meeting meeting to order and um please join me in a flag salute and pledge of allegiance. To the flag of the United States of
America to the stand, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. I sus I suspect we need to do a roll call. Here. Here. The Richard Board of Education has been
meeting in executive session pursuant to NJSA 104-12. The minutes of this meeting will be released when the need for confidentiality no longer exists. Pursuant to the requirements to be open public meetings act, advanced notice has been given to the star
ledger, the record, and the clerk of the village of Ridgewood. In addition, notices were posted in the office of the school secret board secretary and in all school buildings. So, welcome everyone. We've got um a bittersweet uh
presentations uh tonight when we um recognize some of our staff that's retiring. We'll also have our public hearing on the 2526 budget tonight. So, it's a a big meeting. Okay. So, Dr. for would you
like to introduce our presentation? Absolutely. Good evening everyone again and thank you so much for your patience. We're so sorry to keep everybody waiting for so long. We had some urgent matters to discuss in uh an executive session. But
uh we have again bittersweet uh reasons for being here tonight. Uh certainly uh sweet because we have not only some folks that we want to honor, but we also have so many supporters coming out to be here to honor retirees who have put in such an awesome amount of service to our
school district. Um so for starters, uh we're going to invite up um our representatives from George Washington Middle School who are here to honor Carol Pettit for her 23 years of service as a math teacher in our schools. Okay, thank you.
So, Miss Carol Pettit is set to retire on October 1st, 2025, after 25 years of teaching for Rididgewood Public Schools. Education is Carol's second career after a career in business and raising her two little boys, Evan and Cor Corey. Evan's
over there. She began her Rididgewood journey as a power professional at Haw before taking a maternity leave position teaching third grade. Carol then taught fifth grade for 16 years at Willard Elementary before joining the staff at
GW as a sixth grade as a sixth grade math teacher for the last seven years. GW has been incredibly lucky to have Miss Pettit. Her students abs absolutely adore her. In fact, some were very angry when they heard this news that you're retiring. I
actually had a group of students approach me in the cafeteria asking if I could talk you out of retirement, but I let them know you're grandma now and it's time to move along and uh but they really really care about you. Um and it's such a testament to the environment that you've created in that classroom.
Uh some of her students use the following words when describing you. funny, calm, a great teacher, caring, supportive, so nice, and my favorite teacher. Miss Pettit's colleagues agree. Carol is a wonderful teammate. She's an
amazing teacher, and her st students adore her. Carol is someone who you can always count on and will greatly uh be greatly missed. She consistently goes out of her way to help others, always bringing a positive outlook to any situation. Carol loves teaching middle
school math, but she genuinely cares about all of her students. She takes time to learn more about every each and every one and she even chap her own ski club during the winter and even actually skis with the kids. On a personal note, I've
learned a great deal from you, Carol. Her husband, Bill, passed away suddenly on September 19th, 2020. Carol's strength, courage, and resiliency during that time when I was an AP down there and and still to this day has been very inspiring to me. Your
grace and selflessness, even in the face of adversity and tragedy, is something I'll always remember about you. You definitely taught more than just your kids. So, now it's time to be grandma to Leah, William, Coulson, and we got grandchild number four on the way in
July. Carol will also be celebrating her retirement with her brother and friends on a trip to Norway to visit uh where her grandparents grew up. So congratulations Carol on your well-deserved retirement. You have le left a lasting legacy.
You said she's a math teacher, so she doesn't like to talk much. Just want to say thank you so much to everyone here. Uh, Rididgewood has been a wonderful district to work in all these years and every school I've been at from Haw to Willard to GW, one is
just as good as the other. And of course, ending at GW has been just um such a great way to end my career here. All my colleagues um are like family to me and my administrators are so supportive and the parents in this
district have always been uh there for for us and so I thank you all very much and uh look forward to a great end of the year and and if everyone could just stick around. What we'll do is we'll do some pictures at the end. Well, we'll go
through all of our retirees, but if you could all stay, we'd love to get a picture of you individually and also all together. That would be wonderful. Thank you so much. Uh the families to do be in the pictures too so you get that. All right. Next, we're going to I'm going to invite up
our district technology team. For starters, we're going to recognize our database systems administrator, Georgia Abbrunzo, for her 18 years of service. It is with a bittersweet emo emotions
that I want to acknowledge Georgia's 18 years of service to the district. Georgia began her work uh in the district in 2007 as a data coordinator at the Ridgewood High School. Uh that
was a newly created position at the time and her responsibilities were multiaceted including building school master schedule, scheduling all the students, producing student report cards, transcripts, supporting administration and staff with report as
well as purchasing and budget management among other things. Georgia quickly built strong relationships with many colleagues and earned the reputation as one of the most knowledgeable, capable, kind, friendly, and enjoyable people to work with. And I
can personally attest to this as I was hired as Georgia's replacement in 2010 when she moved to the district-wide database administrator position. It was both both a challenge to live up to her reputation at the high school uh but
also a privilege to have her as a mentor and a friend ever since. Uh Georgia continued to excel in her role in in the district position and positively impacting even more people. Our district has benefited greatly from
her work. She has been invaluable in developing numerous district operating procedures, maintaining the safety, integrity and accuracy on student data, performance operations of student information system, integrations between multiple systems, data analytics, design
and implementation of complex projects and migrations and so much more. But most importantly, she approaches all her work with dedication, treats everyone with respect and kindness, consistently going above and beyond to help anyone in
need. Georgia's expertise is widely recognized among her colleagues who consistently seek her assistance with data projects and innovative, sometimes even crazy ideas, confident in her ability to find solutions. However, her problem solving skills are not the
attribute that we will miss the most. We will miss Georgia's energy, infectious laugh, her movie references and quotes from shows like Seinfeld, I Love Lucy, Moonstrack, just to name a few. And I will personally miss enjoying the cup of
coffee with her before diving into discussions about the next issue or idea. So on behalf of our entire department and the district, thank you Georgia. Enjoy your retirement. It has been fun.
George, would you like to say something? Actually, I'm really bad at this, so pardon my crib notes here, but um anyway, it's just real short. I just want to thank the board and the administration for the opportunity having worked here for the past 18 years. It's really been an incredible
journey. Uh you're all like family to me. Uh beginning with the high school, thank Jeff Nyas and everybody there, and ending with this incredible talented IT department. I mean the talent. Yes, exactly. The
talent is incredible and under your leadership, Siri. Um, working together with you really has been the highlight of my professional career. I've learned so much from you and we've developed great bond uh friendship and uh I will
take that with me always. I'm grateful. I've learned so much. Um, and thank you to everybody in it, especially to my partner Gabrielle, who's retiring also. Uh, and I'm blessed to know so many other inspiring, caring, and
dedicated people. Um, I'll treasure the friendships and fond memories that were made, and I sincerely hope that my contributions have made a difference in achieving Rididgewood's tradition of excellence, and I wish the board and administration many years of continued
success. Thank you so much, Georgia. And again, please stick around. Um, and next we wanted to invite up uh for her 13 years of service, assistant database systems administrator at at the district level,
Gabrielle DeAndrea. uh not often you uh losing two friends um to retirement at the same time. So it is again with a great pleasure and a little sadness that I want to acknowledge Gabrielle DeAndreas for her
13 years of dedicated service to the districts. Gabby's connection to Rididgewood public schools runs deep. as a town resident and a parent of Ridgewood graduates. She was involved in a district long before her employment and her family, her husband, her son and his wife joining her today to uh
congratulate her on on on her retirement. In 2012, Gabby began as the administrative assistant uh primarily to the guidance department at George Washington Middle School when she where she supported students, guidance counselors and
parents while maintaining student demographic data as the school registar and her work consistently demonstrated dedication, attention to detail and a commitment to helping others. Uh that was one of the reasons why in 2019 Gabby transitioned to the IT department when
the position of assistant database administrator opened and she quickly became a value team member and a friend uh and that was right before the pandemic. So u that you can imagine uh her experience getting onto the job. Um,
her knowledge of school operations and experience with students, staff, and parents proved invaluable in improving our user guides and providing training to all the district staff. Gabby's attention to detail and persistence ensured data integrity and accuracy in
state and federal reporting. Her diligence and organizational skills guaranteed timely report cards, postings, and up-to-date Skyward school calendars. She consistently provided kind and respectful support to building users and parents with skyward issues.
Gabby's willingness to learn and assist assist her colleagues was always evident. When help was needed with facilities reservation, she took ownership of the project and established the workflow in the new system with limited resources. Gabby, you will be
missed for your hard work, kindness, your laughter, and ability to find the best memes for the group chat. From all of us in the department and the district, I want to say thank you. Enjoy your retirement and keep in touch.
So, my speech is very very short. Um, but I wanted to take the moment to express my sincere gratitude for the opportunity to work for the board of education for over 13 years. Um, I am so grateful for the amazing people I've had
the privilege of working alongside. Before I became a full-time employee, I also substituted as an administrative assistant at just about every school in the board of education.
And everyone was wonderful. I learned from so many people. Um the they're they're just wonderful and amazing people that you have here at the board of education. When I started as a substitute, um, I actually had one
job here at the for board of education working alongside Georgia. And I always said to her, "Please have me back. Find a job for me. Please find a job for me here. I want to be with you." And Sherry, whose job I eventually
um took over. Um, and I find it pretty apppropo that I am leaving alongside of Georgia. Um, someone who I truly love. She's just
everything. Um, everyone in it is incredible. They're wonderful people. I will miss my early morning good mornings and my Jason saying Gabby Gabby Gabby and a limb and you know just everyone
here. Um I even substituted next to Pat K right in in special programs. So I just want to say I truly valued my time here. I appreciate the laughter, the love, and the opportunities that I've experienced with everyone everywhere in
the board of education. So, thank you all. All right. And next, we want to invite up our special programs representatives to honor the 32 years of service by administrative assistant to special programs Pat Kowalsk.
We're joking that Pat is probably upset that she was not the first person to go because she's weighing all the other speeches and thinking, "Which one do I use now?" It will be the Okay. Boy, this is
hard. Do your little bit of good where you are. It's those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. It's a quote by Desmond Chutu. It surely reflects my thoughts on Pat
K. Together we gather to se celebrate uh someone who has served overwhelmingly for good. Art Pat Colosic aka Pat Kay. Her contributions to Ridgewood Public Schools span more than three decades and
have touched countless lives, creating incredible positive ripple effects that will continue long after today. Pat Kay began her journey with our district as a par professional at Haw Elementary School and also uh perhaps a
little time at Ridge. No, just just just Haw. Uh and Glenn Glenn uh from her very first day. Oh, that's right. Glenn gave me a lot of good parts for this. Um she demonstrated an unwavering commitment to special education that would define her
extraordinary career. As our district's administrative assistant for special programs office, Pat has had been the steady hand and the warm heart at the center of our community. She has often been the crucial first point of contact for parents, navigating what can often
be an overwhelming system, offering not just assistance, but genuine care and understanding. She has provided reliable support for every single educator and related service provider while serving as a trusted right-hand to every
administrator for years. It is no surprise that Pat was honored with the prestigious Tradition of Excellence Award. This recognition reserved for those who exemplify the highest standards of service and dedication to our district perfectly
captures Pat's impact. The award continues to acknowledge her service and extraordinary quality of her work for the throughout these 32 years. Janelle Ni, Amanda Zenudis, Dean Pam, uh, and now joining Alicia Pabone, we are all
honored, truly honored to have had her support during our time here. Pat's approach embodies the very best of what education should be. Her colleagues describe her as cheerful, kind, courteous, always with a welcoming smile and a wonderful sense of humor that
brightens everyone's day. She's known for being knowledgeable, yet always willing to lend a helping hand to anyone who needs anything, whether it's coordinating real time with Skyward, leading communications through COVID, ensuring assisted technologies are updated, or e even being used as a
reinforcement with our preschoolers and our step students. Pat listens with empathy, solves problems creatively, and anticipates needs before they arise. All while treating everyone with the dignity and respect that have become her
hallmark. Pat, on behalf of everyone gathered here today, thank you for your dedication, your compassion, and for that little bit of good for three decades making Ridgewood Public Schools a better place. While we miss you tremendously, we take
comfort in knowing that you have built something that is lasting. Congratulations on your retirement. Congratulations to Jeff, your children, Jamie and Kate, and of course to Parker. Your love and ever pride and joy. We know the time for all
the love and joy to come with them is so richly deserved. Go ahead. There's no way I can get Michelle is so eloquent. Um, I just want to thank everybody, the board, all my co-workers, um, everybody that I've
worked with over the years. It's been an incredible journey. Um, I had to put my glasses on. I can't see it. Thanks. But I just want to express my heartfelt thanks to all the wonder, wonderful people I've worked with over the years. Your support and confidence in my
performance has been invaluable. I'm truly honored to have been part of the tradition of excellence that defines the Ridgewood Public Schools. And I thank everyone. I I know Carol Pettit, everybody behind me. I know most of the people and I I've been around for so
long and I am going to miss it but um it's time to move on to another journey but I thank you all for being part of this journey. And lastly, we want to invite up uh for her 30 years of service, first grade
teacher at Willard Elementary School, Margaret Shinade. Hey, first of all, I just want to say what an honor it is to hear all of these speeches about these amazing individuals. I've had the pleasure and honor of working with so many and it's just incredible. So, congratulations to
everyone. But Peg Shannad is a dedicated and talented educator who has taught first grade at Willard School for I was going to say 31 30 years. Though Peg would have found success in any grade,
she has a strong pull towards six-year-olds. Their curiosity, silliness, creativity, and genuine love for learning is a perfect match for Peg. For all who know Peg Shannad, she is a serious
jokester. Peg is the teacher that wears the giant birthday hat, I mean big birthday hat with fake candles um on her head um to greet her students on their birthday. She has been spotted dramatically standing on a table or two
in her classroom when teaching. And rumor has it she even did a cartwheel in the hallway as a reward for her class, which I experience today in the classroom. Her students love reporting her shenanigans to me and getting their
teacher in trouble. Peg visited each one of her students during the pandemic with a colleague who's here tonight wearing a blowup dinosaur costume since they had been learning about dinosaurs. And of course, the leprechaun always visits one ch making a mess of the room. Peg helps
them trace the trail of glitter and find that little shoe the leprechaun left behind. Peg is also known for her extreme organizational skills. She is the teacher that visits her classroom throughout the summer to redecorate, rearrange and reorganize, even painting
bulletin boards for colleagues. She loves taking those math workbooks home to tear out the hundreds of pages to create easily accessible packets for her students. She is visibly excited when asked to help a colleague clean out their room, reorganize the bookroom, or
empty a closet. And on top of the organization, she is so creative in all she does. When she noticed the water bottles in her classroom kept falling over, she created little water bottle holders out of plastic popcorn containers and use zip ties to secure
them to the table. Who knew? Peg is generous and will do anything to support a colleague or student. Need someone to wear the Panther costume for an event? Peg raises her hand high. In need of an auction donation, Peg will take the kids
trick-or-treating as their prize. Need a volunteer to play in the Wizards game? Again and again and again, Peg is in. A student's parent can't come for PE play week? No worries. Peg will be the students partner rather than taking her needed prep time. Her students wishing
they had a class pet. Peg brought Trixie the rabbit and patches the guinea pig to school, who actually she allowed to hop around the classroom during reading time. Yeah, Peg is allin. Peg Shenod loves Willard School and she loves teaching.
In her career, she has experienced new everything. New curriculum, new units of study, new approaches to teaching in every subject, new technology, new colleagues, new administrators. She has taken it all in and continued to grow
her practice to be the best possible teacher she can for her students. A few years ago, she even learned sign language, which each class has fully embraced and even proved to make her the perfect match for a recent student. Peg, you have helped make Willard School the
special place that it is. Thank you for the dedication, love, and enthusiasm you have brought each day to your students and colleagues. We will miss your humor, your stories of Emma and Edward, and your presence all over Willard School. How lucky Willard has been to have you
for 30 years. We wish you all the very best in your retirement, and we can't wait to hear about your adventures. It's very short. I had to write it down. Um, I just want to thank my entire family that came out tonight. It's very nice. Thank you for all their love and
support throughout the years. I also want to thank my Willard family. I could not have done it without them. I feel very blessed that I went through the Richard school system myself. My mom is also a graduate that's here tonight and my dad and my children also went
through the richwood school system. More importantly, I feel blessed, honored, and proud to call myself a Ridgewood teacher. I have loved every single minute. I have enjoyed every single minute and I will miss you all. But hopefully I'll be back
sometime. Thank you very much. I don't it will be very hard to fill all of your shoes. Uh you've all done wonderful work for our district. Thank you so much everyone. So let's do some pictures and maybe a family. We'll do
the families first with our retirees. So Peg, you want to start? Um, and then we'll do everyone sort of backwards and then you can get a picture with all of us if you want. I think we'll get uh back to the meeting
now. All of the retries are welcome to stay for the rest of the night. So good. Okay, think we have to start the meeting again. So, we're going to
uh public comment now. And just a reminder that this is a public comment um for any subject, but we will have a separate public comment after our uh budget presentation um which is going to
be in a few minutes. So, uh right now we'll open up for public comment. Yeah, I don't know if there's anyone here in the audience who wanted to speak. I don't think there's uh let me just check and see if there's
uh remote right. I don't see any public comment right now. Um, as I said, we will have a public comment after the budget presentation and then of course we have a public comment at the end of the meeting. But did we ask for the remote if Okay.
Thank you. All right. I'll close public comment for now and we'll move to um the public hearing on the 2025 26 budget. Good evening everyone. Thanks so much for being here. What an honor to if you
if you're just tuning in and you didn't hear we were just doing, we were recognizing some incredible retirees from our school district. Uh so grateful for all their years of service and uh it's been an honor and a privilege for me to get to know so many of them. Uh especially being so new to the district.
It's a little scary to see so much institutional knowledge and experience leave at once, but I'm grateful grateful for all their work. Um very much so. So this is our final budget presentation. Uh according to uh New Jersey statute and code, we are to be giving uh both a
preliminary budget presentation and a final budget presentation. Uh we are representing and recommending to the board uh the this budget unchanged from the preliminary budget uh in terms of in terms of numbers. However, there's been uh there's some updated analyses which Mr. Matthews will share with you. Uh
again, I just want to start by commending uh the board of education and our business office and all of our principles and department leaders who worked very hard to evaluate all of our budgetary lines to really sharpen their pencils to make sure that we're
capitalizing on as many efficiencies as possible so that we could continue to make progress towards the district goals and be able to support the new vision 2030 plan which we uh have just have just uh just finalized. So, uh, tonight
we're going to run through run over with all of you kind of what the highlights are with the budget and of course we'll have open time for questions for anyone that from the public would like to weigh in, share their thoughts, share their concerns. Um this is not an environment
that really works well for dialogue, but we will of course uh make an effort to just acknowledge and uh any concerns or ideas that people bring forward and it is at the discretion of the board whether they want to discuss any contributions that are made by the public at that time. Um so uh uh Mr.
President with your blessing I will we'll go ahead and start the presentation. All right Mr. Matthews you want to take us through? Yes thank you uh Dr. Shores. So, as previously mentioned that on March 18th of this year, we had submitted our budget to the county superintendent and and the
business office. Our budget came back approved from the county on April the uh the 3rd. And today on April 28th is the uh the public hearing for the 2025 2026 budget at Ridgewood Public Schools. I also would like to thank uh
the entire board of education. I'd like to thank my uh finance committee, Mr. Muhammad McMood, uh, Miss Mary McCalli. I'd like to thank our board president, Sheila Rogan, Mrs. S Rob Donnie, another board member, and Mary Liuhaney for your diligence and your understanding and
your pushing and nudging and asking us questions regarding the budget. As mentioned to you guys earlier, we want a zerobased budget and every line item in that budget has been justified by principles, by supervisors, by the ed center and as and obviously by by your
questions during during the course of the whole budget process. So today, here's our agenda. We'll go through our district. We'll talk about our student highlights and accomplishments. We'll do a budget overview and we'll talk about future needs and capital projects.
So as mentioned earlier, budget objectives is to develop and implement a budget that effectively supports the school's mission and strategies and priorities. We started with a zero base budget from the ground floor where we went through every year every every budget for the district. We did a
mid-year review looking at where they were year to date, looking at the current spend this year versus uh last year. and we went line by line to make sure that every item in that budget could be justified. There's some items that had to be uh gone over two and three and four times to make sure that
it makes sense uh as far as how we're going to go forward. Um in the presentation we did budget discipline. We uh instructed they have that zerobased budget approach. We uh went through the entire facilities reorganization. Um current situation is
Aaron Mark is the person that oversees the custodial contract. They oversee some of our grounds and our trades and we went through a total reorganization. We're currently in the process right now of hiring staff. We've onboarded our manager of custodial. We've onboarded our director of facilities. We're
currently going through an interview process for a facility for um for fiscal specialists and admin to complete the cycle of uh reorganizing the facilities department. We're also going through onboarding or interviewing the trades to have them on boarded before July 1st.
And we're kicking off our year on May 1st with our new uh company for custodial to u transition into the July 1 time period and get ready for the summertime district facilities. Um in this budget you will find that this budget has been adequately funded uh to
handle the required maintenance to protect our facilities to do the emergency repairs to do the maintenance and do the capital projects. So these facilities will be maintained. They will be protected and we'll move the district forward with our this current
budget. These are some numbers for the district. Um I'm not going to read them all to you, but uh currently um we have 5,398 students. Student teacher ratio is 16 to1. We have 10 school buildings, 248
AP scholars. Our cost per pupil was 21,299 which is up from our prior year cost of 20,449. We are also ranked number four out of 243 best schools in New Jersey. We have 12 homeschool associations who support our schools and our students and
are very active in our communities. And we have uh one ed foundation which we have to u use as far as getting other donations. Here's our enrollment numbers over the last couple years. This chart is showing
a slight decline in enrollment. Uh in the fall, we'll be doing demographic studies, so we'll see where we're going to be in the future. But this is our numbers for the past couple years. Uh and state aid is tied to these numbers. Um as you have heard in the last presentation that there was state aid
reduction in this current year's budget. We reduced our we got our steady reduced by 3% in the current budget and some of these uh reductions are are based on our our enrollment declines. So the 2025 2026 budget is
supported by CNI objectives. It supports MTSS which is a layered system of student support. It also supports a new gifted and talented program as well as enrichment. And Mr. Ross, if you want to just kind of add to CNI, anything you want to mention regarding the 2526
budget? Thank you, Mr. Matthews. Uh, no, just to say I I want to thank the board for supporting these priorities because they really are very important. They're central to our strategic plan and uh we're looking forward to a great year with with these new improvements. Thank
you. So, you touched on some of this already. Moving on, in terms of professional development, which is also part of our strategic plan, the the PD is is funded throughout the district and supports our strategic plan and PD helps support the district in terms of
advancing our staff at all levels to further drive instruction, provide the students and the staff with the resources they need to improve productivity and improve student outcomes. And these are some of the items that we are going through PD just name a few. Journey of a graduate,
executive functioning, school of climate, uh, K to 5 mathematics, K to 5 BLA, MTSS, art and music, data science, STEM, and purchasing and procurement. Special programs 2025 budget supports these five
special program objectives. specialized instruction, early intervention and pre-intervention support, family partnership, strategic alignment and annual review, and inclusive practices. You want to make any comments about special programs? Certainly. Um, I
also thank the board for for recognizing these. These are the actionable objectives that came off of the uh state of special education when we reviewed the data. So aligning those needs and those goals not only connect to the
items in the strategic plan vision 2030 that you just mentioned but also specifically to special education. There's a lot of targeted uh goals that will be actualized through this uh new budget. Thank you. Thank
you. On to innovative academic programs. Moving into 2025 fiscal year. There will be new innovative academic programs at all levels. elementary, middle, and high school. On the elementary side, you see revisions and evidence-based enhancements to K to 5 ELA. At the
middle school courses, you see game design, pop dance legends, exploring computer science, creative coding. And at the high school level, you see English, see mathematics and computer science, AP calculus, data science. Under finance and applied arts, you see
unified acting, unified painting, unified sculpture and science worlds, engineering and applied physics. H epic, research and prototype development. H epic. Moving on to student highlights and student achievements, sports
highlights, and extracurricular highlights. So these are some of the class of 2024 achievements. Just going down the list. AP by the numbers. Um 1146 AP exams.
um 30 AP course offerings, 37% score of five, 29% score of four, 22% score of three, 248 total AP scholars, 90 AP scholars with distinction, 44 AP scholars with honors, 60 AP scholars, 29
capstone diplomas, 25 research and seminar certificates, and these are just some outstanding numbers regarding the education that our students are receiving at Richmond public schools. Um, awesome. Average ACT scored 27 in 33 top ranked sports
teams throughout. On to 2324 sports highlights. I'd like to do a kudos to Keith Cook, his impressive coaching staff, and our amazing student athletes. There were championships won across all seasons, the fall, winter, spring for both boys and
girls. Congrats to the student athletes, parents, and the coaches for their exploits on and off the field. Extracurricular activities for 2324. Uh to name a few, we had the applied engineering. Ridgel High School
band members continue to do well. Ridgel High School percussion and gymnastics, third place in their league, Rididgewood quiz bowl, Ridgewood crew, French students, a whole bunch of nice events regarding extracurricular activities for
the 23 24 class. So, we're going to go through the actual budget overview. We'll go through the revenues. We'll go through expenditures. We'll go through the tax levy and go through um capital projects. So, on the revenue side for
2025 2026, our tax levy is $107 million 392191. The 2% tax levy increase total dollars is 2,105729. State a side as mentioned earlier we had a reduction of 3%. So our state our
state aid is 7 million70977 budgeted fund balance we used $2.7 million under capital maintenance and emergency we're we're using 4 million23 280 uh that's a reduction because we had the Glenn Rich project that was $6.8 $90
million last year. Um miscellaneous revenue uh that's made up of like community school interest income and rent revenue. That number is $4 million. Tuition is 2.7. Medicaid reimbursement the number comes to us direct and extraordinary aid is $3 million. Our
total general fund budget of $130 million $989,0001 166 which is a reduction of $1.9 million over prior year general fund. Ask a question. Sure. the capital maintenance emergency $4
million um and eight so original budgets are 2425 $8 million that was not used so that is that gets paid forward for this these projects and four is additional right yes so that was
that's that was the the 8.8 was budget not action. Right. That was budget. So, but um the 4 million this year is for new projects and those pro the pri prior projects will still be done from the
that $8 million. So, that is still set aside. No, this is separate. This is the 2526 projects that are in the capital budget of $1.7 million and also the maintenance reserve of 2.1 I believe it is. Top of my head, I don't remember exact number. And then also emergency
reserve of $500,000. So that's a 25 26 reserve numbers. So is the 4 million enough for uh Ridge and Glenn project? Yes. No, no, no. It has nothing to do with Glennon Ridge. Glennon Ridge will still Glennon Ridge is into Glenn and Ridge is into the 2425
number $8 million. They are still from that one. Yes. Okay. Thank you. on the I'm missing a slide. The let me hold a second. I apologize if this tax le got slipped in there before the uh
expenditures. I apologize for that. So on the expenditure side, the instruction is $63 million. School support is 157. Administrative is $8 million, $9 million. Planet property is $13 million. Transportation is five. Employee
benefits are $20 million. capital projects. That's the $1.7 million. And community schools 1.4 is for total expenditures of $130 million. 989166. I apologize this slide came out of order.
Um so this is the pie chart for the revenue breakdown. 81% of our revenues come out of the tax levy. 19% coming out of state aid and other sources. uh expenditures the same uh pie chart I
won't read it read each line to you but this is the pie chart regarding expenditure breakdowns and on the tax levy at the last meeting we did our tax levy based on 5.9 billion in terms of the ratables so we were uh saying based on a
household of $712,000700 was 251 but when you add the ratables of over 200 over $20 million. The actual number goes down to $80 uh less on a
$712,700 on a monthly. It's a it's it's less $6.74 on a daily rate of of 2 cents. So the actual number went down based on the increase of ratables of $20 million
28 $28 million. 28 $28 million. Sorry, I apologize. I think that number is in here. And on the capital project side, we have actually opening up bids tomorrow for the elevator mo modernizations at GW and um high school.
We have the Willard boiler replacement at $600,000. We have the halls air conditioning in their gym at $500,000 and the orchard roof replacement at $313,000. And this comes to the $1.7 million for capital project for the 2526
budget. And we like to thank our entire Richmond organization, our budget team, Naomi Widner, uh Aaron, Aaron Bowman, uh Julie, Johanna, Amy, the whole entire team was very supportive in helping us
put this together. Again, thanking to the finance committee, thank Dr. short towards leadership and direction and the support from the uh central office staff as well. That that's that's it. So one more question if you can go to one slide before which capital the capital
projects. Yes sir. So um so from my position perspective I just want to make make clear that I'll be voting yes on the budget overall for the the amount of tax levy which is 2% that we are increasing the tax levy and the overall resolution and that 1 point about 1.7
million we would be spending on capital projects in principle right so I will be voting on on that but not on these specific projects um because so elevators are good. The roof replacement is good. Those are
emergency projects or immediate projects that we need for the villard boiler replacement and horse gym air conditioning. Those are the type of projects. I think most of the HVAC um ventilation those type of projects we
need to find um 30% 35% state money. We have different ways to find that either by going smaller referendum or by going different grant ways. So we should be spending that money on projects where we don't get matching funds or we don't get
uh referendum money or grants or aids like if the BF field comes up if we have to spend money on that then there will be no referendum grant that comes for that right so even if you go for referendum you don't get 34% matching debt service for that so those are the type of projects that we should be doing
from our capital money and these these projects can be done by finding the both of these are not immediate like they are good to have within 1 to 5 years or 1 to 3 years. So we can try to find some money for that that that's my principle um when I'll be
voting on a specific projects but today I'm voting on overall as a budget that yes we'll be we should be spending 1.7 million or that much money on the projects but which projects I think when these specific projects come in then we would have again votes on those. So I'm
just saying that my yes vote is not committing to these specific projects. We'll again have votes for specific projects. Thank you. So you submit the budget, you have to list your capital projects in the budget, right? Obviously these could change. They change all the time. So like but you have to list each
each item in your capital projects. List the account numbers, the value of that project and that's got to go go into the budget software. So right, I totally get it. The only reason I'm I'm clarifying that is in case rest four other four board members feel strongly or not for
if the majority feels strongly and one of these projects go through and at that time if I vote no then it's not a contradiction that why I voted today yes and then I'm voting no later on. So I'm just clarifying my position. That's right. Thank you. Okay. Are there any questions from the board?
I know we've seen this and talked about it. So, um on the capital projects, they are on the um discussion in the uh Wednesday meeting uh for the facilities committee. Yeah. When Wednesday special meeting? Yeah. Yes.
Okay. Um I see a hand raised. Dr. Schwarz, did you have anything you wanted to say before I open up for um public comment on budget? Uh no, I I don't think there really is
much that is significantly different uh with respect to what we've discussed uh in the budget and what's in the budget uh versus what we talked about last time. I think the the only thing that seems to have changed is that we have vetted our numbers regarding uh we had some requested interest in water
fountain placement especially in elementary schools with respect to peeos filtration. Um we we are finalizing and finally vetting uh some some additional numbers but it does appear that uh we have some more affordable options uh to to to make at least more progress than
we thought that we'd be able to make with respect to those in terms of ensuring a minimum number within each school and hopefully getting to a place where we have a sufficient distribution that we can even turn off any that we can't that we can't necessarily update. So that way the only open fountains are
that that in all the schools we have accessible and PAS filtered fountains. So that's some positive news. More details on that once we confirm all the numbers. Terrific. And one of the numbers that's different from last presentation which Mr. Matthew has
highlighted is that the the tax levy is 2% higher from last year and tax impact on individual household is negative for Boto Porsche. So that's a big change from what we presented last time.
Well, just um I want to thank you uh for all your work. I it's not easy to come to a new district in September and start right right away on crafting a budget for the following year. Um and all of our administrators for their teamwork
and really looking at their budget critically. Um Dr. Schwarz for leaving leading the team. Can I just add another add one more piece? I apologize for interrupting Madam President. Sure. So we scheduled another meeting with everybody who did their budgets. Now, we're going to go back to everyone to
let them know what's in your budget. So, we're confirming what we've already submitted so they'll understand like what's really in your budget. So, we're going to close that loop for 2526 budget so there's no questions about what's in your budget. Those meets are going to take place next week. Great. And
certainly for all the board members, uh I know that um everybody took a deep dive um annoyed you maybe with a lot of questions and clarifications. Uh but in the end of the day, I I felt that um the
board members did understand the budget and um had really gotten their answers to their questions. So, thank you for that. My last comment, I apologize. Sure. Um, one of the things that you and I spoke about earlier was the one thing when we do the budget calendar, the 2526
budget or 2627 budget is getting the budget priorities from the board. Like what are the things that you guys want a lot sooner so we can start to bake that into the to the budget process so it's not coming later sooner rather than later, right? We'll work on that.
Great. All right. Um, if anybody any other No. Okay. Then I will open up for comments from the public. This comment period is on the 2526 budget as presented. There's no one here in
person. We have some hands raised. So I um Peter Moltons, you're on with the board. Good evening. Uh thank you for the uh presentation and and the hard work in regards to the uh
the budget. Um just to start one item because it was mentioned by Dr. Schwarz is thank you for the work in terms of the water fountains this year. Um and getting safe water to the kids uh in before we have safe water from the town.
Um but in in regards to the budget uh two two questions um if it can be addressed tonight. Uh, one is in regards to the benefits costs and if that's something that is a one-time increase or it seems like this is going to be rising much more substantially than inflation
moving forward as you know benefits have over the years but it's a it's becoming obviously a larger piece of the budget and it's a it's a big increase. And the other is just a general of uh you this is it it's been addressed before uh of
you know the challenges uh that may be coming over the years you know we have aging buildings and obviously want programming and what what are the things that you see uh that um uh may be challenged or constrained because of the budget uh andor where you see
improvement in the future. So, thank you. Um, Mr. M, are are you still there? I am. You know, we had a little bit of a what part of yours and so could you
just your um concern or your question? Oh, I'm I'm Can you hear me now? Is it is is it any better or or or is it so breaking up? No, you're not breaking up now. Okay. Um so
the um so the items were uh one in regards to the benefits. Uh I if it seems as though that is this a one-time increase in regards to uh benefits because it was a a fairly substantial increase or is that something that we
believe is going to be uh ongoing in regards to large increases in the future? And and the second item was uh are there areas that seem like they're constrained within our current
budget? uh and uh also what seem to be the possible opportunities in the future in regards to our budget. Thank you. Thank you. And we're um we'll try to give some
answers to those questions. Um but we'll finish with public comment first. Um Ann or boy loving Boyd de Loving, Ridgewood resident. Uh, the first thing I'd like to say is with
respect to Dr. Schwarz's opening comments tonight about this public hearing. This is a public hearing, not a public comment. Typically, at public hearings, there is a dialogue. And I'm certain that the tax voice would appreciate it tonight if there is some
sort of immediate dialogue between speakers and members of the board and not that questions will be answered at a later date or questions will be answered by email. That is the purpose of public hearings. It is different than a public
comment section. The purpose is to for the taxpayers to be able to engage in dialogue on specific topics. So, I would appreciate it if there were questions answered immediately as opposed to we'll answer your questions at a later time so
that we can keep the transparency going. Um, with respect to the comments about revenue coming in due to an additional $28 million in assessments, I guess you all know that 1888 million of
the 28 million in new assessments is attributed to the fact that the Valley Hospital is no longer providing inpatient or inbed service at the facility. So now that now they can be fully taxed as opposed to the bed payments that were coming in in the
past. It is my understanding from listening to a presentation that was delivered by the village manager last week that the bed service uh revenues that the village was collecting, none of them were targeted or none of them were going to the board of education. But now
that we can collect full assessments on Valley, the board will be getting some of the $5.2 million uh estimated annual payment from Valley. I guess also, as you all know, Valley is contesting
paying $5.2 million a year. So my question here tonight is, was the budget that you just presented, was it built on the fact that there will be money coming in from the Valley Hospital? So that's my question. I hope somebody can answer that.
You're not answering right now. Well, I'm just finishing public comment as we normally do and then we'll answer questions. Again, this is not a public comment. This is a public hearing. This is not public comment. It's supposed to be during public hearings. It's supposed to be some dialogue. Are you saying um that
you're not going to follow that method? You just want to have public comments here. Well, that's Yes. Comments from the public is right now. We will we'll get to your question. She is it comment or is it public
hearing? I thought this was advertised as a public hearing. Yeah, I think public hearing does not have a time limit for the questions. It's a public hearing, but we'll see whether there are any other comments and then there might be other people who have
questions. Typically, that's not the way public hearings are run in the state of New Jersey. That's not how we've done it in the past. Um, I have the answer if you want. I can clarify that. Pardon me. I'm not gonna I I certainly wouldn't argue with um anyone from the public. Uh we
have a couple of questions that were asked. Um and we also have somebody uh we have another hand up. So I thought that we would gather all of the questions and answer them after that. So
is there and then we'll get back to you Mr. We'll be talking about that if you have another comment to make after you have an answer. I I'm I'm not making comments. This is a public hearing. So, I am participating in the public
hearing, but I will say more. So, um, so I'm disappointed that the board's discretion here is that you are not going to manage this as a public hearing, that you're going to manage this as a public comment and get back to a later date, but that is what it is.
Um, next comment or question I have is that the um, Dr. Schwarz has indicated tonight he has changed his position. uh in the past, you know, I took issue with his position that he had said that the cost of uh adding the water fountains, the
purified water fountains in schools was quote exorbitant unquote. I am pleased to hear tonight that there seems to be some movement in the direction of providing clean water to the students in the district. However, uh after the
last comments from Dr. wars concerning the exorbitant nature of water. I decided to do a little research and I filed an OPER request with your uh business office to determine how much bottled water is being purchased by the district on an annual basis. And I'm a
little bit confused about the results I got back. Uh first of all, there was $3,700 in bottled water purchased by the admin building in December of 2024. The note on the invoice indicates that it was due to a water
emergency. I checked with the water department, Mr. Richard Calby, who's the director of that department, and asked him if there was any sort of water mane break in the area in December that affected the admin building. And I was told, as far as he knew, there were no
water mane breaks in the area that would have created a water emergency. So, the only thing I can uh think of is that perhaps this bottled water purchase uh in the amount of $3,700 had to do with the water emergency that took place in the village in September and October and the water
was actually distributed to schools. So, I would just like some answer as to what that $3,700 bottled water purchase was. uh that the invoice came in on December 20th of 2024 and the invoice was labeled
in connection with water emergency. Also, as a result, the results I got back from that Oprah indicated that there are three schools in the system that purchase bottled water uh via a f via a dispenser on a
regular basis. That is Glenn, Ridge, and Orchard. I'm curious to know what about the other schools? Why are Glenn Ridge and Orchard purchasing water? And some of those invoices
indicate that it is a state mandate that that water be provided. If it's a state mandate that the water be provided, what about the other elementary schools, the high school, and the middle school? Why are there no recorded purchases of bottled water for those schools? or did
that was that data not provided to me? So that is another question I have. There seems to be a discrepancy with respect to purchases of bottled water only I received information only regarding three schools in the admin building. Uh on the three schools that I
received information about there was a notation that it is required by state law. Again if that's the case what about the other schools? I guess those are my issues. And I say they're issues, not questions or questions, not issues, whatever. And
I'd like some response. Hopefully, it's tonight. Again, this was advertised as a public hearing. And typically in public hearings, there is a back and forth dialogue, not a attempt to put taxpayers on the spot and have them make comments
and then hope that we get answers at a later date. Thank you so much and good evening. and I'll stay on the line in case you have any immediate answer. Thank you very much, Mr. Love. And I Good evening, Ann Loving, Bridgewood
resident. Uh, at the risk of sounding redundant, I would also like to say what my husband said that I am delighted that apparently or hopefully there are now going to be filters put into more of the water
fountains in these schools. But I do want to know how this came about because Dr. Schwarz specifically stated that the cost was going to be exorbitant and that the
science on whether it was even necessary and whether PFAS in water was dangerous was not clear. So uh Dr. Schwarz, I'm wondering did you do more research and conclude that in fact POS in the water
is dangerous and how did you come up with the fact that it's no longer exorbitant? I'm delighted that that's the case, but I want to know about the change of plan. We have questions from the public um
and benefit was one of them. I don't I mean I'll take the benefit question and maybe some other questions as well. So one of the things that we've been doing since I came on board was yeah I was going to bring it closer to
so one one of the things that we've done is we put in three requests with the state employee health benefit plan to get a record of our claims over the last two years. Um we've been getting projections for 26 27 they work on a calendar year that claims are going to be going that that
that benefits are going to be going up over 20%. So for the current budget claims are or health benefits are up 16%. This is what we are projecting to be the kind of number we're going to see for the next couple years. So that's why we're looking at
alternative medical plans and that's why we're requesting our claims uh history right now. So, we are realizing that this is going to be one of those cost drivers over the next couple years. We're going to be seeing double digit increases in health benefits. So, yes, for this year it's 60%, I've seen
numbers of 25% for next year. So, we just put in our latest request for claims probably about 3 weeks ago. Took about a month or so for it to come in. And once those final numbers come in, we'll have updated claims through March. And now we also have a bid out for met for medical brokers as well. and whoever
would decide to be our medical broker can now make a make a presentation to the board regarding the different options that we can look at regarding self-insured full insured private insurance and that that'll come come to the committee first. So that that process is is moving along right now. Uh
the medical benefit broker package has been done. We just got to do our final evaluation and then we'll be bringing out that to the board at the next meeting. So that's the medical benefit situation. So yes, it is a big cost driver. It is concerning and we need to do something about it.
Um the other thing regarding the water we had was um are there were there are there are um that will be constrained with this budget and are there are concern you want me to go first Dr.
source. So, one of the things you're always concerned about is out of district tuition. So, we sit down with special programs, we get their numbers, we see the numbers are going up every year and then we have to build a contingency for kids going out of district beyond what's in the budget. So, I think we're using eight kids or
nine kids or 10 kids, something like that under the ed. So, so those are those are costs that go up beyond the budget season. Um so yes that that is a in the budget and every year you got to plan for an increase of kids that are going out of district and those numbers
are going up and also double digit increases every year. So that that is a cost driver that's very concerning but it's it's um it's being managed regarding kids graduating out of the program and bringing kids into the but that's special programs issue but
financially it is a a major concern and a cost driver. So, health benefits, out of district tuition, and then also just in terms of how we purchased, that's something that we're trying to streamline and improve upon. Like you'll see there's a bit there's a uh a resolution here for for services for
custodial supplies. Well, two years ago that was 391. Last year it was like 350 and for 2526 numbers down to 280. So, we are streamlining some of these cost drivers to be more efficient and and and and keep the numbers to a to a level
that's that's appropriate for the budget. So, yeah, I would agree with that. And I would also say that um as Mr. Matthews referenced, health benefits is something else we have to look at as well. Um it's it's a constraint right now, but it's also a potential opportunity if we if
our our rate our claims rates are good. We might be able to go out to market and be able to get equal or better coverage for our staff at a at a at a more affordable increase. Um, of course, uh, we we always have constraints with respect to the fact all the fixed costs related to our budget. So, we have to
stay mindful of those things. And if I, if I heard correctly, I think the some of the commentary in the first time that he asked the questions was related to facilities. And of course, our facilities do present a considerable demand on us for uh, for preventive maintenance and just general maintenance. So that way we can treat
our property with an appropriate amount of respect that's due our community and our students and our staff members and our taxpayers as well. So we don't have a ready of an available u steady fund that would be sufficient to meet all of our facilities needs um just on an
annual basis. So we do need to we do need that that's a that's a constant strain that we're under where we're going to have to be creative. I think that was kind of part of the origin of Mr. Donniey's comments earlier about when we see some of these bigger projects, are there opportunities for us to seek methods like rod grants or maybe
targeted uh referendum where we were confident that we get a small amount back? But we we have to talk about some of those conversations because we can't we won't be able to chip away with the money we just have from year to year. Are you on? Yeah, it's on. So targeted or um the other thing that I have
recommended a couple of times now and I'm I'm again advocating for it is some sort of certinity every year. So we know we have 11 buildings. We know how we have old facilities. We know we need to
upgrade them. But if we create a large referendum and try to do everything at once, there are inefficiencies in that because you have still same number of administrators who who have to try to manage or monitor all of them. They that
cannot be done. So that's outsourced to architects and construction managers and all. And then sometimes something maybe may not be needed for eight years or nine years and we are doing it today because we are trying to do one referendum at one time. So if we create
a steady set of referendum and if we say okay a few years ago we know we were looking for 90 million or $100 million um that was in 2019 that's what we were looking at right for for all the upgrades data number at that time we have chipped away from some of that but
we know if we divide that number to 20 years and if we created $5 million per year that's a manageable number for our administrators to prioritize. So if they have a limited number of funds, they
would only pick the projects that are really needed that year instead of any project that may be priority two. So always it will be we'll be picking the priority projects in that range $5 million range and then after a few years
when that debt is paid off for year one then it's revolving. So you're not increasing on the base amount or you're not increasing a big number at one time. So if we come up with a $5 million every year referendum with the election time, we can just add a question there. That
would be very small impact to the residents every year and after a few years that debt will be paid off and then we will just be re reusing that same debt service numbers and the the bigger benefit of doing it that way is we are prioritizing the really important
projects and we will be getting 34 35% from the state. So every time when I look at these projects, I think that oh we could have done it for cheaper but it costs more when you do things for school and when you hire the uh labor for at a certain regulations and prevailing wages
and all the overhead. So that over at least that overhead part is being paid by the state from our income taxes not not from our property taxes. So that's why I advocate for u a fix certain every year we do the projects that way administrators also will have uh
certainity and to answer some part of Mr. Mult question um we do have a healthy maintenance amount uh spend every year and we have a maintenance reserve. So if something really breaks we do have maintain reserve and we do
have some capital reserve that uh we have built up over last few years. So if something breaks we we won't be just out of the water. we have the uh we have the money and uh I I just want to continue in the continuation I wanted to answer the other question about the assessment
part whether Mr. um loving asked that did we plan our budget based on valley's assessment or increase assessment so no we are not taking that into account because if you look at our presentation two weeks ago versus our presentation
today our tax levy is same so we when I say we it's all Mr. Matthews and team's work but I'm I'm taking the credit um by saying we um the as Mr. Matthews said that it was a zerobased budget. So he looked at last year's tax levy, created
a zerobased budget and then added what are the really needed improvements or changes that we have. And if you remember one of the slides was the expenses slides and in that only 14% is um where we can actually uh pick the
vendors and vote. other 86% or so is is fixed costs where it's uh salaries, benefits, uh um the transportation, special ed, all of those. So those are already long-term contracts that we are already in there. So the annual ones are only 14% and those are not
discretionary. Those are the only thing that we vote over is that which vendor to pick and how much to spend on a specific project at one time, right? So those are the types of things that we are doing. So the the tax levy is increasing by 2%. That has no impact on
valley hospital assessment. Where that value hospital assessment comes in is the tax percent each household for every household. That number changed from last presentation to today. So when we had the presentation two weeks ago, we were as Mr. Matthew said, we were using $5.9
billion as our um ratable base. That ratable base changed to 6 something. this today. So that's what what make individual household impact as negative. Um so we will not have any schoolboard increase for individual homes because
most of that will be absorbed by the value hospital increase. But if that doesn't come through then everybody would experience somewhere around 1.9% or 1.94% increase whatever that number comes out. Is that correct?
pretty much said it all. You and I had some back and forth on Yes. Thank you. And the last uh comments were about the fountains, but you had mentioned this earlier. Yeah, I'll speak to it again.
Uh thank you uh Mr. and Mrs. Loving for your concerns and your comments. Um you know, we did go back, of course, you know, we hear from our constituents and we want to make sure that our numbers are accurate. I know speaking with Mr. Donnie and with Mrs. Broen who are both on our facilities team. We were all
really interested in just making sure that our assessments of what the potential costs of water fountains would be. So that way we know what we're getting into in terms of making such commitments. Uh it did become clear when we vetted our numbers that there were a couple of things that were actually
skewing that number very high. The first was that we're actually working off of a number that was erroneously quoted which was all of the district water fountains, not just the ones that have not already been treated. that skewed our number quite high. It was actually almost double beyond what we expected. And then beyond that, we also did find uh quotes
for fountain changes that were lower than the actual quote that we had had. So, we don't have a final number for what that would consist of, but looking at the layout of which schools already have been treated retro retroactively with filters and which schools uh have a disproportionate number of untreated
water, we're confident that we'll get to a place where we'll be able to offer uh treated water for all of our students. do think that's the right thing to do. Uh when I made my comments about POS and safety and all that, uh we know pretty clearly that POS is not healthy for any
human being. Um with respect to the changes in regulations, there's a lot just a lot of uncertainty right now and there is not very clear guidance regarding what schools should do when there's POS in their water. So that said, I also had a conversation with the district physician and he also supported
the fact that if we could find a way to get it to a place where it was uh something that we could manage within the budget, even if it was for a year and a half or whatever time period that it would be, that it would still be prudent certainly to make sure that we're just uh and even if it would not
necessarily have any like a a major significant impact on students, that we're certainly just doing a due diligence to do the right thing by our kids. So, we can't ever guarantee a perfectly safe environment, but we can certainly within the constraints of our budget, if we can find ways to to make
our schools safer, perpetually safer, and that is certainly what we have strived to do. Uh, Mr. Loving also referenced uh records of bottled water purchases. I can't speak to which schools are purchasing water and why. That's something we'd have to look at. Uh, I'm
still understanding all the different patterns of the way things are done here. Uh I I think there I might have been interpreting a a concern about like large purchases. I know that last year I want to say it was last year. I'm just shooting from the hip right now, but there was a circumstance where we were concerned about some sort of a water
main break potentially and so we had to purchase a large quantity of water bottles to ensure that we could keep schools open because we can't open school if if the water is not running. So uh so at least if the water's not drinkable at all. So per perhaps
summer summertime when I wasn't even here but I authorized them to order extra water as have have an ex a Wednesday's inventory for all the schools last summer. That's why I I authorized that like last July or August. Yeah. Right. So I think his question was that he also remembered
that it was in September October but the invoice is dated December. So he wanted to confirm that is the invoice dated December which says water emergency was 14th September because that could be ordered by food service could be food service order. So I I don't know the
answer right now but I'll find out. Right. So that was the question and the other was if we have six elementary school and the Glenn schools or seven buildings with little kids why do we only have dispensers in three schools and not the other four? Well you have to look at that right?
get back. Yeah. And then I would and then maybe perhaps in the spirit of the hearing, even though we're giving this in a structured fashion, we want to give anyone who wants to come back and ask for clarification that they can do that now. We haven't closed our comments yet.
Mr. Ling, are you still there? Do you want to go ahead? I I just wanted to add that there there was a uh a water advisory issued by Rididgewood Water on Saturday, September 21st of this past year, 2024, that affected Willard and Ridge, and that was sent out to the parents and and it is stipulated here
that uh there would be water bottles made available. So, I don't know if that's part of this process, but it might be important. What which month? That was September. Right. Right. That's I think that's what he mentioned. Yeah. I just wanted to be sure that you know that right. Does your mic on?
Oh, your m your mic might not be on. Mr. Loving. Yeah. Uh, good evening, Boyd Loving Ridgewood resident. Thank you so much for providing answers to some of my questions. I'd just like to know, will somebody be contacting me directly via
email or phone with regard to my open questions concerning why are there only three schools in the district that are have these water coolers uh and what is the notation on the water cooler purchases that it is by state mandate. I
believe the question about the bottled water purchase was already answered by Mr. Matthews who indicated that he authorized that. Why the invoice came in in um December for a purchase that took place in September or October, I don't
know, but uh I'm hoping that that's what that is as opposed to $3,700 worth of water being used in the admin building for some reason. So, just I would appreciate somebody getting back to me with the open question concerning the use of bottled water in the three
schools and why not all the schools, including the middle schools and the high school. Thank you so much. Thank you. We you will um Thank you. Seeing no more uh hands raised, uh we
will close the um hearing and uh move on with the agenda. Uh well, you've already given me many chances to speak. So, I just would say a few other things. First of all, I just want to acknowledge uh two individuals
who retired uh who are whose retirements are on this agenda who were not joining us tonight but still deserve some recognition. Uh first, Julianne Matthews. Dr. Matthews has served the district for three years as a supervisor of elementary and uh elementary English language arts and social studies, so
humanities. I want to thank Dr. Matthews for her me for her years of service here and all the work she's done in supporting our teachers. And then I also want to acknowledge Mr. Dan Dilva. He is an art teacher at Rididgewood High School. Uh Mr. Dilva does a lot of really great work uh in um in different
medium and particularly he does some really interesting work with fashion. He's done 25 years of service with the district and I just certainly want to acknowledge him as well. Uh I also want to acknowledge some other folks. Um today was the first day of Alicia Pavone. She is our new
director of special services. She actually started today. She was approved by the board a couple months ago and uh we're really glad to have her. She's really rounding out the administrative team. Sat in our first meeting today. That was fantastic. Um I also want to introduce a candidate who's being represented to you tonight. Uh he's
actually here with us today. His name is uh is Justin Jasper. Mr. Jasper is being recommended to be the new principal of Ridge Elementary School. Uh we we did a we did a really nice search. We saw some really great candidates. Mr. Jasper had an opportunity to uh speak in front of a
group of stakeholders uh for the district and present his insights in the school. Uh he is he leads in a very humanistic and student forward way. uh but he's got a strong record of also improving student achievement and we're really looking forward to having to to
recommending him to to all of you and as the as the new candidate to be uh to be the the new principal of Ridge uh elementary school. Mr. Jasper, did you want to say anything? You just go to the microphone. Thank you. Thank you, uh, Board of
Education, Dr. Schwarz. Uh, it's just an honor to be here. I'm really excited for the opportunity to join the Rididgewood team in public schools and uh can't wait to meet all the teachers and staff uh children and families of Ridge and uh just very excited for the opportunity
and uh looking forward to uh tradition of excellence. Thank you so much Jasper. Welcome. And I think we'll vote. Welcome. And I think we are we we're thinking of changing it to in pursuit of excellence.
We'll see. We'll see. Talk about that a little later. Um so, uh and then also he's not with us here now, but he stopped by earlier today. We also do have a recommendation here. I think I think Mr. Matthews, you were you were uh understandably excited for having him here, but may may have
misspoke earlier when we talked about him onboarding him is that we have recently recommending him tonight. And that is a new director of facilities for the school district, Mr. Jose Mr. Joe Higgins. Uh Mr. Higgins is the current director of facilities in Hawthorne uh school district and he is uh he really
again shined in the process of our interviews. We did hold he was our lead candidate. So much so that we actually felt like uh it would be just it would be ingenuine if we presented him with any other candidates because he was so strong. But nevertheless, we wanted to give him give a a stakeholder group from
our school district the opportunity to vet him. Uh when he was done uh he was he was concise. He was to the point and uh and he was clearly experienced. The committee was very comfortable with us advancing and working with him and we're really excited to have have him. uh as
if you didn't follow it uh if you haven't been following along, Mr. Matthews has been working very diligently with his team to reconfigure how we deliver facility services in the school district and we're bringing many new positions in house and no longer outsourcing those positions. So, it's a
it's it's a it's more or less a netneutral change uh w with respect to what we had been paying with our previous previous uh layout. Um but but uh uh Joe Higgins, Mr. Higgins will be uh in charge of all of those functional
parts. So we're really looking forward to having him join. I also wanted to just uh thank the board again for your support of our full process for developing the vision 2030. Um and as Mr. Donnie was just referencing, and I think Mr. McCalli was was was right
there with him. Um, you know, there's a vision and mission statement on the agenda that we're going to adopt tonight, which we felt would be an appropriate next step to formalize our commitment to this process and the outcomes of this process. Um, if you haven't seen the presentations, you know, we had thousands of survey
participants and community participants and stakeholder groups and we've really come out on the other side with with some really really profound points of agreement. Uh, and and I say that subjectively. I I I've been really impressed by the extent to
which people who participated in this process feel very good about the direction particularly of the mission and the vision statement. Um so we can certainly have some commentary on that. I'd certainly welcome any thoughts that we have when we get to that portion of the agenda but uh but I really love the idea of not necessarily that we're
trying to do away with the tradition of excellence. quite the opposite that we really want to embrace excellence but I think we recognize that within the mission statement our group that was working together to put that mission statement together recognized that really it's in the pursuit of excellence that we find excellence right it's not
necessarily something that you have to arrive at and then maintain so um so as we consider this and talk about it as a community I just I'm I'm just grateful for uh the time and and commitment folks made to really hashing out all these different components um and you'll hear
about this all the time because I'll make this a part of my monthly update for as part of my superintendent report. We'll talk about it at part of the the superintendent coffees and of course in all of our district goal conversations and our budget planning uh vision 2030 will be at the forefront. So the next
real big uh installment of vision 2030 is probably going to be the state of the schools address on June 2nd. So we're actually having a meeting this week. It's a pretty pretty intensive meeting to to really really um kind of finalize what our project what what data uh
visualizations we're going after to be ready for to to really help give an even deeper insight into how our schools are doing and how our students are doing and what trends we're finding. And uh and we're going to be really couching that data in through the lenses of pursuing
excellence, but also trying to understand what we intend for the journey of a graduate to be. for those who were part of that conversation. Right? So, and our students were very much the student participants were very much in favor of us considering our vision for the experience as being a journey. So, that's uh going to be a
significant part of how we how we present our our our uh our information as we proceed. Um we'll also have a district goal presentation um as part of our end of year processes. I report out on district goals. Um I'm going to work with the board and particularly Mrs. Broen on figuring out how we want to
Last year we did two different presentations. We did a state of the schools presentation and then a district goal presentation. Um I don't want to make like the world's longest state of the schools address by trying to combine them, but if we can somehow efficiently provide them together, that that probably would be be positive. So I
think we we'll work and figure that out. Um one in the afternoon with the goal of being out by midnight. So we we'll figure that out. But in the meantime, uh, and then of course all of our 2526 plans, our vision vision 2030
is going to is is already reflected in all that work. So I want to commend everybody who's been a part of that process. Um, and and all the good things going on in the district. Um, and I think I've talked enough. So thank you all. All right. Uh, we'll go to consent
items, regular and routine. Um, oh, sorry. remember you wanted me to go through the uh Oh, I I I that was my fault. I was supposed to kick it off and actually I was bothering you about that, too. So, and I'm going to I I'm going to you Mr. Ross also gave me a really great
rundown of where he's where he is with a lot of projects. So, I'm just I'm going to just give you an opportunity to just throw out a few of those things, too, if that's okay. But, we'll start with Mr. Matthews, you have a chance to organize yourself because I totally surprising, Mr. Ross, on this. Yeah. just uh just for the board and the public, I um there
was um a a very intense um and um just overreaching yes, ambitious list of of projects to be done uh during the spring break. And I understand that many
of them or most Yeah, we're almost% completed. and I thought it would be good for the board and the public to hear all the good work that happened um this uh last week. Yeah, as Miss Broken said, it was a very ambitious uh spring project list that we put together. Uh we
were going to report the findings or the update to you at the facilities meeting, but she had asked that I do it today. So, it's a little mundane, but I'll go kind of school by school with some of the major points. I'll start with uh Benjamin Franklin. So, first thing we had on here was uh paint the main
hallway. So, you walk into Benjamin Franklin right now and you'll see very shiny blue main hallway. And as you go down the end of the corridor now, you see if you go to the left, we got to now paint that side now in the summertime. But the the corridor looks really, really nice. It's very bright and shiny.
It does brighten up the place. Also, on entrance number eight, we did the concrete pathway uh from the sidewalk to the entrance. That was all concreted out. Looks looks very nice. Uh we also walked through walked the kitchens and we cleaned the the kitchen floors were all clean and shiny because we went
there on the very first day last Monday and we cleaned all the grease traps and um we did water testing at BF. We had two more schools. We had uh BF and we had u the high school. So the water testing at BF was completed on on Monday, April the 14th. So everything at BF that was on the list was
done. And going to the Glen School again, the uh concrete pathway in the front of the school that was all kind of choppy and and unsightly. That's all done. I actually got pictures. Um the um we abaded and installed the flooring in rooms 11 and
13. We uh did the grease traps. We cleaned the kitchen floors. We did the um high school tennis courts were chipping away. We did a big project last year on three of the courts is start is
starting to crack and chip away. So we called the company up came in gave us a proposal and they they resealed and and overlaid the the mesh and so the seals are all the cracks are now sealed. But I think long term we're going to probably have to read through the tennis courts
because I can still see it's cracking on the perimeters and on on the edge edge of the tennis court. So that that's going to be something we got to deal with later on at the high school. Uh install new epoxy force in a hallway ramp done. Cafeteria done. Science swing
all done. Clean the grease traps. I didn't check it, but it's it's checked off as done. Somerville. Um I I think it's like 16 17 years you you've been trying to get this work done. Something like that. I don't know the number of years. So, I
I went to Somerville last Monday morning because that was one of my main pet peeves to get that work done. I didn't even call wanted to tell I was coming, but I was just coming because I wanted to do the inspection to get to the door. She was right there smiling ear to ear and walking right to the entrance and
the work was really done in a in a very first class manner. She was very very happy with with the work at Somerville. uh we putting in the new ceilings, new lights, and it's a lot of work that had to be done to get that work done because I went there on the Thursday before or Wednesday and they did all the rip out.
I was a little nervous about the work getting done, but I have to also kudos to my team like Damian and Julie just just following through to make sure the work got done because I was off those last two days and they hung around and made sure everything got done and Damian worked all around the clock that that
entire week. Uh courtyard at Treval was done was completed. Power wash the courtyard. Put in new flooring at uh Willard in rooms of uh B1. That looks real nice compared to what it was before. Willard
the the the treads on the stairwells were are on schedule, but we had to go ahead and replace them because the treads the all the treads didn't come in. But that's work is almost done and should be done shortly. The main hallway in Willard, if you've been to Willard over the last couple of days, main
hallway painted bright, shiny, really nice. Hall's carpet was completed today. We had a situation there regarding some other remedial work that had to be done or remediation. Uh outdoor stair nosing. Again, the stairnosing as a little tread
on the stairs that is uh not quite done because we have to go and get the right size uh stair nosing. So, that's in process right now. the uh the epoxy floors and the two bathrooms at the halls. That's all done.
Um so we did a spring clean up of all the buildings. Um I didn't go to all the all the schools, but I'm they're all checked up as being done. The um we had offices in the ed center that were painted. We painted the honor's office. Uh Miss Corish, your office was painted
as well, right? Um Brian, you got a paint job as well. Uh so we did a lot of paint during the spring break. Uh boiler rooms were all not all but most locations were all uh done. We had combustibles. It was kind of messy there. A lot of that stuff was all
removed and discarded. And then terms of the um the hallways, we washed and burned hallways and all the schools says here completed. I didn't see all the schools, but the four or five that I did see look really nice. So, all in all, it was a very successful spring break and
we're we're actually working on summer projects. Right now, we kick off the um summertime with a meeting on um Thursday, May 1st with the uh new company. We're going to also have Aramar help with the transition and um start the onboarding process sometime
next week. But it was a very successful spring break project and the entire team all chipped in to support follow up and make phone calls and and do surveys and make sure that it all happened. So it was very happy with the outcome. Thank you very much. Um that is a lot of
progress made and I look forward to having it continue. Thank you. Yeah, thank you uh Mr. Matthews and I I just while he was speaking about all these projects, I just get excited on the prospect of getting more work done. So I
did some numbers. If we if rest of the board members agree to that proposal at some point uh that if we start spending $5 million a year on capital as a referendum that would per household impact would be less than $40 a year. So
every year we can just impact somewhere between 30 to 40 depending on the interest rate. I'm taking higher interest rate with the current interest rate probably $30 a year. We can do $5 million of projects every year because we don't spend that 5 million in in one year will that will be 15 to 20 year
spread and 35% will be coming from the state. I wanted to say if the state if the state has money to fund it. I wanted to say that many projects in five days took a lot of dancing and coordinating and
amazing and as a teacher in the building to come back and see paint and flooring I bet and for the students I bet that was a really very positive um experience. Now I hate to ask but you mentioned about repairing the tennis
courts. Was it is that going to be a positive in terms of students able to use that on the tennis team for this spring more than what you thought might have had to happen? I actually met with Mr. Cook on that Monday or Tuesday when I because I did I surveyed the tennis
courts to check out the work myself. So, we spoke about the tennis court. So, it's you're going to get through the spring season, but the it's it's not sustainable and it's not a long-term solution of the repairs that were done o over over the break. like you could actually tell and I know the parents
were upset about the conditions so I think this addressed some of their concerns. Yeah. It's a short-term solution. Very good. M broken it's not a discussion but since you made a comment I want to cross question because you said if the state has the money so
yeah in the in the recent past has the state denied if there was a referendum to match the debt service if if there was a district that went through a referendum for long we've been charged fees for the um you know for
debt service um so you know nothing I Hey, I mean I I operate that you can't really absolutely count on everything from the state. So no, I'm just asking a very specific question. Yeah, I know that if it's a Yeah. So you know the long range
facilities plan, you know, the referendum process and if a district has gone through the referendum process, has the state denied the 34% matching grant because they did not have money in your recent recollection? Not to us. If not to us, right? So, and
I don't I have not heard any news reports for other districts. So, I don't know where that comment came from. And if that is not the right approach, then um it's a question that one of the residents is asking. It's a question that some of the residents asking, what is our long-term plan to keep the
facilities updated? So, if you have an alternate plan, please please propose that. I will. Did you have something? Thank you, Mrs. Broen. I'll give you a uh super lightning round on some of our curriculum work. Um first I wanted to say that uh today was Alicia Pavone's
first day. I had an opportunity to sit down with her and just sort of talk about the opportunities that are available together. Um and we're going to be doing some walkthroughs buildings and just really talking about that partnership. So it's a very exciting day for us and very exciting time. Um we as
a team uh including Dr. Fenwick. Um, Miss Murphy, we've been vetting various products with that will give us the ability to capture more student performance data, progress monitoring through our MTSS system that we're meet through our MTSS that we'll be rolling
out next year. Uh, so we've been looking at a number of those and we'll be we'll be talking to the board at some point soon, you know, with a with a recommendation. Um, we have posted our three gifted and talented teachers. So, we have resumeumés coming in right now, which is great, and hope to get those
interviews going as soon as possible to find some quality candidates and really build a team that will help us build that program out across our elementary schools and then also coordinate with our middle schools so that there's a bridge from grade 5 to grade six. I had a meeting with uh the Ridgewood
Education Foundation a couple days ago just to firm up the details on game design, which is a very exciting elective that they are supporting. We had well over a hundred kids choose that as their first elective option. So that's really really exciting. Uh so we're looking right now at potentially two sections at GW and two sections at
BF next year. So that's really great and we hope to firm that up the next couple of weeks. Then I had finally a really exciting discussion with the assistant dean of teacher education at Ramapo College and they have a fairly new program. Uh it's a it's a bit different
from the typical teacher student teacher placement program. It's more of a residency where they will send a bunch of teachers to a district. So you might get 12 teachers from from Ramipo College and rather than a model in which those teachers are supervised by Ramipo,
they're actually supervised by Ridgewit people and we form a collaborative team with Ramipo and we really build a relationship with the school and those particular teachers and we really kind of work with them in in all facets of their burgeoning careers. So this is something that we're very interested in.
It's a little bit late in this year to set it up for next year, but there may be a school that drops out and if so, then we might be able to actually kind of grab that spot. So, I'm working with Ramapoto to see if we can make that happen. But if not, we can queue this up for 2627 and I think this will be a great resource and a great pipeline for
for future teachers in the area. So, an exciting development. So, a lot more to come. Yeah. And would these be uh student teachers is assigned to a teacher in a classroom? But I understand supervision would be Yes. Yes. and uh we'd have somebody in our district who
functions as the district coordinator for this program which could be a great opportunity for an aspiring leader within our district as well. So there's developmental you know possibilities on both sides here which is really fascinating. Um so it's it's really exciting. So we're going to be talking more with Ramipo over the next few months and and the year. And and last
but not least, we've made a ton of progress I think in our professional development on K5 ELA, but we would be here till midnight. So, I'm going to save some of those updates for the uh the next curriculum committee and then you'll be hearing more about that later. But we're making some really great progress. Great. Thank you. Thank you.
And and on the agenda tonight, I I believe is Brisk, right? Yes. And I don't know if you want to I could give you a 30 second summary. Brisk is um an AI program. We piloted it earlier this year starting at the high school, but then we expanded the pilot through um
down to the elementary level. Uh, Brisk is Brisk is the the Swiss army knife of u of one of these AI tools. It can it can help uh you can you can create uh grading rubrics with it. You can create lesson plans. Um it's it's a it's a personal academic assistant for
educators. Um and it's a just a really great tool. And in a trial kind of an informal trial at Rididgewood High School, uh we had some English teachers grading essays with Brisk and some without. and the teachers who set up a rubric in Brisk and then would get the targeted feedback and they would still
have to elect whether or not they want to take this feedback. So it does not replace the human grader. But in this trial, the average solely human graded essay took about 12 minutes. With the assist from Brisk, it took about six minutes per essay. So cutting your grading time by 50%, Brisk doesn't get
tired. It can still find the comma splice 80 essays in. And so it's a really great support for our teachers. So, we're really excited to roll this out for next year. Great. Perfect. All right. So, anything else?
No. Okay. We will um go to consent items, regular and routine. Attendance at conferences. Um I move attendance at conference. May I have a second? I'll second it. Any questions on
it? Okay. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Administration. Um and on this we have
um the two um we have an approval of first reading of a revised policy 511 and also um some resolutions on vision 2030 mission and
vision statements and um the support uh a resolution in support of the vision 2030 goals and action plans. May I have a second? Yes. Yes.
Yes. Yes. Yes. I just want to add before I move on, I agree with Rob. Um I I think at some point I would like to discuss and consider changing it from I know this is
hollow ground I'm treading on but tradition of excellence changing it to pursuit of excellence. I actually really like that uh looking forward. So it's something I you know I don't know if we need to officially do it but something to think about maybe something to really think about if Mary and I both are available.
Exactly. There any pigs flying in there? No, it's okay. Oh, yeah. I mean, we we actually have that in our mission statement. So, you're really talking about that being the motto. It's on the high school,
right? Right. So, yeah. Another capital project, right? No, pursuit of excellence makes a lot of sense. So, um, so we'll have to just figure that out with
the administrative team and see if how you want to move forward on that. And I don't, being a newbie, I don't know if this is the appropriate time, but I wanted to thank the League of Women Voters that Mary and I are both members of. They came to Rididgewood High School
on the 24th and conducted a voters registration drive. I've been helping them in other schools. I wasn't able to make it that day, but this is in support of the state law that of the report that you have to you and I forget how many students they were able to sign up while
they were there. 17 year olds can register, but they can't vote. But they once they turn 18, they get a a letter in the mail and say, "Welcome." But I want to thank the League of Women Voters for helping us meet this requirement. I'm very proud of that organization. Thank you. You're welcome. That was
okay. I didn't know if this Yeah. No, that was because we just voted on it and said that's great. Perfect. Okay, I'm moving on then. It's um a curriculum and instruction. I move curriculum instruction.
Yes. And I'm really excited about this new brisk teaching program. Um Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. We have human resources and we did already honor our retirees. You
mentioned the ones who who could not come tonight. Um talked about our director of facilities and uh bridge principal. Um we have some revisions of uh job descriptions. I don't know if there are
any questions. And of course we have our teacher rec recognition honores listed. Um this went through a committee uh probably chaired by Jamie I'm assuming right. Um with parents and staff members
these teachers are um nominated by uh parents by my could be students and then uh their peers their colleagues. So, um, we're thrilled for them and we will be
honoring them formally on June the 3 at 7:00 at BF and the public is welcomed uh to celebrate it. It's always wonderful as we recognize the good work that happens in our schools by um our teachers. We couldn't do it without
them. That is for sure. And Miss Broen, just I I just had one one uh one edit that I needed to add. Sure. So under human resources um 8 which is resignations for the purpose of retirement um I did reference
Dr. Matthews retirement but it was brought to my attention that she actually has logged four years of service to the district not oh okay so Mr. Matthews if you could just reflect that in minutes please. Yep. Got it.
So, I I'll move uh human resources. Would someone like to second it? Um I vote yes. I just wanted to add a note. Um Dr. Schwarz and uh Dr. Mr. Ross U regarding uh Dr.
Matthews. Um so about four or five years ago some of the parents brought attend um concerns about elementary school ELA program and at that time Dr. Gorman actually created this position uh for ELA supervisor at
at elementary school level um and uh Dr. Matthews has done a lot of work to advance that and um so I'm just slightly worried with her retirement and Mr. Freriedman's retirement also. So well when both of them were working together
on this program I know that has been transitioned with Mr. Ross. So you probably got some of that knowledge already. So now you have that knowledge that you have to move forward with and make sure that all of the work that they had done both of them u you capture all of that before she leaves and then
continue with that. So that way there's no disruption or no um restart right of so any work that both of them did has to continue because that that's a big uh big impact on the community. A absolutely uh it's really
vital that we find someone who is uh an experienced uh you know instructional leader someone who has uh a deep knowledge of these evidence-based practices that we've really been embracing and study through our work and studying through our work with Dr. from Molly Ness. Um, so that's going to be a big part of the process in our search.
So yes, absolutely. You know, we have the ball and we're not going to drop it. Yes. Thank you so much. So yes, yes. Yes, Mr. Broen. Yes. Pass. Uh, now on to finance. Um,
I'll move finance. I like to second. Okay. Move. Second by M. Broen. Okay. Mr. Donnie. Did somebody second? I guess I did. I second. Yes, I have Miss I have Miss Broen. Second. Moved by Mr. McMove.
Roll call. Mr. Donnie. Oh. Um, I just need to read in the donations. Um, project graduation 24. um arrange between $5,000 to $7,000 a gift in kind um of renovation to the
first floor tower entrance at Ridgewood High School. Somerville HSA and dad night $5,000 a gift in kind renovation to the teachers lounge at Somerville Elementary School. the educwood
education foundation $2,000 to be used to pay for the speaker Maria Lee Chin for the Rididgewood High School Junior Classical League. Somerville Children's Theater $1828 gift in kind of a camcorder to be
used at at Somerville's Children's Theater. Lauren Case $10,000 a gift in kind. A gift in kind of a grand piano for BF middle school. Katie Develin, $4,000. A gift in
kind for a Glow Forge Plus laser engraver for the steam program at BF Middle School and ERDI Partners Incorporated for $500 to be used at the discretion of the superintendent to enhance programs
within the Ridgewood Public Schools. We thank all of the generous donors. Roll call. I just have one question on that. Is is the erd erdi partners inc. Are they any sort of vendor to us? Uh why would they be making a donation?
ERDI is the Education Research and Development Institute. They're they're a uh a group that I'm a member of. It's a uh it's kind of a joint partnership group between different vendors and superintendents nationally. So it's a one of the primary ways where I get my
professional development by participating with other superintendents. We give feedback to vendors. Okay. And in turn uh they make a make a nominal donation to the district as a as a show of respect. Um but then it the the professional development that I get through that service also doesn't cost the district
anything. It's a nice arrangement. Thank you. Is that the only question? Roll call, Mr. Donnie. So, I'm going to abstain from the entire finance uh vote and I have uh two data requests for any
subsequent meeting uh maybe next meeting or the meeting after uh one is from the finance perspective uh for the before and after care program. So, Mr. Matthews in in our contract with the current vendor u I think we had a profit sharing
clause so there's a minimum uh that we expect from them every year and then there's a profit sharing so uh if at some point you can just give a board an update for last three four years have they been paying us profit sharing or have they been paying us the minimum and how are we validating that that what is
the what is their revenue versus what are we getting as the uh rental payment Right. So if you can it may take time. So whatever next meeting or the meeting after and the other one for uh Mr. Ross
u so when this vendor was picked um they were picked based on the quality of curriculum that they were going to provide not based on the cost that they were going to charge our residents. And at the last year's renewal, some resident had raised question that are they providing those computer education
and other uh things that they uh committed in their uh RFP. Um so we have had multiple changes since then. So if if you have time and if you can just validate that from their original RFP from 3 years ago, uh there because we
have been just continuing that right that same contract. So are they still providing all of the things that they had committed to us uh as part of the RFP and is that the reality on the ground which which most likely should be but we just want to we should be cross-checking because that was the
primary reason to pick them. I'll I'll research that now. Thank you so much. So I just want to double check with the alphabets. You want three years of data? Yeah, three or four since since we have been with them. Okay, I got it. Thank you. And Mr. Matthews just to confirm my understanding on the
alphabet extension is that the profit sharing model will not change and the rates the parents would not change as well. Is that correct? That is correct. Uh I met with them last week that was launching what you guys gave me out out of finance was
to work out a deal where there was no increase to the parents and profit sharing would either increase or stay the same but I I kept it the same. So, that was the agreement. They sent me back a contract last week. I have the contract. Um, and I was going to execute
the contract, send it back. I'll have a copy for you guys at the uh next finance meeting. Yep. Thank you. You're welcome. I'm not I'm not uh like thinking of any um wrongdoings here or any errors. I just I'm just asking to cross check
because there have been two or three changes in business office and in the curriculum office both. So we just want to make sure that the original bid we are sticking to those requirements. Understood. Any more questions?
I don't think so. No. Okay. Um, Miss Handy, yes. M. Maui? Yes. M. Mcmood? Uh, I think Mr. Donnie, you already abstained. Yes. He's not voting. Yes. For me? Yes. And Miss
Broen? Yes, we have four. Yes, one extension. The next is a re resolution and motions not included in the consent agenda. There are two items. One is uh the budget approval um that we have
discussed and there is a resolution uh that I will read into the um u um into the minutes um on u on the res on the res on a
residency. So why don't we take the budget first and then I will read the resolution on the residency and we'll vote on that. So yeah, Mr. Matthew, before you go there, I'm sorry. Before you go there, I
just want to make one shout out on the previous item. So the custodial supply contract that we just voted on where I abstain um in 2425 we spent $391,000 on on buying the custodial
supplies at Hawk. So Mr. Matthews is changing that to a fixed vendor which will be a a predictable amount and that is $268,000. So the difference from last year to this year from $391,000 to $268,000. So, I just wanted
to give a big shout out there. Agreed. Say I agree again because I was actually thinking about that. So, I don't know. It must be a very special night. Thank you. Thank you. So, moved by Madam President. Is there a second? I'm going to find second by Mr.
Okay. Roll call is Mr. Donnie. Yes. Mr. Handy. Yes. Mr. McCalli. Yes. McMove. Yes. Broen. Yes. 5 Z. All right. Um on resolution and um be it resolved in the
matter of a residency of student number 911969 and student number 91192. The Richard Board of Education finds that same are not doiciled in the Richard Public School District. Be it
further resolved that the students listed above are therefore not entitled to a free and appropriate public education in the Rigid public school district. Be it further resolved that the Rigid Board of Education directs the board secretary, board attorney,
superintendent of schools and anyone he may deem appropriate to act as his designate to uh to effectuate the obligations of the Richard Board of Education under the laws of the state of New Jersey, including but not limited to
remove of the above listed students from the Richard Public School District and the calculation of appropriate period tuition. I move uh this resolution forward. I second moved by Miss Groen, second by
Mr. McMood. Roll call. Mr. Donnie, here. Miss Handy, yes. Mr. McCalli, yes. Mr. McMoo, yes. Mr. Sproen, yes. Pass 5 Z. Approval of bills. Um, Marilyn. So, I
think do I I have reviewed these bills as listed here from March 17th through April the 4th. And I move the that I move for the approval of the same. Right. And I second. Second by Miss
Broen. Hearing no questions. Mr. Donnie. Yes. Miss Handy. Yes. M. McCall. Yes. Mr. McMode. Yes. Miss Broen. Yes. Pass 5 board member announcements. I Oh, did you do that? I
was going to I was going to recognize the achievements of the Ridgewood students um of the Cambodia Club that ran a very very successful who's got talent night at GW for the students of BF and GW got an opportunity to showcase
to volunteer and showcase their talent from dancing and singing and playing um the guitar as well as violin. was a wonderful evening and a side um an opportunity for parents and teachers and students and also they collected some
donations. And then they didn't just stop there. They pulled that off. They went on Sunday for our fourth annual Cambodia New Year celebration. And this year there was over 60 students and family members there. There were dances
and and games celebrating the new year of for the Cambodian New Year. In addition, we have a Cambodian family in Ridgewood that I've come to know over the last couple of years. I think they're a Traval family if I'm not mistaken, and they have led um the
talking about the traditions. And this year we had a special guest um a woman came up from DC just to share in the celebration and it was just amazing to see the leadership of our Richmond High School students. the high there must have been 10 high school students there,
middle school students, and the long-term commitment that the students have made to make the world a better place. And it brought the Cambodians to tears to see that in school, in this village of Ridgewood, so much love and
empathy for a country that so many of them have not had the opportunity to visit. So, I was busting with pride and I'm so happy to see that now. It's great. Thank you, I I just wanted to reflect on some of the things that have happened this month
in our in in the village. Um and and one of course um is the Westside band concert. Um our student performers um did a wonderful job at Westside and it's really such an enjoyable uh two hours of
wonderful music. There will there'll be a coral um chorus and orchestra concert at Westside. I think it might be next week. Um so watch your calendars for that. Um there was the Holocaust
Remembrance Service um last week and um you know it's it's in its 30th year in Ridgewood having this service um and certainly I haven't been to all of them but to see
the at one point seeing the Holocaust survivors light the candles then their children and now their and some their grandchildren it's a um very um moving experience and a wonderful remembrance and uh so proud of our community that
that um provides these opportunities to really reflect upon the world um and the really uh you know when we look at Martin Luther King celebration I think that's in 35th year might be longer than
that Holocaust remembrance there many Um there many um there's the Thanksgiving interfaith um program. So there's many traditions um and I think it is a pursuit of of excellence for our community when we
look at those things. Um we had um at the community center we had a group of musicians from GW and there and students George Rockingham project I think it's Rockingham Rockingham Rocking thank you
um and uh that was fun. Parents, grandparents, um their peers all came to listen and it was great. And then on Sunday we had the daffodil festival, Earth Day, um with I I think there must
have been at least 30 vendors there, maybe more. Um and even on a cold, windy day, it was really well attended and um lots of good information for the community. So I'm just reflecting on some of the great things that happen on
a regular basis in Ridgewood. Board committee reports. I know that our um our um agenda really took into account the committee meeting. Anything anyone needs to report at this
point? I checked our uh finance committee April 9th. It was all included in the agenda there policy. I know we you've done that. Any Yeah, it's agenda. um JPEG I mean sorry
feedback right excuse me short report tonight um where's my page uh basically just the uh access the is this Wednesday night at Raymond's this time um uh next CPAG uh coffee chat
and the last one of the year is May 13th um and the next and final CPAG meeting is June 10th That's all I have. Curriculum we discussed um and facilities were still in discussion on
some of those items. Um yeah. Um can I add about fields? Oh please. Um I spoke with um Miss Winterrad from the village and the meeting for the fields meeting in May will be um broadcast. they are
going to have facilities so that it will be hybrid in person as well as people can um I don't know how she's going to do it but she's been working to facilitate it to be a hybrid meeting so people can um be a to see and be a part
of it without having to be there in person. So I know that was a concern at the last meeting but it's all been worked out and I'm happy to report. Oh thank you. You're welcome. Any other Okay. Um discussion
item ex Oh, I think I saw the minutes that you guys are still working on the um numbers for sports teams to provide an answer to our uh ice hockey team. Do we know a tentative timeline by when we
will be able to provide some information to them? We were pretty close. Well, let uh Dr. Shor's comments on that. Yeah, we've come a long way with this uh this analysis. Um it's actually we really worked hard to meet to try to
create a fair comparison regarding the relative cost of facilities annualizing it. One of the things we realized is if we did in fact the team uh uh Keith Cook and and Moren uh did a lot of great work in building this out the spreadsheet figuring out a way to
annualize the cost over sometimes like a 20-year period for different sports. The problem is that they kind of did a they did a raw annualization based on program which doesn't take into account program size and was skewing the the estimated cost for some programs. So for example, like girls flag football was coming out
with a very high per pupil rate because we were incorporating them as an equal share of like the fields when on a per pupil basis. It's not just the same equal share. So So we want to tighten that part up that I'm actually asking Mr. Bowman to kind of work through with the spreadsheets because we're starting
to get to a level of kind of advanced formulas to figure that out and and the athletics office has done a great job. So that's a slated item. We should I expect that this is going to be very useful and we can start actually drawing conclusions as a board in our next meeting. So we I were you would did you have access to that? Was that in the
agenda? It it was in the minutes. So the number was annualized but there was maybe on a different tab but I did not see how that annualized number was reached. So I was wondering if we are taking into account the annual um the
like we are going for a bit for fields maintenance or we taking into the field maintenance into account that contract that we'll be paying a third party vendor we will have a fields um a director or a manager level position just to manage our fields. Um so whatever percent of time they are
spending so all the c the maintenance and custodial time that we are spending on that every year um every 8 to 10 years or whatever time um I'm not uh like don't quote me on that but um 2008 to 2019 so about 10 years
changing the turf um so those type of fixed expenses or if we take the BF project and if we redo that field so so any of those fixed capital projects uh we do tennis court every 3 years or 6 years right so so the fixed capital pro
expenses plus all the custodial expenses that we are spending money on so are we taking all of that into account when we came up with the that analyze number so I just wanted to look at the the background that how did we come to that analyze number for those fields yeah so
so so there is some backup data in there if you go to the other tabs okay but in the meantime like I'm trying to end this maybe conclude it right So if there's any other related costs you think should be included too, you could help us by I just Yeah, I think I mainly I'm just thinking about the custodial or
maintenance cost every year plus onetime capital costs. Yeah. So so what we what we've been talking Yeah. right there are estimates involved but I'll make sure that the estimates are inclusive of these items that you brought up here. Right. Because when when we take their ice hockey is rental so rental is
offseted by capital and maintenance both. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and to be clear, like we definitely included the cost of even like complete referencing of the tennis courts or that was pretty straightforward because it's tennis and it's boys and girls tennis and right, you know, that's pretty much it. So, so
we annualized that that was that was relatively clean and there's not a lot that we do otherwise for them. But like to your point in grass field, if we have staff members who are maintaining the grass field, the employee or at least a portion of the cost should be factored. I can't answer whether that's included or not right. Thank you.
Anything else? Uh, acceptance of minutes. Um, March 17th, regular. March 17th, executive March 24th regular. Um, I move acceptance of minutes. I have a second.
Second it. All in favor? Okay. Other business? Think we have any? We'll move to um minute uh comments from the public. There is no one here in the
audience remotely. Is there anyone not seeing any hands? Close public comment and um make a motion to um adjourn the meeting. All in all in favor wait five more minutes but no uh
okay our next meeting is May 19th so who's closest.