Good evening. I call this meeting to order at 5:04 p.m. Present tonight we have director after director NMO director Koulenberg and myself director deities. Um thank you to our interpreter as meaning we have a quorum. Thank you
to our interpreter Astrid. Could you please share the interpretation instructions with our participants and then we can turn on the interpretation function. Thank you. The first business in order is the approval of the agenda. Directors, are there any proposed
changes to the agenda? Seeing none, do I have a motion to approve the agenda as presented? >> Motion to approve the agenda. motion to approve the agenda as presented. Do I have a second? A second.
All in favor say I. I. I. >> Motion passes. Our next agenda item is an executive session pursuant to section 246-424E. CS determining positions relative to matters that may be subject to
negotiations. developing strategy for negotiations and instructing negotiators specifically as to the school district's contracts with Carbondale Community School and Two Rivers Community School, inviting Dr. Anna Cole, Dr. Park, Chief
Shcoin, and Jonathan Landon. I would also like to note that Director Ramirez will likely join us in executive session. Do I have a motion to move into executive session? I move that the board of education move into executive session pursuant to section 24-6424EI
CRS determining positions relative to matters that may be subject to negotiations developing strategy for negotiations and instructing negotiators specifically as to the school district's contracts with Carbondale Community School and Two Rivers Community School. Inviting Dr. Anna Cole, Dr. Park, Chief
Shakcoin, Jonathan Landon, and Director Ramirez. Do I need to call a vote? Second. >> Oh, yeah. Do I That was the second. No, that was a motion. Do I have a second? >> I second. >> Excellent. The board will now move into
executive session. The time is 5:06 p.m. The time is 6:21 p.m. and the board has returned from executive session. Our next agenda item is our opening celebrations and updates by our superintendent, Dr. Anna Cole. Good
evening. Fun to have folks here and ready to engage on topics. um want to uh celebrate a couple things tonight and uh share some information about what's been going on in the district as we enter the heart of budget season in alignment with
strategic our strategic plan and strategic priority number three which is focused on operational excellence. Um, we have a strategic initiative focused on financial excellence and really strengthening every member of our um, Roaring Fork Schools community, especially any sort of any of our
constituents who have some oversight on our budget to strengthen training and opportunities um, to grow folks's understanding and awareness of the budget. And so just want to appreciate our staff who have been engaging with what is now going to become weekly
updates on the budget as it evolves over the next couple weeks from Chief Shakoin. Um folks have been checking out those videos, slide decks, sharing questions, and then we're also hosting every other week an online Q&A session for staff. So really want to thank staff who've engaged in that process and shown
up at meetings and shared questions. It's helping us strengthen our communication, transparency, and and building a stronger team to provide accountability and oversight on budget. So, um looking forward to keeping that work going and um supporting that
strategic priority. We also want to thank this week our partners, youth entity and the the um their leadership team as well as nearly 100 community uh nonprofit, business, local organization partners who met with students from all
of our high schools yesterday as part of the 2026 Youth Entity Career Expo held at the Spring Valley campus at CMC. Um, this is a Youth Entity really uh organizes this and coordinates it, but it's a massive lift from so many organizations across our our community
to make sure our students can learn about summer internships, job shadowing opportunities, summer job possibilities, and also just um career and post-secondary career pathways. So thanks to Youth Entity for that work and all the uh school leaders and teachers
and staff who accompanied students up to the job fair. And finally want to celebrate the staff, students and families of Basalt Elementary School as it was named a recipient of the Colorado Governor's Distinguished Improvement Award, which is an honor presented by
the Colorado Department of Education to schools demonstrating exceptional student academic growth over time. The governor's distinguished improvement award recognizing recognizes schools whose results on the state's school performance framework shows significant improvement in student growth and
progress that enable them to close achievement gaps. So, um, a big shout out and congratulations to the BES Longhorn community for all the hard work and dedication that is resulting in really strong academic outcomes for students. Thanks.
>> Thanks. The next business Oh, sorry. Yeah, I'm lost on my screen. Give me one second. The next business in order is a budget update presentation from Chief Shoe. After which each board member will have two minutes to share comments or ask questions.
Thank you. So, we'll um we'll go through this budget report um and then we'll take questions and I'll just go ahead and start. Okay. >> This time around, >> it's on everybody's mind. I mean, it's on our principal's minds as they're
really trying to manage their budgets and looking at declining enrollment and and keeping and and there are some staff reductions in here, too. And and so it's just something that's really important, as um Superintendent Cole said, is to make sure that everybody is apprised of
our budget. And that's why we're doing our staff Q&A to make sure and also staff updates weekly to make sure that we're bringing everybody, you know, just up to date on all the current happenings here. So, looking at outcomes for tonight is
increasing budget transparency and financial projections and foster meaningful board discussions. And that's what I've heard my whole tenure here is really important for us to ga engage early and often as a board and as a community to make sure that there's
enough input from the public, from the community, from the board, making sure that we get all the voices in the room while we're still working on the budget. So, the way we're starting this for this evening is to look at where we've come from with our past and with our present and future finances and projections. uh
looking at anticipating enrollment and revenue trends in the future and then discussing the fiscal impacts for 2627. Where are we going to be for next year and what does that really mean as far as impacts next year and looking at salary and benefit trends including health
insurance costs being very important uh and strategies for addressing the financial impacts because we don't want to just talk about these problems and like not have any solutions for them. So, we do have some some direction that Superintendent Cole will talk about as well um that we're looking to move
forward with and looking at feedback. So, I'm going to jump into the the next slide. So when we were uh in our conversations uh for the 2526 budget year, which is this current fiscal year from last
spring, a year ago, uh we had to come up with 7.8 million roughly in saving strategies because of some losses and gaps in our budget at that point in time. And this just shows just what I would call is our level one budget reductions for 2425.
Um so that we can see that this is kind of when we started implementing budget cuts and what we did at the time is it know why it's it doesn't seem to be working.
>> Oh okay. There we go. Okay. So then looking at uh 2425 audited actual results of where we actually landed is uh any reserves of 15.7 million which sounds like a lot of money but our minimum fund balance is 12
million and um that is at 10% plus 3% TAR emergency reserves and that's very similar to what other districts minimum fun balance policies are and we just have to and it's really important to our state to watch this very carefully also because we are kind of on our watch
So, we just got to be thoughtful about that. Um, but our unencumbering reserves are 3.665 million. So, the good news is for 2425, we had some one time non-recurring uh savings. And this is from
>> Oh, it's okay. And then uh anyway, uh so it's showing up um 800,000 for self- insurance favorable stop-loss payments. So that helped the district as well as other net variances of a half a million.
So that are also non-recurrent because of some of the reductions we made. Okay. >> Then 2526 uh original budget reductions and this is what we did. This is kind of level one level two budget reductions um
for the next year. So 8.1 million. Uh some of these are continuing on the cuts that we did for 2425 into 2526 because they are recurring but there are additional cuts that were incurred during this time. Go to the next and then the deal
strategies to reduce expenses. There was $1.8 million that was reduced for 2526 and that just shows where we were at at that point. Where this left us is there was some system systemwide cuts um adjustments to
to school resource allocation frameworks. We started the really deep work on school allocation frameworks at that point. Cost of living and steps and lanes were preserved for 2526. Um but there was no increases in salary schedules. They were held and frozen uh
for both 2425 and 2526. looking at the next and then estimated actual uh results for 2526. Uh looks like we're going to about be at a break even for this year. We had um about $879,000
of um negative um reductions just because of our um declining enrollment and because of additional charter school transfers and those kind of things. Okay. But we also have some onetime savings uh such
as the CC cap is not going to be reduced, which we originally thought it was going to be in utilities at 300,000 um from a warm winter. We're hoping to be able to save that and we're hoping to achieve another 200,000 in favorable variances, but we're still working on
that on those numbers as we're finalizing the budgets. Okay. So the bottom line of this is that we've solved sol solved our internal financial issues and now we have the external challenges of declining enrollment that are increasing health insurance and all of
those kind of things that we need to focus on. So then we go to 2627 budget discussion. Uh so when I put this out it's a little bit non-conventional the way that I put
out the 2627 budget discussion. The reason why I do it this way is because it we we've already reviewed in detail in January and February the revenue estimates. And so the top two numbers, the 95.3 million and the 16.6 million of
reduction from transfers to other funds, those we've already discussed. And then looking at carrying forward all of our expenditures as though we were spending everything the same as 2526. That yields $83 million that we would need to to spend. Then taking out budget
carryovers, which are just one-time expenses that we don't want to show those in. I think that would be Yeah, we just have to take that out, which would leave us a net deficit of 2.4 million we need to solve for. And so we need to cut 2.4 million plus any additional costs
because we the goal is to is a balanced budget just to make sure that we are continuing to be good stewards. And I think that this board and we have shown that we're good stewards as we've gone through 2425 and 2526 and still being at that balance budget. Okay.
Um so the estimated additional expenses that uh we have seen that are going to need to go into the next year's budget. Um we have a little bit extra for sports. Uh we had a budget cliff that we've been talking to the board about with the tech mill funds and some
additional capital purchases that were um used for recurring costs but were put into a fund that had one-time available u fund balance and now that fund balance has depleted and so now we need to spend that through our general fund. uh some
SSN paras which are required through IEPS and then additional incent retirement incentive costs one time we're saying because we you know it's pretty much an affordability issue with being able to increase for that program. So, we're calling that a one-time cost
for right now. And then looking at the education lanes increases that were from all the uh increases that the certified educa like certified staff had um had completed in their education credits.
So, that yields us to a $3.6 million deficit. And then if you add the steps and health insurance if there was anything left um for uh being able to um negotiate based upon then it's will be a
little higher than that. So if you go let's see here I want to go to the next slide. So, um, this is really hard to read, but I'm just going to summarize it to say that, um, and I encourage the board to look at this. Um, as far as the
exact reductions we have incurred, uh, there are a lot of the ratios that were staying the same. Uh, there was a lot of deep work completed on the staffing ratios and it was really determined that this is the right balance of reductions
for this year. And then, you know, because we don't want to go too deep with these schools. It's really hard to get to this level of cuts in one year. So, we've just got to be really thoughtful of how we balance all this out. And so, we came to about a break
even after all of the reductions that are recommended there. And there's a lot of reductions in there that are administrative. There wasn't any sacred cows in the budget. There there was everybody was taking a non-s salary haircut. And there was a lot there was positions that were reduced um on both
administration as well as schools. Okay. But then the challenging part of the budget is I did add back this $1.7 million that we originally took out of the revenue um of the budget. So that
now we really don't have meaningful cuts in our budget right now um from the legislature and we know that that's a risk. So, that's something that we're going to really have to monitor very carefully so that we have this recurring funding available of $2,80,000
for um staff for negotiations, for benefit increases, steps, increases in salary schedules, whatever they would choose to do. Now, on a step, just so you're aware, it costs roughly 1.3 million. And uh if we were going to look
at a 10 and a half% health insurance increase, which is what we did receive um for the district, that would be roughly 1 million. So they're not going to quite be able to get to a health insurance cost and a step with that type of funding. Okay.
>> And sorry to interrupt just real quick. For anyone in the audience having trouble seeing the slides, these are all available on our public agenda. So you're welcome to pull them up on your phone or your device or uh email them to yourselves. I know they're a little bit small right now, so feel free to just pull them up on uh whatever you brought with you. Thank you.
And this is a really good graphical depiction of what we were just talking about. Uh we had the initial deficit of $3.4 million and then we had the added def deficit um for um some increases in
um steps and potentially for health insurance. And then the other thing I would say is that we have resolved and mitigated any of our self-inflicted what we're calling self-inflicted bud budget issues which is very true. And then what we did is we
are being a bit more aggressive with our budget and what we think the legislators legislature is going to cut to try to maintain our steps and health insurance for employees to some level. Okay.
So, uh, budget estimate. So, what I was saying earlier about the the some of the challenges in the budget is just the volatility of the legislature this year in the state. And this could yield up to a $2.8 million shortfall on
our current budget uh depending upon the level of cuts that are going to be implemented at the state. So, we just we're going we might have to come back to the table on these budget reductions. It's a challenging year. We don't usually need to do this, but this is one of the more difficult years that I've
seen throughout my whole career actually. And that just pretty much says the same thing except for to add that we could the where the 2.8 million comes from is that that would be if we lose um if we actually decline in enrollment further
than what we think or if the legislature cuts us um further than we think then or some combination of those two things then we could hold ourselves as a hold harmless school meaning that the legislature previously set a floor for
of 2425 funding and 2526 and 2627 that um we couldn't go any lower than that. So it gives us a year to before we would go further. Um so hopefully we don't get there, but that's why that is the floor.
Okay. And so then this is just talking about the cumulative reductions. Um we're just at our third level of budget reductions at this point of time. So that just and the reason why I'm starting to show levels of how many times we've cut is so that you could see
how many times we've as an executive team as all the principles and the leaders of the organization and as a school district how many times we've been reviewing our budget to go through and see what there could be that what would be the next layer. Okay.
and 27 28 and 2829. This is we may have another tough year in 2728 because I don't think the state legislature is through with the their discussion of budget reductions number one and number two is that we have um another year potentially declining enrollment and
also our enrollment averaging is is going is being reduced by the legislature every year by one year. So, we've got another tough year for 2728 and hopefully in 28 29 it's going to start to level but um but we're in it
for probably another year and I hope I'm wrong but that's just what all of the um the statistics are showing me. Okay. So, the salary and b the the challenges with salary and benefits is preserving steps and lanes for 24 25 and
26. As we've talked about, the inflation is outpacing our salary increases because we haven't seen um salary schedule increases now if we're not I mean if we don't have a salary schedule increase in 2627 this will be the third year without a salary schedule increase
and we also have our health insurance increase um outpac pacing um salaries. So, um, okay. And this just shows the 10 and a half% increase that we received from
CEBT, which is our health insurance provider. And that's on top of 35.4% increase in 2526. So, that's a big that's almost half 50% increase in two years. Uh, so it's a big increase and it's even more for those employee plus
plans. So that just but I don't know what the negotiations is going to come up with as far as what they're going to make a recommendation of which plans we go with and how we fund those. That's really up to the negotiations group to come back to the board with. Okay. And
um Anna, would you want to talk about the next level strategies? >> Sure. >> So so much of our work thus far and that you heard from Chief Shcoin is really defensive and like how do we make budget cuts? how do we um you know restrain spending and uh and restrict our
expenditures. We are also moving what feels like more proactive strategies forward to start to address some of these challenges as the board is aware and many of our community members are aware. We've uh launched an an uh exploratory committee looking at a mill levy override that would be a potential
tax ballot initiative next fall. Um the role of the exploratory process is to develop a proposal to bring to the board which would probably happen at the end of the summer. So the decision of whether we actually move in advance a a ballot question to the um November
election is the board's ultimate decision um both on whether we bring something the final ballot language and this the plan for spending should it pass. So um we're continuing that work. We've started community meetings this week. We've got a website up um as this
work and as the proposal that we bring to you kind of evolves through some of these community outreach efforts. Um so we're we're getting after that as an opportunity to address some of these challenges. We're also carefully looking at enrollment trends. We know that overall we're declining enrollment. So
is the entire country certainly the state of Colorado. We see different communities um noticing impacts and declines. It's at uh unique rates. But we are definitely similar to many other mountain resort districts in the state of Colorado and some of the declines we're seeing. Um, so these are these are
consistent trends. We're watching carefully to see uh where our kids are going um and if there's ways to provide services and programs that might be able to recapture and reserve kids. And so one of the things we're looking at and starting to explore is the potential of
offering a secondary online program um as we see families starting to move to choose those kinds of learning environments. So more to come there, but just want to make sure that the board is aware that we are um not solely in a defensive mode when it comes to budget challenges, but also trying to think
creatively and differently of um how we can can use different strategies to address the challenges we're facing. Okay. Um, looking back at the budget development, um, one of the things that I also heard from the board last year is is just taking a lot of the guesswork
out of the budget development process and making sure to to apprise you on what is what are our next steps. I mean, where do you guys get some more feedback and input on the budget as we go forward? So looking at late March through April, we're we're looking at additional detail and input. This is
when we garner the majority of our input and this is when we have the most ability to change our budget as we are starting to finalize things. And then looking at um let's see here in April, we're going to look um again at the FY27
draft revenues and expenditures for the general fund and start to really um roll that up towards late April. Then in May is a continued general fund discussion and review of non- general funds early June final board budget approval. So we'll have our first reading in the at the end of May and our second re reading
in June. So that's what that looks like right now where we're at is we just closed the school budgets, but we're still finalizing some of those. We've got a couple little pieces out there that we're still working on and looking at um the department budgets are going to close on April 10th, pretty much
right after spring break. And then we um on uh uh the 15th of April, then Chief Bon Bon Pac is going to be talking to you about the capital projects budget and we have the full budget calendar calendar linked in there as well. >> Okay.
>> Okay. And that's it. >> Thank you. Um director after, would you like to begin? >> Yeah, I'm happy to. Thank you both and thanks for the um 90 minutes we had in finance committee on meeting uh on Monday to go through this
in detail. So I got a lot of my questions answered but I did I have a few clarifying questions. Um but before that I just wanted to say thanks for putting this together so thoroughly but also I feel like really prepare preparing the community for this. So, as
we talked about on Monday, you've over the last 12 to 18 months, I can see where you've staggered the cuts so that this hopefully isn't a huge surprise to anybody who's um who's hearing about it tonight. Um because you've prep been
preparing us for the last year plus um on what cuts would look like once we got to this point that we're at now. So, thank you for the prep work and the proactive communication over the last um well during your whole tenure here, Christie. Really appreciate that. Um I
do have some detailed questions about the retirement incentive uh line that you put in one of the slides, but I think they it's probably too detailed to get into now. So, I'll submit a board tracker request for that. So, um I'll try to do that by the end of the week. Excuse me. Just a couple small
questions. Um Anna, how many people attended the or roughly attend have been attending the community meetings about the MLO? Um we had a meeting at Basalt High School on Monday and were lucky to follow Basalt High School school accountability committee. So we kind of
had a captive audience. Okay. >> About a dozen um I think families who consistently attend the Balt High School school accountability committee. So we kind of made them stay right where they were. And we had about four additional committee members join for the MLO
conversation last night in Glenwood. I think we had two and director Ramirez there for with at the MLO meeting. So tomorrow night is right here in this room at 6:30 um for that you know this kind of first round of MLO community
forums to share information and we'll also be live streaming that. We'll record it and put it on our website. >> Okay. Thanks. Yeah. Thank you. Um uh Christie, how are you doing with uh the increased cost of fuel transportation fuel that we've all been
experiencing over the last 3 weeks? And how do you do you see have you modeled out how that might impact our current fiscal year budget? >> Thank you. That um is a great question. That's a really huge uh question mark, okay, on what that looks like it's going
to be um given all of the international situations that are happening right now. However, we just had a conversation actually with Chief Bombfuck a couple days ago and we did up that budget to reflect the additional cost that we were anticipating in that line item. So, we
believe that we have that covered now. Okay. Uh, so we just we had to we had to shift things around at the last minute is pretty much what ended up happening. >> Okay. Um, do you know if you don't know this off the top of your head that's fine, but do you know where where you
pulled that budget line from? >> It was a few. Yeah, it was from a few different um I know we were talking about um the impacts of um school costs um related to um mileage for trips and
how we were going to run those. So that was a the conversation and a couple of other um smaller items. >> Okay. And we can be sure when we bring you that 26 27 budget specific to operations and uh transportation costs,
I'll be sure to articulate where we found the savings to increase fuel um the cost for fuels. >> Okay. Yeah. I was just also curious how you think about the volatility, but I saw there was a mention on one of the slides about savings from the unseasonably warm winter that we've been
having. So energy savings presumably in buildings, but I'm guessing that the new cost of transportation fuel is eating into those savings quite a bit. >> Yeah. Um it will um we fortunately still
had a fairly uh good size budget for that line item. We never really reduced that. So we were still seeing pretty high fuel costs last year and those fuel costs had declined during this year. So we hadn't really built that that decline
into the budget which was fortunate. >> I see. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Thank you. I don't have any other questions. >> Director Ramirez. >> I know. Thank you, team. I was not even join finance committee today, so I apologize for missing out on the what
I'm sure was a conversation. Um I did have some questions that I wanted to make sure to ask. Um specifically, you know, I think even in going through the 2627 uh general fund budget estimate, there was a bullet point anticipating some
cuts, the 375, but that's separate from the 2.8 fall that we're anticipating. >> That's it's included in that 2.8. So that that's included in the 2.8. So it's really an additional 2.425
425 million we could be looking at. So it's for so the total amount of cuts is between zero and 2.8. It's a great great clarification. >> Thank and then um the reductions in expenses. I was going through the line items and there's just so much
information in here. Um I just wanted to clarify um can you please express or explain I guess how some of those um reductions were decided on? I know there was just some front office
specialist and other things that I'm wondering was that a team decision but how that made me >> Yeah, that's a really great question. I know I'm I'm going to defer to Anna on a lot of the the staffing allocation methodologies because that was a very um
robust discussion. I think some of the other conversations were um surrounded around um looking at and having conversation with the leadership team as well as the executive team and and looking at budgets and budget managers
and really brainstorming um where we could see you know what our next level of cuts would be and then looking at prioritizing what um what what would have the least impact on students. But I'll go ahead and um defer that to Anna on the staffing allocation side. Let me
try to give you a g like a general thinking around this. A lot of our staffing reductions are happen just um in direct response to our numbers of students and where we have especially for school-based staff where we're tied exactly to projected student enrollment
for the number of FTE that we staff a school with. Um so some of those adjustments came simply from us running our um standard formulas of of school staff with declining numbers of students. So the bulk of the reductions in total uh full-time staff came from
that. The additional decisions like the front office specialist was actually coming back to a previous agreed upon staffing level that had been expanded upon when we were rolling out the bilingual communications toolkit which you'll remember was a couple years ago. One of the things we recognized when we
rolled that out was that we needed to increase there was an expectation that every front office would be staffing bilingual staff at the front offices and not all of all of our schools were. And so in order to um provide a little bit of time to get that configuration right
in our schools, we overstaff some of our front offices. And so at this point we pulled it back to kind of um the core ratios that we had historically feeling like schools now have had plenty of time and staffing um cycles to make sure that the expectation of having bilingual staff in every front office is met and
it is. Um so that was really a returning to kind of former ratios. We also had reductions across our academic culture achievement team um our school health services or nursing team that were similar to um really getting tight on
the purpose of our teams on looking at comparable ratios. A lot of the decisions were made by hiring managers, department heads um finally stamped by executive team ultimately will be in the budget for you to approve. Um I'm trying to think of any others
because you know and I would just name that our key goal and and Chisha Coin mentioned this when it comes to making reductions especially with staffing our goal is always to make reductions at a level at which we can manage that for the most part through attrition
resignation retirement non-renewal. Um because if we end up having to to significantly reduce staffing numbers, we're bound by um TEDA and different state law to actually hold, you know, our tenure teachers have protections. So we can't, you know, even if we displace
our folks a certified teacher whose tenure loses their position, um we continue to provide them a position for the next year at their same rate. Um we try to find a place for somebody to land that fits and works. Um but we we try to
really temper any sort of reduction at a pace that attrition can manage. Um okay. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. Um and so on that same sheet at the bottom onetime funding it says F FRC onetime funding revenue retirement incentive addition. Um
are that is that are we saying that that is coming back to the district? That's a savings for the district that we're using towards >> from F FRC. Yes. Because what happens is that we we commit to as a district staffing every school with a family a
bilingual bicultural family liaison. Um it's a critical core piece of our work and how we make sure that we're supporting students and their families. Um and that team, our our family resource center team does a phenomenal job of grant funding. And so although we
want to make sure every year we are committing dollars so that that grant funding dries up, we don't lose staffing, we don't lose position, we don't lose core services, there are years when the team has done a great job with grant funding and the funds are there and we can allocate them to positions which ultimately saves the district funding. And that's what's
happened now two years in a row. So we want to make sure that we honor and hold that commitment to those staffing ratios and support the team as they're going after a ton of grants, which they are have been continually pretty successful. So creating savings. So really what it
does, it doesn't come back to us when you think of that slide that you've seen already with um that Chief Shaquoin has brought you with all the very small text where we talk about um our first projections of revenues and and general fund transfers. It's actually a
reduction in a general fund transfer because we would transfer dollars over to the fund that supports the FRC, but it'll reduce the amount of dollars we have to transfer. Does that make sense? Yeah, I just wanted to clarify. So, it's onetime funding for the F FRC and the
retirement incentive. >> Retirement incentives on its own. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> And it's and that was the um we couldn't go any further just what uh superintendent was talking about um in
relation to additional recurring budget cuts such as additional positions. And so that was the way we funded at one time. Um, as we're still talking about this policy and how we're going to fund it in the future, um, we we didn't know how we could fund th those additional
dollars on a recurring basis without too much of an impact. >> And on that same sheet on the bottom of the last line, it says onetime funding 33,555. It just says onetime funding. Is that a grant? >> Is that revenue we just found?
um that is the 400,000 minus the 366 that's the differential of the 33 and so that is part of what we would be um utilizing for our um non-s salary but the or I mean like for other one-time
costs that's pretty negligible in in our $95 million budget and the 2,80,000 is the recurring dollars that we have available for additional salaries and health insurance and that kind of thing. And that's why we differentiate the two
to show what is available for those for those types of funding situations. >> Okay. Thank you. You're quite welcome. >> It's all compacted so I had no idea what what that number was referring to. >> That's good.
>> Um I also just on the strategies to reduce expenses I just wanted to clarify. Um so we have these are the strategies the team is saying we're going to be doing for the 2627 year. Um are all of these take
like are they starting to take place? Are we solidifying them within the next Okay. Thank you so much. That's it. >> Thanks. Um Director Kenberg, you're up next. Before we do that, let's fight the acronym urge as much as we can since we
have an audience tonight. So F FRC, all of the everything that we're used to just throwing around. Um let's take the syllables and spell it out. Thanks. >> Thank you for the comprehensive update and the schedule that we're on this year that is allowing us to engage in this way and the public to engage in this
way. Um as I've said over the last few meetings, this is something that we've pushed for and to see it happening at a time when it needs to be happening like now when we need to be having thoughtful discussions and making tough decisions like these, I think is is critical. So, I'm grateful for all of that work um cuz
I know it wasn't easy to get us here. And really, my only question that I have is uh for the board and for the public is can you describe the timeline for when the legislature will actually give us our final funding formula because that is another huge constraint that we
have and we can put all this work in and make all of these projections and then I think it's important that we don't understand that that can shift and when that can shift and the pressure that puts us under. >> Thank you. uh in this one I mean and the legislature does this um pretty
frequently in putting us in this kind of a a pressure cooker if you will um because of the time constraints of when we have to complete our budget. But this year is pretty exceptional because they um don't have very good being in the state does not have very good um
economic forecast data that they were working off of because they had some um delays at the federal levels and things like that that were causing some problems with them getting good economic forecast data as well. So that has compounded this problem and they're looking at getting that um economic
forecast data pretty much when we're on our spring break. And so then what we anticipate happening is after that period of time right in April that they're going to have this whole flurry of of information coming out and potential budget cuts and conversation
and you know feedback and all this loop and all this kind of stuff and they could not it's possible that we won't know until May what that looks like. I mean, or hopefully early May. Um, and we may need to make some presumptions based upon what people are currently talking
about even while we finalize our budget. Thank you. I think from my seat, I would just want to encourage that even if we are in May, we make sure that there's time for the public and the board to engage because we know what that's like to be under pressure to do that. Um, and
it's easy to make the decision and move on, but just ensuring that we we build in some time at the end of the year when it already is busy because these are are massive decisions and and potentially shifts in our system. So, that would be my my last comment on that. Thanks,
>> Director Nemo. >> Yeah, sorry. There it is. There you go. >> Okay. Um, yeah, thank you for all the work that you have done and that you are doing. Um, this is all still very new to
me and I've been plucking away at it and trying to figure it all out. So, I just have some I think just some hopefully really simple questions. What does revision to roles calendar revision scope? What does that mean? >> Sure. In in our efforts to reduce
expenditures, we looked at some of our especially district office roles and folks that were working on like a year- round calendar and kind of asked in the world of ask we actually reached out to a lot of employees and said, "Do you think you could get your key work done on a reduced calendar with a reduced
salary? Would you be interested in that?" And we had a couple folks take us up on it and say, "Yeah, we would be interested in that. you know, we we think we could do the core work that we do on a 11 month. It's not quite what we call our calendars, but like an 11 month or a 10-month calendar. So, we had some savings that way. I mean, one of the one
of the um consequences of that is that if you know, given where we are now, that like you know, if you come up to this district office in July, there won't be a front office person there. you know, if you have an appointment or a meeting with somebody, they'll meet you there and get you in the in the building, but like we won't be open for
business in July for a couple weeks um in an effort to have some savings. So, we did those kinds of adjustments to some of our roles um and job positions. >> Ahu. Okay. What else? You'll also notice in
the reduction of roles, Jonathan Landon is managing 16 different things at a board meeting by himself where we used to have two people. Um, so that was also part of consolidation of of scope of work and trying to um, you know, we're
asking staff to do more with less. >> Okay. And adjustments. Thank you. That makes sense. I would have never come up with that on my own. um adjustments to school resource allocation frameworks. >> Yeah, great question. So, we have this
really interesting um and I think unique. Every school district does a little bit different of how do you fund and staff schools. And so, we have um what I would call a school resource allocation framework or the develop the process we use to develop a school's
staffing and budget. And it has um a number of ratios that then turn into um numbers of certified teachers, numbers of pair professionals, numbers of special education staff, numbers of administrators um that that then move
into schools. And then there's additional investments that we make um that might have to do with title one funding like special student populations, special education, emerging bilingual students, um percentage of students who come from families whose income is beneath the federal poverty
level. You know, then we have all these different adjustments. There's additional allocations that we make in elementary schools for small class sizes in kindergarten and then in kindergarten through third grade. Um it's this really kind of complicated process or allocation framework that
results in every school leader getting you know what what Chief Shaquin would articulate is their budget but is also kind of a staffing plan that then they build um and some of the things that in we really haven't adjusted some of the core ratios
as we've gone through the last two years but we have adjusted some small things like for instance and this is when we talk about school resource allocation adjustments ments. One of the things that we did um was we had some subtle reallocations of how we allocate title one dollars to schools to make sure the
schools with the highest percentage of free and reduced lunch eligible kids and families are getting additional dollars. We used to have um what we called a small school allocation which was you we'd run all those staffing numbers and then we would say okay if your school has a population less than 400 kids you
get an extra an extra teacher just because it gets really hard at a small school to be able to offer all the things. Well, one of the things we realized two years ago was just about every one of our schools was getting close to that number. And so it really wasn't a small school allocation anymore. It was just a general
allocation. So we moved that that um threshold to 350 students and we talked about further reductions because we now have a number of schools heading towards 350. So it's those kinds of adjustments would be the kind of things that fall under that umbrella of adjustments to
our school resource allocation framework. And I would also name that we continue to be doing very I think meaningful and courageous and difficult work with our interestbased bargaining teams to really scrutinize those those
ratios and frameworks right now where they are knowing where we're headed and knowing that we really need to um be able to evaluate every investment against are we getting are kids getting what they need from this investment.
Is this investment in staffing or programs having the desired outcomes that we want? And if not, how do we adjust that that allocation of resources um to better serve kids, to better uh save funding, to streamline what we do and focus on core work? And so that is
ongoing work um that we continue to work on with our employees. So more to come on that probably in the next year. Okay, that's all for me. >> Uh, once again, the cycling colleagues
appreciation for the effort in bringing us to this point, making sure we maintain transparency and timeliness. Um, and I just wanted to elevate some of the nudges that were already mentioned. Thank you for diving into the decision-m process around that particular slide with the reductions that we have right
now. Um it is a lot of moving pieces with a lot of input and I was just wondering could you just mentioned the IBB process a little bit um but between the decisions that you have listed on the 26 27's reductions page as well as the
discussion around the retirement incentive decision. Can you lay out that timeline and the role of the board going forward? So the one is the slide and then the other one's the retirement incentive. >> What was the first one? just you you answered it from director Ramirez's um question about how those were made, but
I'm just could you lay out how those interplay with the IBB pro or the interestbased bargaining process? >> Sure. We you know that um we make our best decisions especially when they're complicated and difficult by having a variety of viewpoints at the table
because we are um you know a small group of folks that need to get other eyes on complicated challenges and complicated solutions. The retirement incentive is absolutely one of those complicated things. It was um an incentive that we
uh created in the early 2000s in an effort to um find some savings, have some benefits for retirees. Um and for a long time it was paid for by the cost of folks who were long tenur in the district and paid a lot retiring and
they got this nice bonus upon departure. And then when we replace that position often with a firstear teacher or new teacher, there's significant savings that could pay for that retirement benefit. What we've seen in in subsequent years is that um not only is
it not budget neutral any longer because um for a variety of reasons, I think part of it is that we tend to to not we're not hiring as many teachers as we used to and we are also hiring more experienced teachers. It's rare that we get a new teacher to us is a new teacher
to the field. Um I think we're really lucky that way. And so what's happened was um that the cost of that incent that uh benefit has stopped being something that was budget neutral and actually become something that's quite volatile and unpredictable. Um and so we've had
years where we budgeted $300,000 and far surpassed that. We had years, this is all pre chief shoo I want to name. We've had years where it was missed entirely from the budget. Some of you were here, you remember us coming back to you and going, this was $688,000 that we totally missed in the budget. Um, and it's what
we've seen is it climb. And so you can see this year we're projecting it to be around $966,000. So where we're at with this as we look at every cost and we're looking at every expenditure really critically is I think what we've identified is two key things is that we have an interest first in really
honoring um our current long-term tenur staff because this retirement incentive is uh anybody who's worked with us for 15 consecutive years or more is eligible for it upon retirement. So, first is that we have a real interest in honoring our current long-erving tenur staff who
are counting on this to to have it um the commitment be honored. Uh these are folks that have been working with us for a long time. They've known about this and especially I will just name when you're within probably 3 to 5 to seven years of retirement, you start to pay attention to these sorts of things pretty critically. They play into your
decision-making. They play into your budgets. Um, and so we have an interest in honoring the current long-erving staff in looking at this plan. And we also have an interest in addressing and transforming the plan so that it's less
volatile, more predictable, and frankly could potentially have a stronger lifetime benefit for staff if we are able to take the dollars we're allocating to this one-time bonus and infuse it in our salary schedules at a
15 plus year step. because then what would happen is it would increase potentially a staff member's highest average salary which is a big stinking deal in the way your PAR long-term benefits are calculated. So those are kind of our interests and and what we're
hoping to do is really I think around you know and I think the other interest is then to find a collaborative solution. Um how do we uh both address the volatility of this and transform it to support staff without pulling the rug out from folks who have this in their three-year plan? Um and how do we do it
in a way that's thoughtful, that's clear, um and that feels collaborative. And so we're hoping to continue to engage with our um interestbased bargaining representatives. We had a great conversation with our classified interestbased bargaining team today about it. Um, director Ramirez was there
and it was interesting because we, you know, we heard from um, in particular one staff member who's planning to retire counting on this saying, I wish this had been in my highest average salary for the last 5 years. I know exactly what my PAR plan is going to be. You know, he he was also saying please
don't take this away right now because I'm counting on it. But you know what we have heard from staff is they understand the interest but how we do it the why the when we do it really really matters. Um and so we're we really need to continue the work with our interest based bargaining teams. My my personal
deadline for the board would be by the time we move forward this budget I would like to have a proposal ready for all of you to name how we're going to address this. whether that's a threeyear, a 5-year plan um to transform this what feels like right now a very volatile um
uh investment to something that feels more predictable and sustainable. So that's our hope in that work and I think we have a lot of interest and have had some great you know I mentioned the Q&A sessions that Chief Shaquin and I have been holding and Chief Brockman's been part of those as well and we have some
real interest um from staff who are willing to work on this with us and so really looking forward to continuing that and hopefully bringing you um a plan by the end of the year >> and will that be will that be a thank you that was okay very helpful um will that be a part of the interestbased bargaining presentation that we get at
our next meeting? I don't you know I don't know the next meeting was your meeting so interest based bargain's next Tuesday and I was like next board meeting >> um I I mean that would be a that's a great goal for us and I think that was pretty close because that next board
meeting is April 15th I think it' be a great goal for us at least for an update on where we're at with the process and maybe how close we are with the plan. >> Yeah and the interestbased bargaining input is going to be really important to come to that consensus especially with certified staff moving forward. Um, I
also just had a question quickly about CCAP and I looked up its Colorado childare assistance program for families. Make sure I have that on the tip of my tongue. Um, we didn't see the reduction this time. Do we expect that grace to continue or is it still potentially on the chopping block? Do you have any crystal ball for its
future? So, there was Right. So, these were the federal dollars that were temporarily withheld from a couple of key states in January. And so when we were preparing our amended current year budget, this was um going to this funding was going to be withheld from the district. So we included in the
amended budget, but then it was reinstated until the end of May. Um I have not heard any updates on this from the federal or local level. I think everyone said, "Oh, it's been the funding has been reinstated till May." But we'll keep you posted because it
definitely is a a key um a key lever in helping us achieve our goals in early childhood access. Um we have a huge number of families that benefit from that funding. And then just one other thing on that list of specific items um that have been reduced. I saw the prek tuition. We are
still addressing that decision in the next meeting. Is that correct? >> Correct. >> Okay. Yep. >> Thank you. Um we now have five minutes for open discussion. I did want to make a request and I think if we are bringing back another budget discussion um your slide eight for the original budget
reductions we have a slide like that similar for the 2425 year with a projected losses and gaps in the plan to address. Can you guys bring back something for the 26 27 school year similar to that? I think it would be helpful to see it bulleted out and laid
out in that way um because it's kind of we're peacemealing a little bit with all the information. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Something where you did that make sense? >> I I'll look it up to see what and if I have any questions about it, I'll reach out. >> Thank you. Does that sound good? >> Perfect. >> Okay.
>> All right. Well, more to come on the budget for sure. Thank you all. >> At this time, we welcome members Oops. Sorry, Madam Chairman. Off to >> um at this time, we welcome members of the public who have signed up to address the board. There are there were 11
speakers who signed up prior to our meeting and then we had the last four spaces filled up which I as chair I'm happy to call up tonight uh unless any of my fellow directors see an issue to that seemingly I signed up before 6:15.
>> Thank you. Um the board all lots 45 minutes for public comment to respect the time of all who are present. Speakers are to limit their remarks to 3 minutes or less. Reminder to all speakers to uphold our procedures for public comment. We ask you to be thoughtful, constructive with your
comments and thank you in advance for sharing your feedback. Members of the public who wish to share their views with the board may do so in writing at any time. For this evening's public comment, we received four written comments. Our first speaker is Kath Adams
who is not present this evening. Our next speaker is James Stanbury. >> I'm tuning my hearing aids in. Give me just a second, please. That's That's better. Oh,
my name uh Can you guys hear me? My name is Mike Scanberry. James M. I've been in the valley since 1967. Um I can remember when Willlets was Hayfields. And uh anyway,
I uh all of my kids went through K through 12 basalt schools which treated them very well and they've all done well. Um my daughters were a sex education class
at Basalt Pie. day the uh the teacher lost control of the class and it was very ugly and I complained to my castanza um in house
say that was a highly regarded occupation. when you guys teachers get to heaven, you're going to be in the upper crust because of the influence you've had and the care you've
given to the people entrusted to you. Um, this curriculum I'm going to be speaking on that several years ago when this curriculum was accepted
um we opposed it and um was passed anyway officers with information they aren't material enough to process more than they need to have this information and
care about. That's insane. It's insidious. It's flusted on them by people who are supposed to love them and care for them. It's wrong. It's not only shortsighted, but wrong.
It damages our very dearest heritage and children. In what world to let children make decisions from which there is no turning back?
A good question would be asking yourselves who's pushing this agenda? Who's pushing it? Are you guys being used to institute something that is so bankrupt and
thank you Mike >> and and they're falling in the curriculum. >> Mike, thank you so much. We're going to have to make time for other speakers. I appreciate it. Thank you for your comment. >> I'm not >> Thank you for your comment. My time is
up. Okay, I got my three. Okay. Well, thank you for hearing me. >> Thank you. >> Our next speaker tonight is Michaela. >> She's here. >> Michaela. >> Thank you.
>> I know this is on the agenda next time, but I don't know if I'm able to make it. but just wanted to um come in person. So, my name is Michaela Hammer Pura and I'm here as a longtime youth advocate in our valley um serving kids 0 to 18 in various roles and as a parent of two
kids who go to Balt. Um I would like you to please reconsider the proposed 26 27 early childhood tuition increases. Balancing district budget pressures by passing even more costs on to families and educators who are already being priced out of the valley would be a grave misstep. When early childhood
becomes less affordable, families leave or don't move here at all, which accelerates the enrollment decline we're already facing across the district, including K through2. It becomes a self-defeating cycle of higher costs, fewer families, lower enrollment, less funding, back to higher
costs. I understand the stated goals, aligning rates with local providers, reducing general fund transfers, improving early childhood teacher compensation, and maintaining quality. Those are real priorities. and teacher pay must improve. But increases of this
magnitude, 5 to 35% based on the school, in one year, risk turning early childhood into a program that only works for higher income individuals and households. While everyone else is pushed into patchwork care, long commutes, or leaving the valley and comparable to local providers isn't a
meaningful benchmark for me um in a region where the market is already unaffordable for the workforce that keeps our community running. Many of us barely afford this program but don't qualify for benefits like CCAP or Kids First. I'm also concerned about shifting
the staff sorry sliding scale into a benefits navigation approach through the family resource center. Connecting employees to resources can help, but it shouldn't replace the district's responsibility to keep early childhood affordable for its own workforce. Asking staff to cobble together public benefits
just to make working here possible undermines retention and stability for kids. Early childhood education is essential infrastructure. It's the highest leverage window for brain development and school readiness and it's one of the most effective two generation investments we have because
it supports children and stabilizes families. But access determines impact. If families can't afford it, the benefits concentrate among higher income households and equity gaps grow. Before moving forward, please provide a clear public affordability and enrollment impact analysis and put additional
options on the table. phased in increases, a stronger sliding scale, and a transparent plan for how new revenue will translate into compensation without pricing families out. And please address why other funding sources don't appear to have been fully pursued first,
including grants, philanthropic partnerships, and the technical support school teams need to become grant ready and competitive. Early childhood is essential to our community and our K through2 system, not a luxury add-on. And I do want to say that my children,
one is in fourth grade, so she is not affected by this. And my four-year-old will be receiving UPK next year, so not affected. But just fundamentally, I feel like we got to work on this. And I'm not a teacher. So, thank you guys. Thank
you. Our next speaker this evening is Jamie Gocha. My name is Jamie Gosha. Both of my kids attended school in RE1 and I live in Glenwood and own a home in Carbondale. At the last meeting, I spoke in opposition to the inappropriate and explicit sex education curriculum that
was implemented by this district and along with dozens of concerned parents and community stakeholders asked that it be removed from our schools. This board issued a statement that the curriculum will not be removed from our schools, which sent the message to our kids and our community, that your agenda is more important than the well-being and the
innocence of the students you were elected to serve and protect. Tonight, I would like to talk a little bit about trust. This community demonstrated their trust in your good sense and judgment by electing you to your position on the BOE. We trusted that you would hire a superintendent and senior leadership
team who are experts in educating our children and managing the taxpayer funding that has afforded our communities with updated learning spaces and highly qualified and caring teachers in every classroom. We trusted that when our children are away from us at school that they are learning how to read, write, do math,
make friends, play outside, and build supportive relationships with their teachers. We teach our kids to trust that the adults at school have their best interests at heart and that they want them to be successful in their studies and to be productive, helpful citizens. We are believers in public education because we are products of
public education. We know it can be an amazing experience for kids if we can trust that these things are happening. Unfortunately, the ways in which this board, this superintendent and the senior leadership team has handled the valid and heartfelt concerns regarding the content in the sex education
curriculum, the lack of transparency around its introduction in the opt- out process, and the dismissive and patronizing manner in which you have treated those with concerns has eroded all public trust in the Red Park School District. Without trust, there can be no relationship. The good news is that you're in a
position to earn our trust back and do right by the children and families in this district. You can start by contingent curriculum and adopt an age appropriate and parent approved curriculum such as positive action or health smart that meets state requirements and protects the innocence and safety of our kids. You can make
necessary changes at the superintendent and senior leadership level to ensure that our student achievement levels are not an abysmal failure. 35% proficiency in reading and 15% proficiency in math is unacceptable. And those responsible for that failure must be held to account. Instead of asking for even more
money through the mill proposal, you can responsibly manage the funds that you have and eliminate unnecessary administrative positions so that the teachers receive adequate pay and our children have the resources they need to learn. Did you ever stop and ask why student employment is down? I would bet that student performance scores and
putting your progressive agenda ahead of parent partnerships are the reason. Focus on the basics. Go back to the curriculum that focuses on positive relationships and inspires curiosity and critical thinking and diversity of thought. Make school joyful again. Until you take ownership of the mistakes being
by this district and commit commit to course correction, you will not be able to regain public trust. I'm asking you to listen to the concerns before you and to be brave enough to swallow your pride, respect the role of parents as ultimate teachers of their children, and work together to arrive at solutions that result in kids who are healthy,
motivated, and thriving. Our next speaker this evening. Our next speaker this evening is Ashley Stall. Good evening. My name is Ashley Stall and I'm a mother to a student at Glenwood Springs High School, a student
at Yampa, and a little one who will likely come up through this district. We are a queer family. I am also the executive director of P Flag of the Roaring Fork Valley, and I was part of the community that fought to get the three Rs curriculum adopted in 2023. I want to talk about real kids tonight.
I work with the GSAs in schools from Aspen to Parachute. I know dozens of kids in this district by name. I have sat with queer kids of all ages right here in this valley who tell me that this curriculum is the first time that a health class has acknowledged that they
exist, not celebrated them, not centered them, just acknowledged that they are real. That's how low the bar was before 2023. And that's what's being threatened right now. I want to be clear that I'm here on behalf of those kids tonight.
They would be here themselves if it was safe for them to do so, but it is not. These are kids in our community who are already navigating more than most of their classmates. Higher rates of depression, anxiety, and isolation. Less likely to have adults at home they can
talk to about who they are. For some of the kids I work with right here in this district, a health class that says queer people exist is the only place in their day where they feel seen. That is not an abstraction. That is a kid in Glenwood, Carbondale, or Basalt sitting in a classroom each day. And what happens at
this board table affects whether that kid makes it through. Let's be honest about who is behind this campaign. It's not a group of concerned local parents who independently arrived at the exact same talking points used in Minnesota, New Jersey, and Texas. This is a coordinated national playbook dropped
onto our community by people who have made their careers out of making queer kids feel like they do not belong in public life. They are not interested in improving education for kids in this valley. They are interested in using our children as a political prop. And while we are fighting to hold that line, I
want to ask this board to also push further. The three Rs acknowledges that trans kids exist. This is good, but it is not enough. A trans girl right here in this district has health needs that are specific to who she actually is. And right now, this curriculum does not
address them. She deserves a health curriculum that speaks to her life, not just her anatomy. That means working with health educators who understand trans bodies. It means supplemental materials that go beyond acknowledgement. And it means treating trans kids as full participants in their
own health education rather than an afterthought. I'm asking this board not to just protect what we have, but to demand more of it for the kids who are counting on us. Public school is for all kids in this community. If your religious beliefs require that queer people do not exist, there are private
options available to you. This board was elected by this community twice in an overwhelming fashion on this issue to protect this curriculum. I'm asking you to keep doing that. Thank you. >> Our next speaker this evening is Mike
Goa. Hello, my name is Mike Osha. I live in Glennwood and own a house in Carbondale. Both my children were students in RE1 and I myself am a product of Roaring Fork School District. Starting kindergarten in Carbondale and graduating from Roaring Fork High School
in 1990. In fact, I played a lot of dodgeball uh in middle school PE in this very room. History is important and I think people who have lived here for generations and helped build and keep our communities thriving have a valuable perspective that should should not be
ignored. Uh once upon a time school is a place that taught kids how to read, write, do math, think critically, and play well with others. Parents rights and responsibilities for moral and ethical upbringing of their children were respected by school officials and their partnership was seen as being
necessary for student success. The community was proud and support uh supportive of its schools because they were producing high achieving well-rounded and uh skilled members of society. It wasn't perfect, but nearly all students were proficient in basic academics and life skills that prepared
them for their future endeavors. When I look at what is happening in RE schools now, I don't see anything remotely resembling the experience I had in this district. The disgusting and im immoral sex education material you're exposing young young children to is criminal.
Your refusal to take accountability for adopting this repulsive curriculum and not being transparent about its content or how parents can opt out is appalling. The way you are prioritizing politics over truth and ignoring public outcry is shameful. The three Rs curriculum needs
to be removed from our schools immediately. The Royal Fork School District of today is an embarrassment to our community, not only to have the implemented and uh defended this vile uh curriculum, hidden content, and opt- out procedure and ignored concerns from
parents and stakeholders. But now you're going to sit there with a straight face and ask for more money. How do you expect to keep uh how do you expect us to keep funding your failures, especially when you clearly do not wish to uphold the values and expectations we have for our kids?
This values residents have a long history of supporting our schools both financially and philosophically. Uh recognizing the value of high quality education for our kids' future, the future of this community. The Roaring Fork School District continues to prove that this is incapable of offering our
kids a highquality education. According to the superintendent's mid-year report, two out of three kids are not able to read and eight out of 10 kids can't do math at a proficient level. This is outrageous. You all need to hold people responsible to account. There is no way
the community should support a milary override to send more money to be burned up a house that is on fire. This administration has proven that a progressive that your progressive ideology in and incompetence is damaging to kids. They are not getting smarter,
healthier or more skilled. R1 schools are a failure and change all that level is desired is desperately needed. >> Thank you very much. Please conclude your comments. I appreciate it. >> Two I have two words of advice. Do
better. >> Our next speaker our next speaker this evening is Salomi Gonzalez. Salomi Gonzalez as a speaker. Thank you. Gonzalez, soch. Garfield domest. key.
Latinos. Jasmine Ramirez, please. Excuse me, Salom. Please adhere to our regulations. My minutes. Thank you very much. >> Thank you.
I'm speaking Spanish. Shake. You know what you're doing to the kids? That should be child abuse. So, I'm going to go back to our expectations for public comment. We ask you to be thoughtful and constructive with your comments and thank you in advance for sharing your feedback. I'm
also going to ask that we up um end the applause as that is eating into other speakers times. you can show your respect and appreciation for them in other ways that are better aligned with the uh the actions we need in this boardroom. Our next speaker is Susan
Trible. Thank you. The agenda today calls for a celebration. The public would like to address this, but in different ways. We want to highlight the congratulations for the miscalculation of roughly $6 million and
reports now indicate that an additional shortfall of possibly $3.5 million for this year. That figure includes the loss of students leaving the Roing Fork School District, taking about $470,000
in funding with them. This budget failure is not a tax problem. It is a superintendent and a board member problem. We are also being told that the district will completely close its deficit by 202627
without a mill levy override. It is important to note that when you full when you were fully funded those funds were mismanaged which created the deficit. Why should the public believe that overriding the mill levby giving you another chance will not result in
the same mismanagement? Test scores show that even with a fully funded district, 70% of students cannot read, write, or do arithmetic at the expected level. Those are the three Rs we care about. We celebrate a 90% graduation rate, but
that includes the 30% of students at the state at the state average, which you also celebrate, and 60% who are not at state average. From 2010 through 2013, district proficiency rates were around 80%. A huge difference from today's 30.
Let that sink in. What has changed? Leadership. We used to be more conservative and focused on quality education, reading, writing, arithmetic. Our schools were once beacons of learning where families chose one school over another based on strong academic criteria. Now students
are leaving. Have you asked why? Is it because you have repeatedly ignored public concerns about curriculum and test scores, and through your progressive decisions and poor outcomes, you have driven students away? Today's new three-hour curriculum has
effectively become a health class that is really a sex education class. When Advocates for Youth, the creators of this curriculum, told you it should never be referred to as a health curriculum, you called it that anyway. It is not appropriate for four to 5year-olds, much less 14y olds. It is so
explicit, I'm not sure it should be considered for high school students. This remaining has caused a mistrust to your leadership. The miscalculation that you can do as you please affects your budget. The truth is you are no longer focused on creating a well-educated society. Your curriculum choices appear
more about dumbing down our children and sexually stimulating them at the earliest age possible than it is about educating them on the fundamentals. When will you start putting our children first and their education? And when will you start providing proper curriculum that drives test scores up? When will
you connect that this will increase student enrollment? In the end, it is these things that improve your budget, not a no levy override. Thank you. >> Thank you very much. Our next speaker this evening is John Eaton.
question is do we throw good money at bad policy? The fact of the matter is grades have fallen since 2013 from 80% to 30% competency. So more than 70% of the students school now
do not have the skills to contribute to society or function well at work. with an email levy request researched and found that I'm paying the school district more than $11,300 70%. Let me see. So, I'm paying more
than 70 I'm paying for more than 70% of the kids to fail. This is money very poorly spent. It has become very obvious that the school board is much more interested in the far-left political agenda than teaching, reading, writing,
arithmetic, and history. I talked to more than 40 people in the last 3 weeks, and not one of them thought that teaching 5-year-olds that the woman's most sensitive spot was her clitoris, that the male penis doesn't have a bone in it, or the depth of the vagina canal.
This was they didn't think it was a responsible thing to do. They were shocked and they considered this irresponsible. The word is out. It's gone viral. The people are young people are irresponsible. This curriculum is going
to spur kids to to be curious and try and experiment with sex way sooner than any reasonable parent would ever consider. And I really don't care what your so-called experts say. I worked with addicts in jail and I can guarantee you that they would all say that this
will create sexual addiction. We have been talking about this for a long time and realized that the school board really doesn't care what the parents think or say. The superintendent's comments in the newspaper shows that we're also having a very hard time trusting you with money.
Apparently 7 million is unaccounted for. This is in incompetent or Is this incompetent or corruption? Excuse me. The last superintendent took this the the board for a lot of money and he was unqualified and incompetent.
He played you like a fiddle. Now you're asking for more money. You need an outside audit immediately to give the taxpayers an answer to where their hard-earned tax dollars have gone. So, I'll give this advice once again. Go back to when the schools were getting the best grades and look at the 12-year
curriculum and start there. throw out what's not working and clearly that's this curriculum and get and and throw out whoever doesn't support it. Talk to all this the old school board members who got the best results. As a recovering addict, they say the hardest thing to do is admit you have a problem
and you guys have a real problem. I was employed at this school one time four years as a coach and we raised three kids who won a lot of awards and I will say this, they're contributing a lot to society in this valley. Thank you so much, John. I appreciate. >> We also have two grandsons in this
valley and that is why I am here. >> Thank you. Our next speaker this evening is Tanner Janetti. >> Hey, you got to be a good boy up here. Okay, you sit on now. Thank you.
Thanks. Testing one, two. Well, before I get started today, I just wanted to ask for a show of hands on everybody who's in here in opposition of the 3 hours curriculum. And please keep your hands raised if you're in opposition of the parental
rights violations that are occurring. Thank you. So the packet that I passed out before you all is the same version I emailed you earlier today and this is a formal request to meet to resolve the parental rights violations that are currently taking place in the district and
provides a detailed dispute foundation citing federal constitutional Colorado statutes and district policy violations. I've also brought a copy of this to be submitted for public record in this meeting. I truly look forward to looking
to receiving your response and working with you for the betterment of this district. Um, the rest of the time that I have available to me, I was going to focus in on this mill levy override. And the fact of the matter is we got to let the facts and merit actions speak for
themselves. And in 2025, only 25% of our students were proficient in math. That means that three out of four students in this district are not performing at grade level. Yet our graduation rates remain near 90%.
So while we celebrate an accredited status from the state, the parents and taxpayers of this valley are looking at the real the reality of an academic stagnation and a complete collapse of fiscal oversight. This isn't a success story. It's a
pushthrough policy. We're handing out diplomas that don't reflect actual competency, effectively setting our students up for failure the moment they leave our halls. Even more distressing is the board's failure in its most basic fiduciary
duty. The district received $7.7 million from a mill levy in 2021, then led the district to a $5 million deficit only two years later, caused by what this administration calls massive errors. You admitted to forgetting about budgets for
entire line items like transportation and special education. You drained 10 million in reserves in a single year to cover a lack of internal controls. Any private sector board would have been replaced for a fraction of this negligence. And instead, your response
to losing millions of taxpayer dollars through poor accounting was the straw man former admins and blame systems. Yet the senior board members here were responsible for this budget's approval. And yet again, you are asking the community for their endorsement for
another mill levy. This is not going to fix the financial issues. This is not a funding problem. It is a leadership problem. Since 2021, the academic gap has not closed. Our proficiency rates remain below the state
average and our bank account has been ma mismanaged to the point of crisis. How can you ask the taxpayers for a bailout to fix the holes created by your own oversight failures? Actions speak louder than words.
>> Thank you. That was pretty good. >> Thank you. >> Next, we have Savannah Ferguson. Good evening, board members. My name is Sabrina Ferguson. I am a district parent and a taxpayer. I am here tonight because the math for this 4.5 million mily override does not add up. In
October 2025, RFSD enrollment plummeted by 4.2% nearly four times the state average. While our student population shrinks, the tax revenue is exploding. Property tax collections are set to increase by 11 million this year alone due to rising
valuations. To claim that 11 million people is not is an insult to the taxpayers of this valley. By raising the tax again, you aren't fighting the housing crisis. You're subsidizing it. You're directly responsible for the cost
of living increases increases that prices families and our teachers out of their homes. Last year, the district faced a 5.7 deficit. Your solution was to drain 2.5 million from reserves and divert 1.5 million from the medical
housing surplus. Let's be clear. When a d district loses track of millions in recurring cost, it does have a revenue. It doesn't have a revenue problem. It has a management problem. In 2021, you promise us issue 5B would fund teacher
staffing. Instead, you inflate administrative pay. Today, 32 administrative position cost us 5.7 million and average of 117,000 each including benefits. Well, the superintendent took 33% raise. Our
classrooms are starving. Your you have spent years prioritizing the comfort of the front office over the news of students. Your academic results are equally indefensible. While math and literacy scores lag and schools slide into priority improvement
status, your priority is higher in deans of culture at 83,000 year plus benefits. I think that culture does not teach a child to solve a quadratic equation of decoded text. Culture is the result of academic success. It's not a job title
that you can buy with taxpayer money. Every dollar spent on is a dollar stolen from a math interventionist or a smaller classroom. The most recent audit shows a 37% drop
in cash reserves in a single year. That is a massive red flag. This 4.5 million bail out isn't a strategy for excellence. It's a It's an emergency bailout for poor management. Stop asking your voters and directors to pay for
your fiscal mismanagement. You're sitting on a people said accountability starts here tonight. Will you prioritize the classrooms or will you continue to feed the bureaucracy? Thank you. >> Thank you. Our next speaker from our
additional list here, and I apologize if I mispronounce uh Jaylen Lesig. Thank you for allowing me to speak tonight. Um my name is Jalen Lesig. I'm a retired technology teacher from um Basalt Middle School teaching our in our
district here for 25 years and 11 previous years in uh Sydney, Nebraska as a classroom teacher. The reason I'm here to speak is because I am so alarmed at the extremely low academic test scores in our district.
This is a red flag. A little over 10 years ago and around 2012, Basalt Middle School made the national schools to watch list for three years consecutively. They were recognized statewide and
nationally for our high academic scores. The CDE site uh revealed just last night the shocking truth of um the the decline in these scores here in our district. So, how do we address these low scores?
I suggest skimming out programs such as the so-called health program or sexed um for primary grades or for school and instead focus the time spent in the classroom on skills and topics that
matter for academic success. Math, reading, English, science, social studies. Those are the basic skills of for success in future. As educated people, we know that students brains develop in a mature and mature in stages
over the years, especially in reading and math. My point is that they should not be mentally pushing primary grades to try and comprehend sex. Let the parents take that responsibility.
I wanted to know what this curriculum really included. And in spite of going to the school and searching the district website, there were no answers. Are we really looking clearly at the
needs of our young children? There is insufficient evidence that young children in the Roaring Fork school district are really ready for a type of program like this. For these reasons stated,
as a retired teacher and a taxpayer, I do not approve of my tax dollars being spent on this curriculum. Let's spend our tight funds as s seen tonight on curriculum that counts. math,
reading, English, science. >> Thank you. Up next, we have Elise Wolf as our speaker. Good evening. My name is Elise Wolf. I live in Carbondale and I have a child in the Basalt ECE who will be entering
kindergarten next year. I'm speaking tonight in support of the three Rs curriculum. Um, I want to restate those rights, respect, and responsibility. Thank you to the board and former board
members for bringing this curriculum to the Roaring Fork Valley. The ECE parents receive all of the notifications for Basalt Elementary. So I saw that saw the announcement that the Basalt Elementary School would be teaching this curriculum in March uh
right in line with the opt out form. I read through the curriculum knowing this was coming down the line for my child next year and knowing this was something um of a subject of contention for some. I read all six lesson plans for grades K through four. They are
entitled my space your space. My body is my body circle of life. Understanding our bodies consent. Your body your rights. I read through every page and tried to
imagine myself in the shoes of other parents. What part of this curriculum might be objectionable? I couldn't find one part of respect, body part knowledge, and boundary
setting that I could find objectionable. My space, your space curriculum being taught to kindergartens in basalt at least discussed giving kids the space to develop the touch they are okay with and the touch that makes them uncomfortable.
These are not sexual. We're talking about faces, knees, elbows, ears. Nowhere in here is sexuality discussed. Nowhere in this curriculum are private parts, genitals discussed.
What parent, what what community member would not wish that our children are taught to respect each other, protect themselves from harm, and communicate wrongdoing? I want this deeply for my child and I also want her classmates to be equally
equipped to respect each other and arm themselves with the language to protect each other. In the K4 curriculum, there's only one part that concerned me. It was in the My Body is My Part My Body curriculum targeted for first graders that sets
students up to identify trusted adults and practice telling a trusted adult about abuse. At this point, we all know that the adults kids think are trustworthy turn out to be untrustworthy. I don't know the right curriculum to address this, but it should be
considered. Just think about this. Um, just four or five years ago, a trusted daycare teacher in this valley was building an unsafe relationship with students. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Our next our next speaker this evening
is Alvin Badget. I will remind the audience to please hold applause. Alpen budget. >> I'd like to start by thanking you all for having all of us. It's uh very respectful of you to hear our comments.
Uh my name is Alen Badget. I didn't really prepare, came to listen, but I stopped at the library and got a book out of the free room and it inspired me. Um, it's about finding a holy moment and
I might read from it. Um, I'd like to introduce myself. Actually, before I introduce myself, I'd like to thank Tanner for what he's been doing, bringing attention to these matters of the 3R curriculum, um, which I'm highly opposed to.
I'd also like to thank Mr. Mr. Nisslanic who spoke on the 11th I believe when I listened to the board meeting um comments on the 11th and heard Nlanic. Can you bring your mic closer? >> Sonic's testimony about his second your
second grader coming out of the classroom or the other kids coming out of classroom cuz his second grader had opted out. And the kids came out confused. My heart broke. I cried.
A little bit about myself. I've been here for 50 years. I'm 52 years old. My dad is a coal miner. I'm a painter. I came here after work. I've spent my whole life preparing a
home for my five children, one of whom just graduated from college, Kumlad. My three-year-old is going to be a kindergartener. My 8-year-old is in second grade in private school. And my two high school age kids are here at Ronin Fork High
School. I pay 10% of my monthly income for property tax. I grew up in a shack and marble and drank water of the spring. The home I property or the property I bought in Carbonale was a trailer home that I p I fixed the leaks
in the roof for 17 years and then I got a loan and built the house. I heard earlier during your meeting about a 50% increase in your insurance. That hit me too. It
hurts. You know what else has increased? Property taxes drastically. It feels like oppression. I work my butt off and I can't afford to live here. I want my kids to live here
too. happily. So, at any rate, I strongly am upset about the disrespect of this three hours curriculum. >> Thank you. >> I wish I could go on. There's something in there about calling
>> we have we need to hear this to hear this. There's something in there in an animation that white people cannot add. >> Did you know that that's in your curriculum? white people cannot appreciate you showing this evening and I must ask you to statement itself.
>> This is not respectful of the time of statement itself is racism >> and the other board members. Thank you. >> Statement itself is racist. >> Our final speaker of the evening is Christy uh not >> Christy White. >> Thank you.
Hi there. Thank you for allowing me to be here and I wasn't planning to speak at all, but um I feel it's necessary. I've been in the valley for over 31 years. Um
I'm not as prepare prepared as all the other speakers with all their um statistics. I'm just going to speak from my heart. Um, my mom taught school for over 35 years. Her mom taught school for
54 years, was a superintendent, and I they're rolling over in their graves. Um, we raised six kids who went through this school district. One graduated from
Waring Fork, three from Glenwood High. The youngest was very affected. And um when he came home from school one day, he said, "I hate you. I hate America to us." Um it was his senior year. He had
all his credits. I looked in the driveway. His car was there. So I knew he was at home sleeping or um just being away from the environment, the evil environment that he was in. because
within 2 weeks or so he said I love you to us and gave us hugs and um it just this is there when he graduated there were 13
validictorians. You tell me that is oh you get a participation ribbon just for being here that that's that's asinine. Um um all people however I want to say I am
a Christian all people are validated. I love all people. Um so maybe there should be a separate class for those that LGBTQ um class for for them just a separate
place where they can go not being forced upon everyone else. Um and uh speakers >> I saw comments of criticism at the board, but please refrain from indicating um comments of criticism at our staff and students. Thank you. >> I I'm sorry. I didn't think I was
criticizing, but anyway, so I saw the curriculum that is being introduced, and I thank God that my kids are out of this demonic uh system. This curriculum is nothing but legalized pornography and I
will fight with all my being until this is totally removed from our school system. Thank you. Thank you. >> You want to make a move? >> Madam Chair, I make a motion to take a brief recess. Five minutes. We have
second. Second. The board will go into recess for 5 minutes. We're the board is returning from our fivem minute recess. Director NMO is >> she's right there >> is is here as well. Thank you. So director after director Ramirez,
director the freighes, director Koolenbergs and director NMO are once again present, meaning we have a quorum. The next business in order is the approval of the consent agenda which includes routine personnel minutes from our previous board meeting, updated home ownership guidelines, and the 2026 27
staff housing tiered. And there are also no final read policies included in tonight's consent agenda. Just worth noting. Directors, are there any items you would like to pull off the consent agenda for a separate discussion and vote? >> I make a motion that the board approve
the consent agenda as presented. >> Do I have a second? >> I second. All the vote. >> I I >> I >> Let's all check our mics, too, Betsy. Yep. Okay, good. Thanks.
Uh the next business in order then is discussion on policies GCHC, GCS, GDA new, and the repeal of policies GCQB, GD, GDA current, and GDAA.
Each board member will have two minutes to share comments or ask questions unless staff wanted to open with anything else. I don't think so. I think these are pretty straightforward, but happy to answer any questions you have. >> Director Kenberg.
>> Sure, we'll start us off. Um, we went over all of these in policy committee. I didn't have major comments or things that I'm remembering that I wanted to bring up here. Um,
on GCHC, it looks like it was addressed the final paragraph. We wanted to make clear that this is the CDE evaluation, not an internal evaluation process. Um, in GCS,
I support Director After's comment about the data research that's not a regular part of instruction or assessment needs informed consent for parents. That was something that I had raised during um policy committee was ensuring
that if we were including students as part of research that we got informed consent and I do think that saying that it's not part of regular instruction or assessment will make sure there's no confusion. Um, and then in
I don't remember anything specifically in GDI other than making sure that our our language aligned in terms of positions and um who's responsible for holding these things. I don't have anything else.
>> Director Ramirez, >> the only um question I had was GDA. I did ask a question of um saying that well employees serve at the pleasure of the board. I mean technically we do do the routine personnel but I don't know that we have
the right to dismiss anyone. So I just think it should be updated to superintendent. >> We can make that revision. >> What's up director after? >> Thank you. Um thanks for all these. I
thought they looked good. Um, I uh ran the professional research and publishing uh version uh new version by a close friend who has a lot of experience on that topic and she thought it was fabulous and um was hoping her own
district would um possibly do something similar. So, thanks for that. Um and uh yeah that was the one piece we discussed was just clarifying the purpose of this policy the purpose of the data um specifically around this policy.
>> Thank you Dan. >> Um I did have a question about it was talking um this about all the policies >> any of the ones. >> Sorry I'm a little scattered. >> All of the there's a bunch of G's all >> the GCS so it's okay. Okay. um
professional research and publishing it just says only those studies which have value to the school district will be approved and I'm just wondering like who decides what has value there is an approval process and there are um sometime but not often employees who
perhaps are doing generation research project as part of a lensure program or something like that and so there is value for the individual completing the information and it also could be a value ad for the school district, but we
probably would not allow it if it were something far outside of the scope of a regular work of schools >> and that'd be a team decision or a group decision. >> I think that the CAO is the approver. >> Thank you. >> Chief academic officer.
>> We're getting there. I need it too very much. Um, thank you all so much for taking this time. I did not have a chance to join policy committee. I was on the road for work. Um, and then can you just touch on did any of these interact with the uh collective bargaining contract as implicated for
staff? Yeah. And so can you remind me besides policy committee, were there stakeholders involved in reviewing and revising? Yeah, that's a great question. In addition to um policy committee, we did because um these are mostly related to staff, we were able to look at the
support staff um policy in leadership professional development when chief Bombak and I meet with classified leaders and that was very helpful. And then the induction program we looked at in LMC. >> Excellent. Uh thank you so much. I don't
have any labor management committee. Labor management committee. Yes. See, I didn't catch that one. Thank you. All right. Um, and we'll now have five minutes for open discussion. >> All right. Thank you so much. These are on first. We'll see these again. Is that
correct? Or are they on consent next time? >> They'll be on consent unless they're new and need three. >> Two new. Okay. GCS and GDA. Thank you. The rest will be on consent. Okay.
in relating to new ones. So the repeal and the new one will be few years from now on political. >> Thank you very much. I appreciate that clarity. Thank you. >> All right. So the next business in order
is approval of the Roaring Fork SDRs 2025B increase borrowing resolution. Uh, do I have a motion to approve the Roaring Fork SD Trans 2025B increased borrowing resolution? >> I make a motion to approve the Roaring
Fork SD Trans 2025B increased borrowing resolution as presented. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Second. >> We're now two minutes two minutes discussion for each board member and then five minutes of open discussion. Director Me, you want to take it away?
I mean, I looked at it and if Christy thinks it's a great idea, let's just do it. No, I I don't have anything right now. >> Okay. Thank you, director. After >> Yeah. Can you just stay We actually didn't talk about this in um finance
committee and I hadn't reviewed it at that time. So, um, sorry if any of these questions are, um, I hadn't previewed them for you, but can you just talk a little bit about, um, I'm pulling up memo in the memo, it
says, um, there's a decline in the amount received for the March 10th property taxes compared to the anticipated receipts, totaling a $6.5 million reduction in receipts for March. That's just a timing issue, right? >> It's a timing issue. >> Okay. if not a um some of the public speakers tonight I think might have been
referring to some something there. I'm not entirely sure but um I just wanted to state for the record in case they were that this is a timing um a short-term cash flow situation related to collection of property tax some of which is out of our control. That's
absolutely correct. uh we have uh the way that the state calculates this is based upon the average of the last three years collections because people have a choice of when they pay their taxes between February and May. And so it's just dep dependent on if you have a
large taxpayer for example that pays later or earlier. it can really shift when you um have your um when your you receive your property taxes and the state requires us to pay them back immediately upon the receipt of those
property taxes. So then that requires additional borrowing to get us through April. So it's just a kind of an awkward situation that is just based on timing. >> Okay. And then the um the difference that you're referring to in the third paragraph of your memo, you say that um
3 point sorry 33.3 million is the need and you're asking for 36 via this resolution. That's to give us a buffer in case there's continued timing issues. Correct. Okay, that's correct. Or you know the real challenging thing with
cash flow is that it is based on the timing of receipts of our grants. it's based upon, you know, if there's any large payments that we owe to accounts payable, you know, based upon a different schedule than just averaging. And so there's lots of different
variables that I don't necessarily know of until I I get I get a hit somewhere. So then it's good to know that we have an additional buffer for just those general cash flow fluctuations that that occur in a business.
Thank you, >> director. Um, I think just timelinewise, it's helpful for the board to be um, you know, whether it's through a uh, update or, you know, finance committee or something to have the opportunity to
talk through this. I mean, obviously, it's something standard that we need because of everything happening with state finances and everything. Um, but I do think it's helpful for the board to have a little bit more notice, especially if this is going to become a
regular routine. Um, which who knows, hopefully knock one. I hope it doesn't. Um, but I appreciate our ability to ask for more rather than just the bare minimum because I do think we need the buffer. Um, especially just with the
volatile um, financial world that we're living in. Um, and so I appreciate the team's memo to um, inform the board of this decision and why we chose that amount. >> Okay. Thank you, >> Director Kenberg. I don't have any questions on this. Okay.
>> Thank you. I would just note for the record and public that may or may not still be listening that the Colorado State Legislature determines per pupil funding and that as property taxes increase, the state contribution decreases. and that this need for a loan is because we don't get property taxes
until much later in the year. Some of the public comments mentioned increase in property taxes as a windfall and that is unfortunately not the case. It actually is very difficult to uh bridge the timing of availability of funds and if I said any of that wrong, please jump in and correct me.
>> I I'll just um I'll stand with you on exactly what you stated. Uh the the challenge is is the that the legislature really impacts our local property taxes and how much we pay as a local jurisdiction towards our per pupil
funding and and the funding for our students and how much the state pays and that state back bill continues to decline. So as our property values increase then instead of giving our property taxpayers a break they take at
the state advantage of that and and increase our our share local share of the property tax. And that's why we have had have seen these large increases in in borrowing over the last couple of years is is because of what the
legislature has been doing to that local share. And it's been significant. But we have not been receiving a significant increase in our funding as a district as a result of that. It just changes who's paying the bill. I appreciate that. I
think maybe we just need to open each meeting with some version of that statement from here on out for the next few months. Um I really appreciate the extra time that this takes as well on your from your staff to file these and deal with the state. It is not a simple process and it is a significant
investment of time. Um, thank you for bringing it forward this evening and I wish we didn't have to, but we obviously support your recommendation here. >> Thank you. >> 5 minutes of open discussion. >> Um, I just wanted to add something. You just reminded me a couple years back and
it might not be that long ago and I don't know if you remember, but we did have a conversation at one point about maybe having like the CFO write a not like a, you know, an opinion piece in the paper to talk about district finances. M
>> it might be a really good time to >> consider that an option as we're talking about >> um not just the MLO but declining enrollment and all of the conversations on property taxes. I think it might be a good investment of our time of to try to
see if we can I don't know draft something up to share with community in regards to even property taxes and that's just one one topic that would really help us communicate with district community on you know the impact.
>> Thank you. No, that's a really good really good push. Um and it's very timely. So, we'll see what we can do. Thank you. >> Yeah, we're going to need the repetition. We all have come to understand it in this room, but it's still a foreign language to anyone who's picking up the newspaper, even those who
stay relatively informed. So, never shy away from repetition on this front. >> Understandably so. They make it exceptionally difficult. >> Yep. >> One would almost say intentionally, but can I ask about the hold harmless? >> The I'm sorry, the what?
>> I I know what hold harmless is. I've looked it up, but are are we currently in a hold harmless situation? No. Okay, >> we are not. Um, >> and it's listed on here, the 17,000 ones like So, I guess Yeah. Can you explain that to me?
>> Yeah. Hold on. This is uh it it was a um legislative bill that passed uh I believe was 23 2425. But what it really pretty much does is it holds districts that are declining in enrollment pretty significantly
to um the minimum funding is now the 2425 total program funding for 2526 school year and 2627. So it gives like a buffer of time as the state is taking away our enrollment averaging so that
districts are not going to have to just downsize so drastically that it's going to be so significantly impactful to them that that it's really difficult for the culture and for the kids and things like that. At least it
it provides somewhat of a buffer if there is some precipitous decline in enrollment we don't anticipate or if the legislature cuts us to that point so that it just at least gives us a floor.
>> Yeah, because it's on this proforma one under current month hold harmless and override property taxes. It's so um >> yeah, that's that's what that's referring to. I'm not sure what where you >> we don't have it or we don't do it or
>> sorry >> what page are you on because I have >> um it's it's on it's on this proforma this I don't know how what to call it the actual >> what line >> what line >> the yellow one >> 27 >> oh 27
>> oh >> I think that's our overall >> so harmless is in there but it doesn't mean >> I don't think that's our >> no that's not for us that we Okay, thank you. I just I wasn't sure if it was going back to different question right there.
>> Yeah, I'm Yeah, you were fine. No, that that's great. I because it it does hold, you know, there's a hold harmless provision and that's what that's referring to. It is still that corre I did answer that correctly. It was just under a different context than our
previous budget discussion, but so that's why they have it in the spreadsheet. >> Okay. Okay. Any further comments or questions? Uh then I believe we need to call the vote. >> I I
>> I >> I >> I thank you very much. Motion passes. Okay. Thank you. >> The next business in order is new DAC member approval. Do I have a motion to approve the new DAC members?
>> I move that we approve new DAC members as presented. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> D chair Bridget Dash has uh prepared a few slides and she will briefly go over them before the board engages in discussion and we have two minutes. Thank you Bridget so much for joining us this evening.
>> Hi, thanks everyone. Um can you all hear me? We're not hearing you yet. >> Oh let's see. What about now? Can you hear me? >> Audio on. >> Can you hear me now? >> No, we still can't hear you. >> We still can't. Okay,
>> Jonathan's working on it. >> Hold on just a second. >> Okay, Taxi, you got to go to sleep. Okay. You can wait right here. Do you want to sit in this chair? >> No. >> No. Still can't hear you.
>> Still can't hear me. I'm so sorry. >> Would you call me and we'll put your >> Okay. Let me see if I She's on the move. >> I'm on the move. I have my phone.
I'm not sure what's wrong. >> Did you have Jonathan's number to give him a call? He can put your phone on speaker. Thumbs up. Uh >> oh. I don't mind technology problem. >> One more time.
>> Can you guys hear me now? >> Nope. Call me and I'll put my phone up to the mic. >> Hit the wrong button. >> Oh, good. Can you hear me now? >> Okay. You have to turn off the speaker on your computer.
>> Okay. Ting. Okay. What about now? >> Good. >> Thank you. Good hour. Okay. Great. Oh, thank you all for being here and taking time for me. I know that you've it's been a long soy appreciate it. I just want to give a quick update. We have
three new members um that we are working to vote in and I want to give you a brief overview of Jonathan. Also, first of all, my name is Bridget Dash and I'm the the chair of the of the district's accountability committee.
On this slide, you'll see there are three names in blue, Joshine Wise, Randy Hutchinson, and Dominic. And there's one in yellow, Elizabeth Taylor. The three in blue are the ones we'll be voting on to inform the board
sent in her resignation from the DAC and is not able to participate any longer at this time. Would you mind going to the next slide, Jonathan? Um, we you can see for both Dominic and
Randy um DACA members voted in favor. There was zero against. We did I tried to push in. We had three new um people apply to be on the the DACK. Joshine got her um got her application in in time, but we didn't have a very good uh
turnout of votes. So, there were three members that did not vote, but we did have four in favor. So, that passed from our committee. Um they did not um vote against, but they just did not participate in the vote. Next slide.
Um Dominic would be taking the position for one of the um for the administrator position. He's an administrator at Basalt High School. We're so excited to be able to have him as a member on the DACK. And I shared these slides with you
beforehand, but if you want to read more about him, this is information that he um put in the application form and then I just transcribed it here onto the slide. The next candidate is Randy Hutchinson, and this is the only one
that I would have a possible um question. Uh right now, I have her in the teacher slot. Um she is a school social worker and so I wasn't sure where exactly she would fall according to the
bylaws. Um so I do have her in that teacher position. If for some reason she didn't fall within that area, then I would move her um into the resident of a district um category. Um we've done that for another teacher, Kim Har, who is
with Two Rivers Community School. And then the final person that we're voting in is Joshine Wise. She is a parent. You got to just wait one second. Okay. >> Sorry, it's bedtime at my house. Joshine um is a is a parent um in the valley and
she um is has come to the last two DACK meetings and is really engaged and so we're excited to have her as a part of the deck. So that is a brief overview of the new DAC members. I'm happy to answer any questions and I just want to let you
all know that we are expecting um two members that are currently on the deck to resign at the end of the year. So, we are hoping to continue to grow the deck so that we can start next year off with a really strong um committee. >> So, as a matter of here, Bridget, you're
going to need to turn your speaker back on. I'm going to mute you on my phone and we're going to have to just kind of go through this as uh as well as we can here. So, because the board's going to be speaking and you're going to want to hear that. So, I'm going to mute you
here. >> Oh. Um before we open for public comments, can I just make one clarifying question? Um in our consent agenda, we had change of personnel. Is there anything on that list that would implicate um eligibility in these categories for the DAC
under the administrator category? I don't want to dive into the details too much, but it's already I think Dominic I saw resigned from the basalt position. I don't want to go into HR details in public session. Just making sure there's nothing there that would uh conflict
with his position here. And if we if we need to just put that somewhere else, that's fine, too. >> I think we just trust the process that um Bridget articulated with some flexibility in assignments and we can circle back in a couple months if that
sounds okay. Thanks. >> Okay. Uh two minutes of open discussion. Director Niml, I don't have any questions. I am excited. These people want to be on the board. Uh, Director Ramirez,
>> thank you so much, Bridget, for all your incredible work and all the teams work and making sure that you guys are not just recruiting, but actually diving into all of the things that you guys are responsible for. I really appreciate your guys's commitment and all of the time you guys give and you give as chair
to make sure all of this comes to the board. So, thank you for that. director after um no questions but huge gratitude Bridget to you and the team uh recruiting the these members and everyone else in the room um for the
DACK. So thanks thanks so much Director Coolenberg. >> No questions either. Just echoing the gratitude. I'm really grateful that the DAC is in the shape and that we've got some committed and engaged new members coming online. Yeah, same. And I very much appreciate those who are putting their names into
the hat to jump into these conversations. It's a steep learning curve. Um I'm sure for everyone involved. So, thank you for facilitating that onboarding. I know it's not easy. Um Bridget, we really appreciate your effort there. 5 minutes of open discussion.
Uh can I just confirm on the public record when we are going to be hearing from the DAC with their interests and concerns around the budget? It is coming on April the 22nd. Is that correct? >> Yes, >> I believe that is correct. And so I know the board had an interest last year in
making sure that the timing of that feedback was better aligned in our decision-m like a little bit earlier in the process um to make sure that we're really hearing from the community members who've invested all of this time. And so um Bridget, I don't know if you had any other comments or questions
before um we wrap up the agenda item and vote. I mute your speaker and I'm going to put you on the mic here. >> No, I don't have any more comments. We are excited to have one more um DAC meeting before we present to the board. We were able to make progress in our
last meeting. It was a web session um but we did we need a little bit more time to be able to bring our recommendations to the board. So, we appreciate being able to move our scheduled time to the following board meeting. Thank you very much. Um, would you call
a vote, please? >> Director Afternoon. >> Director Ephrades, >> I. >> Director, >> I. >> Director, >> I. >> Director Ramirez, >> hi. >> Thank you. Thank you, Bridget.
>> Thank you. Uh, the next business in order is a discussion on board tracker request from Director Ramirez. Oh, >> no, there's one more. >> Oh, sorry. I scrolled past that. I apologize. I'm jumped ahead. The next business in order is approval of a board education resolution honoring Women's History Month. Do I have a motion to
approve the board of education resolution honoring Women's History Month? Move that the board approve the board of education resolution honoring Women's History Month as presented. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? I second. And who uh I guess we should ask if
there's any discussion, two minutes of discussion for each board member. Director, anything to add? >> No. >> Hulenberg Ramirez. >> Thank you. Thank you to the team. >> Director After. >> No. >> Thank you for bringing this forward. Are
there any intervening motions to amend? >> Would you please call the vote? >> Director After. >> I. >> Director Defrdes. >> I. >> Director Kenberg. >> I. >> Director NMO. >> I. >> Director Ramirez. >> Hi. And I will go ahead and read this resolution.
Board of Education resolution honoring Women's History Month. Whereas Women's History Month is celebrated annually in March in the United States. It started as Women's Day in February 1909, established to celebrate the achievements of women in various fields and to advocate for women's rights,
including suffrage and labor rights. And whereas in 1980, President Jimmy Carter issued the first presidential proclamation declaring the week of March 8th as National Women's History Week to coincide with International Women's Day. And whereas in subsequent years, Congress passed additional resolutions
and the and the week-long celebration grew in popularity and recognition. In 1987, after being petitioned by the women national women's history project, now the National Women's History Alliance, Congress passed a resolution designating March as Women's History Month and successive years since then.
And whereas Women's History Month provides an opportunity to celebrate achievements, contributions, and resilience of women throughout history and in contemporary society, such as Susan B. Anthony who fought for women's equality. Harriet Tubman who courageously led slaves to freedom. Kamala Harris who became the first
woman, first African-American and first Asian-American to be sworn in as vice president of the United States. And whereas women of every race, class, and ethnic background have made significant and historical contributions to the growth and strength of our society in countless recorded and unrecorded ways.
Whereas the leadership of women in elected office, including the contributions of our own board of education directors, serve as an example of community and civic engagement for girls and women in our counties. Whereas women have been leaders not only in securing their own rights of suffrage and equal opportunity, but also in the
abolitionist movement, the emancipation movement, the industrial labor movement, and the civil rights movement, all of which create a more fair and just society for all. Now therefore, be it resolved that the Roaring Fork School Board of Directors do hereby resolve March to be Women's History Month in the
Roaring Fork schools and strongly encourage staff and community to reflect on the contributions that women have made throughout history and commit to support efforts to improve opportunities for girls and women. Thank you. The next business in order is discussion
on a board tracker request from Director Ramirez requesting a board work session to discuss the progress made using the funds from the last MLO and the uses and gains of these funds. Director Ramirez, would you now present your proposal? >> Thank you. Yes. Um, so I submitted a
board tracker request to have a work session for the team to have further discussion on um the progress made using the funds of the last MLO. specifically an update on all the investments made with taxpayer money during the 2021 MLO and the data that
supports that we saw academic achievement and growth. As you guys heard, I did go to the MLO community feedback remember the whole name um session on Tuesday in Glenwood. Um and I think it would uh be really
important especially as the team is getting u prepared to have further conversations with community and stakeholders um to have that information not just for ourselves but for our team so that we can um make sure we are clearly stating um not just what we used
the funds for um but also just making sure that we're all aware um from that process especially since not all of us were here during that time when the MLO passed. That's it. >> Thanks. And before we jump into board comments, um I just wanted to center
something that director Kulenberg and Dr. Coul and I spoke about for those of you who are and myself who just sometimes need a reminder, we go from the board tracker to this discussion. Now, when issues are identified that would take significant staff time to invest in and like discover and we need
board consensus to direct staff to take that time and bring it forward. Um and I wanted to just ask Dr. Nicole, if you had anything else to share um about work that's already been done or any other thoughts before we open up for discussion on this issue. You know, um I
think it would help to have some just a further conversation about what would be helpful in terms of the like data to bring forward um trends that we could, you know, what would be most useful for the board. I I get I totally get the intent. I think it's really relevant
especially given kind of the conversations we've been having the last couple nights on MLO. Um you know the intent of the 21 MLO was this going to sound familiar staff recruitment retention efforts and staff salaries and so the investments really went to that
um of those dollars and continues to go to that. You know we're we're really bound to those MLO commitments that we make to keep the dollars for those investments. So, I don't know that there's a whole lot we could do in terms of articulating, you know, what the the
21 MLO in terms of, you know, we don't have like an isolated budget for it. The way that funding rolls into the general fund and then is dedicated to staff salaries and um recruitment and retention. We could speak broadly to it. Um, but would love to hear more about what would be helpful to the
conversation in terms of context or history. Um anyway, >> can I >> Yeah, director after. Let's do two minutes for our board directors. Yeah. Okay. Um I think it's a great idea. We haven't talked about it's the first time hearing about it. I think it would be
really important to have that information in maybe a level of detail lower than or more than what you just described. Like if it was $7 million, how many staff did we have at that time? we can do some basic averaging and math
to make that for so we understand how that money was distributed. There were also um there was the educational opportunity fund right that came out of that too. So that would be good to know. Um, I mean, I don't I don't know what you had in mind, but that when you're what
you're saying what the data that's available and what I think would be helpful for making the case for another MLO, that seems like that would be um that would be the direction I would I would be hoping we could go.
Director Nemo, >> I guess I just wonder what that even means. So is it like the MLO we would need to know how much money it generated or generates
and then basically do we just need to know that we spent that amount on teacher salary and benefits but then we'd also want to know what other monies are earmarked for you know I guess how
do how does that work director of ears Maybe if you can just what did you have in mind for tying those together for student achievement or outcomes? >> I mean, I don't know how it works for anything that's like earmarked when you've got this big budget. I mean, all I can think of is you just want to make
sure that any money the amount equals the amount spent. Is there more to it than that? >> Um, yeah. So, you know, I think similar to the conversation on Tuesday of like
the impression that we used MLO money for deans of culture, I think it's important for us to be able to provide the board with the details of what did we use the MLO money for, what did we not use the MLO money for. Um, I think it would be important for us to have
numbers on recruitment and retention. That was a huge effort um I believe from the 2021 MLO. So, it'd be helpful to know was that helpful to us? Was it not helpful to us? Uh, I think it would also be important for us to know what percentage went to what. Um, you know,
it's been a long time. I did request and I know Jonathan answered um the request for the board tracker, but I can't access any of the links in the email. And so it would be helpful to have like that update of like what happened in 2021, what did we ask for you know even
like um you know the education opportunity fund like what was the amount we put in there the first time? Did that change over the you know the the last couple of years which I think it did if I remember correctly. So I I think it would be
helpful to have sort of a debrief of like this is what we learned from the 2021 MLO. This is how much we put to salaries. Um and also what we did not uh use the 2021 MLO funds for because as
you guys know and even during public session or public comment tonight, there's a lot of things being thrown around on what we use our money and taxpayer dollars and it is taxpayer money that we ask for. And so I think it is important for the narrative that we are also going to be asking for as board members.
>> I think it would add to that too that it would be helpful um as we roll this out to include the amount that we're allocating to charter schools, right? That we are still advocating for school choice by funneling some of this money to charters so that people understand that. And um yeah, I just agree. I think
that this would be I think this is important for us to know to be able to be out and be the talking heads talking about this. And then I also think it it will be useful for the MLO campaign. So I don't see it as a waste of time. I feel like this is information that is going to be useful
to staff um as they continue this process. >> Yeah, Director Ramirez, thanks for bringing this forward. I do think a deep dive on the MLO could be timely. Um, I want to use our time right now to make sure that we're clarifying for staff what we want to see out of it. And I
think what I heard and let's try to fine-tune this so we just only invest. So basically, it is time that the board get into a deep dive. We are asking for a significant amount of trust from our voters and moving this forward. We need to find our own consensus around what it's going to be tied to, building
around teacher recruitment, retention, how can we use that creatively to close the achievement gap. These are all priorities I've heard from board members and from stakeholders. Um, and so I'm thinking a work session. Um, and we have a little bit of availability in work sessions over the next month or so. So,
we can probably try to play around where we are seeing what was and wasn't. So, first of all, what how was it broken down last time for those of us who missed it? What was it for? What did it actually get spent on? So if it wasn't
year one with the the um opportunity, what is it? Education opportunity, right? When did that start? When did we start committing funds to it? How much have been committed to that? That would be useful for me. And then an FAQ dummy style for me, what doesn't it go to that
people are sharing? And so that that just arms us to better explain it to those questions to those um misunderstandings. And then I I would also I know this is already out there maybe we just bring it in.
Where are we in terms of competitive salaries as compared to when we ran this the last time? So I know one of the reasons that the committee was so was so interested in tying it to teachers and their recruitment retention is because that game has changed a lot and RFSD was
higher and has dropped in that competitive list. And I think it would it would be helpful to take a look at like where were we when we ran it the first time? Have we improved or gone up and down? So that's quite a bit of data right there. What am I missing that other directors
really feel is important to zoom in on? >> Yeah, I mean I think all that data is really basic due diligence for either the MLO committee or the comm's consultant who are working on this. So I'm a little surprised that wasn't already part of the plan.
>> Most of it is. I think it's just a matter of dedicating a work session time to us exploring it and being 100% clear on it and consolidating those resources. >> Cool. Yeah, because I think if we're gonna if if this thing's going to pass, we need to be able to tell the story of
the value of the last one. >> And I think to that point, it would be really important for us to also talk about the achievement gap and what that has looked like over the last couple of years. I think the team I don't remember to be completely honest 2021 feels like
a long time ago. So um you know I think it would be helpful uh the email that has all those links if it could just be forwarded to the team and we could go in and see all of the language that was shared at that time. But I think >> sorry which email zoom in on >> No, it's in the board tracker.
>> It's in Okay. Yeah. Sorry. Okay. Well, none of us would have access to the links, but but you know, I think just as a like to prep, you know, for the board um so that we could go in there and and review at our own convenience, too. I think that would be a helpful first step. Um
um but I I think my biggest thing is just making sure as we're having this conversation too is um and I did submit a couple board tracker requests sort of in relation of like having to, you know, h further have conversations. So, I welcome the opportunity to further share
questions or concerns if either of the anybody from the team is interested. >> Sorry, can you help me find the email you're referring to? I'm not >> Yeah, so on the board tracker request, >> hold on. Sorry, I need to open that. >> I'll speak to that real quickly. I had
created a email for Anna. that had a whole bunch of links. And to director Ramirez's point, the sharing privileges across folders and 30 different files would need to be updated to give the board access to all those files. It's
something I can do. Um I didn't know that they that you didn't have access to all those files. So that's something I can remedy, but I think what you're asking for is an executive summary. >> Yeah. So the um it's line 166.
Oh, I see. Okay. >> Yeah. And so when you open it, there's just an email in there that has all of I when I got it >> looked in the drive, I couldn't find anything tied to the 2021. Um, >> so that would just be helpful for the board so that we can research at our own
convenience or when we have time. Um, but yeah, thank you to the team for uh giving us the opportunity to review that. I think it will be helpful for us in the long term to um start reviewing that now as we're gearing up for conversations in June or August. June,
July, August. >> And Dr. Cole, can you weigh in on how you feel like this relates to staff capacity and timeline? Um, yeah. You know, I mean, I think it's it was an interesting realization, director Ramirez, when you
asked for the history of this and it became very clear that there's not a single member of the senior leadership team that has was in their roles during this or even had access to any of this information. So, I would say no, we have not gone into this. None of us were here
in these roles at this time. I was on uh senior leadership at the time but not directly connected to MLO. So we didn't even have I don't even have access to some of these things. Um so it is a significant lift what you're asking for from us. I totally understand the rationale. I get it. Um and in talking
to community it has been important. I mean you see the first slide that we talk about in the MLO is how did we get here and didn't we just do this? And we talk about the 2021 MLO and what we were able to accomplish not in the level of detail you're asking for but in broad brush strokes. So we know that talking
about the 21 MLRO is part of the narrative. Our understanding of the detail and nuance that you're asking for will require significant investment. And I think even a recent board tracker request for uh staff demographics that
goes back further than our data tracker took probably 10 to 12 hours of staff time just to get to 22 because of the lack of systems and clear data uh clean data that goes back this far. Um
so it's going to be a tough balance to manage uh detail. Well, I mean, I I get I get the why. I would love to have until the end of the school year on this, recognizing that the people there's no other people than the people that sit in front of you will do this
work for you. So, um you know, we don't and they're trying to get budgets passed and get schools staffed and um it's it's just it's uh I get it. It's a lot an MLO's a lot on staff um to take on. So,
it's it's important work. we can get to it. But I would ask for at least until the June 10th retreat to be able to the things you're asking for, which I think I got and they make a make a ton of sense. >> And I'm sorry, did you just say it took 10 to 12 hours for you guys to pull the
data on demographics >> on that? Like what was this? our HR data systems are not cleaner and so the the ability to pull those reports takes an inordinate amount of time for the way our data systems are sent up and when you see the strategic priorities around
operational excellence and systems integration it's because the files in I mean Amy I'm speaking for you but the files that we've inherited are in quite a bit of disarray and um I don't know if there's anything you want to add Amy this is your your world I don't have
access to all of the years that you're requesting and so I'm not totally sure when I will be able to report out on 12 schools times 10 years but it's labor intensive. >> Yeah. Well, I I appreciate that. I did see the note regarding the the capacity.
I'm a little surprised. I will admit that um that just I mean how far back did we go on the years for demographics? Wasn't it like >> it's on the tracker? Yeah, I went back to all of the years that I have access to in the HIS system.
>> I mean, that's fine. I mean, I I would say like it would be helpful to even go back to 2020, so two years, just to see like where we were before the MLO. That would be like my only ask in regards to that board tracker request. I'm open to um the board's feedback on if they also
think that's relevant. You know, I appreciate the honesty from the team that there's a lot of issues with the system or the lack thereof of systems to help us be able to find this information. I I think because we're so focused on systems and course
correcting, I would just want to make sure to moving forward that like this becomes a norm for the team that we you know, >> right? But when I'm going back multiple years, you know, and errors are made, it is hard. The clean up, the data is
there, but the cleanup is pretty labor intensive. >> Yeah. No, and I totally understand. I'm saying moving forward for like our team like >> starting now to the future. >> I understand the problem. I am. >> Yeah. And I appreciate that work and I I'm so grateful that we're investing
time into doing that. And so I don't want us to go back like you know where it's going to become a bigger problem or issue. I think it's good for the board to know that just for us to be aware. Um, and yeah, I think just from a board,
for me as a board member, I think it's just really important that moving forward, we know like starting, I don't know, 2020, moving forward to now, we're going to at least have good data when it comes to that, especially since it's part of
our strategic plan. >> Yeah. Yeah, I mean I would I would say >> um our team is from like the this moment moving forward is is able to rebuild systems and clean up data that just the
current data has been a significant uphill battle. So we have yet to tackle previous years and trying to clean up history because we are still buried under the current systems that we're trying to clean up. Um it just hasn't
been I mean it's we're triaging with limited staff and I totally wholeheartedly and I believe confidently we have the right leaders doing the right work to get the right data moving forward. Um and I think the accountability that we've brought in with the strategic plan the data
dashboard has strengthened that and strengthened that from this moment we are going to be tracking these things and I think that that's really helped to the board and the community that we have that accountability through the strategic plan. We have absolutely not prioritized going back and cleaning up past data from other people and we don't
really have the time right now. We talked about at one point trying to invest dollars to outsource some of that work and we just haven't had the capacity to even move that forward. >> You guys need a summer intern or something we could use a ton. Um so it's you know
it's those pieces that I'm just concerned about. the current team building a strong historical context is going to take a ton of forensic research for us. So with that in mind and the timeline that this MLO conversation is what we're really focusing on um can you
really crystallize the goal like if if they have to triage time and we are like stuck up against budget with not enough people and we need a work session on the MLO and we need to cover when you walk out of that work session what would you be carrying or knowing that means we would have met it so people can make
sure we're aligning the time. Well, I mean again I think if we can go back even one year before the MLO that would be helpful. 2020 2021 2122 >> just from a perspective of recruitment and retention being part of our
language. Um, you know, my hope is that like there's always unfortunately historical data that doesn't get passed as we all know too well from administration to administration and from board to board. And I think my
interest in this is making sure that there is alignment and continuity between not just the teams but also that we have this information. I think it's really important for us to be able to like talk about, you know, and I expressed this on Tuesday was like the
deans of culture and the learning acceleration plan and you know, I think that we need to really work through and as we all know, it seems like it's going to be a harder year in regards to the MLO. So, we need to be tight on our on
our narrative on what we did use our money for and what we want to use our taxpayer money for. And so I think for me the biggest um want out of this work session is to have the board and have the district be on
the same page in regards to the success of the 2021 MLO. what it did do, where it fell short, if it did, if there are gains from it, whether it pertains to um
staff, academic achievements, students. Um like I would even I think the education opportunity fund is something that we don't talk about enough. I would love to know how many people actually utilized it. Like I don't know, you know, I think there are things that we
just don't know. We've never had that. Like we've just never had a work session for it. >> Can I suggest that we do that in June? I mean, is that It sounds like that might be a timeline. And Anna, maybe you could give us an update in May if you're
feeling like even June is too soon, but I don't think we're going to I mean, I think that would still give us enough time. And it sounds like that might be a reasonable data request timeline. That makes sense to me >> with an update in May >> like an opening for you to say that's
not working. >> I just >> No, I' I I have this now like I'm taking notes on our exact team agendas at our next meeting. So I can talk through with the team. I mean this is my initial guess, but I can talk through with the team what that sounds like. And again, June was my initial hit and see what
folks think and if that sounds doable um to get that level of uh clarity on the impact of that MLO so we can dig in. I do support limiting the the history lesson to just the year before at the
most just based on our timeline knowing that there's work to do um for long-term data but it just doesn't feel like a priority right now. I think the story that we want to be able to tell our our constituents and the stakeholders and the taxpayers is we know this is important. Here's why. Look what it did
last time. And if it didn't, well, we need to make sure we're clear on that, too. But I think there's a lot of good information to bring forward just from that 2020 year. I don't know that we need to go back any further. Maybe in 2021 because it wasn't actually in place. I don't know. Wherever you >> Well, we're say 2020, right? That's what
we're saying. >> Yeah, we can say 2020. That makes sense to me. I mean 2019 was pandemic, so I don't know how great data was. Anyways, >> that's what Lindsay is saying is maybe it makes sense to do 21 because we didn't have the funding until we didn't get funds in the door until 22 23. I
know your 2122 would be your baseline before we got the ML funds and >> right but I think the reasoning for wanting it before is because I like to see actual investment and growth would be good for us to know what happened before like where were we what was our
baseline >> and the baseline being recruitment retention and you want sorry explain we're almost done here maybe I'm just word souping it at this point I'm so sorry I just want to make sure that when we when we send people out we're going to spend the time that we're really clear on the outcome. You say the
baseline of who we hired and or who was working for us and how much maybe what's that baseline? So the 2020 is specific to this board tracker request regarding the breakdown for certified the ethnicity of certified teachers in our
district over the past 10 years which is the only board tracker request I made regarding any years before 20 22. Okay. And then just one final thing, and I just want to put this on the board's
radar, too. I'm totally fine pushing it out to June, but I just want to make sure the board is aware and the team is aware that all of us, especi, you know, we work year round. I know that, but I just want to make sure there is some
level of understanding that, you know, the board tends to travel during the summer and I think this work session because there's an investment in time, it would be really important for us to try to get it done before you call us back for a vote on the
language in August. >> Okay, that makes sense. >> All right, thank you all so much. Any other further clarifying questions from staff? Okay, back to my notes, which I have
thoroughly buried in tabs. Um, let's do a very abbreviated celebrations and updates from staff. That's the next business in order. Um, Director NMO, I keep No, I keep picking on you. I'm going to pick on director. I'm >> sorry. I keep looking over at her.
>> I don't care. I have to go sometime. >> Yeah. Um, I don't think I mean I don't know. I feel like I was in a lot of meetings last week, but we've gone over all of it throughout this meeting. So, I don't think you need any updates from my committee assignments. Um, I will just
give a thanks to all of our staff that are out educating our communities on staff health health curriculum. and note for all of you that I at BS they had the school counselor up front during conferences and I checked in with her at that point and said 80 to
90% of the comments were people thanking the schools and the district for their work. Um and so I thought that was another great way to inform parents with printouts of every single lesson at the table right when you walked in the door. So I appreciate the time and effort that that took from that team. Um and then a
big thanks to the finance team for us being Christiey's gone. Good for her. as being where we are um at this stage in the season. This is becoming the norm, but this wasn't the norm. And so I'm really grateful. And then to all of
you, my fellow female board members, elected officials in this month of women's appreciation and celebration. So as my kids would say, who rules the world? Girls.
Director Nemo, >> this is my fun celebration. >> River, >> I went to Riverview for we had our Riverview um >> tour. I also I also did CCS tour. Um and yeah, so it's been fun to do my tour.
>> A super sweet little girl gave me my what? >> It's fine. She never got shoot. >> I thought you told me they threw a big party because there was no party for me there. Okay. There was an event. >> Yeah.
Thank you very much. >> So awesome. >> You couldn't even get a picture. >> I love it. >> Oh my gosh. >> I'm trying. >> I'm not complaining. I'm happy for you. >> You can borrow it. >> Okay. We'll pray. I'll share it. >> That's Yeah. And of course, I'm grateful
for all of you and the staff and even the the public who care Oh, yeah. who care about what's going on. Um, and I've had lots of conversations with lots of other um, parents and families and even children just little, you know, little
things and like I'm getting a lot of very good positive feedback also about the health curriculum. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. >> Uh, director after excuse me. Thank you. Um, yes, we had the um finance committee
meeting. I went to the DAC um at Tammy, was that last week? >> Um great turnout. Super happy about that. I also just wanted to uh publicly thank the people of Carbondale who came to the aid and support of my family when
we had a crisis a month ago, Monday. It was on President's Day. um including like we got uh when we were at Children's Hospital, we received um audio messages from the entire fifth grade crew that were so sweet. Every
fifth grader in the school send us messages via crew and then the whole team at CMS has just been amazing to create like a cocoon of support for my kid and the um the fifth graders who rode the downtowner from school to our
house to drop off goodies. Um we've just felt the love and the support from that school and the district and the town. Um the town even gave him a gift card. It was just the best. So it was a warm
welcome and it's good to um you know when when folks are mad at us in public um and these evenings are hard, it's good to also remember uh just the the small town support that we give and that
we receive um by being by being members here. And so I'm just eternally grateful to everyone for your support and especially to CMS and CRS. Director Ramirez, >> thanks. Um, I just wanted to say thank
you to director after for stepping in for DAC on the 10th. I really appreciated that last minute we all got it was like crazy just this. I'm hoping sickness stays away from my family. Um, but thank you to the team. I was able to
join um classified IBB this morning. Thank you team for all of your work on that. I really appreciate being part of that conversation and just listening in. I think it's incredibly important that the board when able to is able to attend. So, thank you for the opportunity. Um, I did get a chance to
go to Latino Advocacy Day on Monday and spend some time trying to get Senator Catelyn and Senator uh Roberts and Representative Alasco and the governor's
team to um, you know, hear us out in our 1.3 um, potential loss. um with the specific ownership tax. I appreciate all of our team's uh work it being more intentional
when we're reaching out to our legislators and I think it was it has worked well for our team for the board to hear from us when possible especially when things are um not just hard but when there are issues that affect us
directly. Um, and so it was really a good opportunity I think for for me to um not just be there with some of our students. Thank you to Dominic who took uh I think well he took some students
from Basalt um high school and then there were two students from GMA Springs including my kiddo. Um but I just think it's such a great opportunity to get kids civically engaged and to get us as uh community members civically engaged.
And so, uh, thank you to, uh, Bosas and, uh, Green Latinos for extending that opportunity, um, to meet with our our representatives. Um, I just had one thing that I wanted to make sure I, um, also did during public comment. I
submitted a board tracker request in regards to the Safe Haven website. I just wanted to make sure that got updated as soon as possible. I think it's important that we do provide that information to families, especially given that there's a lot of conversation
in the state right now at the potential of what the next couple of weeks potentially could look like. Um, so I just think we need to be really thoughtful and intentional um at providing resources to families and I appreciate the team's response and um,
you know, work to make sure that we do all of that in a timely manner. Um and then just an appreciation for um our team for all of our work. I know that you know January is technically um board member appreciation month.
Um, but I think, you know, all of us are moms and wives and do all of the things. And, um, it I think it's just incredibly important that this team is able to manage all of our different roles in community, all of the different positions we lead, and still be able to
um, come here and do our job and do our job well. Um, and I value the opportunity to be on this board and um, and to serve the public. So, I appreciate the team. Thanks. The photos of you and your kids with all
of the elected representatives were adorable. >> Thank you. >> Um they were so cute. Yeah, they were all in Bosa's stories on Instagram. So cute. >> Um yeah, I think it's mostly been covered. I've been staying in touch with the CASBY Legislative Resolutions Committee. There's just a lot going on
at the budget level. There may be a ballot measure that we need to keep our eye on which will look and sound very similar to the ballot measure that we are considering. Um it's very different in like structure, but to a lot of voters it'll look very similar. So it's just something to to watch. Um I also
just wanted to name too that other ballot measures have recently been passed which are aimed at discriminating against um trans students in various ways. And I just wanted to make sure that we recognize um as a school district it's very important that we respect and appreciate our diverse community. And I think that the
conversations that we're going to be hearing at the state level just with those ballot initiatives being present um is really important to keep in mind, it will change some of the tenor of um of just life for folks who identify in that way. Um and then I also just wanted
to appreciate all of the work that went into parent teacher conferences. We've already forgotten it was last week, but it was a lot >> and the parents who showed up with the potlucks for this for the teachers. They don't have time either and they showed up anyway. And again, just noticing that work at the community level, even when
the things above us at the state and federal level may feel overwhelming and demoralizing. So, thank you, Director After, for centering that experience and just reminding us that we need to support our neighbors and to be a part of those community level schools. And I'm proud to help out in the ways that
we can, even though sometimes that feels really far away from the problems that we want to solve in that moment. There is nothing else. I would call this meeting adjourned. The time is 9:17.
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