welcome to the April 24th 2025 meeting of the Rutherford County School Board first we have a call to order we have a lot on our agenda tonight and I will not tolerate outbursts from the gallery you will be
removed we will be opening the meeting with a brief moment of silence or prayer and a pledge of allegiance to the United States flag no one is required to participate or be present for any of these and being in this portion of the meeting is completely voluntary mr
darby dear heavenly father Lord I would just ask that you would be with this board i would ask that you give us open eyes open ears open hearts help to guide us to make decisions that are in the best interest of this district our students their parents and our staff i
ask this in your name amen we have some special guests from Stewarts Creek Elementary to lead us in the pledge today um if and I apologize if I say your name mispronounce it um if Rean Wy Landon Fraser Don Logan Jax Cole
Will Haynes Lincoln Thompson Joselyn Tovar Olivia Hansen will come up to the podium and lead us in pledge please i thought they were over there with all the creatures i pledge algiance to the flag of the
United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all first up we have the approval of the
agenda any comments or questions i'll entertain a motion so move Madam Chair second thank you Miss Sharp thank you Mr fidel all in favor say I i any opposed motion passes
does everyone have their mic on Mr vaughn next we have the approval of the consent agenda any comments or questions motion to approve thank you Mr vaughn second thank you Miss Sharp all in favor
say I i any opposed motion passes next we have Rutherford Proud Mr evans hi there my name is Caitlyn Benvitz i am the district's library and information specialist and I am here today to
celebrate school library month in April um so to kick things off right now um our communications department um has prepared a video of some of our library media specialists and the role they serve across our district as I say it's the heart of the
school we try to create a pocket of peace in the middle of the day i'm not sure if you're not coming into the library before school or during lunch I'm not sure you realize how many students are using the library as a as a peaceful place to just exist in the
middle of the noise of the school there's a bathroom right across the hall so they'll come across and and let us know that toilets are overflowing and so as as a librarian they think we can fix everything in the building uh oftentimes they'll come to us and be like "Hey I don't know what my next class is can you
look my schedule up?" So and we've learned that every touch point when they come in the library lets them know that we're here for them so we never get upset when they come and ask us questions that are ne not part of our job because that means they trust us and they know that we're going to take care
of them hi there I'm Caitlyn Benvitas i am the district's library and information specialist for Rutherford County Schools and I am so excited to share some programs lessons and different promotions our librarians are doing across the district here are some
awesome highlights i think that people think that um I sit in here and just read all day with my hair in a bun and shush people and I do that however my goal is to put books in the hands of children and have them want to see and read more
so I'm constantly trying to open their eyes to new books finding a genre that they like i love it i love seeing the kids read every day finding things that they like to read um I absolutely love it and I feel like I've even told Mr up
he has extended my career by giving me the opportunity to move into the library versus being in the classroom people are surprised that I see so many classes a day i think people think that um students just come in to check out books and leave and we have classes all day
i'm teaching library skills i collaborating with teachers if they need help covering a standard I'm happy to help them you know or supplement in here and I don't think people realize that one of the things I love about the job
is that every day is truly different and that's refreshing for me as a person that every day I see different students and what I notice is every year not only is it different students and I get new
ones every year but it's also different teachers and also teachers can change also and I try to help them with as much of their needs as possible the environment of our library is evolving
and changing so we have a mixture of activity and then we'll have quietness and solitude for those that need it um it becomes a place for
whatever the students need it to be i think Miss Jenkins and Mr seedorf really pull it all together it's like the atmosphere is great the books and stuff you know the people that come in they're great but I think the energy Mr cedorf and I work really hard for students to
feel seen and known in the school our our school is a really big school um and so we really want the people that have chosen the library as their space we we realize that there are some people who choose the gym as their space and they're going to be known in the gym and there are some people who choose who
have other clubs and they're going to be known in those places by those people but there are some students who have chosen the library as their space and we want them to feel seen and known and so um part of our mission is just making sure that we talk to those regulars um and build relationships with them because sometimes they don't have
relationships with people outside of the building and we want every student to see themsel on our shelf transitioning from the classroom i was a first grade teacher before I became the librarian here at Cedar Grove and the biggest thing is getting to know everyone i get
to teach all about 900 kids on a 7-day rotation so every nine days if there are no days out of school I see them all i get to know them all i get to work with all of the teachers all of the staff the ladies in the office um so the biggest
thing for me was expanding um my relationships because I'm really big on relationships and I don't have relationships just with 23 families anymore i get to have a relationship with everyone in the school and get to try um to show everyone that there's a place for everyone in the library okay
so I am blessed that I get to have lots of planning time with our teachers here so I go to all their PLC meetings i get to be a part so that's either planning lessons helping them come up with book club tie-ins um helping them in their classroom so sometimes I'll go and co- teach in the classroom um and really
making their learning exciting and um hands-on stem is something that you can incorporate in any topic so I think the blessing of being in the library is I get to pull that into other classes that may not have STEM so I pull STEM in because I love having kids involved um and doing something with their hands i
think it's good for them to learn those problem solving skills um and I pull that in really in any class that comes to the library so anytime that they come I want them doing things i want them building i want them problem solving so I pull in STEM with ELA classes like today or even with science or social
studies so we were pleasantly surprised this year to see that our circulation statistics had doubled and so we contribute that to several reasons one of the first most important reasons is the is the relationship that my collaboran Liz and I have focused on
building relationships with students uh one of the second reasons is that our library is diverse in that it is set up to meet the needs of our students so our library is undoeyed so what that means is that students don't have to know a
dewy call number to find their book they go over like it's a bookstore so we have purposely set our book books up so it's like a bookstore so if you look behind me you see that our books are faced out they are engaging they capture interest and our entire library is set to do that for our students it is colorful and it's
filled with books that they want to read and also we focus on books that they request so when we find that we don't have books that they've asked for we focus on those and make those a priority in our next order liz and I are firm believers in the fact that every student should be able to walk out of our
library with a book that they can read and that makes them want to come back and get another book and it's just seeing the smile on a on a student's face that there's a book that they can read it's the best feeling in the world all right so I would love to talk to you
a little bit about who we are as librarians all right we in Rutherford County have 60 library media specialists we have 30 library assistants or EAS we serve 52,000 readers and as of last week
we have 513 um,216 books we have 68 combined years of experience um which brings very valuable expertise when we come all to the table to collaborate we
um collectively hold 67 different graduate degrees ranging from library sciences literacy instructional technology and education um now you will notice that we have 60 library media specialists but we have 67 degrees which
means that some of our um librarians have pursued additional graduate degrees i am proud to share that we've had so many librarians present at our district level as well as the state level over these past two years among
them Seagull Middle School's library media specialist on the right Katie Capshaw presented at the national level in 2023 in Tampa Bay at the American Association of School Librarians conference so many librarians across
this country attended her presentation that there was standing room only and there was a line out the door i've learned that um we have had 12 librarians recognized as their school level teacher of the year in the very
recent past and a handful of those librarians have been recognized at the district level um as their respected grade band teacher of the year for the district so what we do it is difficult to be concise when it comes to defining the
role of a school librarian but if I had to state it plainly I would say that we create learning opportunities every task every program every lesson and every resource that we
provide is an opportunity for a student to grow i talk a lot about our library programs that's part of my job um and I want to take this opportunity to give a voice to our own school librarians um to help
clarify their role in their own words so the next several slides are not my words but the words of our school librarians when I'm asking them to define their role we touch the minds of every student in the building and very few people in a
school can say that our enthusiasm and love of reading is what our kids see and learn from and that's what we're all here for i read to our structured setting class i meet with seniors to go over graduation information i print posters
locate articles and gather resources for teachers triage laptop issues and teach research classes we run afterchool clubs like book clubs STEM robotics we secure grants for literacy initiatives we partner with community members to enrich
learning we empower students to grow into curious capable and compassionate learners extending our impact far beyond the walls of our schools like Brian said in our video it's really hard to pinpoint the role of
librarian because it looks different in every building because the needs of our students are different so as you can see here we have so many successes that we value according to the needs of our students one of my personal favorites was seventh grade got an extra reward
time and 30 to 40 students in the seventh grade picked the library over the gym or outside time that's a big win so how do students benefit from um their school library there's actually a
lot of research we build strong libraries or strong school libraries build strong students the background went away i'm not sure why um so research has shown that in
over 21 state studies have confirmed that successful library programs support students in academic achievement regardless of gradeband demographic or economic differences we know that well staffed libraries lead to high reading achievement scores
research consistently shows that when children have access to a school library that houses plenty of books and is adequately staffed they read more and score higher on academic achievement tests across the board we also know that
leisure reading leads to a wide range of benefits that set our students up for success outside of complementing all our curriculum standards in our libraries librarians primarily build their programs around growing a recreational
reading culture within their school we know that reading for enjoyment has an array of cognitive and psychological benefits studies have shown increased cognitive stamina stronger critical thinking skills the development of
empathy and positive mental health outcomes in those who choose to read for pleasure we bring these common understandings with us to our library space um we know as librarians that the
key to creating a lifelong reader is to allow choice we know that allowing students time and modeling free voluntary reading promotes stronger reading habits and students who read for leisure again have higher
achievement scores across all grade bands and yes even math so I just wanted to briefly celebrate that circulation is up across our entire district which means that more students are checking out books
today than they have in the last several several years if you look at this bar graph up here um the very top of it reflects 29,733 books checked out that school is a tiny school called Buchanan Elementary
School it has about 470 kids enrolled there and Miss Andrea Austin has among the highest circulation statistics for our entire county our high school seniors are reading too um at Rockville
High School we actually have some high school seniors modeling a love for reading through digital book reviews and if I may take 60 seconds to show you an example of these high school seniors sharing books that they love
yep hello Rockwell readers this is Victoria Sto and I'm here in the library to talk about Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austin is one of the first classics that I ever read one of my favorites and I know we have a strong perception about classics but this one is very relevant
and very funny uh in this book we know the Venet sisters who are facing their need to marry during the Regency era in England lizzie meets Mr darcy and their relationship will be impacted by pride and prejudice they will initially have a
lot of arguments debates and struggles that will represent the complexity of interpersonal relationships and communication and of course hide some of Jane Austin criticism of the society of the time she talks about pride she talks about the role of women sisterhood and
more come by and read more about the work of Jane Austin and know who she truly is and what kind of messages she hides through her mockery and romanticism and we just have one more by Chris who
is a senior at Rockville High School my name is Chris Collins i'm a senior here at Rockville High School i have two books um this one's One Punch Man i don't know the author's name unfortunately but like it's a really good series i recommend like in my opinion like I watch a lot of anime so
it's like being able to come here to this library and read the books like for example I was like really young when I was first watching the series and like I don't remember and I came in here one day I was like I was already reading Bleach bleach is also another really good book i watched that one i just wanted to read it but anyways back to One Punch Man so I watched it as a kid
but I didn't really take in all the information so I came in here I was like why don't I just try and read the book and I was addicted bro like I couldn't put the books down bro and it got to the point where even even though like it stops at 18 I'm still reading it on my phone like and the this series too it
has a three in one it's like three volumes in one book huge book i'm finishing it in one class like it's amazing i I recommend y'all come come stop in here come check out some books or whatever and yeah y'all have a nice day i think among our librarians there
is a very special kind of joy with hooking a reader so having somebody come into your space as a non-reader and finding that perfect book that gets started like Chris does finally I want to celebrate some
individuals um this year Rachel Hib Hibden who is the librarian at Rocky Fork Middle School received the Excellence in Computer Science Award um recognized by the Tennessee STEM Innovation Network cararissa Benton who we also saw in the video um at Leverne
High School just recently traveled to Washington DC to receive a national recognition in teaching excellence from the National Education Association and Katie Rafz our wonderful librarian at Barfield Elementary School was just recognized this year as Rutherford
County's elementary level teacher of the year lastly I want to recognize some students at Stewart's Creek Middle School um we have a reading engagement platform called Beanstack which we purchased for a handful of middle
schools across our district um to engage our middle schoolers specifically in reading um and we have had some really wonderful results it turns reading into a competition so you can compete against grade levels you can compete against um
home rooms and you can even compete against other schools which is what happened in March we had a March Madness reading challenge and at the end of March Steuart's Creek Middle School read almost 300,000 minutes during the month
of March and they have received our inaugural March Madness Reading Challenge Champion Trophy and to present this award to some of our most avid readers at Stuarts Creek Middle School I'm going to invite Miss Stacy Whitlock
um an absolutely fantastic librarian good evening everyone um my name is Stacy Whitlock and I am the library media specialist at Steuart's Creek Middle School um happy school library month to my colleagues who are present this evening um and watching
from home and thank you to Caitlyn Benvdas for being our biggest supporter and number one fan um I'd like to begin by recognizing the staff and students at the four other middle schools that participated in the March Madness
Reading Challenge uh it was Rocky Fork Rock Springs Christiana and Seagull they were indeed fierce readers and competitors i would also like to recognize the incredible administration team and staff at Steuart's Creek Middle
our principal Dr laton Murray is a strong supporter of our library and the activities that we use to engage our students and promote the culture of reading and literacy at the Creek our amazing staff encourages our students to
read independently as often as possible whether they are in a social studies class science class math ELA or an elective class reading is a crosscurricular skill that impacts every aspect of our students academic
achievement just like a basketball player practices free throws to improve their shooting skills readers improve their reading skills by reading to add to what Miss Benvita said in her presentation earlier RCS
librarians build relationships with our students and get to know their unique needs and interests then with care purpose and due diligence curate a school library collection with a variety of books that meet the needs and
interests of our diverse student population so they can have the tools they need to achieve socially and academically we have six students here in attendance this evening representing
Steuart's Creek Middle School they are some of the top readers from the March Madness Challenge for the challenge each student had the individual goal of reading and logging 600 minutes between
March 3rd and March 27th at Steuart's Creek Middle School there were 140 students who met or exceeded that individual goal um we're going to start with uh Miles Gloppa if
you would stand please miles is in sixth grade and he logged 761 minutes of reading for the March Madness Challenge miles enjoys reading the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series by Jeff
Kenny and Work in Progress a verse novel as well is one of his favorites so congratulation Miles ryan Blair is also here this evening he is in seventh grade and he logged 936 minutes of reading for the challenge
ryan is a fan of dystopian and science fiction books congratulations Ryan um the next student is actually not here this evening she's trying to um qualify for for state for track um Anna Gloppa is in sixth grade she logged 942
minutes of reading she enjoys reading many genres of books including verse novels and realistic fiction her favorite author is Sharon Draper and loved reading her series Out of My Mind and good luck Anna Cla i hope you qualify for
track next we have Miss Irma Baldorama who is here with us this evening she is in sixth grade and she logged 2,167 minutes of reading irma enjoys reading she enjoys reading graphic novels and most recently
finished reading the book The Summer of the Mariposas by Guadalupe Garcia McCall congratulations Irma next we have Lillian Top she is in uh 8th grade logging 2,865 minutes of reading for the
challenge she loves dystopian books such as Neil Schustman's Scythe series as well as mystery books seventh grader Alana Perser uh logged a whopping 3,849 minutes of reading during the
challenge she is a huge fan of Aaron Hunter's Warrior Cats fantasy series and then we have Caesar Tovar if Caesar could stand please um he is our top reader overall at Steuart's Creek for the March Madness Challenge he is in seventh grade and
read and logged 9,489 minutes of reading and yes this kid is legit he sat sat back down okay he's back okay caesar is a passionate reader and enjoys many types of books but
especially enjoys sports fiction by authors such as Mike Lupa and John Feinstein and he wanted me to make sure I added that his favorite author iswami Alexander you're here thank you so much for your support of school libraries and congratulations
to all my kids thank you thank you all for your time this evening um I want to thank our communications team for visiting our libraries and speaking with our amazing library media specialists i want to thank our instruction department for seeing the value in our space and our resources i
also want to thank Dr sullivan who on a whim gave me my first library job last but not least I want to recognize our librarians that came out tonight and our librarians watching from home thank you so much for all you do thank you thank you
all right so I got a little bit out of order there we were supposed to do the staff awards first but I really like with the librarians so thank you um so uh I I want to make sure that we recognize Sonic Restaurants we have a couple of new rep or different representatives this this week or this
month jeremy Arnold and Cameron Alexander you guys here oh great um we usually Mr spragggins and Mr schuer usually come but uh they sent some other great guys this week and we're going to tell these guys are That's okay we
appreciate you so just to remind everybody Sonic has agreed to uh sponsor these awards all school year uh and they've already signed on for next year and so they said one couple months ago hey we're in just let us know what you need and we're there so we appreciate the support of our schools dr martin is
our um deputy superintendent back here she's going to help with the um awards and we're going to do a picture right over here with everybody when this is done uh the first award winner this month is Brad Decker the principal of Oakland Middle School and I I joke with Mr decker
before the meeting that I it just pained me that I was going to say something nice about him but I was really joking because Mr decker is a wonderful principal just earlier this week he called me about a family who was having a hardship was advocating for him wanting to know how we could help him we were able to find a program that would
help them and that's just the type of conversations we typically have for Mr decker and this goes to prove it this is the nomination from the parent um who who nominated Mr decker unexpected to us our daughter had a difficult time transitioning from elementary school to middle school recently this is a child
who is normally well-liked and wellknown and has lots of friends so again it was truly unexpected uh that we had a bad exp that we were having this type of experience the staff at the school from the front office to the counselors to the assistant principal to the teachers all had a hand in helping my daughter
adjust to the middle school environment and I'd like to give credit where credit is due and that is the one in charge who is Mr principal Decker uh the support I received from Oakland Middle School was truly a beautiful thing mr decker recognized he could help my child and connected my child to the appropriate
staff members who could help i've already sent a handwritten thank you note to the staff but I also wanted to make sure that we nominated him for that award so I wanted you to hear that from the principal so again thank you for being such a great principal our next award winner is in the teacher
category this is and just to remind everybody we do four categories we we recognize a principal a teacher a support staff member and someone is involved with transportation uh each month so in this category it's for a teacher Miss Kristen Lucas is she here great come on
up so Miss Lucas is a third grade teacher at Wilson Elementary School and if you don't know third grade teachers have that wonderful reading law to deal with every year and to help the parents and the students navigate that and this parent specifically mentioned that that's one of the reasons she nominated
her miss Lucas is an amazing teacher she works hard to help her students make the most growth possible she teaches third grade and handles all of the stress from the retention laws so well she also helps lead lead her team in reading and we need more teachers like her so that's
directly from a parent so thank you in the transportation category we want to recognize Shia Curtis and I hope I pronounced your first name right Miss Curtis aisha aisha sorry about that come on up she's a bus driver bus 185 right so correct me if I'm wrong but my
understanding is you went to school uh Miss Curtis you went to school in Christian right you live in Christianana and you really wanted to drive in Christiana to serve your community that's what our transportation department told me you were nominated by a parent who said "She worked with my son to get him adapted to being a
first-time bus rider she is always nice patient and understanding and I see her treat all of her kids with care and respect." So thank you and then our final recognition tonight is for Miss Rebecca Ray who actually could not be here but I still want to nominate or recognize her
tonight she goes by Miss Becky uh now and this is also unusual she now works at David Yuri but when the nomination came in she was at Rock Springs Elementary School but she's liked so well at both schools we still wanted to make sure she was recognized so Miss Bakey is the face of the front office and is the most deserving person for
special recognition she greets all families and students with a smile and is willing to help however needed she is loyal to the community is a bright light each day each day and she is wonderful and we are so lucky to have her and so we're going to go out to the school and actually recognize Miss R she just could
not be here tonight so if she's watching thank you very much all right so we're going to do a quick picture over here with everyone and then I think that Mr pedigo has something is that right okay thank you all yes we did last time okay well yes
[Applause] mr darby you want to introduce Mr pedigo uh we have Mr pedigo principal of Eagleville is here to share some stuff with us first off thank you to Miss Darby for
inviting us uh out for some recognitions thank you to the board Dr sullivan uh for having us here this evening got some students to recognize a lot of great things going on at Eagleville uh I do want to highlight a couple of recent things before we get to these students over here uh that our students are doing
uh of course I got to start with Maddie Puit who is in top 14 of American Idol so shameless plug vote Maddie uh we've had Emily Bird that was top five in the global amazing shake in Atlanta here right as spring break i think that may
be the highest anybody from Rutherford County has finished in the amazing shake so great work by her uh we've had David Harrison has had a perfect ACT 36 here recently we think the first in school history for that we've got two softball players nominated for Tennessee Gatorade
Player of the Year for one that's softball team to have one is good but to have two is fabulous we had Carly Whisner here the other night 3d state championship and middle school girls uh archery so just a lot of great things going on at Eagles we've got great uh
staff and students there so for these guys over here uh they went to junior uh beta nationals uh and won the national championship in what they call living literature uh so speaking of books in the library they did a book that was called The Great Mouse Plot by Ronald
Dah it's a children's story about young Ronald and his friends who decide to prank a mean shop owner Miss Patchet the story is set in a sweet shop where the children regularly buy sweets but Miss Patchet's rude and unpleasant demeanor towards them prompts them to plan a revenge for them and what the students
have to do is go through and they've got to basically build a set uh of what is going on in the story they become the characters of that story so they have done a fantastic job in doing that so really appreciate them and to win a national at Beta was just a great
accomplishment by these students so we do have a few of them here tonight uh so I do want to point them out uh also our sponsors our main sponsor Marcy Fluger who unfortunately couldn't be here tonight miss Michelle Curtis uh is one of our sponsors students that we have
here tonight miss Aubrey Tibs if you'll stand up as I call your name Miss Bella Wilson Mr porter Tomlinson Mr ryder Williams and students unfortunately that couldn't be here tonight Lawson Lada Luke Cooper Lillian Hoffer Audrey Hall
and Alex Bolton so great job by these students in doing that and we really appreciate their accomplishments thank you again for your work that's outstanding thank you Mr pedigo madam Chair yes if they will go to the lobby I believe Mr evans wants to grab a
photo before they head out thank you we have a presentation this this evening from Miss Shana Groom good evening i'm Shana Groom i am the health services coordinator for Rutherford County Schools that means I'm
over our school nurses and um unlike a presentation I'm actually going to read a proclamation from our governor um in honor of our National School Nurses Day that's coming up in a couple of weeks um so bear with me it's a lot of wherees but
um I'm not as good as this Mr reed but whereas school nurses have played a critical role in improving public health and impromoting students academic su success for more than a hundred years and whereas many children face complex
and life-threatening health problems that require care while attending schools and whereas school nurses serve as an important conduit between students and parents the local community and health care providers are f by providing
wellness and improving health outcomes and whereas school nurses support the health and educational success of children and youth by providing access to care when their cognitive development is at their peak and whereas we
recognize the hard work and dedication of our school nurses in the state of Tennessee and commend them for their continued efforts now therefore I Bill Lee governor of the state of Tennessee do hereby compla proclaim May 7th 2025
as school nurse appreciation day in Tennessee and encourage all citizens to join me in this worthy observance and just very briefly I would like to um recognize uh that we have um 21 nationally certified school nurses in
Rutherford County and only 55 in this state so almost half of the nationally certified school nurses are here serving our students in Rutherford County so that's awesome thank you for your time next we have public comment first up we have Allan
Younren ladies and gentlemen of the board thank you again for allowing me to come up here and speak um a couple weeks ago we came in and you guys had a docket on your agenda to look over and more information was needed to try to make a better decision or whatever moving
forward um this time I'm just going to try to keep it sweet i know you guys got a lot going on today um I do plead with the board to hopefully make real good decision on this i wanted you guys I wanted to actually introduce him to you this is Jackson and I want you guys to actually see him meet him see the boy
that you guys are you know well making a decision on um I know it's it's a difficult decision to make good or bad i get it i understand um again thank you i don't want to take up too much more of your guys' time thank you
next we have Dominique Smith hello I'm Dominique Smith i'm here this evening to speak in support of Rutherford uh Rocket Chips Charter School application i'm a resident of Smyrna i have twin daughters who are here with me tonight they will be kindergarteners at Stewart's Creek
Elementary School in the fall stewart's Creek is an amazing school my husband and I actually chose the neighborhood we live in specifically to be zoned for that school however if Rocket Ship were to open a school here in Rutherford County that would be my first choice for
their elementary school i'm an educator myself i'm actually a principal of a middle school in North Nashville and I'm very familiar with Rocket Ship's model before we moved to Tennessee to be closer to my husband's family I was a founding teacher at one of Rocket Ship's
schools in California that ex experience has shaped how I work to this day especially in the areas of teacher development and coaching even though rocket ship was my third teaching experience it was the first time I had a really strong coach who gave me clear
guidance on how to effectively prep and deliver a lesson as an educator I know the importance of quality instruction but as a mom I'm drawn to Rock Rocket Ship's complete approach to building a school community first rocket ship schools are diverse they welcome and
celebrate a variety of cultures that exist within the communities they are located in and that is something I loved for my daughters to experience second Rocket Ship provides individualized instruction for students which involves a lot of small group and even one-on-one
instruction i believe this is especially important for young children third Rocket Ship supports not just the individual child but the family as a whole teachers do home visits with all of their students getting to know the families and the communities that they're serving family engagement is a
core to Rocket Ship's model and last Rocket Ship has a big focus on joy the entire school begins every day singing and dancing together i still know every move to one of the troll songs they would play and dance frequently with my
girls the level of joy that level of joy is often missing in traditional public schools not only does it make learning fun but it reinforces for students that the adults in the in the school care about them and want them to be there rutherford is a fast growing community
many of our schools are overpopulated we need more schools and Rocket Ship knows how to build a great school from the ground up with all of the operational systems that are needed i ask you to please support Rocket Ship's charter school application thank you next we have Sarah Bell
hello i do not like public speaking um but I just wanted to take a moment to thank all of the Rutherford County librarians and educators for the work that they do and the love that they pour into our children every day my son is in the third grade and I have only positive
things to say regarding the teachers and school staff that I have met over the past few years i feel connected and well informed about what my son is learning i know exactly what books he's checking out from the library because he excitedly shows them to me when he gets home in the afternoons in the same vein
I have been beyond impressed with the level of professionalism and thoroughess that Dr chastain and the library sorry media specialists have shown in their recommendations i was hopeful that the board would defer to their expertise regarding compliance with the state laws i read through all their notes for every
meeting to me at least it felt like a concerted effort was made to address the board's concerns and present recommendations in a logical and in-depth manner the board's repeated refusal to follow these recommendations has been downright disgraceful i have always loved reading
i was checking books out of the high school library years before I was a student i actually read several of the books you guys have removed only once did my mother ever stop me from reading a book um it was A Time to Kill by John Gisham when she
told me that I was too young to read it I respected her opinion and I waited to read it until I was older now that I am a parent myself I work daily to build that same level of trust and respect with my own son a common question in my house is is that
for grown-ups it is asked about books movies musicians and even video games i answer him honestly he knows there's some language that isn't appropriate for him at his age he has a basic understanding of what sex is and why media with that content is not
appropriate for him at his age he understands that there are some depictions of violence that are too graphic for him at his age so if I believe that something is inappropriate I tell him and I tell him why he says "Okay." and we move on it really is that
easy i trust him and he trusts me i wish more parents had this relationship with their children but many in this county obviously do not um and I will just end with a quote from a Nolla uh this is how you lose the time war which is what
finally convinced me to speak as you can tell I'm not a good speaker um but I've been very frustrated past few months so I finally signed up to do it um when I read books are letters in bottles cast into the waves of time from one person
trying to save the world to another keep reading keep writing keep fighting we're all still here so anyway thanks thank you next we have Judy Whiteill my name is Judy Whiteill and I'm a retired elementary school librarian
media specialist i really appreciated the outstanding presentation tonight about our media specialist and I had written my comments before that so there may be some redundancy but I wanted to say that public schools have always offered an equal opportunity to every
student library media specialists serve every student regardless of the size or grade configuration of their school while smaller schools offer the opportunity to know the students better most schools today are designed to serve up to a thousand students this element
alone brings challenges when scheduling class library classes and maintaining book and media collections many don't know the full description uh job description for librarians it's very long and detailed but I'll hit some highlights first of all teaching
students to have respect for books and materials that have to be shared by everyone in the school providing instruction on how to use the system that I don't know if it's still the Dewey Desmos system but it enables students to be independent when searching for and choosing books
scheduling with classroom teachers for times to conduct storytime checkout and hope classes where important library skills are taught researching professional journals to determine which books media materials and AV equipment that they must purchase for their media center processing new books and
materials received preparing memorial and honor books checking in organizing and shelving hundreds of books that are returned on a daily basis inventorying thousands of books and materials every year understanding and becoming familiar
with the frequent updating of the operating system that's used in the library media center teaching students how to conduct research for reports projects and term papers organizing and conducting book fairs for the extra funds needed to supplement a limited
library budget and collaborating with classroom teachers to supplement items they need to teach specific subjects and units all of the above and more are required of these professionals while library media specialists don't get a coaching
supplement they should because they coach a huge team and the entire school they do this so that all students can develop a love of reading and strive to become lifelong learners library media specialists are winners in my book
[Applause] next we have Alejandra Beltran good evening members of the board and thank you for this opportunity to speak my name is Alejandra Wran and I'm here to support Rocket Ship's charter school application i have lived
in Rutherford County for about six years now and currently currently residing in Smyrna every day I travel to South Nashville to teach kindergarten humanities at Rockship United Academy which was the second Rocket Ship school to open here in Tennessee when I was first hired I was living in Murphy'sboro
and found it worth commuting then I felt it was worth moving closer to Rocket Ship United so I did i have been at Rocket Ship for four years now when their third school Rockaship Dream Community Prep opened in Antioch I considered transferring but I couldn't
bring myself to leave Rockaship United we're more than just a building of staff and students rockship schools are real communities almost like a family one thing that really stuck with me from the onboarding process is the organization's belief that every child deserves a highquality education regardless of
their zip code i know firsthand how important that is i am a proud first generation Latina college graduate i come from a working-class family and even in a low in a lowinccome area I was given a strong academic foundation for my academic
journey i was able to earn my bachelor's degree in sociology all through Pellgrants based off my grades while in college I worked as a teacher's assistant and began working with groups of students when I witnessed the students growth and their progress I real I realized I wanted to get into
teaching rogers has provided me with the path to reach that goal i am currently working on my master's degree and teacher certification all while gaining valuable teaching experience by teaching on a state permit rocket ship has given me the tools and resources I need to grow as a
teacher in order to help grow my students as well i love providing students with intentional tailored instruction to meet them where they are through our emphasis on datadriven small groupoup instruction i truly enjoy rel relationships I get to build with
families especially with Spanish-sp speakaking parents who feel an immediate sense of relief when they realize they have someone to communicate with they know their children feel seen understood and supported if Frogip opens a school here in Rutherford County I hope to be a part of it i live in the community and
I'd love to be a part of opening a school that reflects the diversity in the area not just amongst the students but among the teachers and staff as well thank you again for the opportunity to speak and I respectfully ask that you approve Ragaship's charter application thank you thank
[Applause] you next we have Josh Walker i'm going to read because I don't want to sound robotic we had a system we had a moment of silence it worked it's the compromise
it's been the legal compromise in this country for decades no one wants it but it works for everybody then Mr tidwell decided he wanted to drag us into his species and culture bill and now we've gotten a letter from Americans United telling us we're breaking the law
because we are we are violating the establishment clause of the first amendment which says government cannot officially perform religious acts doesn't matter how many options you put on the form it's still if it's done in official capacity is against the law now
he's also brought in the ACLJ American Center for Law and Justice um I got that right um and supposedly it's going to be free i'm sure you told y'all it's going to be free but the thing is if you look at their paperwork it's page 40 in the agenda if anyone wants to look it up it
says "You understand however that you alone are responsible for paying any fines attorneys fees penalties costs or damages assessed against the client Rutherford County Schools personally due to your misconduct we are the ones
breaking the law and the ones who are going to pay for this are the students of Rutherford County." is the way they he hasn't told you they're an activist group their goal is to change the law the way they do that is to get someone to break the law like we have done and then they're going to sue their way up through the courts we're going to get
sued to stop they're going to bring it up through the appellet courts to the Supreme Court and the goal is to change the law i know this case because he's mentioned the status of the courts because they're trying to change the law the problem is as the law stands now it is illegal and we will pay for it we will pay every fine we will pay every
fee and the students of Rutherford County will suffer mr tidwell this is not the place to fight your culture war if you want to do that go join a lobbying group but this is not the place for it i beg the rest of you undo this because our
children will pay they will suffer this will cost our community it has to be undone it does not diminish your faith is does not diminish your devotion to undo this to go back to the neutral stance again i beg you don't make our students pay for
his culture war you know better and you need to [Applause] stop next we have Jade Taylor good evening everyone my name is Jade Taylor and I'm here tonight to speak in
support of Rocket Ship's charter school application the viewpoint I'm speaking from tonight is shaped through multiple lenses first I'm a Nashville native who attended academic magnet schools growing up secondly I'm also a Vanderbilt
University graduate with a degree in human and organizational development and now leading Rocket Ship's talent development work i'm also a resident of Smyrna and living in an area where Rocket Ship hopes to locate and break
down a new break uh ground in a new elementary school and finally what I'm most proud of I'm a new mom of a 13-month-old daughter and already thinking about the future of her educational experiences and what she'll what it'll be like for her and so for me
the perspective I'm speaking from originates back to my own mom who has played an enormous role in shaping my educational opportunities she is a special education teacher who instilled in both my brother and me the
importance of receiving a highquality education um early on in our lives the public schools we attended were far away from where we lived but for her the distance didn't matter it was the importance of highquality education and
so I know that the effort my mother uh made to seek out highquality schools during our education is what ultimately prepared me to attend Vanderbilt and ultimately find the career path that I'm on today after college my career began
working in HR in national retail chains and when I wasn't working I was serving as a tutor i saw an opportunity to work for Rocket Ship Public Schools as an opportunity to bridge my passion and my profession and when I learned that
Rocket Ship was opening a school in the community that I grew up in Antioch um serving unders underserved communities in diverse areas I was ultimately excited to join i knew this was an organization I wanted to be a part of
and so for my own daughter I want her to have an opportunity to attend highquality schools and one that's close to home alongside others in her community excellence during these early years is important because it sets you
up for success in middle school high school and beyond and so knowing that Rocket Ship is intentional about that work and committed to helping every child reach their full potential is exactly what has excited me and
continues to propel me um and hopefully Rocket Ship and opening a school up in the Rutherford count county community working on the national rocket ship team and talent development we know that the core backbone of our schools is our teachers they're the ones that make
the direct impact and so with that as a parent and resident of Smyrna I respectfully ask that the Rutherford County School Board vote to support Rocket Ship's charter school application thank you thank you next we have Elizabeth Shepard
thank you for the opportunity to speak to you all tonight i'm here as a Blackman High School parent and also as a school librarian thank you so much for featuring our librarians at tonight's meeting i want to personally give a shout out and thank librarians Sarah
Shannon Katie Caitlyn Eric Misty Brian Michelle and Kelly for all the professional and personal support they have given me on my personal journey of librarianship they and all the other RCS librarians truly deserve every bit of your appreciation your thanks and your
support like I mentioned last week as board members you have or last board meeting at as board members you have an ample opportunity to show our librarians your support through your words as well as your actions you have the power to update the librarian job description so
it is clear to all stakeholders that RCS only hires the best highly qualified certified librarians with master's degrees the Tennessee Department of Education has recently changed their policy lowering the standards for attaining a library endorsement i hope
for the sake of our students and their continued success that RCS goes above and beyond setting expectations when hiring new librarians especially with all the additional maneuvering they're now required to do to comply with state law you have the power to provide them with the funds needed to have a well staffed
library to attend high-quality professional developments and to be able to purchase muchneeded books for their students you have the power to make changes to board policy 4.403 at next week's policy committee meeting to amend the current wording and return to the common sense methods for material
challenges that have worked in our county for years as I close I'd like to switch gears a bit and express my concern with the board's potential affiliation with the ACLJ i worry that this organization does not have our students best interests at heart i have serious concerns about the
potential for them to use disputes here in our county as publicity for themselves and to further their reach and their personal gain we have already had enough negative publicity in the last few months it's important that you remember why you're here and why your decisions and your affiliations are so
important don't lose focus remember what you were elected to do investing in every student every day thank you next we have Karen Campbell hello my name is Karen Campbell i am here today as the mother of Samuel Campbell a seventh grader at Rockville
Middle School i am respectfully requesting that you overturn a decision to remand my son to alternative school this action we believe constitutes a violation of his right to due process and represents a failure by the school to follow its own stated policies and
procedures as outlined in the 202425 RCS student handbook and code of conduct first Samuel was accused of cheating and action explicitly categorized as a level one misbehavior according to policy
6.30 of the code of conduct on page 5 of 96 these offenses are considered minor to be handled in the classroom at the at the teacher level and not through office referrals or severely disciplinary actions such as alternative school
placement he was already appropriately disciplined when he received a zero on the assignment with no opportunity for corrections or a retake a significant academic consequence yet that was followed by an office referral and a remand to alternative school which in
effect punishes him three times for a single classroom infraction second as stated in the policy 6.3000 of the student handbook and code of conduct Rutherford County schools are required to implement discipline practices that include restorative
practices RTI 2B which is response to instruction and intervention or behavior a multi-tered system of supports or MTSS and behavior intervention plans these practices were not are not optional they are mandated and must be utilized before
exclusionary or punitive actions are considered in Samuel's case none of these supports were ever provided there was no attempt at restorative practice no document behavioral interventions and no evidence of a tier 2 or tier tier
three plan designed to address the root of any perceived behavioral challenges and none of these options were ever offered by the school instead the only response to Samuel's misbehaviors has been punitive this failure is a clear
deviation from policy and represents a significant break in process in due diligence as laid out in both the district handbook and stated endorsed and the state endorsed RTI2B framework additionally as this failure to provide
interventions is not only a violation of local policy but it contradicts the expectations as outlined by the Tennessee Board of Education um the RTI2B framework which is fully endorsed and implemented by Rutherford County Schools
um finally I just want to add as I close the discipline administered to my son has lacked fairness consistency and transparency and most importantly failed to follow the very policies the district has put in place the policy is clear the incident has been mishandled at every
procedural and policy level samuel has already faced consequences and we are not here to ask for special treatment only fair treatment as guaranteed by the code of conduct and by and his process thank you thank you
did you want to speak no all right thank you was this Samuel yes okay he was listed here yes he doesn't want to speak okay that's fine that's fine that leaves room for Danielle Nadu
good evening i was second alternate so not totally prepared um I'm approaching you guys first of all thank you for your service and in regards to the parent responsibility zones i am the guardian of an eighth grader at Blackman Middle
and who utilizes the bus services um due to a couple issues but most of mostly working parents need an option for their children to get to school that allows work hours you know when you get in the drive or the drop off line for these
schools you're sitting there for 30 minutes or more each way and not to mention that the afternoon hours everyone's at work walking or bicycling are not safe in our areas um often for the middle and high school particularly
at Blackman the crossing guard is not at Fortress Boulevard and Blaze Drive so the children are crossing five lanes of traffic unassisted with just the pedestrian sign and then uh the traffic in addition to
that is tremendously terrible in mornings and afternoons emergency personnel and fire trucks and whatnot are blocked from getting in and out the parent responsibility zone will increase that traffic making the drop off times even
longer uh risk for all of that um same thing with you know going through Rockville and whatnot and then on at the work session of April 16th in 2014 Mr young brought up the TCA section
49.6.2101 section G regarding special hazards feature especially wide roads absence of size sidewalks sex offenders within the the area and um no crossing guards so if you look on the sex offenders
website in particular regarding black men there are three within the adjacent neighborhood there are no sidewalks to many schools they're crossing major roads like Highway 231 Fortress even Dejarnet
um Rockville or Highway 99 and so multiple safety aspects for these children who all receive an equal funding and deserve equal services to attend school parents cannot you know if it were logistically possible we would
all drive our children to school it would be safe but we're it's not possible just due to the entrances exits traffic and whatnot for schools and I understand that new schools are being added which results in added you know need for buses however new schools can't
result in reallocation or removal of services from existing students they must have additional services added so I ask that you reject the parent responsibility zones and so that our children our children can remain safe if we had a walkable neighborhoods it would
be great but we do not thank you for your time thank you number eight instruction the first is Nova Smart Academy K8 Charter School um want to thank Dr mccann for his presentation and our charter school team as well we have recommended motions to
approve or deny the Nova Smart Academy K8 Charter School application as presented by the review committee's recommendation for the 2526 school year any comments or questions to remind the board if you do vote to approve the charter schools is a pretty
pretty simple vote we have to do a resolution approving the approval if you vote to deny the charter school application you have to state the reasons for the denial you can say you're voting to deny just based on staff's recommendations and report but if there's additional reasons beyond
that you want to add to it you can do that as well okay Miss Maxwell yes Miss Malis we had talked I had brought up that there was a last time we had like a third option to deny with stipulations so how will that work like if they were
to deny with a stipulation to give the charter schools time to fix the contract and address some of these concerns if they choose to give them the chance to come back and reapply the to state that is you're recommending the denial at this point subject to the following
stipulations that be able to resubmit on the following conditions and then state what your conditions are so can I say the uh the conditions are the concerns that were addressed in the presentation i can say it just like that okay thank you
okay any comments or questions yes Mr vaude jeff since this is my first rodeo what happens if we take no action you have to Well you take no action is deemed a denial okay the right to affirm under
the state okay no it's actually Mr it is Dr mccann yes you want to address Dr mccann okay it's approved correct yeah it's automatically approved right there and
regardless even if the board votes to deny they still have time to and a whole chance to go through the review process and come back so regardless of if the board takes action to deny with stipulations without stipulations the
committee or the charter application still has and will more than likely come back and review and resubmit yeah Miss Max I'd like to make a motion to deny do we have a second
do you want to state your reasons first of all Mh dr mccann and them did a phenomenal job which I got to witness part of it and uh I just can't support anything that
doesn't come up to the uh performance level of the schools we have in Rutherford County and so far I haven't seen any of that so we have a motion do you have Do you want
to second it Madam Chair yes Miss I would like to amend the motion to second oh I'm sorry i'll second it and then I will amend it to um deny with the stipulation that they can address the issues brought up in the
review and resubmit i'll second Dr mccann's got comment yeah yeah that's fine regardless of whether you um vote to deny or vote to deny with stipulations it's the same thing it's the same thing
they can still resubmit an amended application within 30 days and we can review it for 60 days and then vote again miss Maxwell yes so you're saying we just we just have to do a clean vote to say vote to deny even you you can you
can and and they would theoretically need to address those concerns that were raised by the committee or you can say that outright our stipulations are you address the concerns raised by the committee okay either way it's the same thing getting a little confused about this whole That's okay okay Mr tipple
thank you for that thank you for that clarification uh currently there is a motion on the floor with an amendment so but thank you thank you roll call vote please okay i need to clarify the motion i got lost in that i apologize i believe it
was a motion to deny okay with the stipulations there's a motion to amend amendment first okay so this is a motion to deny with the issues brought up and to resubmit correct there's no there's no
reason for the uh for the other part of they can do that anyway but I thought that was the amendment yeah I can withdraw the amendment okay so she's withdrawing it okay okay so that's withdraw so just a motion to deny okay
mrs rosales yes mr vaughn yes mr tidwell yes miss Sharp no mr vault
Mrs darby yes mrs maxwell yes majority passes but they the charter schools have the time yes to come back and address the stipul address the concerns that were on the presentation yes 30 days in 30 days
to resubmit an application yeah 60 days to then review with the committee next we have the second one second Rocket Ship Tennessee for um the charter school number four recommend motions to approve or deny Rocket Ship Tennessee
charter school number four application is presented by the review committee's recommendation for the 2526 school yes 2526 school year any qu questions or comments i'll entertain a motion make a motion to deny based on that
uh they didn't meet the qualifications and um for the same principle you know that I just can't prove anything that didn't show that uh performance level of the schools that we have here and uh so um
they come back and and make the adjustments and there's part of their application that was just that wasn't done that um I guess in my opinion if it was really important they those mistakes and
errors wouldn't have been made so I'll second that yes Mr cable i would just like to say the same thing for rocket ship applies here which is they can obviously come back reapply fix these things i do have some concerns so that's why I'm supporting the denial at this point but
I do think that there is opportunity there that the concerns be resolved yes um simply because in the past we've already had two applications and whatever is in the um con whatever is in the application is what's going to be in the contract so this is just to give
them the time to address those concerns to come back so that we can get a cont an agreement that's a little bit more favorable okay ready to vote
all right the motion is to deny based on qualifications and performance miss Sharp mr vault mrs rosales yes mr vaughn yes mr tidwell yes mrs
darby yes mrs maxwell yes passes by majority bring back your application with the concerns that have been addressed so that we can review them number three this is summer literacy and
math camp materials with an emphasis on science and reading and math best practices the lit camp and math camp curriculum combines high quality literacy and math instruction and foundational skills development with an engaging summer camp format instruction departments requesting to purchase these kits that include a leader guide lit camper notebook high-quality connected
text sets family guides and access to additional resources available online the cost to provides the lit and math camp curriculum will be 165,876.20 and training will be $7,992 which will come from summer camp funds from the Tennessee State Department of Education you see the
recommended motion is to approve and this is a eightweek camp four four-week camp entire month of June i'm sorry I was making it twice as long would be fun if it was eight weeks give them just a second before we vote any comments or questions i'll entertain
a motion to approve thank you Mr tidwell second thank you Miss Darby all in favor say I i any opposed motion passes next we move to legal first we have discipline hearing appeal and this is
number 2500401 the board has been requested to review a decision of the disciplinary hearing authority DHA and the director of schools to uphold the remainment of a student from Rockville Middle School based on review of the DHA's record the board may A affirm the decision of the DHA B overturn the decision of the DHA
or C grant a hearing before the board if the board chooses B that does send the student back to school so this one we don't have a whole lot so just have to be aware recommended approval is a motion to approve the board initiate a motion in line with one of those three options above i'll entertain a motion
yes Miss How long has the student been out of school just a second can you pull that out of school yes ma'am how long was the remainment for
we have a point system now um so yep nine weeks i'll entertain a motion affirm to affirm the decision of the DHA do we have a second a second thank you Mr
bond roll call please i'd like Can I make a comment uh being a former principal kid get mandated um I want everybody to understand in
this situation it's more than just the cheating incident this is a culmination of Madam Chair yes i I don't believe we're supposed to publicly speak about his record oh we're not okay no
just we just need to go ahead and vote mrs darby no mrs rosales yes mr mr va Mr vaughn yes
mr tidwell yes miss Sharp no mrs maxwell yes all right pass to affirm number two next we have transfer student under discipline number one the board's been requested to admit a transfer student from another school system under
discipline the student was expelled for a title 9 finding according to policy 6.318 the board may deny admissions of any student except those in state custody when a student transfers from another school system while under suspension or expulsion director of schools recommendation is to deny recommended motion is to admit or deny
the admission of this transfer student under discipline yes Miss Sharp i'd like to make a motion to deny but admit into the alternative school for the next school year i'm sorry M sharp could you deny deny for him to go back to school to be
admitted to school this year but to admit to the alternative school 256 i don't think four weeks do that can is that something we can do [Music] miss Ridley what are your thoughts
originally in the hallway up no no okay i I'll remove my motion okay do we have any other motions move to deny do we have a second i'll
second roll call vote please all right motion is to deny Mrs darby yes mr va yes mrs rosales yes mr vaughn yes
mr tidwell Miss Sharp Mrs maxwell yes majority passes to deny you will be allowed in our school system after a year that's right yep
number three and do we need to go into session mr reed do you want to cut for number three [Music] yeah this is an engagement ACLJ the board of education has received a man letter to cease the implementation of prayer at the commencement of its
meetings aclj has offered to provide labor at no cost to the board to assist in the defense of challenges to the implementation of prayer the ACLJ will not be responsible for any cost or awards against the board but would provide legal labor support at no cost to the board you have the engagement
letter was attached to your materials so a possible motion is to approve the board of education engaging the ACLJ to defend the board of education in regards to any challenges to the practice of prayer at the board meetings m Maxwell yes Mr tidwell jeff do you
think this will be a good motion to approve based on your interaction with these folks i I think ACLJ they're very they are constitutional law is their specialty that's what they focus on they have a good deal of experience in that
background um they're willing to take on this case at no cost to the board from a labor standpoint and provide free legal legal support for it so I think that is a benefit to the board in this case so ultimately as someone one of the speakers announced if there's a damage award it will be the board board's
responsibility to pay it but um it the ACLJ is willing to do the lab the legal work to defend the board in regards to this at no cost i'll make a motion to approve second
roll call vote please go ahead i get to speak i'm sorry Mr v i did not see I'm so sorry i'm I'm gonna say I'm gonna bring it back up again that I mentioned the other night and and you know some of the old adages are do you want to bring a gun you know bring a knife to a
gunfight and I feel like that's what's fixed to happen to us um the the the second thing is I said earlier I think we need to move probably a million dollars over to our defense or legal fund either out of ending fund
balance um and I can address that under other business I suppose during the budgetary comments whatever but I I think it's going to we need to make some type of effort and and put the county commission on notice and the budget
office on notice that we are subject to uh paying legal fees or damages or something if we do lose this case and the third and final point I'm going to make beware of anything that's
free especially legal fees that's just my experience being in business over 40 years in this county um don't deny these people are good but again if if if this board is elected to get us in a fight we
need to go in to win and we need to have the best people possible on our side so engage them or don't engage them i'm going to vote against it okay all right this is a motion um to go
ahead and approve uh the engagement of the ACLJ mr va no mr vaughn yes mrs darby yes miss Sharp yes mr mr tidwell yes mrs
rosales yes mrs maxwell pass majority wins next we have engineering and construction rockville High School synthetic field turf request principal Steve Lucer is requesting to have synthetic field turf installed adjacent to the weight room the request is being
donated by Warner's Athletics with estimated value of 20 to 5,000 andrew and Construction has reviewed the request and has no objections recommend a motion is to approve the Rockville High School synthetic turf request as presented any comments questions i'll entertain a
motion move to approve thank you Mr sharp second miss Darby I'm so sorry thank you Mr vaughn all in favor say I i any opposed motion passes number two engineering construction request to
increase RG Anderson's contract for Smyrna High School engineering construction requesting to increase the contract for RG Anderson in the amount of $200,171 $200,17120 these funds will be utilized to replace the remaining corridor ceiling tile and grid in the existing building these funds will be shifted for
remaining balances in the overall project and no additional funds are needed recommended motion is to approve the Smyrna High School ceiling replacement request as presented yes Mr thought well I was going to move for approval but I think Mr you had a finger up i thought yielded miss Sharp
did you have something you wanted to say i was gonna say move to approve you do i I'll second i'll second thank you M i've got a question and thank you Mr bot okay did I understand that this is a movement of money and we anticipate the same thing for Oakland and Riverdale also
it's kind of a clean up there could be some i don't anticipate it to be sealants okay that but there is some housekeeping measures I I guess would be what I would call yes sir there probably
will be yes good deal thank you all in favor say I i any opposed motion passes number uh three yep so we have the Lee Road property the appraisal on the perspective school side and Lee Road nope smarty oh man i
skipped the Smyrna gym sorry i just had made eye contact with Mr reading i just went ahead smart and middle gym scoreboard request dr tehisha Ferguson's requesting to enter a contract with Wilson Bank and Trust to fund the installation of a new scoreboard in the gym the donation cost is $8,695 and will be at no cost to the
board mrs ridley has reviewed their agreement and has no objection engineering Construction has also reviewed the request and has no objection recommended motion is to approve any comments or questions i'll entertain a motion so move thank you Miss Sharp second sec thank you Mr b
all in favor say I i I any opposed motion passes now we're now to read let me go ahead and read Lee Road property the appraisal on the perspective school sign Lee Road has been completed the property is appraised for more than the purchase price under the contract the next phase of examination of the
property will be survey geotechnical topographical environmental and other routine study to determine whether the site is suitable for a prospective school site recommended motion is to proceed with the study and testing of the property motion to approve second second by Mr rosales
yes yes now we go to comments thank you uh does that What's the purchase price since it the appraisal was more the same giving anymore 88,000 i just wanted to make sure right we're not giving them anymore
80,000 we locked in that's fine yeah that's fine i just since other night is it same as other night didn't yeah we went in and that's the price no no i just wanted because it said the the appraisal was more i just want to make sure that's what we So I support it i just want to know how much we're going
to receive it well I've got a question but Dre u the uh when you get into testing and all that kind of stuff there there's a there's a set of stipulations you follow and I think we kind of talked about that the firms that you engage do they bid on
this or these at will people that do survey go i have multiple prices on every test yeah I I've received the last one today so I have not done my analysis to determine which firm we're going to use but we have three
um firms that have bid on everything and we will make an analysis and we will use the one that has the lowest and best price because this is a long-term relationship assuming we buy the property assuming we build a school or
two or whatever we build down there this is a long-term relationship with whoever this engineering firm geotechnical firm that's a that's a different engineering firm um these we could potentially use one of these firms as civil engineers
okay there there are firms out there that specialize doing just testing that and that's where you're heading that's where I'm headed with just the testing now typically when they have been awarded the testing for a project they typically get the oversight for the
grading portion to make sure that the two there's nothing kind of fishy going on they don't do the design but they do the testing for it that that so so there is some incentive typically in this business for them if
they're low they're anticipating getting the oversight of the grading when it comes that that's what I want to make sure that that that the approach here we also rebid that testing as well just to be that's a separate that's a separate contract just to be prudent yes sir
we're we're dotting eyes crossing te yes sir managing the taxpayer dollar as close as we can right now yes sir we are thank you are they local those companies are they local well one of the biders is across the street so yes sir they're all
uh they're not all in Rerford County but yes they are local brentwood Nashville and right across the street we have a motion we have a second all in favor say I i any opposed motion
passes before we start with the bus contract portion I have been asked for a fivem minute break thank you i just Dr pepper and we're back i have looked at these and I believe for each one of these we need to
take a look at individually and vote on them individually madam Chair can I ask a question before started dr sullivan yes i know you touched on this and forgive me because I don't remember just so that it we know before
we even start this conversation is there room to postpone any of these decisions if we need to only if we have a special called meeting somewhere in between okay thank you yep okay well go ahead and discuss because we you and I have talked for the meeting
because a couple of a couple of people have approached me we have to do it tonight you know we are we are under an obligation by the private act to send a budget number to the U budget and finance health correct got to go through
the process so we've got up till what did you tell me may May 15th but we've got graduations that we're shuffling meetings around and all that correct we do and we also have um myself and the finance director who and the rest of our staff and um our schools who are waiting
to know what we're doing with transportation to see what other things we need to do with our budget and so it is the kind of lynch pin if you will for the rest of the budget correct absolutely so really putting it off is not going to help us a whole lot if we put it off any further then it's just
okay that's why I kind of told everybody I thought you know we've been leading to this and I don't think putting it off is going to help us any I don't either I don't think there's another discuss it all the way through and let's try to make the best decision all right agree okay yeah you know we're we're in a uh a
money crunch you know and everything we've got to make a lot of hard decisions uh the first first thing I'd like to make a motion that we u initiate the u the parent responsibility
zone of K through 5 to be one mile 6 through 12 to be 1 and a half miles and that's for everybody and that will that will help us some
do we have a second i'll second it okay now we have a second yes Miss Sharp um are are you talking about across the district yes because I thought what was on the table was just Blackman
um Blackman Smyrna Leverne no title schools have we got the numbers that you have are either all across the district or all across the district no title that's the only two numbers I've provided okay
yep i just mentioned those would be the most impacted because those are the okay most together schools miss Maxwell yes Mr tidwell uh uh just for clarity the the motion does it include does it exclude title one
schools or does it include title is it all schools so I'm assuming that includes all everybody okay and that would be the greatest cost savings correct correct that is on what Mr lee calculated the other day and again this
is rough because we don't have each one drawn close to $3 million th this is what's in our email right we don't have it in the packet tonight correct all right yeah so if one of if somebody go back and review actually
what those numbers are I think budgetary it's $3,80,000 3 million 80,000 yes sir all right and that was approximately how many routes 44 not routes buses
buses those buses run multiple routes i get my semantics wrong sometimes that's why I want to be clear because it does matter so it's how many buses total it's roughly 44 44 buses based on current
zoning okay yes Mr dr s and I think it's important that when we talk about parent responsibility zones as a district we're not advocating or stating that those are walk zones we're saying they're parent responsibility zones responsibility
how does this align with other districts the city of Murphy'sboro's district how does it compare to all of those do you have anybody have any information related to that knox County does this exact same way city of Murphus Bur's PRZ
is I think it's a mile but they're K5 they include title though they still I think they do include title yeah I think our our difference with some of our title is that one of the ones I know that Miss Sharp talked about the other day is a title school so we could
definitely I guess handpick a couple of those but that gets a little strange i know the school that I opened Rocky Fork is soon to be titled and that title school and that subdivision is right beside the school as well so and and I'm
speaking for you guys but sometimes title changes so so a school could be a title school like like exactly what you're talking about rocky Fork currently is not but they're probably going to be in the conversation we have
that one we had really good um participation with the developer and we connected all of our sidewalks so if it goes title then that one gets excluded if you exclude title it becomes
a it becomes very difficult to pick and choose neighborhoods that's my fault miss Sharp trying to Mr arvey rather I keep calling Miss Sharp i'm so sorry we'll answer down here
all right Miss Sharp yeah just point down here why don't something that I kind of wanted to just bring up the main reason that I brought this up was to try to keep funding in transportation to provide more money to our current contractors so I'm wondering
if the board would be favorable to maybe moving this down in order after we discuss the amount of money to see if the money from doing the PRZ is needed if it's not needed this may not
be something that we need to implement right now okay so you want to max are you making a motion to move it down right now you moved it from Well there's current there's currently a motion on the floor
seconded so excuse me you want Are you agreeable to moving your motion to the end here after we find out what the amount is yeah i mean it's going to be the same [Applause] yeah and I've seconded it so I agree
with it too so okay so let's go to school bus liability insurance yeah I think this has been discussed quite a bit um liability insurance when we put this bus contract motion because it has to be
published 5 days in advance we add school bus liability insurance request risk management to include bus contractors under new policy consider our own BOE liability policy offer stipen to bus contractors provide their own liability insurance and I think that
also in kind of connects to to number three as well so the board has options Mr reid if you want to come up and address as well any updates that have changed or if anything has changed i don't think anything we've we've talked
about this a lot and talked about it a lot Tuesday night as you know um the law you know was changed um a couple years ago requiring bus contractors to get their own insurance our we the county had provided insurance for the bus contractor for years that's always kind
of how our county's done it with the best with respect to the bus contractors the state law changed it required that um the bus contractors obtain their own insurance and that's what the law has been up to like just a couple of days ago so Ruy County as they do every year
they are required um to u go out and do an RFP for the county's insurance program they did that um many weeks ago u based on the law that was in place at that time and the law in place at that time did not provide did not allow the
county to carry insurance on the contractors anymore so when the RFP came in the RFP did not provide for insurance for the contractors the um we went uh we asked risk manager
go back to we had one one firm responded to the county's risk management RFP and they went the risk management office went back to them multiple times asked if they would provide coverage for the bus contractors we would like and told them we would like you to do that
but the company is not not willing to pick up coverage for the bus contractors so our current policy that we have in case for for bus insurance expires June 30th of this year so there's no there's no options to extend it just is
insurance policy expires once it expires it's gone so given with respect to where we are with needing to get insurance in place by July 1 we've got budget requirements by May 15th really we don't have any other option but to go ahead
and proceed with the alternative of bus contractors obtaining their own insurance which is what the law had been all through this year up until maybe just a day ago or a couple till Tuesday when the legislature went out of session so um so this current contract you have
before you for your consideration your package does provide for the contractors to be required to maintain their own insurance they named the and named the board of education as additional insured but to help them with that cost because the board has recognized that as an additional expense on them that they
have not historically borne we have added in the contract a provision for the bus contractors to be paid a stipen of $4,000 per bus to help them with the cost of insurance based on the estimates of insurance that I had obtained and
been submitted to this the office here and many contractors we thought that is a good median amount that should be ample enough to pay for an insurance policy under today's rates uh under the terms that we're proposing in the contract so um so the contract you have
before you does propose this change with respect to insurance with respect to the and the contractors being required to maintain their own insurance i did based on this new legislation that we talked about Tuesday night the new legislation has been approved as of Tuesday I believe i don't
know the bill has even been signed by the governor yet but has gone through the house and the senate and been passed by the house and senate assuming it does get passed by the governor's office and signed off by them the law may be different going into next school year so
I've added language to this contract which allows the school board that in the event we can as a county can once again provide insurance for contractors to allow us to go out and try to obtain it see what the cost of that would be see if it's feasible and if there if the bus contractors and we are agreeable to
doing that maybe going back the way it has been so but for now with the time constraints we have we don't have the luxury of waiting because we have to we need to have insurance in place and we need to know what the budget's going to be here by July 1 um so so this contract
does provide for the bus contractors having their own insurance it provides them a $4,000 stipen for each bus to help pay for that so they're not out of pocket the cost for that insurance and it provides that going forward that we'll relook at that and try to see if
we're we can go back to the way it has been with respect to the county providing insurance on the buses those are those provisions are all built into this contract miss Sharp thank you um this is I don't think that we need to wait
around to see Governor Lee's going to sign this bill i think he's going to sign it and from talking there's no reason for him not to sign it and from talking with multiple contractors this insurance and making them get their own own insurance is a deal
breakaker so it's kind of it's kind of a moot point my motion would be for us to go back to risk management ask them to edit the RFP and get that there's no reason it would take them two or three 30 days or 60 days to rewrite that all
they need to do is take the RFP send it back out and let's see if we can get the money we've already got the money set aside for the stipens we can use that money to fund the insurance do we have a second to her
motion we can't We just can't sit around and wait for Governor Lee to do the bill and we can't sit around and wait to see what else is going to happen we've got to do a two or three-pronged approach on this because we can't we can't run the date out and then then we're up against the
hard wall but the contractors are telling me they're not going to provide their insurance and where where are we going to be i listen and I don't blame them i wouldn't want somebody to be able to come back and sue me and take take my life's work away so we we've got to we Mr von is
right no no no clapping or I I'll have you removed we've got a lot on our plate tonight no clapping no jeering nothing thank you Madam Chair mr vaughn is right we've got some hard decisions to make
but we also have to come out of here where everybody is is still wanting to work together and we we've got to this is going to be a delicate balance but we can't sit here and run out the clock so that's my motion
m Maxwell Mr mr von he wanted I got do we have a second or not okay we don't have a second yes Mr b and then you Mr title all right now to kind of go back and review and and Miss Sharp I appreciate your comments those are the
same comments they gave me two months ago and I know a lot of them don't like the answer but from from my two meetings and my multiple meetings with Jeff and talking to other insurance um
attorneys related to this the law has stated we cannot do it they cannot tie to our policy and it's not on our policy so with due respect Miss Sharp hoping and praying that an RFP gets out in the next two weeks 3 weeks
and a premium comes back and somebody will cover it what if they don't then we've not made a provision within the the contract blame this on me if you want to but the only way I could see around this to justifiably
u compensate our drivers was to put a line item in there and Jeff and I along with budget and finance the people at the courthouse if it does get changed and and and Kim and and Kim who I'm talking about in the committee we've been
talking back and forth back and forth for two months we're going to get the bill passed we're going to get the bill passed i still had seen the final copy of the bill myself and furthermore I'm not the attorney present here that needs
to interpret what the law says um I know what CATS has said i know what TSBA you got the information from them right wasn't it you so we've got four different sources of information that
says we cannot do it but we have one bill possibly that says we can do it so I don't feel like it's prudent to send a budget to the courthouse that does not have an A plan and a B plan put in it we
we we know if if we give them a stipen they have the choice to go buy their insurance if they don't want to get liability insurance if that's the way the final contract reads June 30th of this year whatever this board ends up
presenting to the drivers they have the choice not to sign the contract i hate that i really do there's a lot of them as I've said are generational drivers a lot of them have driven for this county for 30 years i didn't change the law okay so I hope all of y'all understand
that some of you have been very vindictive to me okay and and I my hide's pretty thick melinda Brown knows that she's grown up with me i take a lot of punches but but I have been the biggest advocate for them to try to
protect them to protect the kids of this county to protect the taxpayers of this county i'm fine with it if we can find something that's affordable but uh for us to wait is not financially prudent so that's the reason this line item's in
there if you want to take the line item out not give them the $4,000 that's fine throw that out here as a motion but you saw what happened so I would offer a motion that we in this new contract provide $4,000
per bus with the buses that have been in service this year and the reason I'm looking at you right now is because there's going to be spare buses that need to be covered and if they've not been on the
road this year have not passed inspection we don't need to pay that premium to them if that makes any sense i had this great fear night before last hell i could see everybody dragging buses out of the weeds and trying to get insurance on them in case they needed to
use them but they need to be buses that have run this year or been inspect been used this year that so that would be my motion to put the $4,000 out there and and I'll come back with another motion talking about the RFP but let's get this done first and we'll talk about the RFP
in a second mr vault I will I'll second your motion [Music] miss Sharp your mic's not on sorry I was talking about Rutherford County going out and resending the RFP not Rutherford County
Schools and many of the bus drivers have told me that the $4,000 isn't going to be enough so we're where do where where does it stop and if we I I wasn't saying just do that i'm trying to chip away of all the things that we need to do and do some things in tandem that's the reason
I presented this to to the board Tuesday night kind of as a three-prong appro approach if you want to pull everything out of the we can go through the contract line item by line item or paragraph by paragraph this appeared to me after meeting with the committee and
talking to again probably 25 or 30 other owner operators contractors uh this is what it came down to the rest of the stuff we kind of worked through and and done and taken care of but the liability insurance is the first thing I
felt well actually I thought PRZ if we did that first it maybe would free up some money that we could have the opportunity to to deal with the $4,000 because this is 1.3 million $1.4 million that I'm talking about right here really
so I mean this is but we can't you know there's got to be something out i feel very strongly about this if if you don't want to offer it to them it's okay we can put it in their pay raise and you know if it works it works if it doesn't it doesn't it's but this this was my recommendation I'll own this part of
this discussion right now and he made a motion and I seconded it restate it okay restate it okay can you restate it I think it was basically that we include the $4,000 stipen for every bus that has been utilized this
year and I assume You've got a list of some kind transportation department does yeah I I said you you transportation okay Mr tidwell I think you were up next
all right yes thank you um I'm going to try to uh what I'd come in here with tonight was an idea that was going to require some discussion um but I want to try to marry both of those ideas right there which is I agree with Stan i mean
it it looks like I mean just the way it's been presented that it is not going to get done in time for school start it's not going to get in time we got to have something to send to budget as well we can't just be guessing at it um so we could move forward with the $4,000
stipen uh the additional part that I would add in there is I'm looking at the raise increase and that the I'm looking at everything as a total cost over four years because this is a four-year contract so my thought was all right if
we do the stipen it's 1.4 million a year that times four it's $5.6 million previously when these contractors were on the county u government insurance that was over four year it was about $250,000 roughly a year so about a
million dollars so it is costing rather the county is costing the county $4.6 million more dollars to carry the basically or close to the same amount of coverage we don't want that additional cost they don't want the the the coverage they're having to go out and
the liability that comes with that so as I've stated many times neither side is the winner however where we are at now against the timets that we have if we move forward with the 4,000 that gives us something to roll with and we don't know what the RFP is going to come back
but if the RFP does get pushed out which we should push um then most likely maybe not this year i can't say for sure this year because it's going to be separated from the county insurance uh whether it's going to be higher or lower than
that 1.4 million stipen we're given but most likely in year two year three year four it will be combined with the county government insurance as a total package as it has done years and years past and there will be drastic savings versus what we're paying year after year so
with that in mind my thought would be that we include in the contract that if both contractors are allowed back on the county insurance that the board and the contractors may enter back into negotiation which Reed mentioned this
little bit earlier um but that we would split any savings between the contractors and the county because our costs have went up with this stipen and they're they they want to be back on the county government as well and then also that saves some money in the negotiation
of the race it is not a guarantee i understand that i know that uh however if we're looking at all the potential options and the liability they want to be on county government insurance it's better for us to have them back on there whole lot more likely for it to happen two three and four but if there
is a carrier that will pick them off uh pick off the bus contractors in general with RFP then that would be the best marriage total so does that make sense that's a lot but does that make sense to everybody
sorry i'm just going to speak on what I've been diligently trying to get an answer to which feels impossible at this point just because I would like for y'all to know what's going through my head um I've spoken to a few different
attorneys i'm still waiting on one to get back to me that specializes in insurance because he was like I need to go further down this rabbit hole and figure this out i have some attorneys telling me we legally cannot provide them their insurance and I have some attorneys telling me that we can my biggest
concern is if we move forward providing the insurance and it is later found that that is not legal for us to be providing if you end up in a lawsuit and then someone goes you legally weren't supposed to be carrying their insurance
you guys are going to be found with no insurance at all and that's deeply concerning for me because I don't want anybody in that position so I feel extremely stuck in this situation because I can't seem to get
a clear-cut answer on whether we are legally allowed to provide that insurance which which leaves me in a really hard predicament because I don't want to lose our contractors i also don't want to expose them to more risk
than necessary and I don't want to expose our district to any more risk than necessary which is one of the reasons why I asked if it was possible to put it off at all just because if we could get a few more weigh-ins on the legalities of the insurance I would feel better
about it because right now I just feel extremely conflicted i do like your idea though Mr tidwell mr move on uh one thing I guess I need clarification with it's my understanding
that the the bus drivers they cannot cut the u if the county if they put them back on there the insurance carrier wouldn't approve
it is that correct mr vot you asking me Mr yeah Mr the the we the they every year risk management sends out an RFP for insurance coverage for the county as a whole this year they had only one
company respond to that which actually is the current provider who is providing insurance this year but that company is no longer willing to provide coverage for the bus contractors i thought we don't have we don't have so is nobody who has the company does not have any insurance
company today willing to pick up coverage for the contractors so this so where we are today if I understand is correct the bus drivers aren't going to sign the contract on the $4,000
stipen we can't we can't carry on our insurance so I don't know any other choice but to park them cuz you know what's what's the
solution insurance won't I don't know state law does require buses school buses to have insurance right to to operate yeah Mr sal yes thank you it seems like we're stuck in a hard
place with his insurance because even if we were to move forward right now we don't have insurance the county doesn't have insurance to give to the buses so and the second thing is
that May 15 is literally around the corner and uh and not only that we the Dr s and Brian Renan have to finish the budget i mean they were when I walked in today they were there
working on the budget trying to figure it out and so a lot of it is predicative of what's happening i don't like this choice but for right now I think your option is a little bit better solution
to say let's move forward with the siphon $4,000 with the contract amended like you said where we can revisit the insurance when risk management goes back
and look and see if they get an RFP with insurance carrier that is willing to carry the insurance for the bus contracts because right now they carried that is not even willing to carry it and if that happens then that $4,000 that we were going to give them goes back to us
and it goes to the county but we can't do that mr tidwell asked for it to be split between contractors and the county okay so it's going to be split between the county and so they will so we will still get the $4,000 to them i I'll let him explain yes that will be confusing
and then I'll go to you Miss Sharp can I yes Mr t okay yeah uh similar yeah so the stipen would stop if if the negotiation happened and the difference between that like that $4.6 million that it's costing us to do the same thing we've always been doing we would split
that between the contractors so the stipen stops so there's no more move forward with that it's on a pr-rated deal uh at whatever point the RFP comes in and has it this is all contingent on it being lower than what was previously lower than the stipen if it's
not lower than the stipen then that wouldn't make sense for us to then pay additional monies but if it's lower than the stipen which historically it's been significantly lower then it's a marriage in which everybody's ideas up here could potentially work out so that so the
savings could be quite significant as long as the it's picked up through RFP if nobody picks it up the stipens's in place that's really all we have at this point miss Sharp okay thank you so I got three questions Mr renan um if this we
give a $4,000 stipen how is that taxed is it like a bonus where there's a higher tax rate to it because that may be something to consider as well it would just be as if because they're contractors we would be cutting them a
check for $4,000 just as if we were cutting them check for for their driving so it's not going to be taxed any different yeah that's not what I've been hearing that's go whoops i'm sorry you had two more questions yeah I've got I got two more questions so
um did the RFP that the county sent out include buses cuz I'm being told that it did not include buses okay so number three why would the insurance carrier not put the buses on is that what you wanted the question Mr
that's a riskmanagement question i didn't understand your third I didn't hear your third question why were the buses Why were they not carry the buses was that what you want did they give you a reason they did not they're they Well I don't I did not talk with them
directly i understand they were just not willing to pick up that liability and that risk that coverage this year so so so who do we talk to if the buses weren't on the RFP how did we get to the no historically risk management every year
they put they're putting an RFP for insurance coverage so in years past they have had the bus contractors on there as part of the package when they bid it because that's what the law had allowed the law changed so and and based on the new law which prohibited that they
issued the the RFP based on the current status of law then the insurance companies there are multiple insurance companies review it and decide whether they're going to quote it or not it's a very extensive process it takes 30 days or more for insurance companies to get the RFP get their information together
get their premiums together quotes together run lost reports how many claims have people had last year all that information together to give you a rate for the coming year so it's a great deal of work for an insurance company to respond to an RFP the size of Rutherford
County it's not as simple as someone quoting a car insurance or insurance on a house it's a very complicated process and a lot goes into it on on behalf of the both our risk management department for the county and for these insurance
companies who bid it so u so the one insurance company who who bid the package this year responded to the request to the RFP did that did not have contractors in it based on that because that's what the law was then and we went
back to the one company who responded to RFP and asked them to add the contractors to it and they simply said they're not willing to write insurance for contractors and even asked under what cir do they can pay them more money can we pay them additional premium
Is there some thing we can do to get insurance coverage for the buses they're simply not willing to write coverage for the bus contractors so but at that time the law was still standing and there there was no no the law at that time
when they quoted it did not allow them to pick up coverage for bus contractors at that time oh there's nothing saying that we but we have gone back to them after saying we expect the law to change which we told them and asked them based on our pro the prospect of this law
changing we want you to provide insurance coverage and they basically said no we can't do anything is a private insurance company there's nothing we can do to force them to provide insurance coverage for us so um you know we talked about the option of
doing a separate RFP there risk manage a minute it will take a minimum of probably 30 days for any company to respond to the RFP we sent out today because that's how complicated they are to respond to these things because they look at your your claim history run loss reports history for years and um it's
not a simple process to get something quoted for an insurance policy of this type it's going to be easier to get it quoted in the context of pack of the county as a whole when you go bid the whole county package out because then it's just a little piece of the overall picture and they may they historically
have been more willing to quote it in that context okay Mr vaughn so really what you know like I said we talking about insurance or no insurance nobody's going to take it and
if $4,000 is not good enough I mean I don't know what else we can do county says we're not going to take it they can't take it so you know it's either they take bus drivers take
$4,000 and get the insurance about it or we don't have any bus service and to me that's a simple miss Maxwell that's Mr zealous thank you um so risk management will have
to rebid the whole thing again to No they just had to bid it we just have to redo it send a an RFP with just the bus contracts on it that's it you don't have to rebid rebid RFP mr
vault I don't want to banner but if it's all right just go ahead yeah and again I I don't want this to be the Stan vault show it's not i've just got You asked me to be the leazison i've met with them i've met with risk management i've talked to 10 different insurance companies i've talked to seven eight
different lawyers uh Katie was good enough to get TSBA to respond to it i've got opinions from CASS i don't know who else to ask okay i I but I have promised the bus drivers I
would continue to press forward with this and actually Ed Ed a risk management and Susan McQuary risk management they are as a and I don't want to say as a personal favor to me i think probably as much to Jeff as as me
but they are already in the process of writing an RFP to put out my motion behind this motion is going to be that we engage the county commission to engage risk management to put this RFP
out because this is a bigger decision than the seven of us they are our funding body this also has to do with their insurance that we are a significant part of their insurance of the overall county insurance but if I
remember right don't quote me on this for sure uh Scott Broadden I don't know that my numbers are exactly right but I think it's 2.5 billion in property insurance school buildings courthouse jail there's over 900 other
vehicles ambulances fire engines police cars private vehicles i mean you you start looking at how big this thing is it's huge and and so the kind of the personal discussion I
Ed and I have and we grew up together and we've known each other for 60 years almost is you know has the package gotten so big that the insurance committee needs to look at pulling it apart because it kind of disturbed me as
a taxpayer really that only one carrier responded right so and I and I'm not trying to do the county commission's job i I and y'all have heard me say this before it's like the tax increase that's not my job my job is to advocate for schools support Dr sullivan his staff
try to make good decisions with the money that we get that's our job but you know you stop and think about this okay is there a different way to approach it you know should we look at a just a carrier that would do the vehicles are
there carriers that just specialize in transportation are there carriers that just specialize in buildings cyber security right we we we've just got through going through that that's part of this insurance and
so I'm prepared i I This is a point of discussion i firmly believe we've got to make up for that's a first thing we've got to do for the drivers for the owners operators I believe is we've got to make some type of preparation here some of them don't believe it some of them don't
think I'm looking out for them i don't care at this point but but I know from the everybody I've talked to and and that being some of the owners right now already have liability insurance okay some of them already carry it and
so they're prepared they're already I know I know the the the the association here represents 70% of them but there's a lot of contractors that are already gotten insurance and they're going to probably continue driving for us you
know whatever is put out there they may not like the pay rate and they may park the bus because of that but they're not going to park it because of this $4,000 insurance so that's the reason I say we we we've kind of got to put a number together to send it to the budget office this is a starting point somebody wants
to amend it and make it $5,000 or something like that i'm not I This was just a number I wanted to throw out there for for discussion cuz it was kind of the happy medium of the the four different carriers I talked to and kind of how they priced it but but if you
talk if you poll those people right over there you're going to hear 20 different numbers so it sound I'm sorry hold on mr tidwell was next but but I was Okay you can respond well I was just saying really quick like I said it just sounds like
it's almost like a three-part thing to move forward with a stipen of some sort and continue to press on for the RF for the carrier and possibly looking at coming to some kind of compromise where the following
year the stipen could possibly be shared the cost between both sides that's what I'm thinking where we may need to Because here here's here's my here's my vision here's my vision about this and I may be wrong we're going to get this
cont this is not the contract the these are numbers we're discussing tonight to send a budget the final contract that's approved that that that that is put forward to them to sign or don't sign is you know we're probably June 30th because we've got to do this subject to
funding anyway so So th this is about budgetary numbers tonight okay Mr tidwell agree agree with everything that's kind of been set up here as far as how that you're breaking it we're breaking it up into three separate parts i mean that's kind of the
idea the this the potential savings i'm going to keep going back to the insurance and the RFP and Jeff spoke to this a little bit yet they didn't accept it this year but the the law did it for forbade it at the time of the bid of the overall package and so you know just from a construction standpoint you know
there may be parts of the project that you don't really care to do but there are parts that you can do good so you're going to take the parts you don't want to do to add it into your full package but if somebody comes if there's parts of the package that you like and they come after the fact and say "Hey we want you to add this on." And and you weren't
willing to do that you're less inclined to do so so I think that the probability of the main contract unless they end up breaking it up which may be a better idea as well but as a package deal what it may end up being is a uh a better likelihood that they're going to take
the bus contract in together with the whole county because it' be part of the county package year 2 year three year four most likely as it has been all the years prior what would happen this year it's a little more tricky uh because you're asking for a carrier of some
point of some kind to carry simply the bus contract uh which you know we don't know exactly the reasons that the current carrier for the county government rejected this but I there's certainly incentive you talk about pressing them to do it there's certainly
incentive because it saves the county money saves the schoolboard money provides protection they're looking for there's a lot of incentive for us all to work together and try to press on this um so I'm I'm for it i do want to add in the portion i don't know if I should
make an amendment on your motion or if we should just vote but just that if it comes back say if they put out the when they put out the RFP which we're going to press them to do if it comes back September October August whenever the stipen stops if it if the RFP is cheaper
than the 1.4 4 million we're paying for the stipen the stipen stops and any savings that are um saved between what we were paying previously and the RFP would be split between the county and the contractors that's that's the only
difference there because like you said everything's going to kind of foil into the next topic which is going to be the raises but I think that is the only way we're going to find a compromise that benefits everybody it's not a guarantee so I'm saying that out front it is not a
guarantee but that could really work so before we vote on the original amendment which I second about but the $4,000 stipen we need to go ahead and vote on Mr tidwell's amendment made a motion yet hey I want I want to bet they'll remind you you won't you won't have to make
that part of the motion they'll remind you what you said oh the other thing and and this is something and if maybe we I need just need to redo the motion alto together but the other thing is that I I believe the $4,000 needs to be made available
immediately at contract signing i don't know if I see that number i don't know if Michael Smith can cut those checks or whatever but not in June whenever you know so there's no way in June because books are closed in July books will be closed too yeah well
whatever the first check writing day there is that they can do it in July that would have to be coordinated with you and and it'd be the budget office it probably be the end of July yeah whenever it just immediately that I don't want to in
other words I don't feel like that needs to be prrated out over the 10-month contract what I'm getting at that let's provide that upfront since this is a new expenditure for them yeah let me start i was going to say if they want to combine their emotions together
i think you brought up a good point though because that's going to be concerning great if their insurance ends at the end of June and they have to get new insurance July 1st but we're not giving them that stipen before then yep i think that's a part because we
don't have the ability to write our checks under the private act but I'm just rais I mean that's a that's a valid concern though because I'm sure they're with everything they've been talking about with the increase of all their costs and everything like that to ask them to have to go purchase that without
giving them the funds ahead of time if they're even if we can even work it all out i talked to county finance we can get a check cut in June we can we can get check cut to them in advance of July one okay okay if they've signed the contract they would have to sign the contract beforehand contract before
thank you Mr reed okay yes Mr z yeah so let's say hypothetical we went and did this RFP and for whatever reason a new carrier shows up and says "Hey we're willing to do this and we're giving them a check in
June 30th or whatever." How will that how will that play out because if they're saying they're going to Miss Maxwell yes go ahead from a budget perspective we're going to have to do a budget amendment find the money to go ahead and pay the $4,000
upfront because that's not a budget and expense i'm in this year's current budget have it approved by the full commission by June 23rd somewhere hit some type of pay but
we'll have to talk to county finance um but it is a it have to come out of this year's budget and it that is a completely unbudgeted amount so okay it's a good point i mean it's totally and that's the reason I don't want to tie a date to it
i don't because this is getting in the books closing the books out opening the books you know people go on vacation Fourth of July holiday i just know that they need it probably as quick as they can on the front end before the buses
roll August right that that's that's all I'm trying to suggest right here is that we work with the courthouse to get this to them from a logistic standpoint I'd rather know June so that way I can move forward with knowing who's driving and who's not so I can make other points and and honestly I would too i I was wanting
to do it at contract signing but we would have to get permission from uh budget office to to take it out of ending fund balance right now and then replenish it or something i think there's a way to do it but that you and
Michael's going to have to work that out i'm not going to speak for you guys over a different budget fiscal year we're going to have to work yeah this is Yeah because it's insurance for Sorry about that uh it's insurance for next year coming out of this year's budget which
is going to skew the numbers right so let's let the accountants do the accounting and let's just us try to set policy what I'm trying to do okay so we had an original motion Maxwell yeah okay just for just for clarity sake if we talk about paying
them up front and the idea is that it is going to be cheaper when the RFP comes back than u than the stipen that we're currently giving then we probably would need to have some kind of prorate in there uh because once you cancel your insurance to join the county insurance
saying the RP RFP comes back in favor favorable motion then there's going to they can cancel and get a refund back on the premium they paid so we would need to have some kind of prorate in there otherwise we're really not starting till the second year no matter
what so you don't know how you want to make these motions well and that's reason I say well and and Caleb I don't mean to be you know cavalier about it or anything but but I think there's a lot of moving parts this thing and we're not back to we again this is a budgetary
thing tonight as much as anything we can address a lot of this in the con when once we get a final contract that is funded we can address a lot of that in the contract that that's I think all of this is healthy discussion
but anyway that's just my two cents worth right now i'm just if we can move forward past the $4,000 then we can talk about PR go back PRZ or go to the pay raise or whatever then so you you want to make a motion or do
you just I'm not going to make a motion to admit we'll just vote on the 4,000 and then we'll I'll probably make a motion i think they want some kind of guarantee that we're going to heavily go in their favor so we'll do it after okay motion to give $4,000 stipent um
motion to provide 4,000 per bus for buses in service this year stipen checks cut as soon as possible before July 1 i don't even know if I put that date okay i don't know if I put the date in
there as soon as possible yes okay yes all right are y'all ready yes all right mrs rosales yes mr vaughn yes mr tidwell yes miss Sharp
yes mr va yes mrs darby yes mrs maxwell yes unanimous okay i like seven and0 okay so next group m miss Maxwell all right i want to go ahead and tie this in
behind that uh Jeff I might need your help up here um help me figure out the best way to phrase this but what we're trying to accomplish here is when an RFP goes back for the bus contractors only this year of course next year we're hoping it's in
with the the whole county budget but this year if it comes back as savings more than the stipen money we're paying which is 1.4 4 million that the stipen will be prrated
because then they'll be moving to county insurance and any savings will be split among the contractors and the school board 5050 5050 and the if this and obviously if they're
um the contractors who'd like to do this would have to reimburse the unused portion of the stipen that's right but that would be under the guise that they I have not had anyone say that they'd rather have the stipen than be covered under the county insurance so the county
insurance is is favorable yeah they they would have to reimburse a little bit but it's not additional funds because they're going to get that money they paid up front back at least it large large portion of it depending on where it's at mr reed could you read that before we Yeah sorry yeah I'm trying that's why I
called him up here yeah go ahead it'd be great yeah give it a shot Don all right how about motion let's say motion to approve once
the stipen ends and the RFP comes back including the bus contractors at a lower cost than we're currently paying then there will be a 5050 split
of savings between the county and the contractors may may want to change it to if the R RFP comes back uh lower than the amount we are paying for the stipen the stipen would end at that point so it's not we're not waiting
for the stipen to end because it's a year madam Chair yes Mr mr reid would it be better to do we need to or would it be better to first make a motion to go out for RFP and get that voted on and off the
table I withdraw my motion dave I think there was Yeah yeah I think that would be appropriate okay okay motion to go out for a new RFP for Do you want to work it go for it Sam if you don't care nope um to send to the county commission the
county insurance committee a request for an RFP for uh liability insurance for the current con bus contractors second thank you thank you for cleaning that up
thank you i think it's clean oh good gracious i was on a roll dog um I'll get you the I move to send a request to the county commission and the county insurance committee through risk
management to put out an RFP for liability insurance for our current bus contractors for for uh 20 25 2026 school year nope
25 25 26 what did I say i said 24 i don't know what I said thank you for cleaning me up from July 1 to June 30th this coming year mr vaughn has seconded yes Miss Sharp yeah they'll send I think we have to
send it to everybody y'all give me the names i'll send I'll get a second okay no no sorry okay we have a motion we have a second let's take a vote
all right miss Sharp Mr vault yes mrs rosales yes mr vaughn yes mr tidwell yes mrs darby yes mrs maxwell yes unanimous 7 and0 again we're
on a roll um next we move to M maxwell i got to come back in again all right did we get our motion kind of worded out Jeff yet I gave you a little extra time period there so I think it needs to say along the lines of this if the results of the RF RFP allows the county to
obtain insurance coverage for the bus contractors and the cost of that insurance under RFP is lower than what the cost of the stipens are then subject to an amendment being reached between the bus contractors and
the board of education that any cost savings realized as a result of having coverage provided by the county or versus what is provided by the stipen will be split equally with the bus contractors and the board of education can I just say ditto
that is the motion I would like to make um do I need to repeat that entire thing no is that was very well said that's exactly what I'm going for excellent job m darby you seconding thank you mr darby has seconded it now I want to make sure
I understand for sure you now you're this is assuming that the RFP comes back after we've already paid them the $4,000 is what you're saying if if we if if by a small miracle here we get it back
June 15th and everybody checks off on it and it's good and we we don't even have to cut the fourth the the $4,000 will be negated and we'll go with that right that's I want to understand and that's what someone would like to comment on
sure thing it helps when you have a former auditor as your person too or at least has been involved in auditing we will not be able to do it before June 30th because you're paying for services from one fiscal year to the next that makes sense that makes good sense but we'll figure it out
Mr vaughn yeah what are we going to do if it comes back more than $4,000 are they going to have to make up the difference no okay okay so we have a motion we have it
seconded let's vote mrs darby yes mrs rosales yes mr vaugh yes mr vaughn yes mr tidwell yes miss Sharp yes mrs maxwell yes y'all are on a roll three in
a row i'm so happy let me talk about the mechanics of how that would work if that actually happens so if we get an RFP number back and it's lower than what the county is spending on the stipen then that will come back to you and you compare the numbers the bus contractors will have access to that number too we would have to come back amend the
contracts to provide for them to reimburse the county for whatever gendy's portion of stipens been not been used for premium and then you would then um the savings would be they would get half the savings and the other savings stay with the board of education yes
madam chair it will be require an amendment to come back from the contract will come back before you there will be another paper to be signed by everyone to officially yes Miss Darby Mr reid and I have no idea how anybody
feels about it but I'm just going to ask the question if it comes back that it's less will a contractor have the option to keep the 4,000 and have their own or is it an all or nothing scenario
all in or Yeah i mean we would have to when you bid the package out it would have to be a all or nothing bid if a contractor chose to go ahead as they do now as some contractors do now they still have coverage they've had coverage additional
on top they can choose to continue to do that if they choose to do it okay yes m Oh you got the answer okay okay okay uh let's move to contracted services rate anybody want to make a All right
comments motions oh Miss Maxwell did you give me the floor okay you have the floor okay all right so I'm going to make a motion i have some explaining of how I arrived at this
conclusion i know that the county commission is not excited about this part we also know that uh or I also believe that the uh contractors have asked for way over
what was I thought uh somewhat reasonable however uh we have to find a compromise somewhere and we do know that their costs have went up so here was my thought there's been a lot of motions
put out there i think 10 10% 2.5 2.5 2.5 was one of those i'm going to make a motion for 17% 2.5 2.5 and 2.5 i had originally thought about
making it at 15% 2.5 2.5 2.5 but here's the thing this ties back in to what I think is most likely to happen based off the motions that we just made which is the difference between I'm looking at this is four years too i'm looking end result i'm not trying to do year by year
by year anything like that i'm looking final result over four years the difference between 15% upfront 17% upfront is roughly $600,000 the likelihood that the county when they bid
back out the contract for insurance if it doesn't happen this year because nobody wants to hold the bus contractors by themselves which I'm believing that's not going to be the case but if it doesn't happen this year it will be included in year two in the package
itself very high likelihood that it gets picked back up into the budget it's way less than the 1.4 four and for years two three and four at the very minimum there should be based on historical evidence significant
savings at least 3 million $3 million by the math that I'm doing here we are only raising it another 600,000 so I'm going up further than than what I initially had thought but I think considering that we are trying to
aim back to get them on county county insurance and the savings that come with that will more than pay for the number so that's my motion is 17% the first year 2.5 2.5 and 2.5 the
following years second have any comments yeah my go ahead sorry uh my initial thought is the the two and a half and we had talked in one of the meetings with them
i had suggested and I've talked to budget and finance about this but I don't I think it nobody felt very comfortable about it i watched the con consumer price index very very close because it's relative to everything I do
insurance and um interest rates and the cost of eggs and the cost of everything i think one of the big things that we noticed in sitting down with all these contractors is that the price of buses
disproportionately have gone up about 50% versus the consumer price index 20 I think 24% uh if I remember right over the last four or five years and so that's one reason I've kind of advocated pretty
hard about a significant you know increase but I I think on the back side you know we hope I think that that the current administration is going to be able to get inflation under control but you know this month's CPI index came
out 3.4 four i really think the doesn't the current contract and somebody answer me didn't it wasn't it 53 and three three did I remember that right is 14 over the life of it i guess I'm looking back at you Trey but it was 53 three no
14 over the life of it yes yeah so I just you know I think two and a half is probably too too little over the back side i think it you know maybe 17's going to be too much on the front side for the county commission to swallow i
don't know that's just y'all heard me Thursday night y'all heard me Thursday night say that that none of them have said that they're going to do some kind of tax increase i don't you know we can send it up there and see what they say i mean that's worst thing I guess that can
happen but I I think the backside is probably a little little low that's my That would be my general discussion right now i I don't want them to be left with 10% i thought that was too low but I don't know if I can do 17 not with not with
what's coming down the po and I we don't know how the PR We are definitely going to have to do PR zones there's no way that we are This is We are in a hole a deep hole and I don't I I don't know what we we can do
we've got so much coming on us right now and the county commission we have tried to hold the line we knew this was coming and we haven't been able to do that i I I I don't know if I can do 17 go ahead Miss Darby something that has weighed on my
mind a lot um I think we all looked into the salary study very deeply my concern is the conversation that's been going on about the amount of money and and those
types of things when it to me feels like when it comes to certain things everybody's all about spending that money cuz those people are worth it these people are worth it as well and they serve our students as well and so I think that that's something that
shouldn't be overlooked um I also have concerns and and I have brought it up before and I Dr sullivan this is in no way shape or form i thought you did a fabulous job when we were at our retreat with you guys cutting a lot of things
and and cutting where you can it comes down to a budget issue and our job is to educate kids from K through 12 that is what we are charged to do i do think there are probably more places we
can cut i don't know that anybody wants to and I'm not saying that I do but when you are spending money on things you're not required to do and you want to tell people that you
can't afford to give them the money they need to continue running their business to serve our students it's a to me that's just a big conflict so I think I think 17 is a nice middle ground i know it's not what you were hoping for and not what you
wanted we don't have endless funds though i think 17 is probably more than other people would like for us to give because of our budgetary restraints but I think if that means we have to go back and look at some other things is it more important for us to provide
transportation for the kids we're required to educate or is it more important to have programs that people enjoy for students who are not required to educate among other things we have a lot of great things in Rutherford County a lot of programs a lot of subscriptions a
lot of things that our teachers are utilizing that they love and I don't want to take those from them but a lot of these parents don't know how their kids are going to get to school if we don't have bus service and if the kids aren't in the school we don't have anybody to provide
services to so to me it comes down to a budgetary thing and and sometimes you have to go back through that budget and look at things and kind of place them in a priority order and maybe that means for a couple years you have to do without some of the extras that we've been fortunate enough to have as you
build back towards that moving forward while you can sure thank you Madam Chair um I had initially started at 17 but seeing all of the expenses and everything that that
they've had um I I would like to I would like to see it be more um probably closer to 20% uh but I will not I will not support any PRZ zone and our title schools period
miss Maxwell yes Miss uh I I appreciate that i'm glad we're having discussion about it i think it's good um I want to tell you guys how I got the we I think we could have found a happy medium probably everybody would have been excited about well not excited but everybody probably would have been on
board unanimous I I would assume at 15% two and a half two and a half two and a half however the reason I went up to 17 is obviously we know that their costs have went up pretty drastically but I want to paint this picture for you real quick just just do some math with me right here so the
difference between 15 at the beginning the last three years are all the same the difference between the 15 and the 17 is 600,000 that's over four years so you know quick math what is it $150,000 a year the assumption
is most like like high likelihood that the now with the law in place or amended that the bus cont the the insurance will be included back into the county insurance and bundled as a whole less stan something like Stan mentioned they
bundle it in separate ways but they're bundling it in with more of the county insurance historically the savings on that versus us paying a stipen each year would be over a million dollar a year
so the likelihood if we're if we're just saying forget it RFP it's not going to happen it's not going to happen years down the road it's you're avoiding a lot of historical precedent uh on that and the figures and if I'm off by $500,000 guess what that's still
$500,000 a year in savings year 2 three and four and we're only going up 600 over four years which is 150 a year so I mean to me the math it's more it's it's better for us it's it's better for them they like it's the coverage they are desiring it seems
extremely likely to happen so I don't want it to just be painted into a picture that I just randomly went up $600,000 for no reason no they they probably as M sharp said they probably do need more we do not expect inflation to be at these
extreme levels like they have been over the past several years so the next contract will probably look a lot different but where we are currently let's give them some stuff up front the significant difference like I said it will be covered in the most
likeliest of scenarios worst case we're looking to being covered more so in year two to make up the difference of one and two and then year three and four are likely going to provide additional savings to the county and school board so that's how I got to that
conclusion any other comments Miss Maxwell all right so um I will not be supporting a PRZ and I will give reasons why however I'm kind of leaning more with Stan that I think
we need to go a little bit low the lower not I think we're too high and we need to increase a little bit more the other years if you were to do 15% and then increase instead of 2.5 3.5% that will give you almost a 25%
increase over time versus 24 and a half% between the two from a fiscal perspective Mr tidwells is more friendly for the district okay yeah that and I think the reason I brought that up yeah is that I don't
want to make any misnomers here that inflation's running three and a half% right now so the the 2 and 1/2 2 and 1/2 2 and 1/2 is probably not going to cover inflation uh unless dramat you know unless we go into a recession or something like that and then we go into
a recession we won't have thousand kids 1500 kids a year moving into the district so we won't have to have as many uh buses or teachers you know our expansion won't be as great so I I don't know all of this is subject to county commission funding anyway you know as
we've said earlier um I' I've disclosed to y'all the meetings that I've had you know with with all the um stakeholders i guess that would be what I would call them uh the stakeholders the powers that
be whatever um that you know they fund it if they don't fund it it all comes back to us anyway so anyway we'll have to adjust i I'm curious Katie not to put you on the subject but um you know if it does come if the county commission you
know says y'all got to hold the line where are we going to cut what what where would you start or do you have not to put you on spot but just curious right now you got any ideas like I said I know there are a lot of things that we subscribe to that our
teachers use and enjoy but they're not some of them are not necessities to be able to educate the kids um so you can start with some of those things i know that it is super popular and I'm not saying that I want to get rid of it
but we do have a prek program that we spend at least a half a million dollars a year out of our budget on and those are kids that we're not charged with educating i know it's helpful to parents i know it's helpful to teachers and students but my job is for us to do
what's best for the kids that we're required to educate which is K through 12 so there are places I think in our budget and they're not big they're going to be small but it could be multiple small places that you pull from to make
that bigger amount to help make up some of that difference dr solomon Miss Maxwell yes M how much have we already cut um today I've cut 8 million to get us down to get 12 to be 12 million in the hole um I've cut I just sitting here
brian doesn't even know it yet um lots i mean I today I hoped that I was down to 14 million in the hole and I will tell you right now I have I have 6 million plugged in for bus transportation um and 17% is above that of course whatever the board goes with
is what is my job to then advocate for um but I believe that we have a June 30th board meeting on the table i think that that's a possibility um but I will work with our staff we have we continue
to cutting everything I have the $6 million included that $400,000 I mean the $4,000 sip yes the $6 million did yes mr talk about the prek you know about cutting that program that's probably the
most beneficial thing we do for kids if we want to do what's best for kids you ask any educator out there you ask anybody and they're going to tell you the value of the prek so that's what I'm saying we got
when we look to cut things like that please look and see what's best for the kids that's our job and I'll be honest with you that's probably the best thing we do in Rutherford County every kid should have
prek i'm telling you it's just success rate i mean everything supports it and uh you know it you know we can't fund everything and we've got to you know we got to be fair to everybody and and I mean that's
that's everybody we got we got an obligation to uh to to give a raise to the teachers you know we're obligated what two years to be up to 50,000 and we've got to we got to do that and you know um so we've
got to make cuts and we got to do things that are prudent and what we can live with and everybody's going to have to hurt a little bit to be honest with you so Dr sullivan I think it's important whatever the board decides that two things we put in the motion that it is pending county commission approval of
our school system budget and then second um county commission does not have line item veto power so it would be sending it back the entire budget and would be up to us to then decide what we wanted to cut to adjust so I have a question
but I anticipate getting it to be able to find a way to get it approved i mean that's I hope so we have a healthy enough fund balance i know that's a horrible thing to be able to go into but that's something we need to be united on
so zealous yeah okay so the $4,000 is is it $1.4 million correct so then you budgeted six million i lied i was at five i didn't lie i was It's five and hold on let me pull it up i'll tell you what we have in here brian you have it pulled up too
give me just a second and we just have placeholders right now because we had recommended 10 knowing that that was probably low um let me go to this big master spreadsheet real quick and you may get to it before
I do transportation amount the increase Domino's deliver brian will be more accurate than I am he says and have a dinner or something are you on the overall increase the transportation right now okay hold on just one second i
have to go to a different tab you said Dr svin we're 12 million in the whole Brian still has us at 14.7 right now but I'm at 12 because I've been cutting things over here as long as you haven't cut anything
in transportation i have not it is what I currently have is $5.8 million and that includes new routes from last year's budget but that would include about 500,000 per year so we had about 5.3 so that kind of puts it in between
15 to 17% so it's like because I took 5.8 million subtracted 1.4 that leaves 4.4 you subract 500,000 for the 10 new routes what now subtract 500,000 for the 10 new roads i guess
$500 okay five okay so quick question transportation is one of those line items that has to be shared city the whole thing has to be so yes the whole thing or just the portion dedicated to the whole portion the 141
does the whole portion 141 so you we're looking at a nickel on the tax rate right it's it's a nickel on the tax rate so you you're going to need to lobby your county commissioners for a tax increase
of a nickel and that's what I started out asking for two months ago that very give me a nickel and make this work miss Maxwell yes i would also just like to to point out again
that yes all the math that's been done is kind of a more of a worst case scenario but in a more likely best case scenario the savings of getting the contractors back onto the county government insurance would be
significant at least $3 million starting from year 2 three and four i mean just based off historical precedents for a long time so when we're talking about these figures yes I agree it's 17% that's a
that's a big percentage 20 I think it's 26% increase over four years again this is not a common contract because we've not had a common run of inflation so it's not the standard but I just want to
keep pointing out that this plan really hinges greatly on that if it goes back to county insurance the savings are going to be more significant than the numbers than what we're talking about so that's that's why I'm kind of holding that position there
and I'm going to follow that up i'm going to dive off in this and I said I wasn't tonight that's a 50/50 at best if and here's why tor
liability the county commission and the insurance committee says they will not let us give that up so I don't see any way around it but if the powers that be at the courthouse say
let's do it they want to give it up because the numbers I that have been shared with me is that we have paid out almost $5 million in claims this year
alone and the great fear that I have for those guys and this body and the taxpayers of this county I'm driving down Nolanville Road two months ago just finished an auction and I look up
we've all seen them morgan and Morgan they get more money than anybody else there's a case that was settled here against a Middle Tennessee company $72 million i do not believe that our 21 county
commissioners will allow that to go unnoticed and allow this body or any other part of the county to negate that tort liability protection so at best don't convince
yourself there's going to be a big savings here because I don't I don't think there is Caleb i'm being as straightforward and honest with you as I can uh I said I wasn't gonna dive off in that tonight but it's that that is scary
and you know and I understand why these guys don't want to carry it i mean when you see cases like that but I mean you know if there's a in our armor anywhere there's insurance there's uh
attorneys big groups of attorneys that are looking to poke a hole in it and I'd hate to be the one to sit here and say you know because of our actions you know there's a$25 $50
million I mean you know hell that's 5% of our budget on one settlement so I I I don't I I would not be prudent right now if I didn't caution everybody on that one factor so so please don't convince
yourself that that's going to come back as a savings because I I don't know at best it's 5050 right now i don't I don't think it's 50/50 i think it's probably 9010 because they've already said that
uh the carrier wouldn't take it so I mean I don't know who they going to get to buy bite off into it but it's a lot of money so Mr rosales is Max i'm sorry i um it is a gamble we're we're banking
that we're going to save money and it's not a guaranteed and right now there's been a suggestion to make cuts to the prek program as an example because it's $600,000 because we don't have to fund prek well I don't look at it as
something that we don't have to fund prek i for me in being in the schools I see a noticeable difference of kids that go through prek and go to kindergarten versus kids that do not go to prek
versus kids that go to prek and go to kindergarten versus kids that do not go to prek and enter in kindergarten and it is vastly different vastly different and so well I'm talking right now i've I've
allowed a lot of people talk and not and agenda no one's off of the agenda we're we're talking about making cuts to positions and staffing and right now I don't I I have been since I've been here
for three years in this position all I've done is been trying to figure out how to be creative and generate more revenue for three years i think I appreciate the board to come alongside some of my some ideas to go to the
legislation to figure out some differences with TISA funding and the formula because of the way that the BEP versus TISA is changed we do not get funding now specifically for transportation in the BE compared to
TISA so I've gone to them to ask to make some modifications there's no appetite right now with the current legislation for whatever reason and I can't speak for them to make modifications i thank you board for allowing me to present the idea of bringing a foundation and thank
you for approving it thank you for Miss Maxwell to helping and create generate a board so that we can use it as a fundraising tool to allow other businesses to mad i am talking you do not I'm saying
stop this is not a point of order could you please just bring it back to to I am going to bring it back to you i'm gonna bring it because get there yes because we right now we're talking about less cut parental zone PRZ but I'm going to be honest with you Miss Arby you own a
transportation service i do not you do not know but I'm Roselle wait wait wait a second we do not know if that transportation service mad that you're going that is a and not
only but I've received an email ro that you order take a recess order I would like a recess please but I think we need to understand why with the provisions we talked about because we not voted on the we voted on
these little sections of the contract we haven't gotten to the PR zones yet don't we need to do that first yeah I want to do that first all right i just want to say I feel very strongly that we need to incorporate personal responsibility zones not that I want
5-year-olds walking down busy roads but I feel like this is something across the state that is the norm and we've gotten too large and our budget like I said we're between 12 and 14 million in the
hole now and it's it's not something I like but I think it's something that we have to do now I'll shut up i think it's important i just wanted to clarify so like when I'm talking about cutting the difference between the two of us I'm over here taking like a $100,000 out of medical insurance in
different lines which will impact like next year's offerings for medical insurance okay 50,000 out of textbooks um 40,000 out of those are where I'm making cuts from so it's not like I just frivolously going through and removing a million dollars here and a million wish that I wish that was here so sorry
that's okay yes M so um we have the sheet so looking at the sheet Dr sullivan we have a $13 million deficit but these charter allocations will come back to us in October we're looking at part of that money from this one that
you gave us are we not looking at part no and those will not that those are actual students so after that first year those are their students they'll actually receive so that will go to them directly right but it's we don't we no longer
have the children correct so that come that that money goes to them directly so those allocations are out of our budget so we receive not included in this we receive NRISA um funding so 300 and I think it's at the very top
360 366 366 and then when it actually is allocated to us they take the funding for Rutherford Collegiate Prep off for those students that they serve this year and so they served 400 is it 419 roughly
that today so they will get that money directly from coming off of us and which is fine because they serve those students rightfully so and then for the students that are served under American Classical in Springs we at the county finance department write um cut checks
to them so these are actual students that existed this year so would the true up be just the the new one yeah just the new grades so we've got we've got $500,000 in coming back in October if they true up the same correct no we
won't still not receive funding for that till the next year okay i thought I thought that we discussed the other night that we haven't seen that law yet so that was news to me i have not seen that yet
i was wrong i looked it up it did pass in one of the chambers but it's still waiting to pass in another chamber because I went back to check and make sure that it was and it but the true up is that it's just going
to the the way it's going to be divided is still coming from the total number based on enrollment for the year before but the funding is going to be split before it comes to us what is O so that the 8.7 and the 397 like there's no
issue those are students that are served this year that is generated for the three schools no issue whatsoever those are kids that are there right now it just for some reason TISA includes it in our number they send to
us even though it's a separate the charter commission is a separate LEA i have no idea why it's included it just is no clue mr vaughn you originally had a motion and I seconded it of personal responses instituting personal responsibility
zones K through 5 for a mile and 6 through 12 for mile and a half for everyone save $3 million yeah let's do a roll call vote please whoa whoa go ahead i
got to amend it okay um and and I think this is a legitimate request i had a neighbor of mine call today and he's blind he can't drive his kid to school and he lives 9/10 from
last cases so I would offer a motion or an amendment that any parent that is forgive me if I state this wrong Jeff legally handicapped I don't know exactly what I'm looking
for here the termin I don't want anybody gaming the system but but I mean this guy he he can't drive so how does he get his kid to school so I I would offer an amendment that anybody that's legally
handicapped or disabled yeah disabled is that what I want that's what I'm looking disabled for guidance yeah so any person with a disability not I don't know how we do that but how do how do I phrase that because I'm not talking about
special ed or anything like that i'm not talking about the kids i'm talking about the parents where the parent or guardian has a disability preventing them from providing transportation yeah that's what I'm after butch would you like to He he just she just so eloquently stated that your Yeah you know I think that
person sort of following the uh special ed wouldn't he he won't because the student doesn't have it i mean we could we could put them on the bus just like they are i think that's good would you you you
accept that in your motion or you want me he said yes he said yes okay and I'll second yes okay good deal okay thank you so can you read that back to us please i'm sorry okay so this will be motion um
to initiate a PRZ for K5 one mile 612 for 1.5 miles for everyone with the exception of a parent or guardian who has a disability preventing them from
proving yes that sounds good okay any comments or question before we vote i got to make one more statement i know y'all tired of hearing me talk though this week um I almost I know this is not popular but I think with this
significant pay increase and I'm not saying drivers don't deserve it that's not what I'm saying but I think for any of this to I'm going to say something real ugly right here for any of this to stand a snowballs chance in hell of getting passed through the county commission we better do this because
this is this is a $3 million savings right here and that takes care of about half of what we just spent tonight so you know my vision starting at the beginning of all this was that you know maybe the bus drivers don't get exactly what they want maybe the taxpayers have
to pitch in a little bit maybe we've got to do some things that we don't necessarily want to but as Caleb or one of y'all said down there on the other end that we've all pulled together tonight to try to make this happen and and this is a unifying voice uh for once
and that just tells you how important I think all of us believe this is i'll second that as well Miss Maxwell yes Mr rosales i will not be supporting PRZ because um for safety reasons there is infrastructure that is not conducive to
for children to walk i'm going to use one school Browns Chapel there's no sidewalks there at all it's on a country road it's going to be very difficult for kids to walk home in in ele elementary grades to get to there second of all I
do have concerns that there could be some personal conflicts here because it hasn't been disclosed what are the terms of agreement of something that a business that was sold because this is going to benefit a third party transportation service as well
mr tidwell Dr sullivan um if this were I'll tell you I'm on the borderline of it but I'm just thinking through this what it might look like we have after school programs correct i'm thinking about not at all of our schools
but I think it there is the ability to expand that partnership um the Y is only at some schools it used to be at more schools um it has dwindled boys and Girls Club Smyrna and Murphy'sboro have after school care um
there's opportunities there but as a district there's not a there's definitely opportunities but it would be up to those entities to increase but the potential for Yes okay because I'm thinking two working parents here i'm just working this through my both of my parents' work
u would it be possible and what would it look like maybe know from a financial standpoint um to expand the drop off portion so for instance parents uh what is the typical drop off time for elementary school
what's the early 45 6:45 is it possible to bring that back even a little bit further we would need to pay a stipen in your house look I mean I'm just talking oh we don't have we don't have that um we're already well above
the city of what we open our doors for in some places and so we're now we're offsetting some potential savings with increasing cost for another area i got you but I totally totally understand
madam Chair sure thank you um I I will not be supporting it if it includes the titles uh which all the titles are up in the Lever and Smyrna area uh when my son was at Steuart's Creek and I worked downtown I had to be downtown at 8:00
even if I was the first mother or car rider in the line it was still very difficult for me to get downtown by 8:00 it's impossible it's impossible anymore for you to go up 24 uh and leave at 6:30 in the morning or 6:00 and be downtown
Nashville it's impossible and I I we do need to try to move some things around with the PRZ maybe a half a mile for the elementary and a mile for the um high schools but don't include the titles
because um it's it's it's impossible we're we're putting parents in a in a really bad situation and I know everybody needs to give a little bit but we've got to find a happy medium with that but I will not be supporting the PRZ's as long as the title schools are involved
okay can we go ahead and vote please we're voting the amendment you restate yes okay let's see this is the motion to
initiate PRZ K through 5 for one mile 6 through 12 for 1.5 miles for everyone with the exception where a parent or guardian has a disability preventing them from getting their child to school
okay okay thank you Mr va yes mr vaughn yes mrs darby yes miss Sharp no mr tidwell no mrs rosales no mrs maxwell yes
majority passes okay next we move on to the cola increase salary table so this is the cola increase which sorry oh you need to do the whole contract sorry we
do have the bus contract itself the whole document that was attached to your appendix there so the board needs to consider approving that contract which would incorporate the terms of the earlier motions tonight would incorporate everything that we just agreed to okay i'm sorry let's go ahead
and Well I was going to say do do we have to I mean I thought what we were doing was just simply budgetary kind of waiting maybe till we got the P the U RFP back or something like that do you think we need to vote on the contract itself tonight it's not going to be
signed till the end of June right middle of June or something you be signed by July 1 yeah i mean whenever we get funding but we won't when's the county commission meet filing june 23rd june 23rd 23rd so really I mean we just Whoop
i'm sorry it's got to be signed prior to cutting a check for insurance oh yes sir yes sir which is going to be earlier than you think right dr sullivan I just I think the latest would be maybe the May 15th i think that portion would be
okay for the rest of it um because we need to go ahead and see where contractors are because we will need to potentially if our contractors aren't happy with where it is we need to initiate some other things on our own all right can we can you give us an updated version and then us vote on it
that meeting and and make sure that cuz I I've lost track of all the adjustments we've made will that work for you and work for them and then then we can plug the numbers in and we know where we are i can do that yes what do you think
i'm here to administer what you approve why i always keep looking over to you i don't know why I look at you you're just such a handsome fellow i guess I don't Thank you if if if that's the if that's okay with the rest of the board let's Yeah i would say that if we're going
this direction with the insurance contractors should at least start talking to agents about getting insurance in not wait till May 15th yes because if anything needs to be done on that they need to be ahead of the game on that okay
okay so we don't need to vote on that okay so we'll move on to the 2526 cola increase salary table our recommendation we talked about this the other night is a 2.5% increase um and then the next year between 1 and a half and 2 and 1/2
depending on where we are budget-wise and I know some people have asked me can we do more um I'm ask I know I want to support our staff please from a budgetary standpoint please don't whoops you need a motion for approval
with that 2.5% so moved second seconded by Mr tidwell i've lost my mail all in favor say I i any opposed motion passes okay
do we have anything under Tennessee legislative or the federal y'all have listened to me enough tonight okay do we have anything under general discussion oh yes jazz Fest yes jazzfest
jazzfest jazzfest tomorrow night all day Saturday uh because of the threat of thunderstorms it's been moved to Oakland Middle the same times and everything Jazzfest is the Facebook page and all the scheduling and everything is out there and thank you to um Mr decker for
hosting us uh over there being Thank you sir thank you very much and please come out and support these kids cuz they are uber uber talented they're going to be it's going to be a phenomenal show and please stay just because your kids aren't on the stage please stay yep okay
go ahead just just a reminder we have a policy meeting at 5:00 on Tuesday and then um health and education at 5:30 on Tuesday as well so either myself or Dr martin depending on how we're moving and we started talking to principles about
cell phone policy yesterday already so is there anything else there was something and I cannot remember did I tell you i didn't tell you okay well it's not evidently it's not important i'll bring it up next time so life or
death all right mr thank y'all's patience with this for me tonight i feel kind of responsible for it but anyway thank all of y'all move to journ we'll adjourn