Okay. Can I get a motion to reconvene? So moved, Smeita and Rajesh. Okay. Well, welcome back. Our uh our high school student is
not present with us at the moment. So then next on the agenda would be the report of the superintendent. Mr. Feder is here. All right. Trying to be brief. Um first of all, do we have any principles in the
audience? Can you all stand up, please? Petine, sit down. Don't even raise your hand again. No. No. Me. You Me, you are principal. Yes. Sorry, I I didn't realize it was that difficult a question. Uh, today is National School Principal's Day. Let's
give these guys a round. [Applause] Meg, that's good, Meg. Yep. Yeah, you're good. Um, really an amazing team. Incredible uh work. they take care of your your staff and your students every
day. So, um, happy National Sup that's me. Happy National Principal Day. Um, also we have we have PTO members. Who are PTO members? Raise your hand. Woohoo. We're honoring honoring those [Applause]
guys. And who here was able to attend the Joan Kirk Student Art Gallery? Where's Blair? Blair, are you here? No, Blair. Kristen, no. Um, absolutely tremendous. I was able to walk in there when it was empty. Um, and
the art's amazing. Our our kids and it's a reminder of why we do what we do and why we protect what we protect with our funds because of what our kids need to be successful later in life is more than just being good readers, writers, and
math. They need it all. Um, also really good news. Just got this news I think today. Pete, you probably know about this. the Pender Players, they entered into a competition called the Central Jersey Marquee Awards and they were nominated for eight different awards.
So, it's great stuff. And uh that is Jillian Trader who leads that and uh she's grown a lot. I mean, done amazing things with these kids from from the first one where she was the took over for the longtime person who'd been there doing it
forever. Uh it's fantastic. Eight nominees. Fantastic. Next week is teacher and staff appreciation week. So another big week and already you can is it already out there Lordis? Is is the billboard ready to rock already or Yep. So we use that billboard. They put it up for us and then a whole bunch of things
happen. I'd imagine the PTO people that are here get busy next week as well. Yep. I'd imagine you do. Um another good piece of information, the 12th Congressional District Art Competition on April 25th. uh the 12th congressional district art competition sponsored by
the representative Bonnie Watson Coleman. Uh the top three finalists will have their artwork displayed in the tunnel which connects the capital building and the congressional offices. Wow. And uh we're excited to share that the first place winner is from South Brunswick High School.
Last year I spent a lot of time in that tunnel back and forth in Trenton. Um so it's really good to have our kids represented. Our kids continuously represent across all spectrums with academic, arts, sports, anything. In fact, before I finish, uh Mike, do you have anything to add to my report for
sports? Yes, absolutely. Uh put your hands together for our girls track team. Yes. As well as our boys to this team. They are GMC champions. Unfortunately, I wasn't there for the girls track, but I was there this
afternoon earlier for boys tennis. So, you would have been very, very proud. Great stuff. So, thank you. All right. And after we're done uh with the important work of honoring the PTO, we will do a little budget presentation and um I know everyone's excited for that.
And end I'm ending. Well, I have not done this in a while. See if I can remember their names. Marty, Marty, and Bobby. Oh, Bobby. Does Marty get to speak at all or? I'm gonna let him speak a little. That's very kind. Is our education foundation
leadership? I'm ready. Oh, boy. What do we got? Oh, just the helmet. Just the helmet. All right, that's too bad. Tighten it up. I'm not going to put the light on. And I have it written out and everything. Thank you, Mr. Feder for allowing us to speak for a few moments
this evening about the Education Foundation's upcoming event. I am if I'm up here speaking and it's the beginning of May, it means just one thing. It's time for the tour to South Brunswick. This year, the event will take place on June 1st starting at the high school. I
have already put my request in for Sunny Skies. It worked last year and we're certainly hoping that it works again this year. Once again, we have three routes. The 25 mile route heads towards 27, winds through Kendall Park and Mammoth Junction and Dayton with a rest
stop at Eagle's Landing Day Camp on Davidson Mill Road. The 10mi route circles Dayton. There's a four mile route across the street from the high school which also offers a shorter two-mile route. Details of the times are
on the website edfoundationb.org. For those of you unfamiliar with the tour to South Brunswick, let me give you a very brief history. We started the ride in 2011 and had less than 20 participants. Since then, our numbers
have swelled before 2020 to over 800 people. We gained some momentum last year and are hoping to continue that trend. Now, Morty gets to speak. Thank you, Bobby. Bobby is the treasurer of the Ed Foundation. I have the fortune to be the president of the foundation.
I'm going to talk a little bit about uh how we give money back to the schools related to the tour. And that is we have a participation uh piece of it that for every 5% of the school's enrollment, we'll add $50. We'll give $50 back to the school. So,
I'll make some numbers up that I hope will be easy to follow. So if a school had an enrollment of 100, if five stu if five people sign up and say that they're going to support that school, that's $50 to the school. And if 10 people do, there would be 10% that would be $100
and so on. So that's the major money that we'd be able to give back to the school for every 5% based upon your enrollment of as of October. Uh, and we also have a one for one award that is for every participant that signs up and selects your school, you get a dollar
back. So, there are two different ways to to get money back to the schools. I'm happy that we have the principles here this evening, right, Mr. Feder? Uh, it's principal day, so take that to heart. And we have uh the PTO who do PTO presidents who do great work and uh we
certainly appreciate you at the Ed Foundation. So, back to Bobby. day and they wanted to spend it at a board meeting. Well, well, that hasn't changed in 25 years, so it's okay. And after all these years, I'd like to
remind you of one thing. While riding any distance in the tour to South Brunswick, helmets are required. Thank you. [Applause] So, so I'm gonna turn over to Laura in a
second, but um we do this every year. We honor the PTO, the PTO presidents, and um in case people don't know, once a month I meet with the PTO presidents, as does the board president, and it's
always a great opportunity to hear from them, although I usually babble too much. Um but I really do appreciate you guys. You're fantastic. couldn't ask for more from you. Um I know you do everything you can for those schools and since you've been began those booster thonss I think we've
become kind of rich uh on that. So thank you for all you guys do and now I'll turn it over to you Laura to turn it over and Okay. So he's turning it over to me for me to turn it over to Miss Barry the principal over Indian field. [Applause]
Good evening everyone. It's my pleasure to welcome you to our annual PTO appreciation event. Tonight, we gather not only to celebrate the incredible contributions of our parent teacher organization, but also to acknowledge the commitment and support you provide to our schools and our students. The
role of the PTO extends far beyond organizing events and fundraising. You're the backbone of our educational community, a vital force that helps bridge gap between home and school. You have had an impact on all our schools. The resources you helped secure have
enhanced our classrooms, introduced new programs, and provided opportunities for our students that they wouldn't otherwise have. From science fairs to arts programs, your support enriches the educ educational experience, and fosters a love for learning. The events you
organize bring families together, strengthen relationships, and cultivate a spirit of collaboration among parents, teachers, and staff. This sense of belonging not only benefits our students but also creates an environment where educators feel supported and empowered to do their best
work. As administrators, we're grateful to your dedication. Your commitment to our students education and well-being is truly inspiring. We cannot thank you enough for the countless hours you dedicate to making our school a better place. Tonight, as we reflect on your achievements, let's celebrate the
incredible work that has taken place. We're excited to share a video montage of all the various events and contributions you have made to our schools. [Music] [Music]
Heat. Heat. [Music]
[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]
[Music] were hey. [Music]
[Music] Thank Thank you for helping to plan events and being so creative with them. You make good things happen. [Music] [Music]
[Music] [Music] [Applause] Thank you for your unwavering support and hard work. Together, we're bu building a brighter future for our
students. An additional thank you to our fam to your families who share your time and attention with the schools that you volunteer at so for so many hours and the space your garages or basements that contain the endless supply of PTO events items, school swag or Amazon box
deliveries of all the ideas you bring to life for our students. I'd now like to ask board president Laura Hernandez to come up and help me as we call each of you up individually to receive your certificate of appreciation and a gift bag that our students in the transition center have so kindly put together.
Special thank you to Casey Kelly for pulling that together pretty quickly for me. Appreciate it. So, first we'll from Brooks Crossing, we'll call up Drew Choski and Nicole Deati. Jamie Macro
will receive that for them. Yeah. From Brunswick Gres, Kelly Sanchez and principal Stacy Ta will be accepting that from
Greenbrook. Lisa Browning [Applause] uh from Indian Fields, Lynn Monday. [Applause]
You're getting your gifts. Our certificates are a little jumbled up so you will get them after. Thank you. From Cambridge, Nalofer Toa Farouch and Ramy
Lee Van Vulenberg. Thank you. I have it. from Constable Cheryl Crick and Vanessa Gray. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. My old school
from Crossroads North and South. Deputy Shukla. [Applause] from Mammoth Junction, Zenari Tariq and Manasa
Gangula. [Applause] Dipka Shandola. [Applause] This is important.
Thank you. Okay. So, the PTO does so many things that people aren't even aware of um behind the scenes that make teachers lives so much easier. And as a teacher, I can
tell you how much you help us and how much we value what you do. Even though we might not always say how much we value what you do, I also know that the excitement that's built up for teacher appreciation week is really high.
They're like so excited and you guys never um fail to impress. So like us here, we think you should get a raise in your pay for what you do because you are truly
the unsung heroes and such a major part of our village to make this happen. So on behalf of the whole board, we thank you. We thank you. We thank you. We thank you. [Applause] I just want to make a
motion said it's great training ground for becoming a board member. And it's great training ground for becoming a board member. The the the board president suggested a raise. I would like to make a motion to double their salaries. Yes, I second that.
Every year we'd like to give them a little bit more. Yeah, I just came in. Nice try sneaking in the back. Thank you, Deepa. [Applause]
rewind. Well, not a Deepaca not only is uh does the high school, but like Scott said, we we have a monthly um president's PTO and uh Scott and I join. Um she formulates that and gets that that going and to get people together to
get adults together is a very difficult um task and you do it very well. So, thank you so much. Welcome. [Applause] Okay. Huh.
I know. I agree. I agree. Okay. Now, and it is the budget. It's the budget. It is the budget. You want to take a short recess? So, we could take a short recess and you guys are welcome to stay. Um, and this time, I mean, everybody usually
says it's boring. Go home. We encourage you to stay. Yes. Like it's an important thing. If you do leave, we are going to write your name down. We are. We are. Don't think we don't see this. We see this. You're being filmed. Look at the camera. Th those schools whose PTO presidents
leave will be handled accordingly. So, uh yeah, we'll take a brief break if you want to leave. And I know we have some babies here. I know. I agree. Where's Barry? I'm surprised. Okay, you guys ready to roll?
Yes. Right. Right. Got it. Before. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. [Music] feel constrained.
All right, welcome. So, um I will say this is a lot of repetition. The uh last meeting we adopted a tentative budget. Uh Dave and I put some more u a little bit meat around a few of the areas we want to go
over with you, but I'm going to kind of move through it and uh there will be a time for you guys to ask questions and there's a time for the public to give comments as well. Okay. So the basic key factors that affect a school budget for us specifically are state aid funding,
the tax levy cap, health insurance, enrollment, residential new residential neighborhoods, many facilities, and we have five and 10-year facilities plans. And of those, those are the things that are
pressing all at the same time on the district right now. So, it would be good if we could take any one of those things away, but we can't. They're all embedded in what we're trying to accomplish, which is maintain the programs we do for kids, keep property value high, continue
making this an attractive place for people to move their families. That is what we do. So, real quick, state aid, as you know, the two numbers in red are how much we lost going forward for this year. So, we lost another one point uh
about $1.7 million uh $1,70,000. However, as a reminder to the board, this is extremely important. If they did not put the 3% guard rail up, we would currently be looking at another 1.8 million in loss right now. The
formula spit out an additional 1.8 8 million in loss for our district for this year because of the 3% guard rail where no one was allowed to lose more than 3%. We only lost the 427,000 and they did not give us the
stabilization aid. Okay, question the question was is there a chance to get stabilization aid? Not that we know of right now. I believe they're going to leave the tax incentive aid program as the program. I can't speak out, but I don't
know though. Yeah. So, I I want to talk to you quickly. This is a new slide. This is the changing community. The state and the federal government collects data on free and reduced lunch, the number of free and reduced lunch students. So, if you go
all the way to the right, that's 20145. And then I just skipped a bunch of years and went straight to 22 23 and you'll see it kind of stayed pretty stable. Right around that 12% mark was the percentage of students that are on
free and reduced lunch. Look at this year. 18.8% almost one in five of our students are currently qualified for free and reduced lunch in South Brunswick. That is a extremely
different population change in the state in the district. Now Suzanne and I studied this and mostly Suzanne and we found the number did actually increase as well. So we did one more little piece of leg work to find out did anything
change in the last two years? Is it an anomaly of some kind? Like we know during COVID there was an anomaly that year but not too much and it kind of went back but last year it shot up a little bit and then
2425 is you know that's basically almost about an 80% increase a 70% increase in two years. Here's one change that did occur. the rules of how you let the communities
know. This is federal changed which made it more available for people to understand and know what their options were. While we had an increase, we should believe the
18.8% more accurately reflects our current population of students. We share this just to show there's a change. We also share this to make sure we can express if you look at any national
data, national data will always say stronger test scores come where there's more money. That is a standard across any metric out there on a national and large metadata standard. It goes to say then it could cost the
district more money to help students that struggle financially at home to keep up. That is a normal thing. In other words, the district may have to spend more money to continue the excellence for all students, not just
the students that come from a large home. We owe that to all students. So, it's a change. It's relatively significant and we wanted to share that with you. Thank you Suzanne for the work on that. Now this work was done by our
assistant business administrator Steve Corso. Now people ask this question all the time. Why is South Brunswick so bad at this budgeting thing that we can't seem to run the
budget? There are four districts in the county. Three of them are about the same size. Also, all four of them started out in 1920 with about the same amount of state aid. That's the column, the light blue
on the left of each of those. South Brunswick started with about 25 million. Edison started with about 26 million. Piscat Piscataway around 23 and a.5 million. And North Brunswick right around 25 million. Now, since
1920, we now went down $8 million. Edison went up 72 million dollars. What? 2019 2020. You said 1920. 1920. Oh,
sorry. Not not the year. Yeah. I mean, I I knew what I was saying. 20. If you guys follow along, great. If not, don't worry about it. in Piscatoaway where they started a little lower. They're a little smaller than us and they now have 11 million more
dollars than us. Look at North Brunswick, our neighbor. In the same amount of time that we lost $8 million, they are almost four times our amount. So when you think about why is South Brunswick in this boat, how could
we not be in this boat is the question. That's the question. If you look at the number of students, it Edison was completely, look at Edison for a minute. They were completely underfunded. Look how horribly
underfunded they were in the year 2019 2020. They had the same amount of state aid as we did, but they had two and a half times many more students. That's crazy. So, the formula was a little bit right.
a little bit, right? They should be somewhere right now around 50 million if you do the numbers, but they're at a hundred million. I learned that this week the Edison board
voted down their budget. It was a 0% budget and they voted it down because they have a hundred million new dollars and they don't want to add it. They could bank that money and save it if something changes in the next three
years. We are not living in a world where we've received 70 plus new millions of dollars or even North Brunswick who's received what 40 35 32 million over that time. I've shared this
with you over time, but we thought it would be a good visual to fully understand why we're here. And the reason it doesn't look a lot worse here is because of the enrollment which we've talked about. So current events. So it was shared with me that
there's a post out there by one of our residents and that post said these two things along with some other choice words that were you know derogatory towards uh the board and myself that what we are proposing are the highest taxes in the state.
All I can share and I hope that our community understands what they do when they outright purposely lie to the community disagree. There might be people in this audience right now that are going to disagree with what you decide and they have every right to disagree. They have every right to come
up here and voice their reasoning as to why they disagree. What no one has a right to do is purposely lie to the community to hurt the community. Because you know what it does? It hurts the community when the community believes they're somehow getting the raw deal worse than anybody
else. So, in under an hour, those are all articles that exist. Anyone can look them up, but I had the links for you. You all now, is it 7:30? Yes, you all receive this on on your email. You have this presentation. The green part of the
quote from the same person is one I think is an awesome quote. invite people to come to a meeting. Now, I don't believe the purpose of that was just to come to listen. However, I will agree with that part of the quote. I ask this
community and most people understand this voice an opposition opinion. Don't lie to the community and try to hurt them. That is a bitter move that does nothing for anyone. However,
to just to show how far off we are from the highest, which that person knew, all you have to do is plug in New Jersey school funding. Some of those districts up there have highest percentages over 35% increases
for this coming year because as I have been telling the board and as I have been telling the legislature for years, there's no choice but to be here. Those districts are way beyond us.
And those are names you've never heard before. They're brand new to the game. That means in one year, somehow in one year losing max 3% of their state aid, they went from never really hearing about them to places
selling one. One one of those schools up there was selling two buildings. One already sold the second building, but we know about that one. Other schools reported having class sizes of 40 to 50 in elementary school. That's in those articles. Demer is the commissioner of
education. He that's an article about him testifying and acknowledging certain concerns and issues. I just put this up there to remind the board any of the community that are watching that we are not in this position by
accident. We've telegraphed this situation and have been planning for it. We were bailed out last year and they gave us a little bit of a bailout again this year. don't know what you're going to have to deal with next year. Don't know if there's any more bailouts coming. We don't know. That was the
question um uh uh just asked uh was Dr. Raj asked, do we know if there's any more money coming? We don't know. We're not predicting it. We have predicted that in the past. We're not predicting it this round. The second thing is the tax levy cap. I'm going to go fast real quick. We
know we cannot afford a 2% cap year-over-year. The things that we spend money on, salaries, health benefits, energy, transportation, tuition, all of it, it just costs more. Just salaries alone are more than 2%. Benefits alone are more than 2%. Energy costs go up.
Transportation costs go up. Supplies go up. Everything goes up. We actually need $8 million new a year to just keep moving forward. This year, if you have a 2%, we'd be left filling a $5.5 million hole because
of a health waiver, which I shared with you, we are still left with a $3.6 million hole. We're going to show you what we've done with that. Ultimately, when you combine the state aid reductions and the 2% cap, we are stuck with a $3.6 million deficit. And I'm
here to tell you again, that is nothing compared to some of our districts in the state right now. Hillsboro 22 million bridge 15 million districts with like massive holes they cannot fill they
cannot so one of the things I talked about was health insurance it is always a factor it is always in play this year remember we went over this GLP1s that one line item went up $1.1 million anti-inflammatory drugs went up
$5 million $500,000 the cost of healthcare in general went up $1.8 million. That alone is well over the 2% we're allowed to increase. So the state allows for a waiver. In our case, it's a $2 million waiver the district
can use at that point. That gets you to the 3.51. The third factor, enrollment. We have declined enrollment. It has been a saving grace that we have not had to hit programs. We have not had to do that
yet. Yet, we are expecting another decline again next year. And when you look in enrollment, if anyone wants to do their own research and you go online and you look at enrollment, you're not going to see these numbers. These numbers don't include our preschoolers. If you put our
preschoolers in there in 2024 and 2025, our enrollment looks like it's staying flat. But that would be an unfair comparison for you. I don't want to give you misinformation. So that's why we take the preschoolers out. And you can see the K12 enrollment is is is constantly
declining. But we all know that is not going to constantly decline for much longer. So people always ask a big reason enrollment drops, interest rates, the housing market right now, the way a
community functions, how many births there were five years prior, um the fact that we have a lot of multigeneration households and it takes about 15 years for those households to turn over with new students and we're an aging community. This is the de dem
demographer as well as current knowledge of what's going on in our country. You know, someone says, "If I want to sell my house because I want to move here," and you're sitting with a 2 and a half% mortgage, and you try to buy a new house with a 7% plus mortgage, that's
hundreds, if not thousands of dollars different per month. So, people are stuck whether they want to move or not. So, that's real. So, it's affecting us with a decline in enrollment. And we talked about this last night. The reality is our our current h homes with no new
construction, our current homes house about 9,000 students. We're currently sitting at about 7,400. That means there's 1,600 students in the existing homes that should eventually come back. Now we have new homes. That's
another 1,600. So you're not looking at just one hit. You're looking at a double hit. The problem is we don't know when. We want to just go really quick. You guys remember this? went over and just talk to you. I'm going to show you one example real quick. Um, if we look down, this is first grade on the left.
If we look down at the, um, let's see, uh, the one that says 50 53 16.7. So, basically, this is a first grade class. We currently are not looking to have classes of 25, but that's what you could do to cut
that down to a two. You'd have 25 first graders in the class. And by the standards that we have, by the expectations of our community, we're not there right now. We do have some classes that do get there, but it's an odd thing when it happens. Now, we already cut, as
you as we'll go, a lot of positions due to enrollment. But we have a problem when you have seven different elementary schools and you get a situation where you have 37 in the bottom there. Can you cut one teacher from that, make it one section
of 37 kids in first grade? probably not. So you leave it with two and you have low class size. That's what happens here. So we've done a lot here. We have higher class size next year than we have this year. That's one of the things the impact again is class size.
Um it just it's constantly doing that. This year the big change is if we are too high in a particular school and we have new developments coming into that school and we have no way to house and seat those kids in that school but we
have space in another school. We are going to move them to that other school. That is not desirable. Not desirable by us. Not desirable by the parent. The only other solution is hire more teachers at that point. And that
isn't really an option for us. So that's going to be a shift. We've done it before in very minimal cases, but we have we have neighborhoods with hundreds of homes that are coming online during the course of next year. We have to monitor this. So that's a big deal. Um
we constantly are provide prioritizing our behavior supports behavior and whatever social media has done to kids, whatever co did, it's it's it's a far more challenging situation than it used to be. Um we constantly when we look at these things, how do we limit actual people
losing their jobs? Um we're good at it, but we're not great at it. And we do have people losing their jobs. It's very upsetting. Very tough time. Uh and the big deal is we try to limit disruption. Um historical staffing, we have academic coaches. We've increased that because of
our needs of our students. We've increased behavioral supports because of the needs of our students. We've increased instructional support because of the needs of our students. We've incre increased guidance counselors because of the needs of our students. Special education program because of the needs of our students. And that's how we
operate for the needs of our students. That's what we do. Quickly, this is the middle school. Um, as you can see, we can't leave 17 kids in middle school classes. Uh, so that's a place we have 10 reductions, 10
teachers being reduced at the middle school alone. the high school impact is is not as easy. It's not as clean. Um Pete, uh Jeff Rman, all the supervisors got together and put together a big package. Evelyn worked with them on that and we
were able to find some some savings, some efficiencies. Um but it does have higher class sizes, right? That's what efficiencies are. You you can do the same thing but with more kids in a class. Um big deal. Course enrollment. There were certain courses that we might have run in the past that were not
running because the number of students who selected it was too low. Um movement is another one. Normally in the high school a student can take a class they realize at a certain point I don't really want to take this class. I want to move it. I want to go into this class. Well that
class might be closed and we don't usually close classes but we're going to be closing classes. So these are impacts that I know we'll hear about next year from families rightfully so. It's not the norm, but these are the things we have to do to manage the level of loss
we've had year after year after year after year. Um, and like before, we worked to see where we could do things to still keep the humans even if we have to cut the positions. Um, we didn't cut programs. We didn't say there's no more AP art. We
didn't do that. We collapse some programs. Um Pete and his team and Evelyn, they do a great job of figuring out how to do do this best. It's very fascinating actually. Um but we didn't have to lose programs of courses, not
programs. And we still want to make sure we support our kids. Overall, there's 41 positions. This is a cut of 41 positions. And we didn't get to the $3 million even with 41 positions.
Next, we have 3100 new residences being built as we speak. You know where they are. And they are all over the place. And they're coming at different times. And they're coming at different speeds. All of a sudden, you look one
way, there's nothing there. You look back the next day and all of a sudden there's something going on there. That's happening right now. We have immediate impact from North umberland way. 1,700 homes being built. We have hundreds already. I think we're at hundreds. We
have Heritage. Is that the one on Heritage is the one on Henderson? Shocks. Henderson. Um Heritage on Shocks. That one is going to continuously produce. They're ready to rock and roll. They're going to be all
coming to us next year. And the ones on Henderson Road, 177 units, they will all be occupied by the end of next school year, which means they will all be open, and we will start getting kids as early as registering for next school year this
summer. But we can't tell you exactly how many they will come, what grades they will come to, what the impact will be, but we've already started slating where they'll go because that's where we have seats. This whole thing has has caused us to have a large committee. Last night was
the first meeting of the 50 person committee to look and study how we're going to manage this over the next couple of years. If you don't plan for this, it's a big problem. You have to be proactive knowing what we're knowing,
all the data we have, use that to make really smart decisions. I'm going to warn the board, you're going to make smart decisions and they're not going to be liked. you will make every decision you make will be seen as a bad one by a portion
of the community. You will not be able to avoid that. I encourage you to not try to avoid that. Try to do what the district needs you to do. The people that will be upset are the people who are impacted. They have every right to be upset. That is not strange or odd. In
fact, it would be odd if they weren't upset. But you still have to move forward and do the right thing. We have three people leading this. Pete Ratine, Christina Vi, and Rob Sears. They uh two of them I saw before. They're here and
um did a great job last night. A lot of work into this. It's going to take a lot of work. By next January, latest February, their task is to present to the board some suggested moves for the board so they can be made in time for
September 26. This is the information we get from the town. This is the what they give us to tell us what we should expect. That was actually the second version. The first version was just all
zeros. Another just demonstrates these kids do not fit in the schools they are currently zoned for. They just don't fit. The giant number four, they're all zoned for Brooks Crossing. Number four is currently all zoned. If all those
kids in 1700 homes go on top of the 520 kids that are already in Brooks Crossing, can't do it. Can't do it. So that's the work that's being done. It's important. Facilities. Another big deal. Another major impactor on the budget. We
have a 50 plus year old roof that they decided to drill holes into, a thousand holes into the roof to put solar on top of the 50-y old roof. Can't say that was the best plan. That's the plan we got. That roof is end of life plus
some. That roof needs to be fixed. That roof we are estimating at a $4 million project which includes the loss of solar, the removal of solar, the replacement of solar, and all that goes with that. Our reserve accounts right now are
$4 million. You cannot liquidate your reserve accounts to nothing. You cannot do that. This is real. The operations committee has met. This has to be addressed. It's a $4 million expense of money you do not
really have currently leaking. This is what it is. The other part right now, that's how our tennis courts look throughout. It's a $250,000 fix. It'll be more money next year if you don't fix it this year. If
you wait another year, it'll be more money. The question is, can you wait? The answer is yes. Can you wait on the roof? Yes. You risk causing far more expense and damage and harm, but you can say yes. It is always a choice. We've made
the choice to not do all the facilities needs we had to because we've been balancing kids learning and you have to start balancing now facilities. Yep.
Just just a side note on our tennis courts um board member Mike Mitchell got us in contact with the um the New Jersey Tennis Association. They provided us Yep. they provide us a a grant that we could apply for to have
our tennis courts uh re recoded. Um and they're going to we have uh six tennis courts. They're going to provide us $8,000 per court, almost $50,000 to um to take to help out with this project. And that just came about a
couple weeks ago. So, thanks Mike for the contact. And um that's a big that's a big ad for a big a big plus for this project because this project was coming directly out of um our maintenance reserve. I just
question the difference. That's all. Thank you very much, Mike, by the way. That's awesome. Um what's the diff? Were we just going to recoat? Did we have to pull anything up? I just wanted You're going to you're going to get a new surface top. So it would be no matter what if we got that granite, it's the same process. Yep. Same process. I just
wanted to make sure. Thank you. Thank you, Mike. So, we want to just outline for this to you right now with the 41 positions cut and the other things that we've done, we are currently $600,000 short from balancing the budget.
Okay? If we don't go spend any more money, which I understand no one wants to tax anybody, we need to right now find $3 million more dollars to start the school year. 2 million will pull from the reserves, which leaves you with only $2 million
with 14 buildings. It's horrendous. 4 million is horrendous. 2 million is double doubly horrendous. Then we have to pull 2 million from the operating budget. Then the 600,000. I'm still short. And now we can make maybe move that 875 to$825
because now we need 200,000 more for the tennis courts. Comes to about $3 million. So if this is the choice of the board, which is the choice of the board, my my responsibility is to give you options.
So here's your options. If you don't want to raise the money that the state has said you can, then we start talking about what you want to pick and choose to get to $3 million. You can close the school and
redistrict the kids. You can redistrict the entire K8 population where many kids will go to different schools than they go today. And because of all of the building, you will eventually need to reopen that building again. Massive disruption. It is the
most disruption of the choices, but it's also the most lucrative of the choices. You can eliminate all all courtesy busing. That means no hazardous routes. Specifically, that means
5-year-olds who live at Royal Oaks will have to cross Route 1 to get to school. They will not be provided transportation. That is legal. You are legally allowed to make that decision. Again, very lucrative
decision. We will save $1.5 million off the bat and then you can start charging for subscription busing. We estimate you'll make at least 250,000. So, that one's worth about 1.75. gets you a little more than halfway there. If you don't like that one, you
can get rid of all of our security. That one's about 850 grand and we won't have the South Brunswick police and we won't have any of our security guards or our director. I don't think that one will go over very well either. The next one, which is usually more popular, is just fire the
administrators. It's lucrative. $125,000 each. We need about 25 of them, which is half, and we could figure that out with half the number of administrators. I will tell you the other half will quit,
but you you could do that. So, you'd have to if you fire half, you'll actually get 50 out of the deal. So, that's a really good deal. Actually, that's a that's a surprise little nugget there. You can reduce more certificated staff. All the future certificated staff will
cut right into programs and up your class size even more. But you can do that. Those are options. You can reduce sports. You can pick and choose. Any of the high school sports. The smaller sports might only be 10 grand and the larger ones could go
100 grand or more. Your big ones are football and marching band. I say target those first. That will be very friendly for the community. Those are your choices. Because if you're only going to go for the little ones, you need $3 million. Don't mess around with the small sport. Go big. You got to go big here. You need
$3 million. You can eliminate all of middle school athletics completely. Not that much money, but it's $180,000. That will have a major impact, of course, on your high school teams. And Mike will not be talking about a championship anything anymore because they will not have a
place to start. You can reduce extracurriculars about 3 to 4,000 per club. That's basically all the clubs. You can cut them all then some. You can cut half the administrators and all the clubs and you'll get just about get there. You can eliminate the elementary
G&T program which affects 200 students. That saves you a quarter of a million. There's other ways to do it, other ways to skin this cat, but they all kind of feel this way. That's just where you are. This is what other districts are doing. They are doing those things. They are cutting middle
school sports. They do not have band and music programs like we have. Not even close. As I said the other night, we have advanced choir in elementary schools. Now, if we cut advanced choir,
you would only save about 120 20% of one staff member and you'd have all those people involved in advanced choir sitting in the front rows ready to tell you how they feel about cutting advanced choir and so on and so on. for any one of those things you pick. That's the way
it works. Not saying that should be the reason you don't do it. The reason you shouldn't do it is because we take care of kids here. That's why you shouldn't do it. The byproduct is angry people, but that shouldn't be the reason you do or don't do something. You should do it or
don't do it because it's right. And if you can, there will be a time where maybe you don't have a choice where you don't have an option. You either fix the roof or don't. That could be your choice. You happen to be in a situation where you do have some options this
year. Our recommendation is what you voted on last meeting. So if you do all those things, I'm not I I just these are just you can read these later. This is just the impact of what you do. If you do all those things or any of those things, each one comes with things we don't
like, things we don't want, bad things. Um the biggest thing we're dealing with is we can't do new things. We can't talk about like how do we do this better? We only talk about how do we do it equal or better with less money. That's the conversation we have. Not just we have more money. And I know there's people in
the audience that have asked for things that the answer is no. Uh oh. I don't know what she asked for, but you can have it. You get it. I can't do crying. Um, again, just all stuff we
know. So, what are we maintaining? We're still doing all this. This is why we're here. This is why the people you pay have jobs. No matter what job they do in the district, they do their job so we can do these things. And David has been a mastermind
of getting the money in operations as low as we can get it so we can keep the money here. We don't want to be known for having the best, most maintained bushes. We want good maintained bushes, but that's not what we want to be known for.
We want to be known for doing right for kids. So, what Dave does with Brian, they figure out how to do things as as inexpensively as possible. But you saw, you didn't hear us at all talk about custodial or maintenance cuts. We've done that every other year.
We've done secretaries. We've done other things. We can't do that. We're not even proposing it. We need to stay here and keep our money here. So, the rises program was a huge highlight for us. That program I went
over last time, but you know, awesome. We're getting Raph, you're here. You're still here. How many tuition students? Raph, six PE districts pay us to have their kid in our program. And Jamie's back there. Stacy and Jamie, they're the principal and assistant principal of
that school. That program takes a lot out of people, but they are absolutely killing it over there. Fantastic job and a huge thing. So good, we're doing it again and this time we're expanding to the middle school. That was a $300,000
ad to the budget. One of the few ads to the entire budget. We do that because that's what our kids need, but in this case, we're also going to probably make some of that money back. That's pretty huge. Keeping kids in district is good for the kid and good
for the wallet. Mostly good for the kid and bringing in tuition students is very helpful. So the rest of this is for the board to just peruse at your own rate. We ask the schools and the um and leadership just give us some proud proud
moments or highlights. Not going to go over them all, but I did put them all onto one. Well, actually Lord just put them all onto one page uh for each group. And there's so much that we are still proud of that we do. We thought it was important. We always just talk about money and horror and pain. Even with all
that, the people, the teachers, the staff, everybody in this district makes it so all those things get to keep happening year after year after year. Even when right now we're telling people they don't have a job, people still come forward and still try to do the right thing no matter what. That is a pride
that you can never get too much of. Now, the big thing, the tax impact. As I've shared, the state gave us a tax incentive aid. The state has a formula, which we hate with a passion. The formula has told us, you are spending
not enough money. South Brunswick, you don't spend enough money. Now, we only spend $5.1 million. Other districts like Tom's River, they said, you don't spend enough money. You have to spend $126 million more. and other number crazy numbers out there in the state. We're
kind of in a modest place because last year the board did what you did and because we've reduced our operation costs. So we're in as good a place as we could be in a place that's still lost so much over the years. Anyway, what it
basically does allows you to go to adequacy. You can go to 5.1 million. That would cost the district 4.8 million. The other 250,000 would come from the state. Very nice of them to give us 5% of that money back. That's being
sarcastic. The 50 million 50,000 per million dollars. Thank you. So, this is just the way this goes. We're allowed to do this this year. It's allowed from the DOE. Actually, the only part that is not legally allowed until the budget passes
is the $50,000 per million. That has to be approved at the budget level. The rest of this does not. So here's what it looks like. These numbers went down from our last conversation because ratable got
adjusted in a positive way. So they came down. So anything in the green is at the option of the board. The pink with prior years. The number that Dave likes to point out to us is all the way to the
right. The district has not seen big hits to taxes. Last year was the first time that there was a decentsiz hit to taxes. So it is unfortunate that the state has done this two years in a row. I was
speaking to a legislator today and said, "Why can't they give us three years to put this into place so districts can actually manage this?" Because someone thought of it two months ago and that's how it came about. This wasn't some
grandiose plan. It just came about. It was April. Wasn't even two months ago. That's how this happens. It It's It's crazy. So anyway, at the last meeting, the board voted tentatively to go to the 7.2% that will
have an impact of the average home of $325. That would put the six-year average for the average taxpayer in South Brunswick that they would have paid $87 more over those six years. It's not horrible, but it's not good either. Not going to stand up here and say that's an easy decision. Not going
to stand up here and say nobrainer. Schools keep the town the healthiest above all else in this town. It's the schools. We're the biggest uh employer. All the money. It's what it
is. hate to see an increase, but this is what we need to do to do all those things that we do to keep all the things in place at a at not as a good as good a level as it's been. It's still everything's being declined, but we're trying to make sure you have a roof, literally a roof over your head next
year, safety, and all the other things that we've talked about over the years. This is what you're going to be asked to vote upon. This is the final slide and that is the money and we can open up for questions
from the board before uh we take a seat. Again, it's nothing too new. We did have some recommendations for some slides, so we did try to put those in there. Anything any questions? Does anybody have any questions? Just
comb the color. So that dropped. I think it's important to note it the 325 did drop from 335 350. Yeah, what it was. So they reran the numbers and that dropped at
the annual tax impact. So I'm gonna jump on that which is $27 a month. That's a to go to seven. We tend to freak out when we look at 7.20% that's such a high percentage rate
and it is. Um, but when you break down the numbers, it's $27 a month for the annual household. And we had so many years of we didn't not only not pay taxes, our taxes went down. Like I mean,
I'm sorry, we did not increase our taxes, they actually went down. So, um, Dave, that $87 is over averaging out over six years, right? What our what our taxes went up. Um, one thing I want to let the board know, we got to keep in
mind because the state is so they do things whenever they feel like it, at the last second that they feel like it, that this allowing us to go past the 2% cap. Because if they said, "Too bad, you can only go to the 2% cap," we couldn't
even cover our our cost of living expenses. We would be in major trouble. Um, so they said, "Okay, we can go past the 2% cap and then add the uh the health insurance thing and then we can go up to five million." That's right.
Now, unfortunately, because the state is so unpredictable, it's one of those things that if we don't do this now, we might not even come close to this opportunity next year. And if we're
not given this opportunity, we are in major trouble since right now our reserves is four million. Yes. Okay. So, if we don't build that up um and then that state next year in their infinite
wisdom says um yeah, we're going back to the 2% cap and we've already used the pitily little four million we have. We're selling buildings. I mean, I don't know if we actually will, but we're going to be put in that bad of a position. So we have to look at the big
picture here, not just right now and not the scary two 7.2 because that is a scary number there. But the other part, Laura, people like last year were confused. 7.2% is not an increase on people's taxes, right? That's an increase in revenue, right? So if
someone look at their tax bill right now, let's say they pay 10 10 $10,000, doesn't mean they're paying seven thou $700 more. Doesn't mean that at all. It has to do with their assessed value, not what they pay in taxes. It's 7.2%. The average family and a the average home
will see a $325 increase, you know, give it give or take few dollars depending paying on the house come in at the end. But that's pretty much an important distinction on the school on revenues tax. Just on the school tax, not the whole property bill. Yeah. I can't I I have no control of what the town does. I
want to make it clear that's on your but this is remember it's 7.2% is the revenues. It is not the increase to someone's taxes. Okay. Um well, we when we look at that roof, I am just amazed that they
decided 10 years ago or eight years ago. When did we put that solar on? Eight years ago. Who puts a solar roof on a 50 year a solar panels on a 50-y old roof with holes? Like to me, and I've stated
this before, replacing that roof is a nonnegotiable. We have got to replace that roof this year. We have got to before we have kids in there and the roof caves in and we're really in a lot of trouble. Actually, I I I thought about that for a while. Um that was
before Scott came on, right? Um that was after Dr. McCartney left and there was no money left in the general fund from what I remember. fix that roof because Dave and Scott brought that general fund, excuse me, my apologies. The capital fund um brought it up to 15
million. Did you bring it up to the capital reserve? Yeah. So, there was no money in capital reserve left. Which will put us in the same position if we don't act on this now. I thought about that. Yeah, that will put us in the same position. Deepa,
can you go to the tax incentive slide? So where it says districts can go to adequacy $5.1 million is and if you flip back to the to the next slide uh does that mean sorry I'm not looking at this okay so does that mean that we
can we are per you know we are allowed to go to what four somewhere between 3.5 and 4.2 you're you're allowed to go anywhere from 20 to 7.2. You're legally allowed to do any numbers you want to do up to
7.2. Okay. So then what's this 5.1 million? The 5.1 million gets you above the statutory 2% cap and any waiverss. Okay. So the the 3.51 which is the 4.6
that's the statutory amount. They wrote this plan to allow you to go to adequacy which is above that statutory number. That's where those numbers come from. This is all deep. It's all formulaic. The formula in the software tells us this.
Okay. And sorry. And the next question was is the state reimbursements. What is that? The state reimbursement in us? Yes. 50,000 for every million. Every million of the 5.1 million that is if we raise it they would give us give it if you raise it if you build
it they will come. Yes. What is the word? If you if you raise the million movie if you raise the million dollar they will give you $50,000 for every million. So they saying you're allowed to go to
5.1 of which 250,000 of that will be the state money. You're allowed to raise the other 4.8. So they're saying that we will give you money if you get more money from your people. Correct. Okay. So I just want I mean I was just trying to like Yeah.
Think about and I'll send you Field of Dreams to watch. Yeah. Uber will watch it. Watch it. No, I'm just trying to break this down in my simple head. So that's what they're saying. They're saying we will the state will the state is saying if you get money from your people then we will give you some more
money 5% back of what you get from your people. Oh this year one time hit. So okay okay. So is the formula ad again like last year or is it no worse than last year? It literally is just flew out of the thin air. Okay. And it's not like
for future. It's it's just for No. 100% not for future. Well I can't say 100% anything. I don't know what they'll do next year. We didn't know they were doing this this year. Yeah. Rajes. I think Julie goes first. Julie and then I just wondered um about uh
last year when we were doing the budget, you mentioned that we our bond would expire. We wouldn't Could you mention that and how that affects our budget this year? And I'll put Dave on the call for this one. So your your uh debt service fund went
from almost 3.5 million uh down to 1.8 million and next year the 1.8 million is completely wiped off. It's zero. So you won't be carrying any debt uh in your tax levy next year at all. But we don't we don't collect those funds. Those
funds go straight to your township. So we don't see that 1.8 8 million in our operating um budget. That 1.8 million is collected at the township and paid um through the township. So why do we line item that on our budget then? Because
it's it's uh those are funds that we took to build the high school. So they're it's kind of like a mortgage. You know, you you you have the mortgage, you have to pay it off. It's just that the taxpayers in the community are paying that tax or that mortgage directly to the township. Okay. But When
that's finished, you that's almost a plus. It is a plus. We saw we saw we saw an uh we saw a little bit of a a benefit from having that roll off this year. If we if we still carried the debt service, your um total base budget would be more
in the 4.5 million or 145 million. It was about three and a half million that rolled off. So your your total base budget would have been higher and the 325 would have been obviously a little bit more. Okay. So looking at this our our budget last year and correct me if
I'm wrong if I read that it was 1647. Is that No. Um no the what we're looking here at is your your general fund like how we operate the district. Fund 11, all of our expenses, our salaries, anytime we pay for anything that impacts
classrooms, uh, special education, any any services building built, all of our buildings, our transportation, healthcare, our whole general budget, our general fund is $164 million. What of that 164 million, 141 million of it
is supported through the tax levy, right? So that's your tax levy. So, our budget, our operating budget this year is 164 million. Uh, we have a special revenue fund grants and federal federal grants that we receive and state grants that equate to uh our preschool uh
actually uh increased that quite a bit this year. And the preschool has been a godsend with regards to assisting our our budget and our operating budget. But, um that's a $9 million um special revenue fund addition. And so you have an $1 million special revenue fund
that's that operates out of what we call a fund 20. It's very um regulated and restricted on how and what we can charge there. Uh and then you have your debt service fund and a total base budget of 177 million. So all of those numbers added
together equal your total base in the budget column. And all of the col all of the numbers on your right equate to the uh tax impact that's um in the community right now. Okay. Um, what was our budget last year? Just out of
curiosity, what were we at last year? Uh, you were hovering right around the 160 or 158 million 158 uh uh general fund and your total we're doing an increase of 12 million this year. No,
no, no, no. You're you're increasing n Yeah. I'm not I'm not 100% sure on our our total bas the the increase this year the net increase.5 million the net increase this year is 9.5 million minus
1.8 million which was the debt service that came off that's your net increase if you do 7.2 So it's about seven. So we're increasing about 9 million 9
and a half million in the general fund and 1.8 million off less in the debt service all taxes. So if that's true, wouldn't it be beneficial to just go to
5.78? In essence, in my opinion, my only my only recommendation to the board is 7.2. That doesn't mean you have to agree. I'm just saying that's my recommendation. So just piggy back on that point and I think we have discussed this a lot uh prior right in the finance
committee. So the additional revenue that we generate again the goal is to put that in the capital reserves right because that is extremely low and we know our infrastructure is aging and we will need definitely more uh more funds
so it's an opportunity so that's that's again that's again a goal and can we make that as an administration goal because I know the money goes into the operating account and we need to move it at the June July time frame. So can we make that as an admission goal that additional revenue we generate about 2
million roughly goes to cap uh capital reserves do a little better than that reje why why don't I think the board has told us with very clear y that if we do this we are putting money into the roof of the tennis courts no questions asked exactly so that that that condition of
the of the money is agreed upon okay I have a question about Can you Mike the free and reduced lunch? Yes. You know we had the So in the last couple of years we were you know pretty
stable at 12%. Right. If I remember this 12% 12 right and then we saw an increase to 18%. Almost 19 right. So will that come under like title one grants like what is it like are we is that impacting our so so the reality is
that should eventually hit the formula and do something correct so it hasn't hit it because I thought it variable wasn't it one of the variables like the free and reduced lunch was a it is a variable of a formula that might eventually help but they roll over a
six-year average of all that information so it doesn't help immediately. Oh, so you mean that we need to be consistent at 18% for six years? No, it's an average. You don't have to be consistent. They just take whatever the numbers are and they roll them into six-year averages. Why? Oh, don't
no. There's no why. There's no why the budget is there's no why the state does what the state does. No, no, no. Scott doesn't have that ability. Um because they are the state and they said so. No, the reason I ask why is because at this point you are you are servicing a
population that is on an 18% I'm going to make it worse for you. If you got a thousand new students in next year, you're not getting the money for a thousand new students. It'll be a thousand new students averaged over six years. That
is the way this works. That's the answer. Why? That is the answer. That is the answer. because it's the answer. I'm not being rude. I I This is very frustrating for me because I hate that these are the answers. They're not
logical. They do some things one year over one year and some years six over years over six years. It's a it's a problem with the formula. Hopefully, they'll fix the formula. Hopefully, but we've been saying hopefully for the past so many years. And now the legislators have basically they basically said we
are done. We're not doing the formula until there's a new governor and we hear what that governor wants to do. So that means at the next school year maybe but doubtful. Okay. So I I have another question. Sorry, this is the last one that I will ask. So we have this whole
housing plan that has come from the township or whoever has given us that information. Right. So then these are all these 3,000 homes that are being built. Yes. Let's say you know we have even if we have like 10% whatever of influx of students. So there
is no the state doesn't have a plan or doesn't have a logic to you can stop there. Okay. They do not have a plan. They do not have logic. So they don't have a plan or a logic to service an an immediate need of a township that has
seen seen an influx or is anticipating an influx to uh you know provide public education to those students who who are in that. They do. If your district is Lakewood, right? If your district is not Lakewood, then you have nothing. What
What is in Lakewood? They give Lakewood a money every year. And other districts that have asked for the same money because they've had problems like you've described get nothing from the state. So the answer to your question is no. There is no plan for when you have an influx
of enrollment except for to factor it in to the formula which takes enrollment over a six-year average. So you're you're expected to provide busing facilities everything no increase in uh trans all
the transportation everything and how how are you expected to service them? Yes transportation. And here we are. And here you have it folks. Remember back in I'll throw a month out I think and Scott correct me.
September uh Senator Gopal was very forceful and we were all behind him that they were going to re-engineer that school funding formula. We we were there cheering them on and it fell flat on its face. And
really the bottom line, it is a political situation. There's no ifs or buts about it until the new governor gets appointed, whoever that may be. We might still be fighting this for the next 10 years. Who knows? But no, nothing's going to happen between now and that governor getting appointed.
It's just not. So we can't depend on anything other than those that presentation. I think we I think we go from uh like struggling to keep the district as vibrant as it is right now and growing
the district because you look at the numbers with Edison, they have three times the amount of enrollment that we do. Therefore, they're getting more money. So, your objective here is to kind of work a you know, it's like a tight rope. feels like a tight rope, you
know, where you want South Brunswick to grow and mature and and maybe someday be as as large as Edison uh and get that money from the state. But you also have residents who are on very fixed budgets
who are on struggling with the economy that doesn't have any real clear change in sight as well. So, you know, how do we tell our constituents 7.2 is fine? I think we have to
be locking that tight rope and making a prudent decision uh to say, well, let's go for 5.2 and and and it you know yes that's not going to solve all our problems but we
have uh next year with the hope that we will get some clarification from the state to give us the you know the extra that we will need or however they did their mojo this year their crazy mojo uh
you know we we have we're walking a tight rope here as the board and and I just wondered what you think about how do we talk to our constituents? An average homeowner, it an average homeowner, this is not clear, it's not
clear to most people watching tonight. You have people in Kendall Park with homes that range about anywhere from 300 to 500,000. And that's not even what average homeowner is. That's probably high compared to assessed value because
I know what I live in in Kendall Park and my assessed value is only 170,000. So that's I know that's good for me, but that's not good for everyone. That's what I'm trying to tell you. The discrepancy here is a large amount of
residents who live in larger homes who are going to take the brunt of this. So they have to be sure this is what they want. It's the price that I mean that to live in a larger home that's assessed at a larger value. So, so and I want I want to point out since Jules since um this
is the average home assessed home not what we can get for because you're right there's such a big difference. But if you look at the 5.02 so if we voted on 5.02 we would raise the taxes $258 a year. Okay. If we
look at the 7.20 20 we raise it $325 a year. So all the people that are destitute are saving is $75 a year. So the only instead of paying $27 a month
at f at 7.20 they will be paying $21.50 a month. The difference we should get I think we should get accurate figures from the municipality about this. It's It's unfair to Yeah. It's
then you Wait, Lisa, let her finish talking. Let her finish talking. I was just going to sit down. But what what did you just say? Sorry. You wanted to get accurate figures about what for from the municipality how the taxes are. So
we to help. Yeah, we have that. We've presented that. That's what is here. That is the accurate amount of money. What is an average house? $200,000. Assess. assessed. Assessed at $200,000. Julie, Julie, Julie, listen. Julie,
you've been in the town a long time. I have. When was the last You said your house is $170,000 assessed. Not anymore. It's a little bit higher than that, but that's not the value. Wait, Dave. Dave. Dave. Dave. No, one second. Julie. Julie, how much higher than 170 is your
house assessed? 178. Okay. When was it assessed? No. No. Just let me let me finish. Let him do it, please. Let me just finish this one conversation. Let me just try and help. You have a house that's assessed at 178. I need a quarter. Just as a guess, if you put your house on the market right now, what do you think it would sell for?
Somewhere around 400. Around what? Around 400. Okay. So, the tax, the $325, the way that number came out is from a formula from the township. We don't
guess that $325 is for a house assessed at $200,000. Assessed. Don't care what it's worth. Your house at 178, you'll have less than
$325 in tax. I'm not worried about I'm not saying you're worried. I'm trying to do the math. Just the math. But think about what you mentioned is that we have a district. One of the problems is we have a lot of people who are older seniors living in homes that they're not
willing to to move to due to the problem with the interest rates. Those people are on very fixed budgets. So, we have to think about how that impacts them. We do, but most of those elderly people
aren't living in our million-dollar homes across the street from the high school. Most of those people are living in original Well, if they're living in million dollar homes, Julie, come on. Think about this. They're not living on a fixed income and and making paying the taxes they're paying on those houses.
Forget these, but just the property taxes, paying the PSEG that they're going to pay on those gigantic houses across those. They're not living on a fixed income. If they're living across the street from the high school, they're just not are our fixed income people are
probably living, my guess is in our Kendall Park areas. Um, you have some in mom and junction smaller tiny houses, right? Smaller tiny h that are assessed at 15. Exactly. So, so I get what you're saying. I totally
agree with what you're saying, but I also think that people that are living in our larger homes, which I personally could not afford and I have been here my whole life, um, they're not living on fixed in. You're not f I would bet my
paycheck that I get here on this board that they are not they're not on fixed incomes living. What if we what if we went door to door and said, "Oh, come on. We can't we can't do that. I see your theory. We can't do that. Just calm down. This is just hypothetical. If you
went door todo and said, "Are you in favor of your taxes going up 7.2% this year due to the school budget?" I would say wager to say that 90 to 95% would say no that's too much. I have a comment. I disagree with you.
Look out here. Hold on. I have a comment. Wait, what? We have gone through this for the past four months. Four months. I'll even say five months. Who do you see out here? That's your community. There's nobody here saying not one person gentlemen. I apologize. I
don't know if you will or not, but there's nobody here. So, if they were that upset, they should be here. Do these teachers live in our district? What does that have to do with that? No, I thought that I'm not talking about the teachers. I'm talking about the community. If the community was upset
about this, they haven't heard. Yes, they have. How much more are we supposed to advertise that this is happening? Every year, a budget takes place for the school board in every single district in the state of New Jersey. 600 plus districts go through this every year.
Everybody that pays taxes knows that there's a a percentage of their property tax that goes directly to the schools. And Lisa, we're going to let her have her opinion on what she says here. Absolutely. Thank you. We're just going to let it go. Thank you. But I am just saying if there was a survey to be had,
this would be it. Okay. So, we're gonna Julie have her opinion. And Rees, you had your hand up. Yeah. No, no. I was I mean of course uh increasing taxes is not one of the the best thing to do or to vote on but I think what if I can summarize and Scott and Dave if you can
correct me if we really had to we can based on on the proposals you have already provided the 41 positions and and some of the the cuts around we can manage the budget but we cannot do roof
we cannot fix the tennis courts we cannot uh keep the existing class size as is. So I think if I summarize with staff eliminations can we manage barely but we can't do anything else. So if community is wondering why
not 3.5 or why not something else and why 7.2 in return what they're getting is they're going to get a new roof so that the the schools infrastructure is upgraded they get longetivity. we're not cutting any of the safety programs that you were putting up which was on the
chopping blocks. So again safety if I remember is the core to the community then comes academics then sports and then the other extracurricular activities. So we are maintaining everything. So again if I have to go out and say why the tax increase is in
return you're going to get a roof which is required which cannot be postponed. I think that's what I would have to say and again your point was pretty valid. Why point why not 5.78 then and why 7.2
too. And again, the only only better way for me to say to the community is by just 20 or 30 odd bucks, if we can increase our capital reserves, that financially puts us in a much better position
to face the headwinds coming up next year, which we have no idea, right? Because unless and again all the the drastic proposals that that Scott and Dave put actually I have a gut feeling will have to be considered next year be
it closing of schools or busings or sports which I know is not popular but eventually it has to be and this so that's the best bet is increase the cap reserve let's be in the best position to face the oncoming next year's challenges
which we have no idea what they will be. So that's what I would summarize it all. Good summary. That is correct. Okay. Any other questions, comments? I
just point. Um well, Mr. Appreciate it. Uh, next on our Oh, I need to do a uh an adjustment to uh consent agenda. We need
to add a motion. Mr. President, can I get a motion to adjust the consent agenda? Yeah, I have a motion. Can I have a second? Second, Mike. So we're you have uh we're going to add
motion 1.19 to the consent agenda. So, be it resolved that the South Brunick Township Board of Education hereby accepts with deep appreciation and sincere
gratitude the letter of retirement submitted by Scott Federer effected August effective August 31st, 2025 from the position of superintendent of schools. The board extends its heartfelt thanks
to Mr. Federer for his outstanding leadership, unwavering dedication, and many years of exemplary service to the South Brunswick Township District, its students, staff, and the community. He has been transformational presence in
our schools, fostering a culture of excellence, kindness, and innovation that has positively impacted all of us in meaningful ways. The South Bundle community wishes you, Mr. Feder, oh my
god, the best in your future endeavors. And please have a budget-free [Applause]
retirement. Man, that was a lot harder than I thought. and I've known about it a little while. You all please make sure you pass this budget and pass this consent agenda, please. Okay. Um before we get to the consent agenda, next order of business is our
board committee and liaison reports. Um policy, Miss Khan. Okay. Finance, Miss Rogers. Yes. Thank you. Um, President Hernandez. Um, sorry. I know.
Just I'm all tripped up. I've been with Scott for a long time. So, it was You just screwed me up. You really screwed me up. Um, so the finance committee met this past Tuesday. We went through that
entire presentation that you just saw. Um that was myself, President Hernandez. Um Miss Khan and Mr. Sony were present along with um Dr. M. Sorry, Suzanne Luckorn. Um and Kim and
Dave, sorry, and Steve. There was a lot of people there. Uh so we went through the entire presentation. The committee did approve at that time. We passed the committee um to go to the 7.20. um committee approved um based on the presentation that was given. Uh so
thank you. Awesome. Okay. Um uh Mr. Kisha, so for operations, nothing. He's not here, but we really just touched on the roof. Uh Dr. Raj, no updates at this
thing. Okay. Any liaison reports? Okay. Yeah, I have one. Yeah. So for the high school, uh, we I attended the Joan Circus Art Gallery. It was wonderful. Um, Mr. Feder also touched upon it. So it was my pleasure
to be at that event. Uh, I took lots of pictures and it was Yeah, I sent you some. So it was it was wonderful. And for all of the board members who may have missed it, please don't miss it next year. Some of this art is just stunning. Absolutely stunning. So please try and make it next year if you if you
didn't see it this year. Thank you. She was there. I wasn't able to make it so she was my eyes and as she was touring she was sending me pictures as she was going through. It was awesome. Um Dr. Raj uh quick update on the cricket club
uh South Dunswick uh high school uh cricket club uh they played against West Windsor Plainsboro and they won both their matches. So flying start to the cricket club and I was at one of their matches. It was awesome. so much of cricketing talent. Uh I was actually uh taken aback that they got both the
matches against a well established team. That's awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Anyone else? Okay. Okay. So then next up, old business, there's none at this time. New business, there is none at this time. Our next portion of the board meeting is
public comment. This is on any topic. The board of education recognizes the value of public comment on educational issues and the importance of allowing members of the public to express themselves on school matters of community interest. Complete copies of
policy 0167 which govern this portion of the meeting are available to the public at the auditorium entrance online or by contacting the board office. To permit the fair and orderly expression of comments, we ask that the participants
be recognized by the presiding officer and preface comments by announcing his or her name, place of residence, and group affiliation if appropriate, and by signing the signing sheet, completing the signing sheet up at the podium. Please print legibly or we may be unable
to document your name for the permanent record. Each statement may may be made by a participant shall be limited to three minutes. No participant may speak more than once on the same topic. Mr. Palowski will indicate when you have 15
seconds remaining. All statements shall be directed to the presiding officer. No participants may address or question board members. No discussion between a participant and respondent shall exceed the three minute time limit. It is our
plan to listen to each member of the public. Once all questions and comments from all members of the public are made, the board of education may respond or respond via email in the most timely and effective manner available. All questions and comments made will be
noted. Mr. Pilowski, do we have anybody pre-registered? We have no pre-registrations at this time. Are there anyone in the audience that would like to have a public comment? Please on come come down to the podium please. We open we are very open to um
diverse comments. We are not open to disrespect and I just say that before every comment. Please come on down. Sure. No problem. You want to slide over so you're up next? You can move over so you can go up
next. Just takes a while to get. No worries. No worries. I know. They know. They know me. You know me. Okay. My name is John O Sullivan. 33 Wexford Drive, Mama Junction, New Jersey. And I live across the street a
little bit from the high school. And I do not live in a million-doll home. I wish. Okay. A much newer development has. You didn't clarify a much newer development is over a million dollars. I
wish to I had something to say, but I I see the superintendent will be leaving. I wish him wish him luck. It's not fun being up on a board. I have had experience from council. I know what it's like. I was going to say something
about his salary of $230,000 a year, especially when the governor of the state of New Jersey, which I checked out today, makes $175,000 said salary. So, I guess when
you go out looking for a new superintendent, I hope you have money in the budget for this now because that's an expense. I hope you have it in there now. I just hope we don't go in my opinion, crazy paying
$230,000 for a superintendent. Thank you for your time. Thank you so much. I don't see a sign. Someone else signs. You're okay. Just stay. I'm okay. All right. You're good. Robert Williams, 10 Jeffrey Circle right here in Dayton.
I thank you all for your time and effort. I mean, it's probably a very thankless job. I mean, yes, you pursued it, but I mean, I'm sure you didn't know what you were getting in when you did. Nope. Um, I've kind of missed a lot of the meetings here. I was here more last
year, and I apologize. I should be more active in the community, but things came up this year, and I just couldn't. We all trust you to do the right thing. All right. Um, but I have more questions
than I do statements. We were mentioning or you brought up all these new houses that are coming up. All right. But tax revenue comes in with it. I don't know if that's been factored in. I don't expect an answer. All right. I'm
just kind of like going. I mean, I did a down I thought somebody said, 1700 houses. You mind if I I'll respond to that for you? Sure. Sure. All right. So, the state of New Jersey uh in 2012 put a cap on the amount of money
you're allowed to spend on schools, you're allowed to increase the amount of money from the taxes in the local level by 2%. So, if your taxes are 100 million, let's say, that the town pays, the next year you're allowed to go to 102
million. It does not matter if a billion dollars of new taxes came into the town. What happens? happens. I just did this last night uh with another group because this is a complicated issue. What happens if more money comes into the town? It reduces the amount of tax
everybody pays. It doesn't come to us. So, for example, if you were if you were paying for a classroom of learning and there were 20 students in the class and the class cost $100,000, each student's part would be
$5,000. If we add 10 more kids to that, now there'd be 30 kids who get to share in the same $100,000. The cost didn't go up. There's just more people paying. That's what happens when new
houses come in because of the law in the state of New Jersey. It doesn't give us access to any other funding that comes in. It just reduces. If you saw on the early slides, even when you saw there was an increase of two to 3% in the levy, it was still a decrease in
people's taxes. So if you look in the first one up there, 20 in 2020, we raised the taxes by 2.9, we raised the revenues by 2.93%. Which was probably about $2.5
million, but it resulted in an an $100 reduction in the average person's tax. I'm actually following you pretty well. Yeah. So, what you're basically saying, and I'm sure I'm way off, but I did a back Whoa. Sorry. I did a a back of the
envelope calculation, and I'm assuming Did I hear 1,700 new houses coming in? 3,177. That's even worse. At 10 grand ahead, at 10 grand ahead, we're talking I did 17 million. It's going to be double that. So, everybody's going to
get a tax break next year. our taxes are going down. You got it. So, one of the things that um is integral with the school funding formula is the ratables of the town. So, when all of those houses hit the market, when those real estate sales hit your ratables, your
ratables are going to shoot up. And when your ratables shoot up and your town values worth more, that also decreases your payable taxes, but it decreases the impact of our taxes on on you as a taxpayer. So if your ratables if the
ratables of a town So a few years ago actually in the year 2020 there were three or four warehouses that sold out on Route 130 that were built for say $10 a square foot. They sold for 200 a square foot and that that
amount of sale revenue hit your ratables and your ratables jumped up almost a billion dollars. So we were able to raise taxes because your town value was so much higher. It actually dropped your taxes because the value of the town was
so much increased so much. So hopefully when all of these homes hit your market, your ratables will shoot up again and our tax our two 2% tax on the levy won't have such a dramatic impact or a more
favorable impact on your tax bill. But but the issue is we won't get the money to do things the school needs, right? It doesn't work that way, which is the problem. Well, I know that taxes at least 60 to 70% are allocated to the schools. So, I mean, no matter how the
revenue goes around, I should say the taxes because it's not really revenue. Oh, you might look at it as revenue. I see it as taxes. 60 or 70% of that still going to the schools. So, that that number will shift. Okay. Well, only if the county takes more. Um,
all right. Any idea why Edison and New Brunswick got such a high amount compared to us? That doesn't make sense. You don't know really question of the century. No, but you guys No, don't we
have like you're joining the deeper questions now? Yeah, you are joining like and not that we haven't inquired. Oh, no, no, no. I agree. Yeah, I have I have a theory if you want to see me after the meeting. No, I probably don't. I just ate, so we probably don't want to do that. All
right. The roof 50 years. Yeah, that's a long time. But I mean, somebody put somebody made a decision and the builder Yeah. put the solar panels on there from a construction I'm not a
construction guy, but somebody made a real big mistake. So, there's no insurance, there's no lawsuit. I mean, it's so that the warranty on that whole project was over uh you have like a one-year warranty on the installation
and then you're done. So what happened um in 2016 this the district um engaged with a company to do an energy savings improvement uh project 27 million at the time largest largest project in the
state of New Jersey for uh school district and that what happened was the the essence of all of the the projects around the district didn't have um an architect signature. They they they
dealt directly with a vendor and the vendor in their true wisdom identified the roof and was able to work with buildings and grounds and and business administrators at the time and administration and sell the idea that this was a a good idea to to go down
that road. But it wasn't a good idea, was it? It was not. It was not a good idea. All right. Obviously, if the warranty or insurance I mean I guess there's no insurance on a roof, but yeah, we were talking the other night in our facilities meeting. If a tornado came through and ripped that roof off
tomorrow, it'd be a wonderful thing for the district because then I'd be there's going to be a bad storm on Saturday. Just that roof though. Just that roof. Just that roof with no one in it. I'm kidding. I'm kidding about that. Just the roof. Um, very good. And again,
thank you for all your effort and and thank you for your service. It's it's been much appreciated. I just want to say one thing though. I can remember when the 2% cap was initiated and it was and and I know I don't understand why people don't show
up to these things either. I can tell you right now a lot of people don't get the notice. They don't get the notification. And I have no idea how to get it out there. I get mine from the patch South Brun, you know, that that that email thing, but a lot of people may not be on
it. Um, and I have no clue how to how to increase it. I'm just saying I think a lot of people simply don't know. But I was here, I was in this state, I was alive and paying taxes when that 2% was implemented. And it was because people
just suddenly got shocked by the increase, the implemental increase of taxes and they said enough is enough. That was a bad decision and probably was done in the heat of passion, but I could
see another one coming along and that's scary to me because people make less than adequate decisions when and that's just something to keep in mind between 5% and seven. And yes, I understand it's, you know, the
difference between market value and and assessed value, but it's a slow incrementation and something you have to keep in mind because the pitchforks, you don't want them coming out. Anyway, thank you all for your time. I really
appreciate half this math I don't get, but anyway, and thank you, Scott. All right. Thank you. We appreciate you coming out. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. Okay. So, I'm going to close this portion. Uh, the next order of business is the consent agenda review by
Mr. Palowski. Uh, we have a pretty concise consent agenda this evening. We have a bills list, some approval of non-public technology orders, accepting donations, um, renewal of a contract for our waste disposal. We're approving a withdrawal
for maintenance reserve for our uh, tennis court project. We have a uh purchase over the bid limit uh for that project and we're we actually sold some buses part of our lease purchase program. Um all of our buses at this
time are uh less than eight years old. So uh we're in a really good spot with regards to maintenance and um on those on those vehicles we have we're recording and rejecting some bids for some transportation routes. We're approving our school district budget. Um
You can look at the um consent agenda if you have a chance. You can see the revenue lines of the uh incentive aid where the uh tax levy the other state aid. Uh you'll also see an increase in appropriations
uh to identify the accounts which those um which those revenues are are hitting on the appropriation side. So we have a general fund of 164,729 uh 949,000. We have a tax levy of 41,863 and
337,000. We have special revenue line of 11,50,996, debt service of 1,837,000. Um, and we have a total base budget of 1777,617 and $170,000. We also have our harassment,
intimidation, bullying motion, student field trips. We have the approval of uh a resolution for travel and reimbursement expenses for staff. We did a master education tuition agreement with u the educational
services of educa of New Jersey. We did an in district tuition uh approval and outof district placement approval and we're accepting some tuition students this year. We also did an approval extension for professional service for students with special needs. We approved
a sidebar with uh the SBA and we added 1.19 and accepted um Mr. Fed and that is your consent agenda. Any questions for Mr. Powski?
It's Yeah, it's in your backup. I'm I can't remember. Kim, do you want to just really quick the sidebar? The sidebar was for an agreement between the uh board and the SBA unit. We hired a
non-instructional CSN and they need to have a CSN in order to do the instruction. So, it's an agreement that allows them two years to complete the coursework to obtain the NJ DOE certification. We do not.
Okay. So, what's exactly the agreement for? What what exactly is the agreement for? That we will have certified nurses from there. They need to have a a CSN. It's for It's for one indiv. It's for one individual.
Okay. To get to get the two years to get the certification. Got it. Yeah. Any other questions? Any other questions? Okay, I'll call Mr. Yes.
You have another question. Joel, could you elaborate on 1.9? It's the school district budget that we just reviewed. Okay. So, okay, that's everything. I just want to be sure that Yep. That's the school district budget. That's we just
reviewed. It's all the language we need to pass the budget. Okay. For next year. Roll call. Anything else? All right. Roll call. Uh, Miss Julie Ferrara. Accept. Mrs. Alicia Khan. Yes. Mr. Raja
Krishna is absent. Mr. Mike Mitchell. Yes. Dr. Smith Raj. Yes. Mrs. Lisa Rogers. Yes. Mr. Mr. Rajes Sony. Yes. Mrs. Deepa Carik. Yes. Mrs. Laura Hernandez. Yes. The consent agenda carries. All right. Surviving of the
year. All right. Okay. Close it out. Yeah, I'm closing it out. We're closing this out. We're bringing this home. Okay. Please note that the next scheduled board of education meeting will is set for Thursday, May
8th, 2025 at 7 o'clock. And that is it. Good night, South Brun. Oh, motion to close. I always forget this. Oh my god. Madam President, I apologize. I forgot to mention um tomorrow night at
Crossroad South, they'll be having their annual Super Night of Jazz. And it's a wonderful event. I hope that uh the community will get involved and stop through. It's $10 at the door and um just come. Uh the board got you received
your we received our invitation. So hopefully some of us will be there tomorrow night. Okay. Motion to close this meeting. Alicia second. Well, Dr. Raj, good night. South Brunswick. Oh, come on. Really, Scott?