Everybody in? Everyone sitting down? Okay. Uh, welcome to the August work session of the Washington Township Board of Education. Um, this meeting is being videotaped. Anyone that does not want to be seen on television or the internet may be excused, please rise for the
pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay.
[Music] Okay. Thank you. Uh we don't have any presentations. Are there any discussion items from anyone on the board? >> Yeah, Miss >> Mr. Mr. President, Madame President, I'm sorry, my mic is not even on. >> Um, I' I'd like to make a motion and and
we had this conversation in executive session, and I'd like to make a motion to rip the following position effective September 20th, 2025, the director of HR. >> Second.
>> Any discussion? Yeah, I'm uh so I just think we should not take lightly the importance of HR. That's an area where we do not do things properly. We probably going to get ourselves sued and uh cost the district
a lot of money. Uh if the position's vacated to fill that position, we would have to have a vote to fill that position. So, we could just choose to not fill that position until we figure out what to do. Do you know what I mean? >> Uh, regarding the position, but uh I think we all need to think about the
importance of HR and uh in fact, don't be uh unwise about a situation that could cost us millions down the road. >> Understood. So, thank you, Mr. La Liberty. So, we have currently a $225,000
gap to fill for nine employees who who have 20 plus years in the district. That's a gap we'd like to fill. We have a $150,000 gap for paytoplay that we were told we have to fill because we gave that up last meeting. And on top of
that, we're hearing constantly that there's going to be more pain this coming budget cycle with cutting staff, cutting support staff, cutting teachers, etc. So, I believe that with the addition of uh assistant business
administrator who came in over budget last week, that individual and I don't want to cross the line into administering the district because that's the administration's responsibility to determine who's going to absorb these responsibilities. But I do think that they can be dispersed even
if it's for a temporary period of time uh until we're on stable financial footing. So, that's my reasoning. Um, I don't, you know, I don't I think that this is something that is is a hard decision to make, but I think it needs to be made.
>> Okay. I just have a quick comment before you talk about dispersing um responsibilities. You need to know what the other people's jobs are, what it entails, the hours that they put in before you put more on them. Um, so I
think that's more of a find the facts out first before you cut anything and give more responsibility to people that might already have an overload. Just, you know, check it out first before you do anything. To Elaine's
statement, I I do think I think we push push push fast fast fast. Do it, do it, do it. I think with this we need to slow it down, maybe pump the brakes a little, get all the information that we asked for first and then as a group evaluate what the right step is to take next. I don't
think it's something that we need to rush into right now. We have someone until the middle of September. I think it's something that we can hold off on and look at everything and then make a decision versus make a decision and then possibly be screwed later.
um my opinion >> if if I could real quickly. So Steve, I don't disagree with you. I think we should rip the director, right? We already talked about that in committee of um and I think Dr. Hib's suggestion, I won't speak for him, but as a cost
savings measure measure is to not have a director, but the the conversation was around downgrading the position and having someone lead, just not in a director role. So I don't disagree with you in terms of a cost savings. Um, but I think so. I mean, I'll agree
with riffing the director. I think we already said we were going to do that. Um, I also to Elaine's point, and we talked about it at length, when we're getting rid of a position, I just think that even before we hire, because there's nothing on the agenda tonight in terms of HR at all. Um, I think we have
to really outline all the positions that were cut, including what will be the director of HR, that position being cut as well, and just see where are those responsibilities going. So, I don't disagree with you. I think it we need to have cost savings measures. I think
that's already in place. >> Any other comments? >> One more. I I agree with you, Steve, on the part about the concern, financial concerns, right? I too have concerns about those amounts that you brought up and I think we're going to face
financial constraints next year as well. We're in a bad situation that way. I just don't think this is the way to do it. I also have concerns that you're making recommendations about positions that aren't being recommendations from administration and if we keep making cuts that aren't in line with
recommendations from administration, I think we're going to find ourselves in harm's way. So, >> understood. Uh Mr. Ross, in your experience, you do have you ever taken HR responsibilities on as a superintendent? Has there ever been a time where you took on HR and you
delegated some of the responsibility to the building supervisors, etc. to hire and then or investigations to a certain position within central administration during your time as a superintendent? >> Uh, you're correct. When I was superintendent, we didn't have an HR
person. The hiring can't hear you. I'm sorry. When I was a superintendent, um the hiring came through the supervisors to the principles to the to the superintendent and the uh business administrator pretty much handled the
conflicts between uh between individuals in the school system. >> How long ago was it in what school district? >> Was that how long ago? And what school district was it? What was the size of the district?
>> Black Horse Pike, that was three schools, 4,500 kids. Deford, 4,500 kids. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Any other comments? So, the motion
is to riff the director of HR position. Okay. Roll call, please. Mrs. Bloom, >> abstain. Mrs. Clancy, >> no. >> Mrs. Chillow,
>> no. >> Mrs. Hartong, >> no. >> Mr. Liberty, >> no. >> Mr. Serrano, >> yes. >> Mr. Ross, >> yes.
>> Mrs. Baker, >> yes. >> Mrs. Kazmbo. >> Yes. Motion fails. >> Any other discussion items? >> Nothing. Okay. >> Oh, wait. I have one. I'm sorry. >> Okay. I wanted to put I've never done
this before, so bear with me. I wanted to put a motion on the the floor to um consider and talk about a change of our school solicitor
from Bush Law Firm given the recent to I don't know I mean could it be another attorney from Bush maybe. So maybe I'm putting a motion to change solicitors if that's possible. I
just feel like the incorrect legal information that we've received lately is maybe something that we should consider. We've gotten some not great legal advice. We have a
contract with them. I don't know how that works, Janine, but I'd say probably the safest thing would be to discuss it in committee. That's what I I figured. Maybe that's why I wasn't sure if it was like a motion or if I could put it in committee, but I think it's something that we need to talk about.
>> Agreed. >> Second. >> Okay. So, we could discuss that in the finance committee. It's a contract, so I would imagine business and finance. >> Oh, I don't know. I'm not in either one of those committions. >> Well, she made a motion.
>> Motion, but I'm not sure. >> I think that is a motion. If you were to make a motion, you'd have to like say who you wanted to be the solicitor. You'd have to say >> have to like or no, you'd have to say you want to give notice >> like we want Megan or something like that.
>> So if I'm sorry, >> by the way, this is Megan. Hi, good evening. Everything >> Aaron and Ari are both on vacation. >> I don't know. Am I talking to the mic or am I >> It's on. Um, so in my opinion, I think that you would
have to if you want to fire the Bush Law Group, you can make a motion to get rid of the Bush Law Group. If you want to change who actually represents the board like from the Bush Law Group and you want to keep the Bush Law Group, you can have that discussion internally. >> Okay. So that's what I I want to do then.
>> That's what you want to do. That's what I want to do. So you want to withdraw your motion and >> I'm want to withdraw my >> have this conversation in committee. But this >> Okay, got it. >> Any other
>> Scott? >> I just want to make a clarification about something that was said last meeting. Uh there was a comment from the public that um previously I had to step off of negotiations. Um I think I've already publicly spoken
to this. I didn't have to step off negotiations. I said something on social media that I think could have been taken in a way such that it could have created an ethics violation. Um, it also could not have been an ethics violation. It was something I had consultation with
the board attorney about. But to avoid the embarrassment and the uh put any shadow over negotiations, I chose to step off in negotiations because I felt it was the right thing to do. And I think there's a difference with that. So, I just wanted to set the record
straight for that. Thank you. >> Okay, we'll now have a report from the director of data technology, registration, and school community outreach, Mr. Distillia. >> Thank you, Miss Kazmple. I have four brief announcements. Uh, September is
library card signup month. In celebration, Margaret Heaggan Free Public Library will be raffling off eight tickets to the September 28th Phillies game at 3:05 p.m. Four tickets will be given to an existing adult Heaggan Library card holder and four
tickets will be given to an adult who obtains a Heaggan Library card between September 2nd and September 21st. The winners will be chosen on September 22nd. Today, our teachers, counselors, 10-month secretary, 10-month secretaries, and other educational
service professionals returned to work today. Today was a busy day with meetings and getting geared up for the year. This week is an exciting yet overwhelming time as all are getting ready to receive our students on September the 2nd. Wishing all the staff
in the district the best this year as they continue to positively influence the students. Special thank you to all those that helped out in the food bank this past week. Last Wednesday, we had retired staff, retired principles, current staff members, our junior Air
Force ROC, and our teacher of the year out in the rain last Wednesday to once again devote their time to helping members in our community ensure they have what they need is an important facet of what makes us special and we always appreciate everyone's help that
can make it. And then finally, an important announcement. Um, more information is to be coming. Not sure if everybody is aware. However, the New Jersey Department of Education is replacing the NJSLA with the and the NJ GPA test with adaptive versions. It will be called the
NJSLA adaptive and the NJ GPA adaptive. This new test will be administered by a company called Cambium and will no longer use the Pearson platform such as TestNav or Pearson Access Next or PAN. So, some key changes and upcoming events
that the public might want to know and formal information will be coming out to families in due time. The fall 2025 test for students in the class of 2026 who have not yet passed the NJGPA must take the Pearson administered version in
the fall which will be in early October. So that is every single senior who has not passed the NJ GPA. That's very important to know. Field testing. Students in grades four through 10 will participate in a field test of the New
Jersey NJSLA adaptive test that will be under the Cambia model. That will be in late October or early November. Students in grades 11 and possibly 12 will also complete the field test of the New
Jersey GPA adaptive around that time. In the spring, all students will participate in the NJGPA and NJ or 11th graders will participate in the NJGPA and the rest of the district, grades four through 10, will participate in NJSLA administered by Cambium. So,
they're phasing out Pearson. Uh we are attending mandatory training. The first training that is going to occur for someone like me, the district test coordinator, or Mr. Gfredo, the technology coordinator. The first available session is September 16th which we are going to go to. Um and the
technology department is working hard to ensure that all the devices are up to the standard of the new testing. Um again more information to come. We were just informed of this on August 13th with more information that came on August 22nd. So I appreciate your patience. That is my report. Miss
Cassle. Thank you. >> Thank you Mr. Dilio. Um motion to approve. Oh sorry. Um yeah. Motion to approve uh the 14 items of correspondence. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Second. >> All in favor?
>> I I motion to approve the minutes from July 8th, which was our special meeting and July 29th, the regular session. >> Motion. >> Can I have a second? >> All in favor? >> I.
>> Okay. Board goals update. I spoke to Lorie Bandllo and she Let me find this. She um wants to come back and go over our board self-evaluation. I asked her if she wanted to come to the
meeting this month. She suggested that we either have a special meeting um or we do it in September. She did give me or October. She said that we might want to just discuss when that is. So, I'm not sure if we have anything pressing like Dr. Hibbs and Janine, you might
know if in September since that's back to school, we have any presentations or if we are kind of open and she could come in September or should we wait until October? >> Yep. Um, I have a question. Go ahead. Uh, we have uh Mr. Mueller, the school
board um >> Mhm. BA who's who's supposed to come in in September and address the board with the about financial issues, >> right? Oh, did you confirm that with him? >> Um I know you asked him, but did you confirm that?
>> He I I thought I sent it to you. He asked about that what you wanted on it. I sent it to you. Yeah, it's definitely it's definitely September. >> Okay. Well, Lori's available the second, the 3rd, the 4th, the 8th, the 9th, and the 10th. We have meetings on the 16th and the 23rd. >> So, so
>> in September, you mean? >> In September. So, we could add a meeting. >> I think we need to add a meeting. >> Add a meeting. Um, >> this has gone on too long. Almost two years. >> Okay. We could have them both come if we add a meeting. >> No goals. >> Okay. I Carol, I I think we should have a special meeting because we struggle to
get out of executive session and start on time for all the information we have. So, I think it should just be separate. >> Can I ask what meeting Conniey's talking about? She had mentioned that she wanted the New Jersey school board's BA to come out. She had I think emailed I think and I and Lori about it.
>> Oh. Oh, I didn't know anything about this. >> It was just like I can't remember. >> I brought it up before and ago >> and I was to reach out to him which I did and he got back to Julie and the September would be the most uh appropo time.
>> Wh which of these dates? Go ahead. >> I'm just trying to catch up. Can What's the why? Just out of curiosity the same thing. Uh the we belong to New Jersey School Boards Association and they have a lot of resources for boards
and one of the resources is a myriad of of uh workshops that the BA can talk to boards about finances and what we should be aware of uh how how uh we can get
information to know more about finances and uh we want to keep uh a breast of what's what's going on. We keep on hearing there's going to be doom and gloom and we don't want to wait till budget season to start talking about it. So, we have a resource in the BA with
the New Jersey school boards who can come out and do presentations. So, that's where we are. >> Just real quick, did you did you think to ask your own BA that question first or >> I was out for a little bit. So, >> he had he had indicated to me that he would do that.
>> Well, I mean I mean you guys have a BA sitting right here. I just I'm wondering if if the questions that you're going to ask of the >> I had I had brought this up. He goes out to various school districts. This he's not just doing this for Washington Township. This is something he does on a
a weekly basis. And we talked about it. I said I would contact him. He will contact Janine prior to coming out. >> Eric, it's more like for for points to become like it's his >> certified. >> Yes. It's his presentation that he would give for us to earn points to become
certified board. So, it's nothing like specific to Washington Township. It's just more of a >> learning, you know, we can ask questions and such. Um, okay. So, the dates were the second and third. These are Lor's dates that she's available 2 3 4 8 9 10.
Um, >> so I I'm just letting you know I can't do 8 9 10. >> Got it. And I can't do the 9th because we have personnel on business committee. >> Yeah. So two, >> we don't have any >> two is like as in two like right around the corner like next week. Okay.
>> So 2 three four. So >> it's the first day of school. I don't think that's a good day. >> The fourth. The fourth is uh we have a football game. >> Mhm. >> What the third? >> The third there's freshman football >> at clear. It's at >> the calendar's wide open on the third.
>> Yeah. I'm I can do the eth the 9th and 10th. I can't I can't do the anything after the 10th. >> Okay. >> Eighth is wide eighth is wide open too. She cannot. She did not. Oh, she did give me the eighth. But we have sack and IA. >> We have sack and IA. >> Yeah.
>> Um I can't do sack and I have chemo. >> Well, no. I mean the eighth is sack and I >> some of us >> on some of those committees. Um it wouldn't work for you though. I was going to say if any of them could be during the day because
>> I mean I can if it's a Monday or a Wednesday but there lot I don't know how that works for people that work full time >> calling is with babysitting or Linda >> I'm good >> or me I mean for IIA I was wondering if maybe we could help it by being during the day >> on the fourth Eric is that a varsity
game >> uh I see you're right >> we got pen right >> oh thanks Jerry so I mean I can't do the ETH because it's a freshman game and I have a freshman. But I can do a varsity game day. Like in other words, if it's a
varsity game, it's probably at 4:30, right? So we could meet later. >> Uh no, this one looks like it's 6:00 to 9:00. >> Are you going to that? >> Yeah. Yeah. >> And then Janine has a senior, >> right? Janine. Yeah. Um okay. So >> well, the first day of school may not be
good, but it may be the one that worked the second. >> Is everyone okay with that? That's literally the only date that I can't do. Everything else I can figure out. >> Well, let's go back to her with I'll just go back to her and tell her none of these dates work and give us more dates. >> What about the third?
>> The third is fine. It's just I have to My son has football and I wanted to go. It's the first thing. >> What time is this game? >> Um 4:30. So, if we meet at like 7:30, >> why don't we do 7:30? >> If we do 7:30, I can come after. >> Let's do that. Jerry, would I make it
here by 7:30 after a freshman game at 4:30? >> Yes. >> Never. >> You want to go out and have fun after? Okay. Why don't I just get back I'm just going to get back to her and tell her these dates are not working and then I'll send a doodle to everybody with Lori on it and we'll go from there. So,
I don't want to waste time at this meeting doing it. But all set. >> Yes. All I needed to know is that you wanted to do a special meeting which I didn't hear from anyone down here. Are you good with it being a special meeting instead of >> tacking on to one of our meetings? >> Okay. So, you'll all get a little doodle
from me to about um about that. So, that's where we're going with goals. All right. Next item. Uh old business. Oh, we're still in old business. Any items of old business? >> I have I have some items. >> Go ahead, Connie. I have three items for old business.
Uh, I'm going to make a motion on policy 0176. We made a pol We made this motion and it was the first reading. I want to make this as the second reading. Um, in policy 0176, keep the first sentence
under section three, number one, and strike the rest. >> Is there a second for that motion? >> Second, >> Steve. Second. Any discussion? Yes, for the public, this is the um policy that we have about our law firm and the
solicitor being a different attorney from the negotiator. And just to like give a little background on that so you understand, the solicitor is the person that sits here during the meetings and we refer to for help in that way. And the negotiator is somebody else that works with the unions. So, we have two
separate people doing that, but the I guess I'll say the wording in the policy is unclear whether or not that it's just not typical wording. So, sorry. Go ahead. >> Okay. I decided to do research on this because I know it's a big issue. So, >> I have this from every school in
Gloucester County. Um, in Gloucester County, every school except for Gloucester County Institute of Technology and Gloucester County Special Services follow the stme
wording that you gave us. So, I just want people to know about that. Um, you could maybe decide that you want to have a different attorney from the firm. I don't know if how that but I mean as far as wording this is every school in
Gloucester County. So if this is the way they are doing it I'd like to understand why we want to do it differently. We even said that we would wait to hear what Stasme had to say which we did and between then and now I've done all this
research and that's why we did the first first reading and it was voted to approve their policy. Now you're coming back and saying all the districts in Glouester County follow it. So now I'm bringing it up for a second reading. >> Okay. Yes. So I'll just chime in real quickly. I didn't know this was coming
up tonight. So I didn't have the benefit of doing research and bringing it here because I just didn't know it was coming up. Um I really think that as a board we have to revisit having a policy committee again because we have a lot of policies we reference through the
meetings and we just don't have a formal policy committee. I don't know where policies are really formally being discussed. I think there's some policies that fit very nicely in committees, but there's others like where does this one fit? We don't have a legal committee. We
just don't. So, >> yeah, >> I just think we have to revisit as a group. Again, I didn't know this was coming up. I would have wanted to do research and get wrap my mind around it at least. Um, I I just again I would
rather table the motion and talk about it and create a policy committee because we actually run the board through policies. Like that's how we function. >> So two things. >> I think there's a motion on the floor. >> Well, there's a motion on the floor. >> I'm just want to addressing I just want to address Carol's comments that she's
making which are valid. Um 10 years ago we when you and I were on the board together, we would just have policies that related to the standing committees in those committees and then we started a policy committee and Jack
McGee went through every single policy that we had. If you want to make a motion to bring that or you want to suggest that we bring that committee back, I'm fine with it. Right now, the way we're doing it is just putting I'm sorry I forget to look this way sometimes. We um right now we've just
been putting them into those into the committees as they relate. So if we want to have a policy committee, we can do that separate conversation. There's a motion on the floor. >> Point point of order. >> Point of order. >> If there is a motion to table the motion that is on the floor, the motion to
table comes up first because it's tableabling that motion that >> you understand. So if you're motioning to table Colleen's motion, then your motion will go first. If it fails, then your motion goes. >> This this is another problem I find a
problem. This research that I did, I did the beginning of August because on Janu on July 29th, if you look at the minutes, it was discussed that we would have the second reading at the next meeting, which it would have been last week. But once again, we never review
anything. And I'm not pointing fingers at Lori or anybody else, but my suggestion is before we have a meeting, we should have the minutes from the meeting before and we should all read over them and see what we decided we
were going to discuss at the next meeting. And we don't do that. And I think that that's one of the reasons we get into so much trouble that we never accomplish anything. We slide by the seat of our pants from one meeting to the next. But beware that the fact that
this was done by me after the Janu July 29th meeting, I didn't wait. I didn't know when it was going to come up. I thought maybe it would come up last week. It didn't. So, here we are this week. It mattered to me enough to do the
research because I really was puzzled by what I was hearing from people who speak in public, what I was hearing from people up here, and I thought it was important for me to figure it out using data. Everybody's into data. This is the data from the county.
>> Yeah. Thank you very much. >> Might be best practices to some people, but it's data. Yeah, Pat, thank you very much because I I brought up the motion and I and I then withdrew it because Mrs. Wctor brought up about Esme Strauss and I said that's a good idea. Let's see
what they said. Then it came back >> what they came back with. I made the motion, it passed and was supposed to be a second and I agree that we should get the minutes probably in a more timely manner because of the fact that there's followup and we miss or we're missing
things. Um, you know, we've been talking about this since July, but let's just that's why I'm Let's just move on. Um, let's So, Carol, now we're going to vote on tableabling. Yeah. Conniey's motion. So, a yes vote means you want to table Conniey's motion.
>> A no moon mo vote means you want to >> Well, there would have to be a motion in the second. >> That's okay. I'm just clarifying what yes and no means. So, you first need a second on tableing it >> and then that. Okay. Elaine seconding that. So, roll call. Yes means you want to table this. No
means you want to vote on it. >> Mrs. Chilla, >> yes. >> Mrs. Hartung, >> yes. >> Mr. Liberty, >> yes. >> Mr. Serrano, >> no.
>> Mr. Ross, >> no. >> Mrs. Baker, >> no. >> Miss Bloom. No, Miss Clancy. >> Yes.
>> I thought she already voted. >> Miss Kazmple. >> No, I started with Miss. >> That's right. >> Thank you. >> Three, four, five. One, two, three, four. So, it's five to four. >> Okay. So, now we It was That failed. >> So, now we're voting on your motion to
make those changes and adopt the policy on second reading. Roll call, please. We're voting on on Conniey's. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yes means you're agreeing to the changes. >> Yeah. Yes means you approve the changes to the policy. No means you don't.
>> Miss Clancy. >> No. >> Miss Chilla. >> No. >> Miss Hart. >> No. >> Mr. Liberty. Uh since I never got was able to get a a
view from conflict council, I've been allowed to talk to them. I'm a no because I don't >> Mr. Serrano. >> Yes. >> Mr. Ross. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Baker.
>> Yes. >> Mrs. Bloom. >> Yes. Miss Kazmple. >> Yes. Motion carries. Okay. >> Connie, did you say you have >> Okay, I have a second motion.
Um, this is a two-part motion. I'm going to make one motion and then after that, I'm going to make a second one. I make a motion to resend the riff of nine most senior support staff members of WTSSFA,
thereby making them full-time employees once again. >> Uh, is there a second? Sorry. Is there a second? >> I second. >> Uh, any discussion? >> Um, seeing none. Oh, go ahead. Yeah, I thought in discussion that we were supposed to make the other motion first
and then your motion second. >> Is is that correct the way you did it? >> I don't recall that. And I'll make this is my motion. This is the motion I made. >> Okay. >> Okay. Roll call, please. >> Still discussion. >> Wait. Yeah. >> Oh, >> the discussion, right?
>> I'm a little confused as as to the order of things as well. So, I just want clarification before a vote. >> Should she do the other one first? >> It should probably be better. Okay, Connie, withdraw your motion and do the other one first. >> Pardon me. >> Make the other motion first about the sidebar. Withdraw what you just said and
saying that >> correct. Okay. >> Motion to approve a sidebar agreement between the board and the support staff regarding the reinstatement of the nine most senior support staff members of the WTSSA
to full-time status. The terms of the sidebar agreement have been verbally agreed to and will be drafted in the form of a sidebar agreement to be presented to and executed by both parties.
>> Okay. Is there a second? >> Second. >> Discussion. Roll call. Mrs. Hardong. Abs. Mr. Liberty, >> no.
>> Mr. Serrano, >> yes. >> Mr. Ross, >> yes. >> Mrs. Baker, >> yes. >> Mrs. Bloom, >> yes. >> Mrs. Clancy, >> yes.
>> Mrs. Chillo, >> yes. >> Miss Kazmple, >> yes. Motion carries. Okay, Connie, you can do your second motion. Motion to resin the rift the riff of the nine most senior support
staff members of the WTSSA, thereby making them full-time employees once again. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> Scott? >> Yeah. So, I'm going to be voting no
because if this was the intent, I think it should have been rolled into the original budget and you guys should have put into the tax levy because finding the money is going to be difficult. So, that's that's why I'm going to be out. >> Just a point of clarity, Annette, Dr.
Hibbs did report that Annette found the money so it is covered. >> I can say that, right? >> Okay. >> Clarify that. What? >> She's using money from her budget. >> She's transferring money. Yeah, she's transferring it. Sorry, I didn't mean to say found a rock.
>> She's transferring money from hers into this. Okay. >> Any other discussion? >> Roll call. >> Mr. Li Liberty. >> No. >> Mr. Serrano? >> Yes.
>> Mr. Ross? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Baker. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Bloom. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Clancy. >> Yes. >> Miss Chilla. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Harong. >> Abstain. >> Miss Kazmple.
>> Yes. Motion carries. Thank you. Uh the third thing I want to do. Okay. Um, last board meeting on the 19th, we had a meeting on the 19th. On the 20th, we had a negotiation session with the WTEA. And I'd like to bring up a um an
update on that negotiation session. The board negotiations committee met with the WTEA last week on Thursday, August, I'm sorry, it was the 21st. We met August 21st.
After previously making very good progress with the WTEA as a committee, this month we were attacked with a p a a paradigm shift of new ideas both
externally in public session from board members not on the committee and as seen here in our last public meeting and internally from members of the committee. The board members on the committee were receptive to the input
from members of the administration and chose to follow their guidance. Unfortunately, as a result, we hit a stalemate with the WTA and declared impass. Now, we will
head into mediation with PERK at a continued cost to the district. So, [Applause] Can you can you clarify? Um >> and I don't know what we can talk about here or not here.
>> Can can you clarify? There was guidance provided. What was said guidance? >> Guidance provided by the administration. >> Can you for transparency? >> I cannot get into more details. Well, I
think that's that's terrible to do as you're you're calling people out without actually being transparent. >> So, would you like an opportunity to actually be transparent? >> I I'm I'm going to say this and I'm pretty
sure I can say it. Before you you guys left the room, we were trying to actually get you back in to talk further about the full contract and everything else that that needed to be
discussed and and you you were the one who left the room. >> I'm not going to get into the details. I'll be glad to I'm not unrivally afterwards. I'm not going to do that. >> I make a motion that we go into executive. It wasn't our advice. That should be that should be taken and seconded right now.
>> Second read. >> Thank you. >> Why are we going into executive? I think this conversation just needs to end and we can need we have to go into executive at the end anyway. >> No, that's not it's not appropriate what was said. There should be a discussion in executive for sure. >> Can we have that at the end of the
meeting? I mean, we're going to be an executive for 45 minutes. >> Okay. I mean, >> it's the business of the board. There's no second for Pat for her motion. Scott seconded it. >> Okay. Yeah.
>> And if if it if it fails, I'm I need to speak then. >> So, >> you know what? I'm not even sure if I can make a motion because I'm conflicted. I'm sorry. I I forgot that. >> You just made a motion to go into executive view. >> Okay. All right. >> I guess do we have to state what the
purpose would be? >> Yes. For legal advice. >> I didn't I didn't understand that comment, Dr. Hibs. If it fails, you have to do what? >> If if it fails, there needs to be a clarifying statement to what you just attacked with in public.
>> Which was not fair. >> Negotiations. >> I had negotiations update on the agenda for executive. These comments should have been made in executive already in the beginning. They were made in the public and now we have to address it.
All in favor of going into executive say I. Hi. >> Hi. >> Hi. >> Hi. >> Yeah. >> Um I want I I want this to be like a 10-minute executive, you guys. So, I'm going to say >> we leave the room. So, they can stay. >> We will leave the room. They can stay.
So, resolve that pursuant to section 8 of the Open Public Meetings Act that public shall be excluded from that portion of the meeting involving the discussion of the negotiations. Further resolved that discussion of such subject matter in executive session can be disclosed to the public if any action is taken by the board either at the
resumption of the public session at the conclusion of the executive session or at the public session at a later date. This executive session will last 10 minutes. No action will be taken. Well, we might take action when we get back because we're still going to have our meeting. So, excuse us. We'll be right
back. [Music] Can I have a motion to close executive move back into the public session? >> Motion. >> Second. >> Uh, Ela second it. All in favor? >> I.
>> All right. Um, I don't know what was the result of your conversation. Can we move on or is anything happening? I'm not 100% sure. >> I don't know if anybody >> I think Scott wanted to say something when we came back. Maybe he went to the
restroom. I think >> he went to the restroom. >> Okay. [Music] Is it on? the superintendent. >> Eric, you want to say something? >> Go ahead. Dr. Hibs.
>> Yeah. I'm Eric. In in my opinion, the comments made by Mrs. Baker are inaccurate. Can I have a motion open to the public? >> All right, here comes Scott. >> Did you want to say something, Scott? >> No.
Can I have a motion to open to the public? >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I >> You guys, I don't have any cards. [Laughter] If you're if you're um sorry about that.
I could Hey, I could have been collecting these cards the whole time. We're jawing in the hallway. Um if you're new to the meeting and you don't know this, if you would like to address the board at the microphone, you just get a uh I guess now they're beige cards
or yellow cards, >> whatever. They're like they're like a rainbow of yellow taupe >> and you can pass it to Mr. La or Miss Chilla and they'll get it down my way. Okay. Um, April Renzetti. >> Good evening. No, you're good. Uh, for
those that don't know, and for some of our new NJA reps that are here, my name is April Renetti, and I serve as the vice president of the WTA. Um, my purpose for being here this evening is twofold. One, to speak about negotiations and the other to speak
about Eric Hibbs's insult said to me publicly at the last meeting. First and foremost, hold on. Can I get my phone? >> My apologies for that. So, Scott, you started the meeting saying that you wanted to clarify that
the last time we met, um, you were questioned about negotiations and that there was an assumption that there was, um, a possible ethical charge because of a conversation and that you voluntarily stepped down. That is not our recall of it. our recall of it. There was
conversation, comments and information being put on Facebook and basically uh you were suggested by the attorney, Mr. Bentley at the time to step down. So, I just wanted to clarify that diversion on the other end is very different. Neither is here and there. It's in the past. Um,
however, with that being said, you are fully aware of how negotiations go. you wanted to make a statement to Connie last week and you said you wanted to know and that um you wanted to be informed during the process. You know, being on negotiations last time that
some of you cannot be on negotiations because you're conflicted. However, at the end, you get to vote yes or no to the contract. >> Miss Renetti, I'm sorry. You have to address the presiding officer. >> Sorry, it's okay. >> I'm just trying to address who spoke to what topic, but my apologies. So, you do
have a say in the end when we get to that part. Um, with that, I don't know what just transpired. I can tell you that I sit on the negotiations team as the chair of negotiations. The first two meetings that we had were very
successful. They were polite. They were respectful. They were moving in a good direction. There was a lot of give and take on both sides. The third meeting comes with you present and it totally took a
turn since your question and since your presence that last meeting took a very negative spin on what the first two meetings look like. My question for those of you that sit in the back on negotiations and I guess for you what happened when we went to caucus and you
went in the back room where was the change in the tone? What happened? Because there was a complete shift in the movement we were making. So my team would like to know what caused that shift. If you can answer it, we would appreciate that because the tone was a
complete change. So we would like to know that. Um, regarding your comments to me when you said you find me at times to be disrespectful. Well, it was rude and I'm not rude. I am. I'll give you a list of some things.
There's too many. >> Talk to me. >> Excuse me. >> Address it to me. Megan's telling me >> address. Okay, sorry. I'm assertive. I am passionate and at times when need be, I
am aggressive, especially for things that I deeply care about. 100% will not hide it and will never apologize for being a strong woman. I didn't get to 55 years old and be who I am because I was shy. So, that's not going to change now. Um, I'm doing my job to the best of my
ability to protect, guide, help when my members, colleagues, and friends need that. Since you've been back, fear, uncertainty, and great concern has been paramount. You are supposed to be the leader of this district. You name call employees. You send your lawsuit that
you're suing the district to a Facebook organized group. You've cut jobs, numerous, all while people you hire. you hire at top of guide with little to no experience in those positions. I want to personally thank the numerous community members who reached out and apologized
on your behalf and found that your behavior was completely unprofessional, unwarranted, and I was simply doing my job as a union officer. In closing, I just have to say you can't put children first if you're putting teachers last. Thank you for your comments.
I just want to say one thing. It keeps coming up. Um I stand by my comments about why I stepped off negotiations, but I also think I just want to give the context of what I said. Uh back then it was the support staff and uh contract was was under negotiation and there was
a lot of comments about they weren't feeling valued and things like that. All I said was you are valued. I was trying to let the support staff know that people cared, that I thought they were important, that I I uh I appreciate all the hard work that they do. And then I said, you know, don't worry, all
contracts are retroactive. In my work, and my line of work, I don't think I've ever seen one even here that hasn't been retroactive, but they don't necessarily have to be retroactive. That was the slip up that I made. But my intention was just to show the support staff that they were appreciated. But for the
avoidance of all doubt to not have that go any further and cause any disruption to the negotiations to the administration or embarrassment to the board, I stepped off. >> So before we continue um public comment, all all comment should be directed to
the board president. Please and thank you. And then for the board members, any comments that will that need to be had can be had after public comment is done. You can say whatever it is that you need to say, but please don't do it. Don't just stop the flow of what's happening.
>> Thank you, Megan. Heather Witchcraft. >> Hi, Heather Wickcraft. Um, I don't know how to say this then. All right. I guess I have to pretend I'm talking to Julie. Okay. I'm struggling to understand how you can request merit pay while at the same time suing the district publicly developing, insulting,
and degrading our educators. And we're just preparing to deny not and we're just preparing to deny nine long-erving employees the lifetime benefits they're rightfully earned after decades of dedication. All this comes
amid the bottling out of staff morale during your tenure. How can you sit there in a position of leadership while suing the district and smearing the board actions that directly work against the betterment of our schools and community? Second, um
last night until about 2:00 in the morning, I spent uh emailing uh participate in education's meet the candidate night will be held Wednesday, October 22nd from 5:30 to 8:30 at the Washington Township Senior Center. Um, all petitioners for the BOE candidacy
have been emailed their survey invitations, instructions, and important notes to keep handy. Please check your spam and junk folders if you do not see it. Lastly, I provided my phone number and email address this week and last week, and would like to be contacted regarding anything that went unanswered
last week, as well, anything that may need additional time this week. Thank you, Mrs. Witcraft. Michelle, I said thank you. Sorry, Mrs. Wcraft. Michelle Panchchelli. >> Good evening. Um, I don't work here. However, I am a resident of Washington
Township and I'm a 30-year special education teacher that just recently uh retired. Um um I just wanted to say that um I had some concerns about the school district that that had made the news recently and
not necessarily in the best light. Um, from a procedural standpoint, it's very normal practice in most school districts that when an employee, a teacher, a support staff, an administrator is cru accused of wrongdoing that the employees
p is p placed on a paid leave um on an administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation. And you've um probably taken these actions on many situations in the past and at times under the recommendation of Dr. Hibbs.
It is a smart move in my opinion. It protects the district while the facts and the truth can come out. It does not assume guilt or innocence. Dr. Hibbs, my concern is nothing against you personally. In fact, I'm hopeful that the evidence from the investigation
would clear everyone of any inappropriate actions. It would mean that our students um lives were not negatively impacted by the direct actions of our school leader. It would mean that our elected school board members did not abuse their position to gain an unfair advantage.
Nobody wants these things to be true, and I'm hopeful that they're not. With that said, our current status is that we actually have an employee who happens to have the highest levels of security access, document access, and decision-making authority working for the school district under an active
investigation. That is not a good situation for our district to be in. And in my 30 years of educational experience, I've never seen this before. So, I'm concerned that politics and personal feelings may be taking precedent over protective procedures.
Thank you for listening to my concerns and for all of your time as volunteers serving our community. I'm hopeful that the next time a news article is ran about our district, it's raving about our students and the accomplishments that they've made. Thank you.
Thank you, Jerry Tarashi. >> Rephrase that. >> Jerry Tarashi. I'm the president of the WTPA or Wtea. WTPA. Um,
aside from Mr. Ross, I probably have the most years in education in this room. As many of you are aware, cuz I've said it numerous times, this is my 55th year in education,
between almost 40 years here and previous years in the previous district. When I first came here, I had heard a lot about Washington Township, mostly great things.
It was truly a family experience. Teachers, administrators, and members of the board of education truly cared about one another. In recent years, however, much of that has changed.
Many of you seated at this DS as well as those in the audience and watching from home may remember those days. The days when the emphasis was always placed on the education and well-being of not only the students but of all the
employees as well. As I stand here this evening about ready to begin my 55th year, I find myself disheartened but what by what I have witnessed in recent years.
I'm extremely proud to have worked with such wonderful children, athletes and colleagues in all those many years. Unfortunately, I have seen a deterioration of that family atmosphere.
Sure, there are people who speak about family, profess to be all about the kids, looking out for the best interests of the community. But the reality is far different
today. What I witness is all about power. essentially who has the power, who wants the power, and how far are people willing to go to hold on to the power that they possess or gain additional
power. I'm a history teacher, so I'm very familiar with and very much aware of how power can corrupt people, how power can sometimes
hurt children. I truly wonder how some of you can actually look at yourselves in the mirror or go to sleep at night without a conscience bothering over top
of you. What has been done to the members of the support staff which now seemingly has been rescended to some extent at least was egregious to say the least. It's almost to the point of no repair
within the district. And I hope that's not the case. What has been done too far gone. The rescending of those nine positions is great, but it's too late. They've already
experienced the hardship, the pain that you have put them through. In regard to our contract, the WTEA, which is the only remaining bargaining unit that has no contract, we are ready to meet with you tonight.
Immediately following the adjournment of this meeting, we will meet with you tonight and settle this once and for all. In the meantime, however, you got to realize and face up to the fact that there are people in this room
who are simply out for nothing but power and that power will destroy this district. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Terashi. Nicole Lenudi.
Um, when you guys previously talked about the money that Annette brought from one place to bring it to the other, I was really happy to hear that the nine staff members who so deserve that got brought back. Um, it was concerning to
know where it came from since and it was heard that Annette had put it somewhere. Um, while you guys were an executive, I did get that answer for myself. Um, but I I do think it's important to let everybody at home watching know where
that money was pulled from. There's so my phone started blowing up with so many concerned parents in special ed that more money was getting taken away from our own um, and where that money was coming from. So, I think it's really
important to address that and where it was taken from that we're not losing, >> you know, more people to save our own. And I was pretty pleased with the answer um as to how that happened. So, kudos to you guys for and Annette for doing that.
Um I had one question about the bill list. Two questions about the bill list. Does anybody actually go through the actual bill list by line just to know what's on there? Um, and there was one thing on there, and this is totally out of my wheelhouse, so I have no idea what the answer is. Um, but I get, again,
when I want to know something, I ask. So, there was something on there about $11,000 for a month for copier um, rental leasing, copier leasing. Is that something that we pay every month? Is that $11,000 every month that we lease
these copers? Would it be more financially responsible to look into purchasing equipment rather than leasing equipment? And the answer could be no. I mean, it could be the best thing to do is to pay $11,000 a month. Is it ever more than
that? Is it less than What's the average that we pay on leasing equipment? Because when we're talking about leasing the building versus selling the building, the leasing seemed to be the financial best option when it comes to this type of equipment. Is there
anything else besides copers that we lease that may be able to save us money if we purchased them and did the maintenance maybe in-house? That was pretty much it. Um, we'll wait until the end of public
comment for Janine to talk about that, but we actually have a lot of things that we lease that goes into the lease. So, Janine will talk about that when we're done the comment. Um, Angela Teruso, first of all, let me say thank you um to
everyone here who work so hard to get those nine people their their benefits back. You have no idea or maybe you do have an idea of exactly what that means to them and even to us. I had other members. There were 59 people that lost benefits. 50 of those people called me
and said, "Give them their benefits. They come first." So, as I've always said, our support staff, that's what we're about. We're about other people. You know, I've said before, you know, we're the ones that have the least and give back the most. So, thank you for
those board members that voted in favor of of restoring those. Um, for some people, that really is life-changing for them in their retirement. Um the speech I prepared was actually a little bit different. Um so I'm I'm going to divert from that. Um I wanted to say that
between June and August, we've had 10 teacher resignations. We've had 31 support staff members resign and we've had eight people retire. That's a total of 49 people. Um that's that's
devastating. Um we have 43 as of today. There were 43 support staff job openings. Um, I don't know how you are going to open your programs, missing that many people. And if I were a special education parent, I'd be very
concerned about who would be working with my child because it's going to be ESS. We know that, you know, or I'm guessing that's who it's going to be. And it may be a revolving door when those people realize what they have to do and what's involved with taking care of our children. Because as I've said
before, no one takes care of our children the way we do. Our staff is second to none. I pride myself on that. I was one of them. They're the same way. They're second to none. You will not get better people to work for you. Um
I wanted to say also that I was let me tell you what I'm proud of and this is the last meeting I'll be speaking as president. Um, what I'm most proud of is a support staff that in spite of all the abuse the last couple years continue to
show up and care about their students because it is about their students. I'm proud of a support staff that continues to volunteer for events knowing that they're not going to get paid because it's for their students and that they would suffer if they didn't do that. It
wasn't about their money and it should have been, but it wasn't. I'm proud of a support staff that for the last who makes the least and gives the most while in school and for our community. Those stuff, the buses you see that gives back to the community. And it's not just
about union. It's never just been about union. We are a union. All of us together. And and especially with WTA, I mean, we all have been working together. last couple years have been devastating. Um, this summer has been the worst. I
mean, it has been non-stop for me and for a lot of other people. Um, I guess what I'm also most proud of is the fact that many of our people have been taking abuse over the contract that we have. You know, it's a fair contract
whether you want to agree to that or not. It's a fair contract. And I don't know what's out in the public. Everybody's screaming about these raises. They amount to $3. That's what you're yelling about. $3. $3 for people who make $15 an hour or
$16 an hour. That's what you're yelling about. So, you know, I don't understand why we can't just all work together. We're in it together. You know, we talk about together with pride. That's what together with pride is. Let's support each other instead of tearing each other down. We need to do that. We have to
move on from this and it's very difficult to do that. I mean I don't know that I could come back after the year that we've had and the summer that we've had. It has just been devastating. Has been de devastating for people. We lost so many amazing people to other
districts and it's just devastating. So please let's work together to get things done because we need to work together all of us, the board, us, the teachers, everybody. So please let's do that and thank you again.
>> Thank you Mrs. Teresa Shireen Ducas. >> Good evening. Shireen Ducas um WTA middle school exec member. The WTA has started this year without a contract.
The very people in classrooms every day working closest with students, shaping their learning and carrying this district forward. We have been left waiting while those at the top consider raises for themselves.
Whether it be tentative agreements for the supervisors, administrators, merit pay, whatever. There's a saying, all that glitters is not gold. And tonight, that could not be more than true. On the surface, this
district finds money for glitter, for flags lining the football field, for televisions in this very room, for $300 $100,000 worth of furniture, and only a handful of dream team classrooms, for brand new desk for administrators at the
high school. But if you look beneath the shine, what do you see? Students at the high school are sitting in two and even three study halls because electives have been cut. Tier support is virtually gone. ELA and math interventionists who
once worked one-on-one and in small groups with are no longer here. Secretaries have been slashed, leaving parents waiting longer in offices, on phones, and for responses to their urgent needs.
All that glitters is not gold. And yet, while programs are gutted and staff are stretched thin, raises are on the table for people making the most in this district. So, let me be blunt. If there
is money for administrative raises, there is money for our WTEA members. Is there if there is money for glitter, there is money for gold. Parents, pay attention. Ask yourselves, where is your
money going? Is it fun and glitter, the flashy, unnecessary extras, or gold, the teachers and the staff who actually make your children's education possible? How can you claim we are in a catastrophic
financial situation while handing out sizable raises at the very top? The truth is, the money is there. It's just being spent on the wrong things, on bad decisions, on priorities
that serve image, not students. Our WTEA members didn't budget for refrigerators that are too large to fit through the door of the high school. Our WTA members didn't budget for flags that paint the fence at the high school, for paint, for
televisions, for shiny furniture. Our WTA members budget their time, their energy, and their lives for students. That is where the investment lies, the real investment. This district doesn't have a financial
crisis. It has a values crisis. And to this board, I leave you with this. Shame is when you know the right thing to do and still choose the wrong choice. Stop chasing glitter. Start investing in
gold. Our WTA members and the students heart who are the beating heart of this district. Stop hiding behind glitter. Start honoring the gold. Our WTE members and
our students deserve nothing less. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Dupac. Jenny Murphy. [Applause] >> Good evening everyone. First, let me start by saying welcome
back Dr. Hibbs. As an alumni, former board member, and 40 plus year resident, I believe in fairness of process, and I've come and spoke here many times about that. and most of our community has that same expectation of our elected officials. Your recent suspension did
not include fairness of process, and I'm sorry for the collateral damage that you and your wife and your children endured. The board voted to approve a 7.13 tax increase. And during the process, they
had to specify. You had to specify where those funds would be spent. Why weren't student activities, clubs, and sports a priority in that decision? Because the focus was on adults, not
kids. Mrs. Hartung, I agree 100% with you. All viable clubs and sports should be included in the budget. They are the classroom after 2 p.m. I use the analogy of buying a car.
Certain items come standard with the car. Student activities are the wheels of a car, vital to the educational process and the well-being of our students. My message to the board, like it or not,
like him or not, the CSA, the chief school administrator of the district is entitled to due process. Dr. Hibbs and the WTBOE entered into a contract to protect the board and to protect Dr. Hibbs. Please follow the
contract language as it relates to early termination. It's not optional. It's not uncommon for board members to disagree on the effectiveness of a superintendent. The issue occurred back around 2014 2015 in our district. That's when the WTEA
had the member or executive committee had the vote of no competence against the former superintendent. The difference between that board and this board is that the former board followed the contract and they simply voted not to renew the
superintendent at the end of his contract. Many members of this board made the decision to fire the superintendent last year. This was stated by uh Randy Ford when he came up and talked about being recruited to run on a slate.
Following the contract, Following the contract would not be fast enough for those with a side agenda. That's my opinion and that's what we're seeing. The board invoked a fake doctrine of necessity despite the board having a quorum of non-conlicted members. They
did this in order to manufacture the votes to dispend Dr. Hibbs. And I say that not as my opinion. The school ethics commission ruled that Mrs. Carol Schilla was not conflicted prior to the doctor of necessity and she isn't
conflicted as she sits there tonight. Quote, "This is just a procedural error. When the board president posted on social media and gave quotes to the Philadelphia Inquirer, was there former board action to delegate the authority
to comment on a pending legal matter? Is there anyone on the board, show of hands, that disagrees with the comment that was made on Mrs. Chilla's or I'm sorry, Mrs. Kazmple's comments on the
Ford decision. Is she speaking for you? That's all I'm saying. board. The president speaks for the board at board meetings and when delegated specific authority to speak on behalf of the board. Period. If it was just a procedural error, I would ask the board right now to put
forth a motion to invoke the doctor necessity filed by followed by a formal vote to put Dr. Hibbs on pay to leave. This is an advertised public meeting. You can do that. Make the motion. Somebody make the motion.
And the reason you're not is because you can't. You have a quorum of non-conlicted board members. That's the story that people don't understand. That's what happened. And that's why our name is in the inquir. And that's why lawsuits are being filed in Gloucester County. Just do it the
right way. The third motion I would ask that the board consider tonight is to terminate the solicitor's contract by sending a 30-day notice. I didn't know this was going to come up. This is some notes I wrote before. Your contract has a 30-day
out clause. She can make a motion to terminate the super the um solicitor's contract and you don't have to, Julie. You don't have to have another lawyer set up to be voted in as a new one. That would be an RFP process. So, listen, I'm
I'm going to come back because I have one second. Sorry. Thank you, Tom Baldisaro. Hello everyone. Um, I I agree with a lot of what I've heard today. Um, we never should have gotten to a point where we had to add back long-term people. That
all should have been considered in the negotiation process. Um, we, you know, everybody deserves a contract. You know, I've said this before. Every employee in this organization deserves to be paid at market and to get, you know, an annual increase. I think the sobering reality
is that for every employee we have in this district, not everybody can be full-time benefit eligible. There's not enough money. Now, I've said up here one other time that you I went back and I looked and there were six years of using budget reserves to fill our gap and I I
said that that was all the data I had. Well, I I had opered some more and you know I opered back what I thought would be far enough and I opered back to 2012 2013. That's 13 years. Every year, not counting this budget
year, but every year for the prior 13, and this is not a sh obviously you guys haven't been around. This is a a com it's just a comment on our state. Every year for 13 years at least, because now maybe I'll open older stuff to the tune of
127 million we used to cover budget shortfalls. We've been spending more money than we've made for at least the last 13 years. We've never done it right. That
goes back, I believe that goes back to before Joe, I don't know who the super was before Joe Bolandor, but it goes back that far. This is how long we've been in a budget crisis that was never communicated. Um, I never heard I've been following
board meetings for 10 years. I never looked at the details that, you know, I have until recently, but we've been using reserves for that long. Um, the sobering reality again, we're we're going to be facing more. Prior to the last two years, if you look
back for the four years prior, we spent an average of about $5 million up upkeeping our buildings. The last two years total, we spent under 1.5. We're going to we're playing Russian roulette with our buildings. And when you get that major repair and you have
nothing, you know, to to cover it, you're going to be cutting on the fly. There's just not enough money to go around. And that's, you know, I urge you take the time to plan. Don't just look at next year. Look at five years out.
We're, you know, I heard people people are leaving. Yeah. They're it's going to get worse because we don't have a foundation to bring people into a lot of the you know you you kind of pick and choose when you want to point to the budget being a problem. You know
fiveyear contract you know shouldn't have happened. It binds future boards from decisions. Not saying people don't deserve money but one year at a time figure out what you can afford because what the decisions made and Mr. Liberty said it. We've made decisions in this
budget that going to harm us into the future and it's not getting better, guys. It's going to get worse. Okay? So, you know, it there's just not enough. Everybody needs to understand every board member, every employee, every member of the public, there is not
enough money to go around for everybody. It's unfortunate because again, in my perfect organization as a as a financial officer, I want every employee paid market value. That's what I want. That's what you got to get to. You got to figure out how many people you can
afford because cutting each year, cutting hours, cutting benefits little by little, you're damaging the organization. You need to figure it out. Do it right once. Fix it so you can move forward. But until it gets fixed, you won't move forward. >> Steve Red.
Good evening, Mrs. Gazbo. Um, Steve Redern. I am currently the NJA field rep um for region 2 and I represent the WTA as well as Angela who's behind me. Um, I'd be remissed if I started my comments without congratulating her on her
retirement, her advocacy for her members, and quite honestly, just being a really great person. Um, so thank you, Angela. So, I come to you tonight not with 65 pages of a budget or a budget presentation or anything like that. I
come to you with rational conversations. Okay? There was somebody I knew what I respected a very long time ago that said to me, "If you keep admiring the problem, it never goes away." This district keeps admiring the problems that we have, and we're not solving
them. Okay? We continue to admire them. Okay? So, I come here as an outsider, but I was a full-time release president in Cherry Hill for nine years. I know I'm going to hear, and I may even be in an email tomorrow that gets circulated around this community a lot
with people's names in it. Maybe I'll be the the other ball-headed guy. I don't know. But I'm sure I'll be in there. But from an outside perspective, I hear things. I hear things at the mic. Here's what I know. And here's my list of what I know.
It took you almost four or five months to cost out a salary guide for the support staff and then finally make a settlement. WTEA is going to mediation. You have school ethics complaints flying around. You have a superintendent that
is suing the district. You have people leaving the district. You have people that aren't sitting here tonight that I know for a fact as an HR director is going back to the district that I worked in that he left and now he's leaving this district.
Okay. So, I can continue on and on. I do appreciate the fact that you have reinstated those nine people being dedicated employees to this district. It's one of the best things I've heard since I started May 1st and watching your board meetings. When I talk to people in Cherry Hill or when I meet
people that knew me from there, hey, what locals do you have in your new job? I say Washington Township. The response I get is how's that going, guys? We got to change what's happening here. Okay, I'm going to present you,
okay, with documents. It's an initiative called the Labor Management Collaborative that's running in New Jersey right now. Our district was part of it for 3 years. There's other districts. Woodbury is investigating it right now. Gateway is going to be joining the Labor Management Collaborative. You have representatives
from both of these associations come up here. There's no collaboration right now. Okay. You have 36 unfair labor practices that have been filed at Perk. 36. You probably have about two more
coming as well. Does anybody in this room want to guess as the full-time release president in Cherry Hill how many unfair labor practices I had as the union president against the board or any other administrator in the district?
Zero. Zero 36. If you take that over 180 school days, that's one unfair labor practice a week. A week.
Got to fix it. We got to stop admiring the problem and come up with a solution. I will leave this here, Mrs. Chill at the side. I don't know if I'm allowed to approach. Some boards don't like approaching. It's all in paper. Okay. And drop it off. If you want to continue
to admire the problem, don't read it. If you want to solve the problem, start to read it. You can reach out to Jerry. You can reach out to Angela to get in touch with me. We've got to start working together in this district. Okay. I had the honor and Dr. Hibbs, I'm
sure you know who Dr. Brad Johnson is, educational guru, brought him in Cherry Hill. One of the most powerful comments he ever said to me when we met, he spoke to our staff. He said the teachers work environment is
the students learning environment. I'm going to change that because in respect to Angela, I'm going to say the staff's working environment is the students learning environment. So when I hear people in the community talk about test scores and this and that,
the staff's working environment is the students learning environment. Thank you, Miss Gazle. Thank you, Ron Lucerini. >> Yeah, that's an interesting comment. Uh
if you look at some other suggestions, you might say um the board of education's working environment is the students working environment. And this uh great family that Mr. Taraji alludes to um that was just broken up
the last two years. Uh I have news for him. We've been dysfunctional for about seven, eight, nine years. All right. Our test scores have been plummeting during that time. We had at one point three or
four board presidents uh become resigning, you know, for different reasons with clouds over their heads. Um when Dr. Hibbs came on board and again I'm not a big fan necessarily,
but we didn't give this guy a shot. you know, he just didn't have a shot. And I want to go to something Mrs. uh Teruso said. I also think that uh you wouldn't find a Cherry Hill because I have friends who have kids that that went
there. Uh you wouldn't find the assault on reason that you find at this uh level here in Washington Township. People say things that don't make any sense. they
don't support what they say and just say whatever they want to say and then it just sits it just it just stands for instance the infamous complaint against Dr. Hibbs and Mrs. Chill I don't know who it's against really just you know
that they are too close and therefore she could not vote objectively I guess that was the contention claims that uh Dr. Hibbs went to um Mrs. Chill's daughter's
um recital, dance recital, and Mrs. Chill's daughter was never in a dance recital. So, that never happened. I bet you that didn't happen in Cherry Hill. I bet you they would uh be very I know the people there. They they're they're
supporters of education and they're supporters of reason. All right. Now, let's go to uh Mrs. to Russo. I agree with you. When you make the statement, $15 and $3 more is, you know, not a lot of money. I agree with you. They should
not. But but who was responsible for that $15 during the course of the last 20 years and how many contracts? Maybe you weren't even the president. Okay. You structure the money. Most boards of education do not uh object to the
structure of the money. Occasionally they do, but in Washington Township's history that's been left up to the unions and they've sold out their own. All right. So during that time, I you know, I don't know what a custodian
makes, but it's worth $15 an hour. So somebody was getting screwed during that time. And who was screwing them, you know, over a 20 year period? That's something we have to think about. So that 13% raise all in one shot now to
make up for all the sins of the past so that we could have something to throw at Dr. Hibs, right? Throw something against the fan and hope it it splatters right on onto him. Uh that 13%
if you take an average raise of four or 5% let's say the going rate that 13% is let's say 9% more. What does that come to in dollars? I've asked this question 15 times and nobody's given me an answer. I'll tell you, uh, I've had
some people who are experts in the field say that it probably comes over $800,000, maybe a million dollars. So, because of our sins of the past, right, and we're going to do it and and you know, we're
going to give them a 13% raise so Baker can get reelected. Basically, that's what it amounts to, right? and at the cost of the taxpayers and then they get the 13% raise and we we make up for all those 20 years of
their neglect. All right, the taxpayers are making up for that now. That's the great family we have here in Washington Township and the uh dysfunction. You say, "Oh, the last two years have been brutal." It hasn't been
two years. It's been like eight or nine years. In fact, I've been talking to people at Orchard Valley for those last eight years since I've been retired. Every day I heard a horror story every day about what's going on in these
buildings. I saw it. I saw it at the high school, too, when I transferred over there for the last marking period. >> Thank you, Heather Qua. Hi. Um, I had a couple questions because I've, you know, been watching the past few meetings and I know, you know, it's
come up several times with, you know, special ed concerns and the staffing issues and there have been several questions that have come up, but I haven't heard any answers and I just wanted to see if somebody could clarify
exactly, you know, without specifics, without naming names, people, whatever, what is the number of students that have onetoone needs based on their IEPs. I know, you know, it was asked before and you I don't recall ever anybody coming
back with an answer. Did any of those aids or specialized instructors have their hours cut? How many open aid positions do we still have to fill for our special ed students? And how many full-time aids do we have
versus the part-time aids? I'm not asking for names, just numbers. Um I did also have you know another question in regards to um some of the projects that were needing to be fixed in the schools and one specifically was
around the windows at Chestnut Ridge. I know last year like towards the end of the year when they were getting really heavy rains the cafeteria was flooding. you know, was that ever addressed or is that planned in the budget to get that
fixed because that is a health hazard for our students? Cuz I know that they were delayed going to lunch because they had to clean up the floor so the kids wouldn't slip and fall. So, that was just one of the things I did want to follow up on just to see if that was still in the budget to be addressed, if
it was fixed over the summer, and what the plans are for that. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh, can I have a motion to close to the public? >> Motion. >> All in favor? >> I >> um second.
>> Second. >> The question about the aids. I I I passed your card to Dr. Hibs and they they don't have that information. >> I can I can get that information report back next time for you for all four questions. That's >> And I think your question about the
windows, it's it's in it's in motion. Okay. Okay. Um Okay. Um Nicole, back to your question about
uh I'm I'm not comfortable talking about like the line items. I should have used the word transfer. It was it was transfer from one um account to another account. So, I don't want to speak to that. That's not really my place. But um I think that was the one question was
can we talk about that? And >> go ahead. Did you want to say something, Jannine? Are you trying to turn your mic on? >> I wasn't sure if you wanted >> Oh, you can. And that's it. Okay. >> Jo,
>> yeah, that's a quick question. Um, I don't know if it was a legal reason why we can't respond one after the other. I wanted to respect it obviously, but I feel like a lot of everyone's questions now. Like now I forget like if I didn't,
you know what I mean? Like I just don't know how well that worked and if we have to keep that structure. I do like it when we're able to answer if we can in the moment then that way people following at home when we have a lot of people come up. >> I think April was the first one that came up. Like I'm just saying in general
I lost track of who asked a question and a comment and if anyone wanted to say anything I just don't know >> I write I type up all the questions and disseminate them after the meeting to the proper people and we have the cards of the people who asked them. So the administration get in gets in touch. I'll reiterate this. I said it in
January but Washington Township is kind of a unique animal in that people put so much emphasis I guess on the board. The board just is supposed to be providing oversight and voting yes and no. So when we have public comment, it's supposed to be we're hearing you. We're not
answering questions. So we do take question like the way it's actually supposed to work is people come, they address me, I take the questions, and thank you, move on to the next person. We've gotten into the bad habit over the
years of responding, and then other people on the board respond, and then there's just a lot of conversation, and it's just supposed it's literally supposed to be a hearing. If you've ever I really encourage people to look at other board meetings in other towns and don't just look here and look at board meetings for colleges and things like
that. Like this is not typical of a board meeting um in terms of public comment. It's supposed to be you comment, you're giving us your feedback on what's on the agenda, not asking us questions and getting a response. And so Megan is just enforcing the way it's
supposed to work. um which I appreciate that it's not really the place to be asking questions. >> Yeah, I honest I'm not necessarily disagreeing. That's why I wanted to respect the process. I guess um in a time of turmoil where communication is
necessary. That's all. I just feel like we should overcommunicate and respond where there are clear concerns and questions. That's all. That's that's my only I I get it. I get what you're saying. I just It's for the administration to communicate those things. as a board, we're just supposed
to take in what people are saying so that when we're in committee and we're discussing things, we can say, "Oh, remember at the meeting people were asking about this or that." But it's not really the place where I mean, Megan, you can weigh in on how it's supposed to work. I mean, >> I don't know if
it's this is just very Washington Township is very atypical when it comes to board meetings. It's there's not supposed to be this type of it's not a forum. It's not a town hall. What I'm going to say is that it's typically not a discourse. Like the public comment is at the time when citizens of the public
come and they dis they tell the board their issues and then the board goes back and works on them but it's not a discourse. And so what happens is if um board members start responding one at a time, it becomes a discourse because then they're going back and forth and it's public comment. Citizens have five
minutes to speak and that's what it's fine. I just wanted to note it. It is a change and I just feel like there were a lot of questions. >> I hope to Pat's point earlier about getting out the minutes. I just want to make sure if people had questions like questions that we can answer that they're answered. That's all.
>> Yeah. I always say it's for the administration really to answer those questions. One thing I will say just based on some of the budget comments and I've expressed this to the board, you know, in in our internal everywhere, but I think I really need to just take a minute. I'm sorry. I know it's late, but
just to explain financially how this works because I see a lot of conversation and I I hear things. Public education is funded by the taxpayer and it's funded by income tax. So all that state aid that we get comes from the income tax that's collected throughout the whole entire state. And then there's
this bizarre formula that literally no no one in the entire state understands that says this district gets this much state aid and this one gets this much and and no literally no one understands the fund funding formula for state aid. The other half of the money comes from the tax levy. So what everyone needs to
understand about Washington Township is other big districts like this do not get anywhere near the percentage of state aid that we get. It's, and don't quote me, but it's it's 50-ish% half state aid, half local tax levy, and they keep
cutting the state aid. So, who's picking up that cost? The taxpayer has to pick that up. And so, you have we have to become independent in funding these schools. And that's very difficult because now we have this massive infrastructure that was given all this
state aid and then the state's like, I'm not going to pay for that. It's it's like if you bought a mansion and then you had a job loss or a death in your family and now you have to continue to pay for that mansion with one salary. It's it's absolutely impossible. You need to bring another salary in or you need to move. Well, we can't move
because we have many schools, we have many programs, we have thousands of students and we have a massive infrastructure. So, as the state aid starts to is been being pulled away every year, sadly that's incumbent on the local taxpayer to pick that up. And
that's just that's just what we're left with, I guess. You know, we can't really close buildings. We're bursting at the seams at every middle school, every elementary school. We cannot close these buildings. We could probably stand out a building, to be honest. But the the the state has put us in a situation where
they continue to cut money. So, you have to think of it like this. There are other districts out there. I'm not going to say the names cuz then everybody like goes and doesn't understand because there are some districts that every district is getting state aid for things like special ed. But in terms of the general education of a student, there
are districts like I've said this before, Morristown that gets no state aid for their general education. They do get some state aid for special ed and things like that, but that those people have more control over what happens in the schools because they're paying for it. when you have when you get state
aid, you're you are beholdened to um the state's requirements and you have to, you know, assess things and do things the way the state wants you to do it so that you can get that money. That's why we have something called QAC where they come in and they kind of look at how we're running things. And so if
you want to kind of I hate to say it this way, but if you want to get off state aid, like get off welfare type of a thought, then you have to become independent. we have to become independent in how we're funding things and at and so also at the same time you
know I see people talking about what I'm going to do when I'm on the board and all this like as a person you can say I don't think you should spend money on that I on on a teacher or or support staff or whatever you should be spending it on this as a board member you don't
have the luxury of that because we're the one of the largest employers in this county and so we don't have like healthcare for all in this country. We our employees, we pay their healthare, we're paying for
their pensions. We need to support them because they're our employees. Like I know not everyone has that opinion. I have that opinion that we have an obligation to our employees to not just chuck them out the door. And 90% of our
our costs are human resources. So, you know, we keep talking about these warnings and what's coming down the pike and you know, and I do this in my business. It's public education is not a like your business. It's it's nothing like a private company. It you could be CFO for Google and you don't know what
we're doing here there. It's just different. It's public education and it's funded in a way where we really are going to have a problem here. And it's not really the fault of anyone up here. It's the fault of the fact that the state keeps cutting the
amount of money that we get. And sadly, our taxpayer has to pick that up. So what can we do? We have to do things like full day kindergarten, full day prek, um offer things that make people move here so that we can increase the tax levy. We can increase our property values. You know, my house went up
almost $200,000 in value over the last 5 years. I don't know exactly why that is, but people are moving here for some of those programs, for our autism program and things of that nature. So, if you want to help the situation really, you should go on city council because
they're the ones that can that can really increase proper, you know, the the can do things with um the town that make people move to the town. The only thing we can do is is what's in the schools. I don't know if this is making sense. I'm trying to say we have to get
off state aid. We have to get off state aid. We have to become solvent. and you're talking about a $170 million budget, half of which is given to us through state aid. It's very difficult to make these decisions. So, I just kind of I mean, I'm happy to explain more of that to
people who have questions, but that's how it works. Okay. I hope it makes sense. Okay, moving on. Can I have a motion to approve item number one under report of the superintendent? >> Motion. >> Second.
That's an all in favor, right? I just had a brain. Okay. Any discussion? Roll call, please. >> Mrs. Bloom. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Clancy. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Chilla? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Harton? >> Yes. >> Mr. Liberty?
>> Yep. >> Mr. Serrano? >> Yes. >> Mr. Ross? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Baker? >> Yes. >> Miss Kazempo? >> Yes. Motion carries. Motion to approve item number one under instructional affairs. >> Motion.
>> Second. >> Any discussion? >> Roll call. >> Mrs. Clancy. >> Yes. >> Miss Chilla. >> Yes. >> Ms. Hardto. >> Yes. >> Mr. Li Liberty. >> Yes. >> Mr. Serrano. >> Yes.
>> Mr. Ross. >> Yes. >> Miss Baker. >> Yes. >> Miss Bloom. >> Yes. >> Miss Kazmpo. >> Yes. Motion carries. under student activities and communication. Uh motion to approve items one through four. >> Motion. >> You got a second. Second. >> Second.
>> Ralph. Any discussion? >> Roll call, please. >> Mrs. Chilla? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Hartung? >> Yes. >> Mr. Liberty? >> Yes. >> Mr. Serrano? >> Yes. >> Mr. Ross? >> Yes.
>> Mrs. Baker? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Bloom? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Clancy? >> Yes. Miss Kazempo abstain on number three. Yes to the rest. Motion to approve items 1 through 41 under human resources.
>> Motion. >> Second. >> A second. Scott. Any discussion? >> Seeing none. Roll call. Mrs. Hartung. >> Yes to all abstain to M38. [Applause]
Mr. Liberty. >> Yes. >> Mr. Serrano. This >> is human resources. Correct. Just want to be sure. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Mr. Ross. >> Yes. Abstain from number 37.
>> Mrs. Baker. Uh, >> abstain to number 37. Yes. To the right. Mrs. Bloom >> abstain to 37. Yes to the rest. >> Miss Clancy. >> Yes.
>> Miss Chilla. >> Yes. >> Miss Kazmpo. >> Yes. All >> everything carried, right? Yes. Motion carried. Okay. Under finance, there are a couple things deleted. So motion to approve items 4, 6, 7,
9 through 33. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Any discussion? I have a question. Yes. Um I have a question under the warrant the warrant
list uh with ESS and the summer payment for um AIDS. Um I did mention earlier that I wasn't able to get the link for that. In other words, I was told that the
board approved the payment for assistance that would have worked during the summer. I wanted to find out what what we're paying them per hour. Does anybody know that right now? >> I don't, but I can certainly email the full board.
>> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> Do we do we also have a breakdown of how many aids in the in the summer program are ESS versus our aids? Because I know
I saw where we were asking our people, our internal people if they wanted to work during the summer. Do we know what that breakdown is? Can I get that information? >> We'll add it to the list. >> Okay. Um, I also have a question on Genesis.
I see it's a pretty hefty cost, 200,000 for Genesis. Uh, I'm just wondering, is that a monthly amount or is that a yearly amount? >> Yearly. >> Yearly. >> Yep. The annual pay.
>> Okay. Um are we are we complete now with Genesis? Is that fully implemented over Power School? Yes. Um at some not now. I know you might not know that but I know that
we were told that when we moved into Genesis there would be a very big savings over P school. At some point, can we get information as to what we were paying in Power School and what we're paying now in Genesis? Because I understand that there have been some
things added with the Genesis program that maybe we didn't talk about initially. So, I I would just like to know what with the amount P school cost us and what Genesis has cost us at some point. >> Sure, no problem. >> Okay. Thank you very much. That's all.
>> Okay. Anything else? >> Yeah, I have one. Uh, when I vote, I'm just going to be voting with the context that I think it's important that we uphold our contractual obligations. I think that's all about all I can say with that. >> Okay. Um, I'm going to go on what Scott
said. Um, it's a contract. It's a legal contract and that will be why I'm voting for certain um, things under finance. >> Roll call, please. >> Mr. Liberty. >> Yes. Mr. Serrano
>> abstain from N numbers 29 through 32 and yes to the rest. >> Mr. Ross >> abstain to items number 29 30 31 and 32. Yes to the rest.
>> Mrs. Baker. Um, [Applause] out of an abundance of caution, I'm going to be abstaining from 29, 30, 31, and 32 until I get further
guidance from the SEC. Yes to the rest. >> I'm going to Was I supposed to say each number? I'm sorry. Did I do that wrong? >> You said >> I said 29 through 32, but did you want me to say 29 30 31 32 >> or does it matter? You you understood where I was. >> Yeah. Okay.
>> And you're 29 30 31 32 correct. >> Also, I should note um Mike brought this to my attention that under number 32 it says goal one and that should be goal four cuz it's just a dupe.
it says. So 29 says goal one, 30 says goal two, 31 says goal three, and then 32 says goal one again. And it should be four. Goal four. >> Sorry about that. >> Well, I'm not sorry I didn't do it. I'm just saying.
>> Yeah, 32 should say four. >> No, it's quantitative and qualitative. They're different goals. >> I don't know. Okay. Sorry. Never mind. Okay, Mrs. Bloom, >> I am conflicted. So, it's yes to
everything, but I abstain from 29, 30, 31, and 32. >> Miss Clancy, >> yes to all. >> Miss Chilla, >> yes to all. >> Mrs. part
>> I am conflicted for 29 to 32 but yes to all the rest >> and Miss Kazmpo I'm conflicted on 2930 3132 so I'm abstaining yes to the rest two three four five six so
>> motion failed yeah Okay. Special education >> items. >> Did that pass or pass? >> Motion failed for >> I don't know. Motion to approve items one through four under special education.
>> Second. >> Any discussion? Is that Scott? >> Yeah, Scott. >> Seeing none, roll call. >> I'm sorry. I'm I'm sorry. I blanked out for a second. I'm not going to lie. Um,
is there a way that we can put into IA the um the discussion of what we can do to possibly bring back some more of our special ed students that are placed out of
district? Can we put it in committee? Was that a committee conversation? >> Why don't we break out the specifics instead of saying can we bring them back? Let's let's talk about the specifics surrounding >> of why they're right. Why they were put out. >> For sure. We can absolutely put that information into IA for you.
>> Okay. >> Roll call. >> Mr. Liberty. >> Yes. >> Mr. Serrano. >> Yes. >> Mr. Ross. >> Yes. >> Miss Baker. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Bloom.
>> Yes. >> Miss Clancy. >> Yes. Miss Chilla, >> yes. >> Mrs. Hardong, >> yes. >> Miss Kazempo, >> yes. Motion carries. There's some confusion about whether items 29, 30, 31, and 32 passed because we were told
by Ari that they needed five votes. Dr. Hib says it's under finance. So, it just needs a simple majority. And so, we don't know actually if that passed. I guess Megan is checking. >> Six abstensions. >> Six abstensions. So only three people
voted yes. I don't know. What does that mean? >> Isn't it a personnel issue? >> Yeah, I don't know. You can just let us know. Um, anything under negotiations? >> I gave my report.
>> Okay. Items of new business. >> I said one. >> Yeah, I have some too. >> Okay. Go ahead. Go ahead. >> Okay. Sorry, I didn't hear you there, Pat. Uh I thought it was the comment that was brought up in public session about uh
comments to the press or quotes to the press. Um yeah, I wasn't aware of that one before it went out. Is is do we need to maybe in committee revisit about public comment and how we go about authorizing that? I know sometimes you
probably need authorization quickly, but is that something we should discuss in committee? Yes, I think we should. What committee would it belong in? That's the question. >> I think all of them. >> I don't know. >> I would say >> I mean I guess cuz we don't again.
>> Oh, yeah. >> I got sack. >> I got sack. >> It's on my list. >> Um, is that all you had, >> Pat? Okay. I had the one thing I wanted to say was I think we talked about the
labor management collaborative. Someone brought that up and I have been researching that over the past few months. It's really a good thing for our district to think to get involved in because when we're talking about one day having to do referendums,
this is a tool that they use to help get not only the staff, the board, but the community on board and have that transparency as to why we're doing a referendum. So, I think it's something that the board needs to really consider
carefully and look into. Uh, I also have I'm hoping that once we have our board goals, if everything is finished with Genesis, could we at some point look at our board of education website? And I
think we could revive that and have some things that are good for the parents and staff and community to know about the board on that website. I'm not sure when that would be. Um, also when you talk about this budget thing,
we've talked about it before. I mean, maybe at some point we need to think about going back to voting on budgets in April. We never did. We don't do that anymore. But I believe it was a tough thing, but it really when that was done, you really got input from the community
as far as what they valued in the budget and it was a back and forth between everybody. It was not just the board and then the community. It really it's just something to think about. And the last thing I have is
I've been looking through all these agendas from the other districts, but in general, one of the things that apparently we have done incorrectly was we were supposed to um
we should say, and I'm not sure if it's true, that our meetings start at 6:00. then you go into executive. But the the option is for the public to sit there. From what I've looked at at other um
minutes is ones who start at 6 routinely say we will be back out of executive at 7:30. So you don't really need even need to wait. that would be said, but at least that way if people wanted to be here in case we did
come back out, they have the the ability to do that. So, I was thinking that might be something that we want to look into. And let me see, I had talked a little bit about I don't know what Lor's time frame is and I
don't want to add to her stress, but I really think we should think about as a board having the minutes that we all review them before we come into the next meeting. Like for example, last week's minutes were pertinent for this week.
Jan July 29th was pertinent for last week. I think that I personally think if that's a reason that it would help hold us more accountable as board members and I would like the board to think about seeing if we can work with Lori to have that done. I think the the hardest one
would be the work session to have it then ready for the regular session. The other one could take longer as long as it was before the next session. So, thank you Julie. All right. Um, yeah, I just want to comment, Pat.
Um, your idea about starting at six o'clock, um, to me sounds like a good one, especially because if we have students making presentations, uh, they could do it at 6:00 where it would not be late. They have to go back home to the schoolwork or whatever. Um,
how how would we expedite that? That is that something that Pat would make a motion on? Is this something you have to go to committee on? >> Right. >> Well, >> no, that's question was could we because So, here's what happens. like, and I
don't I don't know that people know this, but when we come here at 6:00 for our executive session, I open the meeting to the public and then we motion to go into executive and then we come back out of executive at 7:30. And so that has recently caused a problem because there was confusion about coming
in and out of executive before 7:30. So the suggestion, I don't know if this is what Pat's suggestion, but what I suggested is that we advertise that that we we open to the public at 6, then the board is going to have just be transparent about it. We're going to have executives for an hour and a half
and then we're going to have a public meeting at 7:30. >> So if if I could just jump in real quickly, >> I think to be fair, if I I think to be fair, we didn't advertise to the public that we were going to take action.
That's the issue from what I understood. Like if we're going to take action, we have to advertise to the public, say they know we're going to take action because if not, we're having everyone come at 6:00 and they're going to sit out there and they're going to wonder, are we taking action? Are we not taking
action? I just don't think that's fair to the public that they're not going to know and they're going to sit here for an hour and a half and sometimes they sit there anyway for an extra 45 minutes because we don't come out of executive session. I just think it's really unfair because people are coming here whether they're bringing their kids or
not bringing their kids. I just think now we're asking them to sit there because if we're going to take action, I think just we have to transparently advertise that there's going to be action taken. That's it. And then that way advertise the meeting to start at 6:00 and say action may be like if we just do that for every meeting. I just
think that that's really unfair and I don't think we're being transparent with the public. >> I understand what you mean. I don't really understand. >> Well, you said we're going in and out of executive. Really, the issue is not going in and out of executive. The issue is is that if we're going to take action, we have to advertise that we're going to take action. That's what we
would have to do. That was the issue last time. >> But but we don't usually come out of executive. We we use that hour and a half, but the nature of >> of the governance is we still have to start the meeting at 6. That's the part that >> we we should
>> we need guidance on that. Like >> I think we should get a for sure get guidance. I'm just stating saying the the issue isn't coming in isn't coming in and out of executive session. The issue is advertising. If we're going to take action and if we're not going to take action,
>> then we don't have to worry about it. We can keep it as is. But if we're going to take action, >> the board used to meet from in executive from 6:00 to 7:00 >> and then have a public meeting at 7:00. And we came in and out I remember other times. So I mean I don't >> it was a problem this time this particular time but it never was a
problem in the past. I mean, >> because we didn't advertise. >> Every other district does it that way. We're the one. We have the problem. >> I think we need to get an opin opinion on. >> Yeah, I think we do, too. >> You rais a good point. Uh, the reason why we were even talking about this is because we had an issue with it and we
should be able we should get get it cleared up. Now, Janine, I thought uh when we do the posting, I thought we always have on the posting that the board may take action. Does it mean the board may only take action at the at after it's advertised or when we say
when we're starting? So, in other words, it says the board will start at at 6:00 and then have executive and I thought on those postings, it always says something about the board may take action. >> So, I think the issue is that the way
it's advertised is that executive session is at 6:00 and the public meeting starts at 7:30. Okay. So, how can I how could we resolve the problem that we had? I I kind of agree with Pat that we say the meeting starts at six o'clock and and and we as we always do,
we open up the meeting at 6:00 and then we go into executive. But then if we have to come out of executive >> and no action will be taken till 7:30 or or post after 7:30. >> But why why would we say that? We should say action may be taken. >> I don't want to talk about what we've done in executive, but we did get an
opinion in executive. So, this is what I'm going to say cuz before we jam before we jam something through again, >> we're not jamming through. Let's just get an opinion. >> We actually had a lawyer tell us how to fix this. >> I don't know if I agree with that comment. That's all. So, I didn't hear it that way. So, I just want to be clean
and say we don't have to rush it through. There's no reason to. Let's wait till the next meeting. Let's get an opinion. Let's talk about it and weigh the pros and cons and then we'll come out as a board and make a decision. That's all I'm saying. This is what I read at 6:00. I we open the meeting and
I say the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the rights of the public to have advanced notice to of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of the act. Public notice of the meeting has been given to the board secretary in the following manner. Posting written notice on the official
board at the Een Abbott central administration building. Mailing written notice to the Courier Post in the South Jersey Times. And filing written notice with the clerk of the township of Washington on February 19th, 2025. And then I motion to go into executive. And then once we're in executive, I say resolve that pursuant to section 8 of the open public meetings act. The public
shall be excluded from that portion of the meeting involving list the executive content. Further resolve discussion of such subject matter in executive session can be disclosed to the public if any action is taken by the board either in the resumption of the public session at the conclusion of the executive session or at a public session at a later date.
That's what's read. I think it's nobody is here when I read that. You know what I mean? they don't come till 7:30, >> right? So, >> and I think the issue is that on the meeting notice, um, while it does say, I believe somewhere that action may be
taken, it specifically says executive session meetings begin at 6:00 and work and regular session meetings begin at 7:30 p.m. >> So, you know, if if we're going to take action, we should plan on taking it at 7:30. Um, you know, if if you want if
you wanted to advertise that we could take action starting at 6:00, we could do that. >> I think that would be inconvenient for the public though to have to come every time and sit there for an hour and a half. >> They don't have to do that. But what the
way we advertise it is wrong >> because we actually are in a public meeting at 6:00. >> Yeah. Right. Right. >> Do you know what I mean? And and so the way it's advertised is incorrect. I'm just asking to correct it and we can advertise it however we want. We can say, you know, no action will be taken
till 7:30. The board or the board will be an executive from 6:10 to 7:30. Um, but I'm just saying the way it's advertised now is is disingenuous because we are opening a public meeting at 6:00. I'm reading OPMA. I'm reading
the Sunshine Law and no one hears it. It's not even recorded. It's not even recorded. And so then you have people saying, "Well, you made you made decisions in executive session." No, we didn't. We opened a public meeting. We went into executive. We came out of executive and went back in. Do you know
what I mean? Like we were following the procedure that our lawyer told that our lawyer told us to do, >> but it just happened to be wrong. >> I mean, that's it. So >> I don't know, but I'm just saying like the all I'm asking is that the advertisement is correct. It's not correct to say that the meeting starts
at 7:30 when I open the meeting at 6. >> All I'm saying is I'm just asking for a very clear opinion to weigh the pros and the cons and not do something right now in because no one's really discussed it. >> I don't care if we do it right now. I just want it to be right. >> And if that's the will of that might
come out in the appeal, right? We have an appeal going on. I I don't mind waiting. >> What? >> I think we need to wait and >> maybe I don't know. >> That's fine. We can't discuss it. >> What do we do? What if >> I have a Hold on.
>> We can't discuss it. >> I have Can we discuss it? >> We need to go back. >> We have to go back. >> We do. We do need to go back. We >> But first, we have to open to the public again. >> We cannot wait. Hold on. I have a a question. This is completely unrelated. Can we put the grading floor policy into
into committee? >> It's already handled. >> It's done. >> Done. It's done. >> It's done. >> Yeah, we repealed it. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> All right. Good. >> Can I get a motion to open the public? >> Motion to open to the public. >> Second. >> Second. >> All in favor?
>> Sean Lindsay. [Music] [Music] Damn, I don't smell that bad, do I? Sorry. Uh, good evening, Sean Lindsay, Washington Township. Um, just have a couple things. Um,
forget I'm sorry. I'm going to call out names. If I'm wrong, don't sue me. Uh I believe in the Coleman annuity back in February, you had made mention about how the whole board was part of a whole board committee. Um and with this current board, the smaller committees are a bad idea.
And I fully agree with you because let's face it, the two most powerful committees that we have right now are HR and business. And who runs those committees? It's the same people. Ralph Ross, Steve Srano, Connie Baker, and
Julie Kazimple as a proxy, I believe. So, the two most powerful committees that we have on this district right now are run by the same people. Why is there no diversity? As we all like to talk, why is there no diversity among the committees? So, I think that the current climate, I do believe the whole board
should be in as a committee. So, everyone has a say in what goes on, not just four people. Also, uh, moving forward, budget talks, student student academics. I haven't heard one thing from anybody up here since Reorg about moving forward, about
progressing student achievement, budget talks. I haven't heard one discussion about that in public. You know, we're facing the crisis that we did this year. We barely made it. Have you talked about it this for next year? Nope. Why? Guess
it's not important to you guys. Um, also, uh, Miss Bloom, I'm going to commend you again. Board goals, it's August. This was supposed to happen back in the first quarter, so why in the world is it not happening? Is it just not important enough to people? Maybe
there's an update that I don't know about, which was probably likely because I'm not part of the board. But again, there's no transparency. There's no discussion about it in the public. And I've already said public trust is it's it's in the toilet. It's horrible. And that's not helping us. All it is it's
it's making you guys look worse. You're supposed to be bringing it to us because you're representing us. Well, I'm sorry. I don't want to be represented by this. It's an embarrassment. And the last thing I'll say, and this might be a little contra, you know,
controversial, but don't really care. Um, Mrs. Kazimple, how are you still the board president? I want everybody to go back, fact check me. back in May, I believe, you stomped out of here because things didn't go your way and you on mic
said, "I'm out. I'm done. This is toxic." To me, that sounds like a dereliction of duty to me. And yet, I think I believe I don't remember who said it, but I think somebody had made a mention, oh, I guess we have to get a new board president. But yet, here you still sit.
I have nothing against you, but you you you literally left. you walked out of this building out the door saying, "I'm done. I'm out." That would sound to me that you don't want to be the board president anymore. So again, when you talk about, you know,
procedure and all that kind of stuff, I'm sorry if if you leave, you should be done. My opinion. And the last thing I'll say is on the contract issue. Um Dr. Hibbs, I'm sorry. I'm glad you're back. But
again, I told you from day one, you're not going to win here right now. Not with this board. They just violated your contract. Now, anybody in here who's still here? Anybody? I'm not going to say name. I'm sorry. I can't. The people that are here that you have a contract right now, what happens
if that contract got broken? Are you guys just going to I'm going to say it. Bend over and take it. No. You would be screaming your heads off saying, >> "Sorry, Miss I'll pause. I was supposed to be directing it towards you. My apologies. >> More talking about the illusions you're the >> the illusion
>> the metaphor you're you're using at the microphone. >> Sorry. Back and forth. >> Back and forth. >> But I'm just going to All right. My apologies. Sorry. That was wrong. Okay. Sorry. Give me an ethics violation. The problem the problem is this is if
they if there if you if there was a problem with your contract even, would you just sit there and go, "Well, I guess not. Okay. I guess maybe not. Maybe it's not worth it." No, you'd be screaming your head off, too, saying, "Um, hello. It's in the contract." The teachers contract, if it's not followed,
you get union representatives up here that will fight for it. They're not going to sit back and go, "N, you're good. No, no, we're fine. We're fine." No. You would be up here at this podium saying, "Why are we not getting what we are contractually obligated to have?"
And I'm sorry again, I don't know how they were able to vote no on that. It's a contractual obligation and with the evidence, as long as the evidence is there, if the evidence is there and you did those goals, you should be paid. Correct. Just like anybody else should. So that's what I got to say. Thank you,
>> Jenny Murphy. If we're going to go back to old stories about the stompout thing, I think it was she attacked Ralph for not following suit on the vote and then came back in and blamed Carol Chilla for being the common denominator, I think it was. So,
let's tell the whole story. Yeah. Okay. So, I don't know what you just said, but uh I will start my time. So, we were talking about litigation when I ran out of time. Um, the third motion I was asking you guys to consider was a motion
to terminate the solicitor's contract by sending the 30-day notice. So, you would send a letter saying you wish to affectuate the 30-day uh the effectuate notice of ending the contract in 30 days. Um, and I'll use a sports analogy here. The Washington Township BOE is 0
and5 and legal matters that I've sat here and watched for. Now you want me to tell you what those are because you have I mean I can answer questions you won't but um first of all three conflicts of interest were reversed including yours partially partially one of yours. So
Mrs. Chill SEC um advisory reversed Elen Clancy SEC advisory reversed. Miss Kazmple, half of an SEC advisory reversed. Miss Kazmple's ethics case didn't involve this solicitor, but
ethics ruling by the SEC in July that you violated the state ethics um act, broke state ethics law three times on three different things. um compromised the board, failed to protect
school personnel, failed to protect confidential information, and then you give a quote to the newspaper saying that you've been vindicated. Now, as far as I'm concerned, that's not a win. But that's just my opinion. You I'm sure you're going to find things to say because you can't talk back and forth, which is bizarre that you have a public
meeting. I'm not saying you need to answer every question, but any one of you guys that have something to say, somebody comes up with, you know, a positive thing to talk about or whatever it is, you are not, you have a microphone in front of you, you can use it.
It's crazy. So, my point about this is we need a lineup change. this the litigation and the things that are going on. We need to get either one, it's intentional to to get very close and cross the line on legal advice
because there's certain people on this board that want certain things to happen. And I've been here long enough to know that generally when there's something seeking to be accomplished, it doesn't start with can we. It says the board wants to and the job
of the lawyer is to work backwards off of that and get see whether it's or not it's illegal to do that. And most really good solicitors and I work with a lot of them will go to that line and won't cross it. I think people in this audience especially with regard to the
doctrine of necessity feel that that line has been crossed. This is not a gray area. This is not a questionable decision. You as elected officials, your job is to protect the people in this community that you work for to protect our students, to protect our staff. This
is a no-brainer. The evidence is before you. Not because you don't want to deal with it. Not because it's it's easy. It's your job to do that. RFP and get another lawyer. Maybe we'll start moving in another direction, a positive direction.
0 and5 U. Mr. Ross, I did have a question. Did the um HR director motion, it failed, but that means you didn't cut the HR director position. I'll ask Julie, did you know on that? I was a little confused.
Did you cut the HR director position because it went down 54 something? Okay. Um so, Mr. for us. When you served two years as interim HR director in Williamstown, did you find that that was a valuable position for that district?
>> We didn't have to stay. >> Thank you. Can talk to me after the meeting, Mr. Ross. We go way back. I I just felt like you might have thought that that was a worthwhile position. Mrs. Baker, I don't even know what to say about what happened here tonight with negotiations because you
essentially negotiated in public. You told your board member Scott last week that we couldn't even have ground rules for the rest of the board. You would vote at the end and you actually gave an update in and to the entire public about why what happened in the session during
the negotiation. And I'm curious because you're supposed to be negotiating on behalf of the board of education. So my question is, are you negotiating for the board of education? At least in that little scenario I heard tonight. I can't speak for the rest of it and what you do in negotiations, but
it was a real conflict for me to listen and try to understand what side you were talking about. >> Thank you for your comments, James Msadi. Good evening everybody. Uh James Madi, Washington Township. Uh wanted to
support Julie with a couple facts about the uh tax levy here in Washington Township. So I've talked about this data a couple times. I had done a bunch of analysis on the 2425 uh spending and just for some benchmark
information about what percentage of the local tax levy uh how that compares to other uh areas and things along those lines. So the average for Gloucester County is 51% of the tax levy coming from the local tax basis. Um Washington
Townships is 57% so we are slightly above the average. Uh there are 10 districts uh that have higher tax levies than us and 16 districts that have lower tax levies than we do. Um in South Jersey the average is and that is
Camden, Burlington, uh and Gloucester counties. Uh the average is 49% and there are 35 districts that have higher tax levies than us and 67 that have equal to or lower levies than us. Um,
however, one of the things that the the data point that I actually find to be probably most relevant and interesting is the fact that when you compare us to the uh 14 the 13 other districts, so the 14 districts in the state of New Jersey
that have a population between 7,000 and 8,000 students, the average local tax levy is 66%. So there are only three districts that have a lower tax local tax levy for a district of our size. Uh so I just think
that's very important because like we like to benchmark ourselves against other areas of Gloucester County and that's important for cost of living purposes but also like we are much larger than all the other schools in our area and need different resources. Uh and I do believe that we probably need
to be looking at getting more of our funding from the local community because of the fact that like we have this different benchmark data. So uh again the missle referenced that and I think there's there is data that supports the fact that districts of our our size do
tend to fund themselves uh a higher percentage from that. Uh the other topic that I wanted to talk about uh was uh Dr. Hibbs's uh merit objectives. Um, I don't know. I have not I I'm I'm trusting the journalistic integrity of
Miss Bernie here in the audience. Uh, her, uh, article in the Inquirer this morning talked about listed out the five objectives for Dr. Hibbs. And, um, I'm strongly in the camp of his contract says we set his performance goals and objectives uh, and that we need to
compensate him for that. Um, I'm reading these five objectives and for anybody you can I don't know where they came from or how their profile they're out there on on the website, but these objectives are I find them kind of disappointing to be honest that that's
what we set for our school chief chief school administrator to accomplish. Um, I don't know at what point in time these get set. I don't know if they're publicly set or if they're part of HR. I understand there's a lot from an appointment standpoint uh that maybe
can't be discussed, but the fact that we have members of the staff, the community out here on different sides of this and like I I work in corporate America. I'm I'm a fan of giving people bonuses and setting performance objectives
to accomplish these things and get paid $27,000 is disappointing to me. I'm not like that's if I was a corporate leader and somebody came to me with this and said these are my objectives and I should get my 10 plus percent bonus I'd be disappointed. Um that these were the objectives that were set for somebody.
So, I would love come next year to hear the the staff rallying for paying the superintendent their merit bonus because we accomplished things that moved our districts, our staff, our students
forward versus making 15 Google presentations. Like, I just Yeah, that's that's kind of um that's that's what I've got to say. I think we can do better this year. Thank you.
>> Thank you, Ron Lucarini. >> You stole a bit of my thunder on that. Um the goals, however, um the board has to prove those goals. I don't know. Again, it's kind of vague about whether you made the goals or the HR guy put
forth those goals or Dr. Hibbs made those goals. I'd be interesting to find out who actually set the goals and then but one thing's for sure, the board had to approve that, right? So, you approve those goals and he met them. I mean, you
can't change in mid-stream and say, you know, like Barkley or the Philadelphia Eagles, maybe he had an incentive of like uh rushing for a,000 yards. He ends up rushing for, I don't know, 1,600, 2,000, whatever it was. They can't The Eagles
can't chase. Oh, he he was really good. So, we made it 2,000 instead of the thousand. We're changing it. You know, you get a goal, you set it, and he made it. if if assuming he met it and all you're doing is setting us up for more
lawsuits. All right? You know, because you have an agenda, Mr. Serrano, Mrs. Baker, Mr. Ross. I also find it interesting that they would actually turn to Ralph Ross and ask him about human resources. When he was human
resource director of Williamstown, we had to work with them on the Hogy sale uh every year. Charlie Dow had a connection with Charlie Earling and I remember asking him about uh his uh
position on the NAACP um executive board or whatever with my wife. All right. I never knew Ralph to be so sensitive about, you know, racial issues or whatever. I mean, he's good friends with Mrs. Baker, so that would
be one thing right there. But uh I remember her telling me well I got on there and they gave somebody uh in the MAACP I don't know it was the president or whatever her daughter a job as the truent officer or something right he was
also president of the board of education when I walked into Tom Fleming's office with Eli Masloikov many years ago and there were little sticky notes on applications that said hire but don't fire hire fire, but can fire. And
Fleming was uh ticked off. I won't say pissed off because Mrs. Comple, you know, she gets very upset about those things even though she talks like a truck driver out in the parking lot. Anyway, uh he
uh the Fleming was upset that this was going on while Dr. Terrell was a superintendent. Now, I can't necessarily attach that to Ralph, but you were the president of the board at that time. And political hiring was rampant. All right.
Rampant. Uh, so I find that pretty funny. Also about the solicitor. How, Connie Baker, how could you suggest to add more duties to this guy? Like,
you know, he is incompetent. He made a ruling here that was overturned by a judge, cost this district five months of more dysfunction, increased dysfunction. All right? And you know, God knows how
much money in court and, you know, while we paid Dr. Hibbs to sit at home and do absolutely nothing. All right? That's not his fault. uh to suggest that this guy should be also the negotiator or whatever you're touting him for. He
should be gone. Gone. And Baker, you'll just do anything. I like to see what Bush Law Firm is going to be contributing to uh you know, these different political action committees that then funnel money back and you
know, put up signs for Julie Kosmple and Baker. All right. Uh, and getting back to the the um Oh, the other thing I wanted to talk about was the woman who came up here, I
think last meeting and made a statement to Dr. Hibbs that the BAS in assistant BAS in this in Gloucester County are getting $69,000 a year. All right. When you start comparing assistant BAS to
comparable districts like Cherry Hill, is our boy Yeah, our guy from Cherry Hill still here. Uh, go see what they're getting paid. It's not $69,000. So, Dr. Hibbs challenged the woman and said, uh, you know, it isn't. And then it was just left hanging. So, you can
just come up here, say whatever you want if you're from the WTA, and then just walk away and let it stand. That's why we're failing as a district. Mrs. Goample, >> Tom Tom Baldisaro. Also, while Tom's coming up, um I need to make a motion to
extend the meeting past 11:00. Can I have a motion to extend the meeting past 11? >> A second. Ralph seconded. All in favor? >> No. >> Well, we have to go back into executive. Was that a real no or just
>> a no? >> Oh, it's a no. Okay. >> I mean, if everyone else >> I mean we can vote no. I don't >> I mean >> I have no need to go back in. I thought you all wanted to do it. Okay. So then
let's Who are the yays for going back in? >> All right. Let's just roll call it real quick. I apologize, Tom. >> It works. >> We only have 10 minutes. So >> about the about the
Mrs. Baker. I don't know what she's talking about. >> She is roll call for 11. >> I'm roll calling for going past 11. She went to the restroom. >> Miss Bloom.
>> Ms. Clancy. >> If we have to. >> I'm taking a roll call. >> Silence, please. >> Mrs. Chill. >> Mrs. Tartong. >> No. >> Mr. Li Liberty. >> Yes.
>> Mr. Serrano. >> No. >> Mr. Ross. >> Mr. Ross. >> Yes. >> You need a cup of coffee. >> Miss Kazempo. >> Well, my vote doesn't matter, so I'm gonna give my true feeling, which is no. >> Okay.
>> But we're going. >> Can I? >> But yes. Yes. Julie, before Toms go, can I just address something real quick? I just want to make sure that members of the board that you um you definitely can see board docs, you can see the board packet, correct? Just to make sure
everybody can see that. Okay, perfect. So, I just want to state publicly that all the evidence that was voted probably down tonight was uploaded into that packet, which clearly showed that the goals were met. So, I just wanted to state that publicly. >> Okay. Go ahead.
>> Motion. Uh, I'm going to pile on to a couple of the the speakers. Uh, start with the goals. Um, yeah, I mean, if if they got made, they should be paid. But I I'm going to really focus on there are some of the worst goals I've ever seen in my life. If you're going if you're going to get training on anything, goals
is where you start. We've heard a lot of people talk about complain a lot about different things and we know we have a lot of things to fix. It starts with goals. You set goals to establish where you want to get to. So, you know, you it's got to be, you know, look up the
term smart goal. That's what you want. Um, there's a lot of training available and I highly recommend you look into it because smart goals are, you know, very helpful. Um, talking about, you know, I I hope that we got guidance on when the the people who did not vote yes that
could vote yes, you're adding to the lawsuit, guys. It's contract. It's in there. If they were hit, if there's questions about whether they were hit, then you should have voted no. If you abstain, you chose not to vote, you chose not to uphold a contract. And
again, so whatever he was due, it's going to be more in a lawsuit. So, thank you for that. Um, talking about what Mrs. Murphy was talking about, she talked about 0 for five. Let's also not forget the one day Mrs. Chilla and Mrs.
Clancy were legally conflicted and then the next meeting Miss Gazle you stated Ari can't legally conflict anybody. So it was a bogus document. Mrs. Gazmple you said in an email the board did nothing wrong. You relied
strictly on lawyer or your legal guidance. Well that's the guidance you got. Why'd you renew the lawyer? Because there's the problem. It's unmistakable that it was screwed up. Not only are you extending them, you're giving them
double the work even when they didn't even know about our policy that they couldn't do both positions. Now, I would say you should seek some guidance from the attorney, but they're conflicted on that because they can't speak out against themselves. You guys need a separate attorney. You need two
different ones. That's how you do it. I don't I honestly don't care what other districts do. Um, I sent you all the research of actual practice, not what somebody else does. If somebody else jumps off a bridge, you're going to jump off a bridge. I don't know.
You have to do the research on the practice, not what again, not what other people are doing. If everybody's doing it wrong, you don't want to do it wrong. I sent it to everybody. The policy you approved tonight is not best practice. The most sane comment around that was from Mr. liberties who said we're still
waiting on conflict counsel independent people to give you advice. That's what you need. Okay? It it should not have been extended. We can't keep going. We can't keep adding risk to this district. And that's what you're doing when you
don't adhere to contracts. You know, it was said and I'm just going to repeat it. Sean Lindsay said it. You have to adhere to every contract. Union contracts, superintendent contract, there's no different. You can't pick and choose what you adhere to. You got to adhere to them all or we're going to get
sued. >> Can I have a motion to close to the public? >> Jody, can I say something? >> There's a motion and then you can. Motion to close to the public. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I >> Go ahead, Ralph. >> Yeah. I I just want to clarify. I
abstain because I thought that the goal should be discussed in public. I think I thought the public should have uh known what was going on and what we're get paying $20,000 for. Yeah, he can. Okay. Um, >> can I say one thing, too? Just >> I really think no one should be commenting.
>> Well, we shouldn't have any discussion about personnel in public. >> Oh, no. It's not personnel. >> Okay. You can't talk about that kind of stuff in personnel. So, that's not a it's not a reason to abstain on that. >> Well, I just want to say I abstained cuz
I'm conflicted. So, I that's why I abstained. No other reason. I'm conflicted. um to go to Mr. Lindsay's comments about committees, we'll take that under,
you know, um I can't even think it's 11. I've been at >> adisementation. >> Yes. Yes. Yes. Um >> I the goals the goal when it comes to the goals like we can't talk about that, but I wasn't on the board when those goals were made. Mr. Lindsay was so
maybe he knows why they were what but um but yeah a lot of us were not on the board so uh can't talk about that. Um oh um me walking out of the meeting I
would like to address that actually publicly once and for all. I did not surrender my duties. I know you really don't want me here some people, but I didn't surrender my duties. I didn't do anything. We had a conversation about the fact that there needs to be a
sitting superintendent at the meeting. And if you guys remember, we didn't have one. And we had brought um uh Dr. Vesby back three times to have him voted in as the superintendent. This poor man came
out with his wife three separate occasions to be voted in. And um I can't talk about what happens in executive, but I was I told Dr. Vespie, you can come in, you're going to be voted in. And that didn't happen. So, as board
president, everyone up here knew that the reason I walked out was because I wasn't running a meeting without a superintendent. It was just it had nothing to do with like some of the things that you're implying it had to do with Ralph voting or whatever. I don't even know how Ralph voted, but I it went
down and I was not about to sit here without a superintendent and and run a meeting again because I had to kind of do that with an assistant super just wasn't an ideal situation and that's why I walked out. No other no other reason. So, anyone else have anything that they
want to say? I think I answered all the questions that I can answer. Can I have a motion to move into executive >> motion? >> All in favor? I >> um >> okay uh resolve that pursuant to section
8 of the open public meetings act the public shall be excluded from that portion of the meeting involving the discussion of legal matters further resolve that discussion of such subject matter at executive session can be disclosed to the public if any actions taken by the board either at the resumption of the public session at the conclusion of the executive session or
at a public session at a later date. The board will be an executive, I'm hoping, for approximately 20 minutes. We will not be taking action when we come out. So, nothing else is going to happen tonight other than us talking, opening back up, adjouring, and going home.
Thank you.