Guest sullinss Posted February 21, 2005 Report Share Posted February 21, 2005 Proceedings of the Business Committee School District No. 2, Yellowstone County High School District No. 2, Yellowstone County Billings, Montana January 10, 2005 The January 10, 2005 Business Committee meeting was called to order at 5:32 p.m. by Chair Malcolm Goodrich. Committee members in attendance were Patty Lacy, Peter Grass, Jerry Hansen, Bob Whalen, Joan Sleeth, Dale Getz, Curt Prchal, Malcolm Goodrich, Shanna Henry, and Judy Herzog. Also in attendance were: Business Manager Thomas Harper, Allan Audet, District Clerk Leo Hudetz, Dave Williams, Superintendent Rod Svee, Bill and Anne Cole, and Don and Betsy Forbes. Pledge of Allegiance Chair Goodrich led those assembled in the Pledge of Allegiance. Daylis Stadium Dave Williams, Executive Director of Activities, presented the Daylis Stadium public opinion poll results. Dave asked the Committee for discussion and a recommendation to the Board on what should be done with Daylis Stadium. The east side bleachers are in need of immediate repair. The west side bleachers need work on footing, but are stable. CTA Architects estimates $800,000 to tear down and replace the east side bleachers. It is difficult to find anyone that will do temporary bleachers and the cost is exorbitant. The current seating capacity of the west side bleachers is between 2600-2800 persons. Committee discussion included the following comments and opinions: • Tear down the east side bleachers for safety reasons. Do not replace them due to lack of funding. • We are checking to see if the insurance company will cover the bleachers next fall. • Do something with east side bleachers immediately. Pursue community effort for rest of project. • Donors are mostly concerned with new turf. Billings Broadcasters Association will give free air time to raise money along with free commercials thanking donors. • Neighbors don’t like Daylis at the current location because of the parking. We should have a new facility, possibly at Amend Park. Remove the east side bleachers. • There are no District funds to pay for new facilities. Use creative funding other than a bond issue. • Can’t give the public the impression we’re going to build something new when we don’t have the money; a community effort is necessary. Judy Herzog introduced a motion to have the east side bleachers removed as soon as possible in the most prudent and cost effective manner. Dale Getz seconded the motion. Dave said the engineers believe the life span of the bleachers is reaching an end. The community needs to be involved in the discussion. He is looking for a long term commitment to stay or a decision if we should actively seek to move Daylis. Further Committee discussion: • Tear down east side bleachers immediately; but, if nothing else is done there will not be enough seating this fall and we don’t want 1500 students standing around. • We can’t make an individual decision without other considerations such as overcrowding at Senior. If we wait for a long term solution, football season will be here. We need to take care of the safety problem first. • Judy stands on her motion to remove the east bleachers. The survey is just the beginning of involving the communities in decisions regarding Daylis. • Tear down the bleachers for liability and safety and then proceed with community meetings for long term solutions. • Concerned if don’t tear down east bleachers then may not be able to use at all next year because of liability. It’s difficult to consider anything different with no money when we are considering a hiring freeze. Superintendent Svee said the engineer thinks the understructure is so overbuilt that if we resheet it, we would not have students falling through. An intermediate step may be to have an engineering firm study it for $30,000. It would cost $65,000 to resheet it. It will cost $100,000 to dismantle it. It was questioned if we could shift Building Reserve dollars for Daylis. Spending priorities for Building Reserve dollars were given to the voting public and should not be reoriented. Superintendent Svee said we will be getting about $650,000 from the State on July 1st for past debt service. This money will go into the Building Fund and could be used for Daylis. It was questioned if we should be spending money on Daylis when we have limited funding with set priorities and educational needs. Superintendent Svee said we should look outside our general funds since it doesn’t affect education expenditures. The question was called for. Voting for the motion was Patty Lacy, Jerry Hansen, Dale Getz, Malcolm Goodrich, Shanna Henry, and Judy Herzog. Voting against the motion was Bob Whalen, Curt Prchal, Joan Sleeth, and Peter Grass. The motion carried. Purchase Land at Cottonwood Park Three years ago, 40 acres of land was donated to the City for a park. We entered into an agreement with the City and the donor to consider purchasing 10 acres of land for a future elementary school within the boundaries of the park. We have until October of 2007 to exercise the option to purchase the property. The contract between the donors and the City stipulates the money from the sale of 10 acres to the School District will be used to develop the park. Administration recommends the land be purchased at this time for the following reasons: • We will need another elementary school on the West end in the future • City services are available • Land prices continue to rise and it is harder to find in large tracts • Substantial residential growth is occurring in the area • Park development at this time would provide quality play area for the future elementary school • If we take advantage of the surrounding park, we only need to purchase 10 acres, otherwise we need 15 acres • This proposal allows the City and the school a chance to plan the traffic patterns Superintendent Svee clarified this is only to exercise an option to purchase property. Approval as a building site will take a vote of the public. The price is determined by a City appraisal. The fair market value one year ago was $20K/acre. We have approximately $900,000 available in the Elementary Building Fund. Anne Cole of the Billings Public Education Foundation stated the agreement with the City says that the park dedication in lieu money from all major development within a 1.5 mile radius of the park would go toward development of Cottonwood Park. A high density subdivision is planned in that area already. Jerry is concerned with the timing and believes we can wait until 2007 to exercise this option. We would still have 10 years to build a school. He is concerned with public perception when we don’t have money. Superintendent Svee said the City won’t develop the park without the money and it’s an advantage to commit to buy now. Joan asked if we buy it and can’t put a school on it if we could sell it? Rod said we could not sell it, it would revert back to the City at the original price. Dale said growth is occurring by Arrowhead School and it makes sense to acquire the site. Shanna Henry introduced a motion to go into the option of purchasing and forward it to the Board. Judy Herzog seconded the motion. Those voting in favor of the motion were Patty Lacy, Peter Grass, Bob Whalen, Joan Sleeth, Dale Getz, Curt Prchal, Malcolm Goodrich, Shanna Henry, and Judy Herzog. Voting against the motion was Jerry Hansen. The motion carried. Jerry wants the public to know there is $900,000 in the Building Fund that is available only for buildings that can be used for this purpose, and that it would not come from the General Fund. Don and Betsy Forbes were recognized and thanked for the gracious opportunity they have provided through their offer. Hiring Freeze Proposal A hiring freeze proposal was referred to the Board from the last Business Committee meeting. The Board tabled it and sent it back to all three Standing Committees for reconsideration. Thomas tried to identify what conditions would and would not be allowed under the freeze. Superintendent Svee explained if a teacher is on leave that FTE stays in the system, and when we hire a replacement we have a second FTE in the system. This skews the count. If we freeze with the given number we can’t add to replace a person on leave. We may have to change the way we count our FTE. COLT identified items they thought were an issue for the freeze and these items are pretty much a wash as far as FTE is concerned. Jerry asked what we could pass that recommends that Administration not increase the dollars we are spending or the positions. Superintendent Svee wants guidance and clarification. He understands the intent to not add people, but the freeze doesn’t allow new FTE regardless of funding source. He interprets this as adding no new grants. Chair Goodrich said the Committee passed a motion to freeze and to also say if there is a mandate or a reason why that freeze should be eliminated for a specific hire, then Administration is at liberty to propose that to the Committees or the Board and seek implementation of that. The Committee was trying to freeze the numbers to be able to predict where we are going to be for expenditures FY2005-2006. Curt said we need some system of financial oversight at this Committee level to propose to the Board instead of the automatic occurrence on the Personnel Report on a monthly basis. Superintendent Svee said he will bring grant requests to the Business Committee before they are sent in or before they hire. We don’t hire in increasing numbers, only replacements. Malcolm said the motion indicates replacements are fine. The intent was to find some CAP to work within and leave some flexibility to administration. The motion to freeze can be reversed depending on legislative and mill levy results. Shanna said at our last meeting we talked about a hiring freeze except for mandated requirements like special education hiring and overcrowded classroom aides. Bob said high school requirements differ in that an influx of students that want to take a specific class may require new FTE. Bob sees the freeze affecting this hiring since it would have to be approved by the Committee. Joan said the intent of the Committee was that the overall numbers from year to year would not grow. Superintendent Svee said we did not increase FTE this year except in Smaller Learning Communities and Reading First in the federal programs. We need to add codes into the system to identify where they are coming from. Shanna said one concern was when we hire staff for a grant and when the grant ends the staff is tenured, which means they may shift from the grant to general fund money. Superintendent Svee said you replace non-tenured teachers with tenured to prevent those numbers from growing. Dale said we are trying to control, and with additional control comes inevitable challenges. We don’t control salary and wages since that is a function of price times volume. We only control volume. The Business Committee should control the volume. It’s prudent to have additional control. We are sending a message to the community that we’re attempting to try to control costs and establish trust. Let the motion ride and let’s go forward. Patty and Peter left the meeting at 6:47 p.m. Chair Goodrich stated the previous motion was replacements. We are not in a situation where we are doing “Business as Usual.” This is the least intrusive way to show the public we are trying to control costs as opposed to letting staff go, and getting rid of textbooks. There is flexibility for Administration to come back with needs requests. Dale introduced a motion that we recommend to the Board what we recommended last month. Judy Herzog seconded the motion. The motion carried unanimously. Superintendent Svee asked what gave the Committee the impression that hiring has been done. If any hiring has been done outside of grants, he wants to know where it has occurred. Curt said the previous year ended at 1112 FTE and at the end of last year we had 1137 FTE. The Committee is concerned that new grant program initiatives may not be sustainable after the grant ends and may result in increased FTE. We need to look at the long term effects of new grants and associated indirect costs. The Committee believes Administration works efficiently but also believes our current staff level is sufficient to get us to the next fiscal year. A constant number will allow us to plot salaries and predict expenses for next year’s budget and also demonstrate to the public we are holding costs. Jerry has looked at the elementary and high school FTE report on OPI’s website and our numbers are increasing. This might be due to grant requirements. Tax Reduction Request-Big Sky Economic Development Authority Big Sky Economic Development Authority has submitted a tax reduction request on behalf of Northland Automotive, Inc. and Bresnan Communications, Inc. Businesses qualify for tax reductions by meeting criteria associated with programs authorized by Montana Code and approval of the County Commissioners. Thomas Harper said the District has supported these in the past but if we have a problem with the concept then we need to address it to the County Commissioners. Dale said this program allows companies that meet certain criteria to receive a reduction in taxes in the early years by the valuation on the County roles and it does affect school district revenues. However, they are still added to the tax rolls for added investment and generate new money. This incentive is a significant catalyst in support of the expansion of existing businesses and in the recruitment of new companies to the Billings area. Judy Herzog introduced a motion that we recommend the Board support the tax reduction request that has been submitted by Big Sky Economic Development Authority on behalf of Northland Automotive, Inc. and Bresnan Communications, Inc. Curt Prchal seconded the motion. The motion carried unanimously. Truancy Project The Rimrock Foundation is asking for a letter of support to the State for the Truancy Project. Dale Getz introduced a motion to recommend the Board support the Truancy Project as outlined in the letter from the Rimrock Foundation dated December 31, 2004 without any monetary commitment by the School District. Judy Herzog seconded the motion. The motion carried unanimously. Budget Forecasts FY 2005-2006 Leo Hudetz provided a summary of employees eligible to retire by December 31, 2005 by employee classification and by age distribution. 43% of our employees are eligible to retire on full or partial benefits. The average number of employees retiring each year is 33 and the average severance package is $23,536. The audit report shows a liability of $16,268,000 for compensated absences. This is an unfunded liability. This report indicates a potential personnel problem and a potential fiscal problem. The District is proposing legislation to be able to use the Retirement Fund to sponsor early retirement incentives. Dale said we need to think about putting money into reserves for unfunded liability; and, our biggest advantage to the District would be in Administrative retirements. Financial Reports – December, 2004 (Unaudited) Leo is looking into Indirect costs and will report on it at the next meeting. Jerry will present his analysis of the maintenance and operation function of the District at the next meeting. Minutes – December 06, 2004 Dale Getz introduced a motion to approve the December 06, 2004 Business Committee minutes as corrected. Judy Herzog seconded the motion. The motion carried unanimously. Minutes – December 13, 2004 Dale Getz introduced a motion to approve the December 13, 2004 Business Committee minutes as presented. Judy Herzog seconded the motion. The motion carried unanimously. School-Facility Public-Private Partnerships The Appleseed Foundation has initiated a Public School-Facilities Project to study public-private partnerships for the building or renovating of public school buildings. This item was presented for information only. Additional Comments Curt said they are still meeting on the food service proposal and factoring in the healthy food nutrition concept as an amendment to the RFP. It will be presented to the Business Committee. Leo reminded everyone that Business Committee minutes will no longer be included in the monthly packet. They will be posted to the website www.billings.k12.mt.us. (Select Forums, and then either Business Committee Minutes to read minutes, or Business Committee Agendas to see the entire agenda.) Adjournment There being no further business the meeting was adjourned at 7:25 p.m. Malcolm Goodrich, Chair Sherrill Sullins, Recorder Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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