Planning and Development Committee Meeting, January 8, 2007

[Marta McAllister]

Proceedings of the Planning and Development Committee

School District No. 2, Yellowstone County

High School District No. 2, Yellowstone County

Billings, Montana

 

January 8, 2007

 

 

The Planning and Development Committee Meeting of School District No. 2, Yellowstone County, Montana, and the High School District, Yellowstone County, Montana was duly held at The Lincoln Center, 415 North 30th Street, Billings, Montana, Monday, January 8th, 2007 at 5:30 p.m.

 

 

Members present: Trustee Malcolm Goodrich, Kathy Olson, Executive Director of Elementary Education, Cheryl Malia McCall, Margaret Aukshun, Anne Barlow, Al Bloomer, Todd Buchanan, Kristi Fred, Cindy Gopp, Sara Nyquist, MD. Also attending; Rich Whitney, Director of Facilities and featured speaker SD2 Superintendent Jack Copps.

 

Call to Order- Trustee Goodrich will Chair themeeting for Sandra Mossman.

 

Communication from the Public- There were no comments from the public.

 

Potential Facility Use Adjustment Plans-

Superintendent Jack Copps reported to the committee on the Potential Facility Use Adjustment Plans in the Billing Public Schools. He noted that there is a business group that is comprised of non-district 2 employees, who will be promoting a mill levy. They will be organizing to raise resources to educate the public on the needs of the school district. They have asked what our priorities are and what we would need resources for.

The targets for the elementary school would be full-day kindergarten. A few months ago it looked positive for full-day kindergarten but now Superintendent Copps is not so optimistic. If there is full-day kindergarten, and other large communities in the state of Montana adopt all-day kindergarten, it would be an incentive for Billings to follow suit and to offer the same education that would be advantageous to parents looking at locating their families in the Billings area. All-day kindergarten clearly helps in early intervention and benefits students at-risk. It is viewed as a great investment in public education. If there isn’t all-day kindergarten, than other priorities need to be addressed.

 

There are 21 elementary schools. Billings needs to decide on whether they want to preserve the neighborhood school concept or do something else. The western side of the community is growing and schools such as Arrowhead have kindergarten students bused to other schools. As of next year, other students may have to be bused to other schools as well. Superintendent Copps stated we either have to maximize the efficiency of the schools by loading the classroom to their highest standard available for student/ teacher ratio, or accept the neighborhood concept, which is to allow smaller classes to exist. If the neighborhood concept were accepted, then below the rims, the district would need to employ 10 additional teachers at $40,000.00 each. Another problem below the rims would be the existing structures. We would need to decide if we should expand our elementary infrastructure and allow an elementary school to be built further west.

 

Cottonwood is a piece of property owned by the district that an elementary school could be built on. The estimated cost for a school, that would house 400-450 students, would be approximately $6,500,000.00. The money received from the potential sale of Crossroads, $2,000,000.00, could be used and additionally, if a bond for $4,500,000.00 was approved, the State appropriates a guaranteed tax base of 48% of that money, which would reduce the cost to $2,500,000.00. The bond would be approximately $4.00 per household. Another statistic that is important, is when you look at your taxes you will see the High School tax is down 11% and Elementary 8%. The reason for this decline is growth in Billings. The big businesses, such as motels, tax monies are spread around Billings which decreases the public’s tax bill. The school doesn’t receive any of this money. This is a good time to consider a bond levy for a new elementary school on the Cottonwood property.

 

If the full-day kindergarten goes into affect, then below the rims, the schools would then be able to put their respective kindergarten students in their own neighborhood schools. In the heights area, reopening Beartooth School would make it possible to preserve the neighborhood concept. There hasn’t been a new elementary school in Billings for 22 years. The average age of an elementary school is 46 years.

 

Superintendent Copps feels the Career Center should be called School District 2 School of Technology. We are now seeing the partnering with SD2 and College of Technology. Students of the Career Center are able to take courses with the College of Technology and their credits are transferable throughout the University system. The Career Center is full because West high school freshman are located there because there is no room at West High. Because of the perception of the Lincoln Center housing too many administrators, he feels that if you move the West High freshman to the 2nd floor of the Lincoln Center and the central administration out into another building, it would help the perception. Some of the possibilities are: if there is no kindergarten in this community, ECI could be moved out of Rimrock and administration moved in. There are other facilities in the community that could be leased to accommodate the administration staff.

 

Trustee Goodrich questioned why would we bus other students out of the elementary schools and Superintendent Copps stated we would be exceeding our accreditation standards and there would be no choice but to, in fact, bus them.

 

Al Bloomer questioned the long-term projection. Jack commented we lost approximately 100 elementary students this year, but right now the numbers are increasing in the K-1st grade level.

 

Trustee Goodrich claimed demographics are changing and putting pressure on certain schools. There is redistribution of families moving the students around.

 

Trustee Goodrich claimed the City County Planning Dept. reported that there are three growth areas: the heights, southside including Lockwood, and west end. Superintendent Copps stated there are two new housing developments in the heights and one development is over 500 homes and the other has over 200 homes.

 

Superintendent Copps feels that building a new elementary school on the West end is imperative, especially if full-day kindergarten is adopted. Professional Educators are recommending full-day kindergarten.

 

Trustee Goodrich feels that business leaders understand the benefit economically to support education. People are tax-leery. Trustee Goodrich commented, the building of the new high school has not been accepted and his idea would be to creatively use the existing facilities as much as possible, sell the excess assets and take that cash burden off the taxpayers. That possibly will allow us to keep the neighborhood schools. He proposes we sell Crossroads, receive the rebate back from the state, and that would finance three-fourths of the Cottonwood school. If the community doesn’t want neighborhood schools, then it would be a different scenario.

 

Cindy Gopp, a teacher at Lockwood claims their community anticipated full-day kindergarten and therefore they passed their levy in preparation for it.

 

Sara Nyquist, MD and Cindy Gopp would like to see students out amongst neighborhoods encouraging a levy. Superintendent Copps said that would not be legally possible in SD2. School personnel cannot promote levies on school time or use district resources to organize students.

 

Sara Nyquist, MD stated that the hospitals welcome change and want students to get a great education and be future hospital employees.

 

Trustee Goodrich would like to see school budgets from 5 years to 10 years. Trustee Goodrich said that a bond vote of 2007 would need an analysis from this committee, how to sell, go further, or go back and how to proceed with this. There will be a mill levy vote in May.

 

Kristi Fred asked why there wasn’t a partnership with the College of Technology addressed before now.

 

Trustee Goodrich stated the College came and asked. The college is expanding and the partnership could affect our economic base. There is discussion ongoing about this partnership. Currently, we have a medical career program at the Career Center that is off campus and at the clinic. There are some concerns about dual credits.

 

Superintendent Copps felt we are extremely fortunate to have access to Rocky Mountain College, MSU-B, and the Career Center. We need to be smart about this and not incur a lot of taxes.

 

Trustee Goodrich commented that SD2 currently, has no indebtedness at the high school and we will need to be looking at investments into the high schools. Engaging all people on the issues would best serve the district.

 

Superintendent Copps noted that there are going to be several articles in the Gazette on the schools plans. The Gazette has been cooperative in educating it’s readers of the concerns of the school district community.

 

Superintendent Copps overviewed The General Fund Budget Forecast FY 2007-2008 with the committee.

He first discussed the Elementary District General Fund. He shared with the committee the budget forecast for the year 2007 and 2008. The report established three different scenarios under columns Assumption #1, #2, and #3. Under Assumption #1 the balance showed what the numbers would be if the community made no changes. After the ANB count (Average Number Belonging), the revenue that will be available to us, less the expenses (textbooks, salaries inclusive of 3% cost of living, steps and lanes for teachers, etc.), we will show a deficit of almost $2,000,000.00. Assumption #2 is inclusive of the Governor’s proposed budget. The balance shown is without a mill levy and would leave us with about $1,000,000.00 short. Assumption #3 is a breakdown if there would be all-day kindergarten. If the Assumptions would include a levy at its maximum we would no longer have a deficit and would leave us with about $400,000.00. The loss of the students (approximately 80) at the middle school level reduced our revenue $685,000.00.

 

The High School District General Fund forecast demonstrates the year 2007 and for the year 2008. In the forecast for the year 2008, the Assumption #1 balance is if there are no changes made with the funding and a deficit of -$166,161.00. Under Assumption #2 with the Governors proposed budget the balance would be $147,720.00.

 

Although the numbers for the high school budget look more favorable, the Billings Public Schools have 8% less resources than other AA schools in the State and compared to Helena, we are 22% behind. Helena is at 100% because they pass a $1,000,000.00 technology levy every year. Superintendent Copps informed the committee that the Governors proposal of $2,400,000.00 increases would only be on 80% of the budget.

 

Superintendent Copps detailed the formula how schools receive revenue in the state and why some districts have more. The legislature gave $90,000,000.00 to the schools but that is broken down into two years.

 

Trustee Goodrich commented that there are structural issues with the funding system and this committee will be advantageous in the long-term engagement process to educate people why education is important as a whole. As the committee goes forward they can focus on particular issues. Trustee Goodrich hopes the committee can go to the board with specific recommendations. All-day kindergarten and neighborhood schools will be topics on the agenda next month. If the state does provide funding for all-day kindergarten then we need to consider if it is what the community wants.

 

Approval of the Minute for January 8, 2007-

Al Bloomer moved to approve the minutes and Kristi Fred noted a typo for an amendment and Cheryl Malia-McCall seconded the motion.

 

Voting in favor were Trustee Goodrich, Kathy Olson, Cheryl Malia-McCall, Margaret Aukshun, Anne Barlow, Cindy Gopp, Sara Nyquist, MD, Todd Buchanan, Al Bloomer, and Kristi Fred.

The motion passed unanimously.

 

 

As there was no further business the meeting adjourned at 7:20.

 

 

 

___________________

Sandra Mossman, Chair

 

 

___________________

Barb Gustafson, Recorder