Appropriations & Oversight Committee — 2019-06-03
Attendance
Manisha Bewtra ; Robert A. Boisselle ; Scott M. Forbes ; Jennifer L. Lemmerman ; Kate Lipper-Garabedian ; Shawn M. MacMaster ; Monica C. Medeiros ; Peter D. Mortimer ; John N. Tramontozzi ; Francis X. Wright Jr. ; Michael P. Zwirko
Agenda
Minutes
CITY OF MELROSE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE CALENDAR● JUNE 3, 2019 Aldermanic Chamber, Melrose City Hall Budget Hearing 7:30 PM 562 Main Street, Melrose, MA 02176 The public should take notice that the Melrose Board of Aldermen may, on certain occasions, have a quorum in attendance due to standing committees of the Board of Aldermen consisting of both voting and non-voting members. Members attending this duly posted meeting are participating and deliberating only in conjunction with the business of the standing committee. Attendee Name Title Status Arrived Kate Lipper-Garabedian Chair Present Robert A. Boisselle Vice Chair Present Peter D. Mortimer Voting Present John N. Tramontozzi Voting Present Francis X. Wright Jr. Voting Present Monica C. Medeiros Voting Present Scott M. Forbes Voting Present Michael P. Zwirko Voting Present Manisha Bewtra Voting Present 7:36 PM Shawn M. MacMaster Voting Present Jennifer L. Lemmerman President/Ex Officio Member Present
ORDER-2019-85 Operating Budgets (City, School, Regional School) City of Melrose Operating Budget for Fiscal Year 2020 in the amount of $86,662,987.61. (Eighty-Six Million, Six Hundred Sixty-Two Thousand, Nine Hundred Eighty-Seven Dollars and Sixty-One Cents). Recommitted City of Melrose Page 1 Updated 6/4/2019 10:40 AM
Transcript
▶ 0:00 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: The hour being 7 30 on Monday, June 3rd, 2019. The Committee on Appropriations of the Melrose Board of Aldermen is called to order. I am Chair Alderman Lipper-Garabedian and I'm joined tonight by Member Vice Chair Alderman Boisselle and Alderman Peter Mortimer, Alderman John Tramontozzi, Alderman Frank Wright, Alderman Monica Medeiros, Alderman Scott Forbes, Alderman Michael Zwirko, and Alderman Shawn McMaster and President Lemmerman. In accordance with the Master and the Laws, this meeting is being broadcast live on MMTV and streaming on MMTV online. It will also be available on the City of Melrose website. Is there a motion to open the floor for public comment? So moved, Madam Chair. Second. We have a motion to open
▶ 0:46 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: the floor for public comment made by Alderman Mortimer, seconded by Alderman Forbes. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? This is the portion of the meeting where any member of the public who's here tonight can come forward to speak on any order before us on our agenda tonight we are going to be reviewing the vocational technical regional school and the Melrose public school proposed budgets good evening if you will just state your name for the record my name is Jerry Morrows 62 Mount Vernon Street silence my device here I spoke to you last week about the reporting of items in the school departments end of the year reports to the state I put together a quick spreadsheet and I apologize it's not a little bit nicer to look at but um when you look at the top of it the
▶ 2:00 school security line items you'll see that from 2009 we had zero monies reported does everybody have one of these by the way okay and then we started reporting 220 230 280 thousand all the way up to 306 thousand in 2015 we jumped to 1.6 million in 2017 1.4 million in 2018 I think most of us can acknowledge that these weren't real expenditures in school security and I think the school departments acknowledge that as well underneath that I have an incomplete listing of monies applied toward textbook software media materials from 2009 to 2018 a missing 2013 here but you can see that I believe it was an FY 12 or FY 13 maybe was FY 13 that we actually had that bond for textbooks and and it was a huge thing that we did that we spent so much money on it but we had
▶ 3:05 been reporting every year that we were spending around a million dollars for textbooks software media materials we're even showing right now those kinds of 400,000 and most recent year $353,000 so the question is is who's actually looking at the books who's making sure that mistakes aren't made the audits that we talked about in the city and of the schools you need to make certain that you understand that they aren't audits that are going down to look at the level of what expenses it's not there's no test to see did an expense get made and was put in an appropriate category they're high level audits the crosswalk for the end of the year reporting is basically saying okay from the city's accounting system to the
▶ 3:56 way the state wants to see it we take this number from here and put it here it doesn't go and challenge any of the expenses that the city or the schools report at the level i raise this issue tonight in the context of your budget hearing is that you as the alderman i think i would hope you'd like to know things like this i would hope that you'd want to understand that despite the the proclamations of the city auditor that everything is perfect no need to look behind any of the numbers that's presented here this is these are just two simple examples of of why you could and i want to be clear that probably going back seven or eight years and nine or ten years i was calling out some of these discrepancies
▶ 4:40 you would think that somebody who was paying attention would say what's he talking about and go and look at it nobody ever cared to look at it so in this budget process when the schools come to you or when departments come to you or the auditor comes to you and says oh this is just perfect and wonderful that's exactly how it is and you need to question that if you don't if you keep I'll it this way very bluntly if you keep accepting the misrepresentations that are made to you in by people here and act on those misrepresentations you're shirking your responsibilities as well and you know tonight is the night you're looking at schools but this does apply to water and sewer functions it applies to every department that you have
▶ 5:28 again the school security numbers add up to more than five million dollars that were reported wrongly now somebody could say well maybe somebody was trying to protect the city and make certain it looked like we were meeting net school spending requirements and so they were misrepresenting things that were charged to the early childhood center we're going to put in there just to make it look better well that obviously would be inappropriate to do but which is more inappropriate that somebody made a mistake year after year after year from 2010 on and never caught it despite the fact that somebody in the public had been raising a question about it or that somebody was doing something different with it
▶ 6:14 again I'm not saying here anywhere that any money was spent on a purpose that would go to the benefit of any individual person but if you don't know where the monies are being spent and what monies are applied to what things the huge abyss of the revolving accounts and all the money that comes from that this is part of those issues and if nobody ever looks at it how do you really know what monies the schools need in the large level and how can you trust the breakdown that they give you year by year in their budget as that that's how the funds are going to be applied one other thing is that the school committee is charged with setting policy by voting on a budget and in expressing their policy through that budget the school
▶ 7:17 committee for no legitimate reason has carved out in recent years these this artificial dichotomy of salaries versus non salaries now I acknowledge that they that there's a budget presented but that budget presented they don't have to adhere to right the superintendent if it's salaries non-salary she can she can have salaries and be hiring clowns every day because their salaries and not you know salaries and I figure what the other distinction they make is but obviously materials and that type of thing but I would think if I was on the board of alderman that i would challenge the school department to say what are your priorities how do you express them your policy priorities how do you express them in the budget and whether
▶ 8:05 it's somebody on salary or somebody not on salary or materials or computers or whatever else that's not a policy expression about how you educate our children at some level you're saying we want some people involved but it's not saying anything more direct than that now i think that there's a responsibility of the school committee to do that because if they don't give that direction to their superintendent the superintendent then isn't being led by the people of Melrose right she's doing what she wants to do whether arbitrarily or not but it's not it's it's not flowing from the Board of Aldermen saying to the schools you can have this much money in the school saying we need this much money because we want to make certain that we get this out of us schools for our
▶ 8:46 children anyway all this data is publicly available information I didn't create any of it some of its from old files in my computer from desi from years ago you know you don't have to work for the you know Department of Education or the Executive Office of Education to get access to these to these numbers but I think it's important for you to question the schools about how does this happen why does this happen why does it take a public records request of a person a formal public records request you know after 10 years for somebody to look at this and finally say oops we made a mistake somewhere thank you thank you any other Member of the public wishing to speak tonight motion to close public comment madam chair second you have a motion to close
▶ 9:35 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: public comment made by alderman Mortimer and seconded by vice chair boys all in favor any opposed and I recognize that alderman future has joined us so we have on our agenda tonight one order and two departments and so I'll go ahead and read the order and we'll see if we have time to start I know we're gonna try to recess right at 745 because we have the middle school students here to do to be recognized but our first order of business for the Appropriations Committee's order number two zero one nine dash eight five city of Melrose operating budget for fiscal year 2020 in the amount of eighty six million six hundred sixty two thousand nine hundred eighty seven dollars and sixty one cents motion to suspend the rules that we may hear from the representative of
▶ 10:20 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: the vocational school second the motion to suspend the rules made by alderman Mortimer seconded by Vice Chair Boisselle all in favor aye opposed excellent so we would be welcome our guests to join us from the Northeast Metropolitan Regional Vocational School thank you so much for coming tonight thanks so this is actually my eighth year coming up here first as principal and in the past for a superintendent so we're gonna change things around a little bit tonight though I'm gonna have a mr. Cohn present his budget report and then afterwards if there are any questions I'd be more than happy to answer them thanks for having me I believe you have this PowerPoint presentation in your packet I provided
▶ 11:04 to all the Member as well as a copy of the budget thank you and they're also available online for the public yes the goal of the FY 20 budget when we when we set out to develop a budget every fiscal year we always have two goals in mind we want to minimize the impact to our member communities we understand that our member communities have significant financial constraints melrose being one you have a 94 residential tax base very hard to raise money through taxation because it's prop two and a half and we're cognizant when it comes to that and also we want to provide an adequate level of funding to support student learning and foster educational excellence because ultimately that's what we're
▶ 11:43 here to do we're here to be melrose's other other school and we want to offer the the same level of excellence that melrose public schools offers to their students at northeast so regionalization exists by definition to offer services at a reduced cost to its member communities so when we set out to do our budgets our initial goal we want to keep it keep the assessment at or below a three percent increase and i'm happy to say this year we were able to keep the assessment increase to two hundred seventy five thousand three sixty eight which is an increase of one point nine one percent and then so I'm going to talk about one of the slides where it says minimal minimizing financial impact historical
▶ 12:33 assessment analysis it shows a comparison for FY 18 FY 19 and FY 20 and FY 18 we went up one point eight six percent FY 19 we went up two point three eight percent we just like an FY 20 we went down one to one point nine one percent the reason why we able to to to offset this this assessment cost or this operating budget cost and offer such a low assessment is for two reasons we have an increase in state funding our chapter 70 formula due to the revamp of the chapter 70 funding formula we received 10 million we're projected to receive 10 million 458 068 based on the the numbers why that's significant is because it represents an increase of eight hundred and sixty thousand dollars over the last FY 19 funding we're going to use all of that to offset the member
▶ 13:35 assessments we also intend to receive nine hundred thousand dollars in transportation aid that we're going to use to offset we're going to receive it this year and use it to offset FY 20 we're also using 3.215 million from our other funding sources from E&D and our other reserves to reduce the assessments cost as well in total that we're we're using 4 million 975 216 of other funds to reduce member assessment so this doesn't come with without fiscal challenges that by 20 is no different we always have fiscal challenges and if by 20 we're looking to increase our cat we our capital project line by a million dollars to finance the feasibility study and all associated costs and with this additional infusion of a million dollars we projected we're going to not have to
▶ 14:30 come back to the cities and towns for until 2022 for additional money increase in funding for a rehab of emergency access road while we have a only one egress in and out of the school and that's a security risk so the police chief and the fire chief have recommended that we revamp our existing access road we're using five hundred fifty thousand dollars there to in the operating budget in order to do so increases for funding for OPEB we have a forty eight million dollar liability OPEB is other post-employment benefits it's basically all retirement benefits and that are not MTRS future it's a It's a future liability, but it exists on our books of 48 million. We have increases in GIC health insurance costs, increases in transportation costs due to our new contract.
▶ 15:16 Went up to about $48 per bus, and we added a bus. And additional professional and support staffing to meet student needs. So all told, our operating budget is increasing two point nine two million nine seventy five eighty four which is eleven point two eight percent however we're using that other monies that i referred to recently about um we're using two point six two million six ninety five two one six um to offset from our end from our other reserves and that equates to an increase of 275 368. Madam Chair, would you welcome a motion for recess at this time? Sorry, it didn't work out. That was very succinct and well done, and you may have more of a presentation, but if you would be so kind to let us recess to recognize some of the students who are here,
▶ 41:39 name is Henry Hooten I'm the Melrose representative to the vocational school and I'd also like to introduce Dave DeBarry who's our superintendent and Jay Picon was our financial manager so I just wanted to know that because I think we rushed into it at the beginning and you know rather than walk away and say who is that didn't even see him so I must stop by saying that I'm thankful that we didn't get our presentation completed to be able to hear the you know what the students are doing with the veterans prior to coming here I was spending time with my uncles who is a Vietnam veteran who came back from the war deeply affected in a changed man and it felt good to know that this generation not
▶ 42:30 only understands the sacrifices the veterans have made but also appreciates what they've been through so as an educator it I really was happy that I sat through that presentation so thanks Jay for taking a little longer than we had hoped all right so I think we were on the last slide probably the most of the one of most interest to uh to the uh the board of melrose um it shows that um your total student increase or in this case decrease when you went down one student it shows the assessment increase going up 1 523 total over last year and the reason why it went up um you might be saying yourself well we lost a student why did we go up we had a we had a decrease in students from other communities and what that what happens there
▶ 43:28 is melrose becomes a larger percent of the total pop school population so therefore your contribution get becomes a little bit higher so that's how you would explain that so that concludes my presentation if anybody has any questions I'd be happy to answer them thank you thank you very much I had to have you all here it's we're down one student but we're at 41 total is that correct just talk a little bit about the programs that those students are are in and then involved in what their program of study is sure I don't know the exact programs of the Melrose students but you know we do have 15 programs with the most popular currently being plumbing electrical medical assisting carpentry in auto tech so those are really the big
▶ 44:26 Francis X. Wright Jr.: five that are really filling up in the majority of the students are in those programs thank you thank you Alderman Wright thank you madam chair I just wanted to say that then alderman Infurna now mayor Infurna i would speak annually uh glowingly about the voc and um i know her son i'm not sure maybe at least one of her sons went there and i also my brother went there he was part of the machine shop program which i think is no longer there but he came out of there with a great education he worked closely at alpha d little with a lot of the world's best scientists and inventors and when he passed away they had nothing but great things about how he was able to work so independently and I know that training came from the years he spent at the Vogue
▶ 45:26 Michael P. Zwirko: and you do a lot of great things a very quiet way up there for a lot of kids who seek an alternate route other than college but contribute so importantly to uh community and to the world thank you thank you all the men's work though thank you madam chair just had a somewhat of a brief question so i know that you talked again about the appropriation of a million dollars for the capital projects could you speak to that a little bit what you think your time frame is i know you're entering the feasibility studies but last year you spoke about the facility itself kind of where you are in the process and what you anticipate coming down for the next couple of years and then i think earlier in the presentation you mentioned something about
▶ 46:05 how you wouldn't be coming back until 2022 if you could just expound on that a little bit as well so we were officially accepted into the feasibility stage this past april we're in the process of now of interviewing i'm setting up interviews for project managers for the opms following that we hope to get an architect as well and then we'll spend some time really looking at the three options so it's a renovation a renovation and addition and a new building and the three options that are still up in the air when that process is completed and we have an idea of which option and how much money we will be looking for we will then be coming out to the towns to try to get the project approved but we are at least a year and a half away from that point
▶ 46:56 it takes at least a year to go through the processes that i um had mentioned and then being that we have 12 communities so to go on the road to 12 towns and cities take some time as well what's the uh the age of the facility now the age is 51 years old i noticed that your enrollment is growing as well a little bit but it's still growing so right popular right we still have a a huge waiting list um you know we're always trying to find ways to maximize our space to maybe accept a couple more students here and there that really could benefit from the school but we're we're getting as close as possible before the fire chief might come down and say that's it no more kids well thanks for the update on that and
▶ 47:45 looking yes presently reimbursement presently if we call we qualify for reimbursement we're looking at a 71% reimbursement to renovate it's nothing we'd have to carry the whole charge ourselves but I mean for 71% it you know as you look down the road it's not a bad investment and based on those factors but I just want to get that out there that say well why don't we renovate the place you it's a standstill you won't get anything for the state won't give you anything for that thank you for the clarification sometimes sometimes a renovation actually the bones you're working with aren't suitable for uh you know the capacity needs that you might future have so that's the whole point of the study yeah exactly yeah so i look
▶ 48:37 forward to an update um hopefully you know before next year but i understand you know you're looking at an 18-month time frame for this so um we we have had um some breakfast with the town managers and the mayors to keep them um you know involved in the process we are looking next year to bring over some of the um councils and some of the fincom committee Member as well because the information doesn't always get to those people um and that's of nobody's particular you know fault however we're probably going to be looking for a couple more breakfasts so keep your eyes open for an invitation if you want to send over a representative or two thank you thank you for the work there's all the questions i have madam chair madam chair i would make a motion to move
▶ 49:23 the bottom line of the Northeast regional metropolitan vocational school budget in the amount of six hundred and eighty five thousand six hundred and seventy six dollars we have a motion to move the bottom line of department number 399 made by alderman Mortimer second by alderman Medeiros I'm not sure yes just I'm sorry just the regional school just just the ball right okay all in favor any opposed we will make that recommendation to the full board and thank you again for thank you so much madam chair as we are still under suspension I would ask that mr. de la Rousseau come forward and please discuss Essex agricultural school with us at this time good evening thank you This budget, number 399, includes a request for an appropriation for the Essex Agricultural in the amount of $84,700.
▶ 50:43 This represents five students. This passed for fiscal 19, we had anticipated seven students, but it ended up being four. so this year through the communications from the school they have indicated that we should plan on five and if I made through the chair to my assistant auditor Kerry golden he said from the school and said the acceptance letters to prospective ninth graders went out on Friday this is dated April 17th we've accepted one Melrose student to attend next year there's one upperclassmen that applied that could potentially be another acceptance that would bring the enrollment to four for next year which is fiscal 20 with the potential of five students attending in total next year so
▶ 51:38 we are budgeted for the five it is a bit of a moving target as we from the past as we've learned but that's the information that we have currently so the request is over thirty one thousand two hundred and forty one dollars less than last year thank you thank you do you happen to know what programs of study they're seeking through the chair I do not unless someone in this audience does maybe superintendent team or when Essex became the equivalent of Northeast prior you may remember years ago it was free of charge to any student but when it became the mega tech Aggie they were now shifted to be able to charge us tuition but under our agreement with Northeast students who go to the Aggie as a tech Aggie have to take a course of studies that is not available at
▶ 52:47 Northeast so most of the most of the students are in the veterinary tech program the husbandry program the horticulture program because those are programs not offered by Northeast and to if I may expand on mr. de la Rosa's point about its moving target what happens is it's almost like college acceptance letters have gone out your child has been accepted you know and maybe three accept and two don't now they go to the waiting list and let's say Saugus had five accepted and only three except there now they're looking to fill their seats so then they begin to work down their way down the waiting list Essex Tech will also take sophomores and they have done that with us in the past taking sophomores as latest August students who didn't make
▶ 53:35 Michael P. Zwirko: it on the freshman round so that's why it can be a little bit of a moving target thank you thank you thank you thank you madam chair just a quick question and hopefully you can answer this the we were just told by the other vocational school that funding even though the numbers went down the price actually went up because of other communities enrollment went down as well does the formula mechanism here for the Essex Aggie worked in the same way just how was how is the student assessment fee calculated you know the answer to that I could I can look into if you don't have I'm just curious if it's similar. I presume that it is. I can find out for you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Madam Chair, I would make a motion to move the bottom line for this budget in the
▶ 54:25 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: amount of $84,700 in combination with the Northeast Regional Metropolitan Vocational School budget, which we just approved in the amount of $685,000, $676 for a grant total on budget number 399 of 770 376 dollars second thank you we have a motion to move the bottom line as so described made by alderman mortimer and seconded by vice chair Boisselle all in favor opposed thank you for that recommendation to the full board and next on our agenda is our department number 300 the melrose public schools we appreciate our colleagues from the school committee in the district here tonight with us thank you madam chair Member of the board for the record my name is ed o'connell and i am the chairperson of the melrose school committee
▶ 55:24 well tonight's formal budget presentation will be in the hands of superintendent taymor i wanted to preface same with a few brief remarks on behalf of the school committee as the board is aware this has been a unique year in the annals of melrose school finance the uncertainty in anticipation of the override election outcome combined with the pendency of our teacher contract negotiations dictated that the school committee take a markedly different approach to its budget process this year this months-long endeavor which drew to a formal close with votes to approve the fiscal year 2020 budget on april 23rd reflected the several exigencies and contingencies facing us this year the school committee thoughtfully and purposefully
▶ 56:07 took a higher level approach with this year's budget aiming to create a process with ample supporting documentation that was clear concise accessible and more easily understood by a wider audience the budget approved by the committee on april 23rd reflects that approach and is true in all respects to both the process formally commenced in january and to the realities facing us then now and moving forward more specifically the budget approved by the school committee accounts in full for all of the revenues available for teaching and learning in our schools and was fully in accord with the budget process that laid up to the vote as well as the abundance of financial information shared and the
▶ 56:50 representations publicly made over the preceding several months in support of both the proposed budget and the then pending property tax override since that date the school committee has taken several further steps with regard to the school budget all in the name of transparency and accountability and accessibility on the part of the public to the information at hand on May 21st the committee was presented with a reformatted budget document that reflected not only the most up-to-date financial information available at that point but also mirrored past practice in terms of the budget layout and the fashion in which the information was presented well circumstances this year dictated a higher level approach during our budget deliberations as mentioned
▶ 57:35 the committee recognized that a desire for uniformity in formatting from year to year particularly in the wake of our community's tax override called for a return to past practice in terms of the budget format again with transparency accountability and accessibility as our top priorities the information before you this evening reflects that approach additionally the school committee agreed that it would revisit its budget again prior to the start of the next fiscal year on July 1st based primarily on the likelihood that our teachers contract would be finalized by then and we would thus have at that point a more definite sense of the financial implications of the contract on next year's budget furthermore the committee also agreed to revisit the FY 20 budget
▶ 58:22 again in a formal sense at the start of the next school year in September with The expectation that the application of the funds made available by the tax override would be largely complete and or underway by that point, particularly in connection with the hiring of faculty and staff, the purchase of supplies and materials for the school year, and any other contingencies anticipated by the tax override but not yet satisfied by the close of this year's budget process. Again, our aim was and is to be as transparent as possible, to fully account for all of the funds available for teaching and learning in our schools and to make all of the information available in ways and forms that are readily accessible and
▶ 59:03 understandable by the public at large and all of the foregoing I should note will be taking place in addition to the school committee's regular bi-weekly and monthly budget and finance reviews indeed as those who follow the school committee's work know finances are front and center throughout the year every year and not just at budget time all of that said given the uniqueness of this year in the past several months in particular it will be more than ever incumbent upon the school committee in its oversight rule to be regularly and consistently reviewing and reporting on the allocation and application of the additional revenues afforded by the tax override as has been noted elsewhere we are on the eve of a fiscal year that will bring increased scrutiny
▶ 59:48 justifiably so and a heightened sense of accountability again justifiably so the school committee is prepared to meet these challenges and more as it is proven throughout its eminently fruitful months-long budget process in conclusion madam chair and with all of the foregoing in mind the school committee respectfully requests your consideration and approval of the school department budget as presented this evening thank you each for your time and attention and And I will now leave you in the capable hands of our Superintendent, Cindy Taymor. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. O'Connell. Before we get to that, yes, Alderman Mortimer. Madam Chair, we are constrained by state law to convene the public hearing within a half
▶ 1:00:27 an hour of its posting time. We're about a minute or two behind that, so I would make a motion that we open the public hearing scheduled for 8 o'clock at this time. Thank you, Alderman Mortimer. Second. And seconded by Vice Chair Boyz-Elvis is to open the public hearing scheduled for 8 p.m. All in favor? Aye. opposed so if there's anyone in attendance with us tonight who would like to speak as part of our review of the annual operating budget now is the time to come forward I am Jerry Rose I have a question of clarification I saw that there was a budget hearing put out there this is one for the entire budget yeah the whole the whole budget okay under the agenda items there's a there's something on the IQ m2 that says budget hearing and there's nothing there and
▶ 1:01:29 that's why I didn't know if that was actually happening tonight but um so I do have some comments on the budget I've talked to you a couple times before we're applying a lot more money to the schools this year you know as a result of the override any budget discussion if it always bases it on the future off the status quo as that the status quo gonna accept them we'll just do marginal things on top of that what you do is you can make changes to the status quo that way certainly but the status quo has an undue influence over what happens in the future several years ago I think back in 2015 the school committee was actually talking more about or had some discussions around different budgeting
▶ 1:02:28 processes and and how to do things and zero-based budgeting is clearly a a valuable um exercise to go through and try to do the work of actually evaluating why do we want to fund a certain element and why don't we um but you can apply that to the whole city instead of just taking every year and saying well 2.3 percent more or 1.9 percent more here or there because of the salary increases i think it's it's a really useful looks um exercise to go and look at you know why are we doing this why do we have these people working here why are we buying these things why do we send you know the fire truck out on every call for every little thing and then claim we need a new fire truck later like re-examine the foundations of what we do
▶ 1:03:20 at all different ways instead of just saying okay here's our budget and let's do a a little bit on top of it and go from there um you know it's obviously too late for this year to do that kind of exercise but you know as you're closing up this year is the time that you can start thinking about these things for next year and you know at this time every year with the school committee with the alderman i basically say that you know budgeting can be a year-round process because it may not be about the numbers it may be about defining and developing what your priorities are in function to then later on try to figure out how can we apply our funds our resources to provide those functions I do have concerns always
▶ 1:04:11 about the school system and the way that they apply resources you know the high school has taken the brunt of cuts over the years and even with the override the expression the the the assertion through the override was to add a little bit to the high school but no way is near to cut the deficit at the high school the high school suffers right now daily for a lack of teachers the elementary schools have a lot more political presentation to the school committee into you there's more engaged parents by the time people got in high school it's like they've given up but that doesn't mean that the school committee doesn't need to emphasize the high school the fact that we have mixed levels of foreign language classes is absurd you know how can one level be doing what
▶ 1:05:01 they need to do when another level needs to do what they need to do and you can't mix it up in the same classroom you can't have the same instruction to people and have it effective and efficient these are the types of things that I don't see coming out of the schools I see a lot of expressions we want this position in that position that position but nobody's evaluating where go i've talked a lot here in the school committee meetings about the premises of chapter 70 and chapter 70 obviously needs to be re-examined in some ways but the premises of chapter 70 were based on what districts did years ago and how much money they applied to high schools versus middle schools to elementary schools and you know the average class size of the middle school was
▶ 1:05:52 was was 25 students per class so you'd need less money for middle schools they're more efficient to be able to operate the average class size for elementary was 22 students per class a little bit less efficient in terms of finances and what you need for teachers but that was considered what people did and as all across the state as an accepted norm for high schools it was at 17 students per class and not that all your classes are going to have 17 students you might have some classes with 25 but you would have some classes with 12 and but at a high school level that is important that kids can go and and study and achieve in the areas that they that they need and I know this isn't within your realm to
▶ 1:06:37 make decisions for the school committee but it's your leadership that can guide the school committee to then guide the superintendent to address some of these long-standing deficiencies it was always easier to cut from the high school and you didn't have people complaining as much but that doesn't mean that the high school doesn't need the money the budget the school committee comes to you with today doesn't properly fund the high school it doesn't properly staff the high school doesn't properly provide the different resources the high school needs but I can tell you that I've never seen in all my attendance the school committee meetings a real public discussion about what does the high school need more and why versus what do the elementary schools need more of and
▶ 1:07:24 why you know you all have heard about teams at the middle school and how they're so you know supposedly critical to the needs of students well teams at the middle school have been a really inefficient use of resources for melrose for a lot of years and teams of the middle schools aren't this be all and end all of that somehow education magically happens my plea for you is that at the the higher level let's find a way as a community to establish what our priorities are not just continue the priorities of 20 years ago and 10 years ago and eight years ago but let's look at the community today you know we heard an outcry at the last school committee meeting which I was sorry not to be able to attend you know about people complaining about you know the the
▶ 1:08:18 Ecamp and I had I was amused at some level and not that it's an amusing topic but I was amused that it felt as if some of the people who don't like the idea of Ecamp leaving are people that don't understand that Ecamp was actually a poor substitute for what needs to happen within the classrooms and within the schools on a daily or weekly basis we have El Pond to go do science nature things we have the fells we have the gardens outside that you can go and do science in you don't have to travel to Maine or Cape Cod or Rhode Island to do real science and if students do it on an ongoing ongoing basis they're much better off for it but Melrose has okay I'll close it thank you thank you what what the issue is though is that nobody's had a discussion about why
▶ 1:09:14 don't we do a competent science curriculum at the elementary level that includes field study right everybody's talking about oh we need a camp and that's been frankly for a long time the school's approach is that oh well he camp will take care of it and parents are funding what seventy five thousand dollars a year to pay for a camp hasn't been a school function but in closing what I'd like to say though is that is that we can discuss these things the The override conversation was not really a comprehensive discussion, in fact, I can point out a thousand different misrepresentations that occurred in the whole discussion. The teacher's contract for one. But the reality is, is that how can we open up this community to have a dynamic conversation
▶ 1:10:01 Peter D. Mortimer: about what our needs are, what our priorities are, and how we want to address those in the future. And as you close out this budget season, the conversations can start. Even before you talk about numbers, a conversation can start about what we do and why we do it and what we want to do. Thank you. Thank you. Madam Chair, before I make a motion to conclude the public hearing, I'm wondering if there's any other Member of the public in the gallery who would like to comment at this public hearing at this time. Seeing none, I'll make a motion to conclude the public hearing. Second. We have a motion to conclude the public hearing made by Alderman Mortimer and seconded by Vice Chair Boisselle. All in favor?
▶ 1:10:41 Aye. Opposed? Three. that concludes our public hearing and we can ask back representatives of the Melrose public schools to discuss with us this budget request good evening again thank you for being here thank you did you have any opening remarks um I'm just waiting for my partner of course again thank you it's always an opportunity to help share the great work that we're doing in the Melrose public schools as mr. O'Connell captured this year was a particularly arduous process we did develop excuse me two budgets an A and a B one hoping we receive the override and one preparing if we did not and I thank these citizens of Melrose because they did see fit to provide us with five point one million dollars what
▶ 1:11:47 i would remind everyone is the 5.1 million dollars is certainly not a windfall it helped restore some positions we've cut over the years including high school and middle school it helps address the growing population we're looking at approximately 4 100 students for next fall it addresses issues of compensation for our staff in which we were not competitive and it begins to address our never-ending space issue with the return of the BB to the schools the budget the Union has ratified the MEA has ratified their end of the contract the school committee will vote on at June 11th so until then of course it is a confidential matter until it is ratified by all parties at which point it will be shared but I will tell you we are very pleased with the contract negotiations
▶ 1:12:46 Robert A. Boisselle: we did interest-based bargaining it is the third time I have done interest-based bargaining with our Union it's a really enlightening process as you try to find what your common interests are and find solutions for the benefit of our students and it was a very fruitful negotiation this time not only in terms of money but in terms of some significant changes and how we will approach business here in Melrose so that I'm glad to take questions thank you madam chair thank you for coming this evening in the data that we have we have a Melrose public schools f20 final budget dated 521 in the munis budget stated 529 2019 and that's the last budget that we have is that correct these are the budgets that we should be working with yes okay going through the
▶ 1:13:55 Robert A. Boisselle: budgets both budgets I've come across some numbers there's probably some shifting of numbers doing that time period one of the numbers is the Roosevelt School had a in the school budget 2.8 million and in the munis budget has 2.9 million is is there a difference in or some adjustment being made in the system so it's an it's an in-and-out on special education so one of the hot one of the hotter things for us to do this early in the season is to decide where our special education staff are going to be dispersed to we're in the middle of moving around some of our sub separate programs such as our TLC our therapeutic learning center we're creating a new program for severe disabilities so we're moving some staff around the other thing that we and this
▶ 1:15:02 Robert A. Boisselle: goes to mr. O'Connell statement earlier that you'll see more iterations of the budget as we get closer to the beginning of the year one of the things is currently where we assign related service staff depends on students IEPs we are still in the process of renewing students IEPs once we have student service delivery grids miss white-lamb right and her staff will determine what the FT's ease are that are needed at the different buildings and then we'll disperse the staff throughout the budget accordingly so right now a lot of that stuff is pooled okay so since you mentioned special education as the process special education in the budget is 5.7 million and in the munis is 5.6 so is that the shifting that you were referring to yes okay good now in the
▶ 1:15:58 Robert A. Boisselle: administration section you have 1.1 million in your budget in Munis is 983 thousand about 121 thousand different so if you remember in the in the override we're adding two administrators so that that could be the reason we're adding two administrators well actually I wouldn't say I wouldn't say two really we're we're adding one but reshifting positions so that our elementaries will have two of our elementaries will have assistant principals and a third elementary will have a combination point five assistant principal point five team leader so that our larger elementaries that are now over 400 will have a second layer of administration okay in the system wide system our system wide you have 2.7 in your budget but the munis has 2.9 million it's just an offset it's
▶ 1:16:58 Robert A. Boisselle: an offset what it's an offset when you add up the new administration and you take it so it's zeros out okay now with that offset music disappears in the munis system while your budget has $11,000 there but it doesn't show up in the munis system as music again we're not at the point where we're dispersing it to buildings yet we're pooling up what pool we have not made all our purchases we're deciding we're looking at the identification organization and object numbers they there's a difference but in the munis bitch budget versus what you have in your budget it's part of the all them in the by make with the chair the music was $11,000 correct in the school by document that the way it looks 11,000 shows up in general supplies
▶ 1:17:54 Robert A. Boisselle: textbooks and dooms in section system wide code 99 the last three items on the section right the music and the administration together no it's in the system wide right I know the system wide represents two million nine eighteen five eighty one so I'm just looking did you change the names for these they haven't been moved into their categories yet because we haven't we haven't dispersed out so they're holding in the holding they're holding right yeah holding in a general supplies textbooks and do section right okay that we're just holding right yeah because you were there was a deficit of eleven thousand you mentioned that it's just put in those slots until it's dedicated right thank you all right thank you very much Thank You madam chair Alderman Medeiros
▶ 1:18:50 Monica C. Medeiros: thank you thank you very much I know I had come before the school committee meeting it previously asking for a more detailed budget and I I really appreciate the budget that the school committee voted on as a final budget document may 21st which we have in our packet and it's in the IQ m2 so it just really it's I think quite a benefit to the public to have a more inclusive and complete document with the budget message and the prior years actual and you know this year's budgeted and so on for reference and I just want to thank you for that thank you as well as to show as much as possible where the override funds will be allocated i know some of that will be hammered out as time goes by but it's
▶ 1:19:37 Monica C. Medeiros: i think it's very important to show that to the public thank you and i credit miss farrell for doing all that work thank you um i just want to clarify that we are voting in our budget for the for the board of alderman our our motion tonight will be to accept the bottom line of 32 million three hundred thirty eight thousand six hundred sixty seven dollars and fifty cents is that correct okay and that is not the entirety of the school budget um i think we see on i want to say it's page six in the budget document the breakdown of the funding is the city of melrose funding with the number that i just mentioned the 32 odd million medicaid funding zero and then the the Melrose Public School offsets of $3,802,983. Exactly. Okay. And so that means that the whole
▶ 1:20:30 Monica C. Medeiros: entire school budget is really $36,141,650. So I think, you know, people at home might be wondering why are these numbers different? And so the number that's in the full budget document of the $32-odd million for the school committee is the city's portion that we're voting on tonight, although the whole document is here for our review. If I may, through the chair, good point, because on page 6, it does say the city of Melrose funding portion $32,338,667 spelled out, and then again, underneath it, it talks about the offsets, $3,802,983 for the $36,141,656. up yeah thank you and that's uh and the offsets are included uh maybe uh page 22 22 22 and that includes uh all kinds of different fund balances um revolving accounts and so on and those those
▶ 1:21:32 Monica C. Medeiros: just so people understand those do not um the athlete the athletic revolving accounts the circuit breaker facility rentals and so on uh those funds do not come through this board of alderman at all and do we see does the public if they wanted to see these funds do they see is there any place where this information is public like the transactions that kind of go in and out or is that something that would just be available through public records request it's a summary report that it would be available through public records requests you certainly would not see the deposits that come in and out from individual families um but there there is a report that is run monthly on the status of each of the revolving funds okay so that's that's
▶ 1:22:23 Monica C. Medeiros: available if somebody wants to look at it yes yes okay and i just wanted to clarify that um i know when we had been talking about and and uh deciding whether or not to put the override question on the ballot the money came up that's the transfer that we've made usually sort of a pass-through it's usually historically been about three hundred thousand dollars and that that would not continue if the override were to pass and i just know at the most recent um one of the most recent meetings that superintendent taymor you had mentioned expecting to receive that so i just want to make sure that that that's clear is that included in this budget if i make the chair um the you're absolutely correct what happened in the past we made appropriation of say 750 000 from
▶ 1:23:12 free cash that won't be happening in the fall we had a 300 000 allocation for medicaid reimbursement which really um was 225 on top of the 75 000 that typically would have been provided for medicaid reimbursement so what you will see this year will be the medicaid reimbursement that's that you'll see in the fall but you will not see the other appropriations so that will continue oh yes that has to continue yes it has to it has to continue okay because we have to receive we we apply for it by asking families for permission to build medicare for the related services their children receive so the money comes into the general fund and then we turn it over to the school department okay um and could you uh talk a little bit about some of the um items that are here i know i see
▶ 1:24:04 Monica C. Medeiros: in the different uh school by school breakdown there's some information about um materials say for for the library and um health and mpe and so on are we expecting that those amounts will continue on a year-to-year basis or is this something that is are the things being purchased expected to be like one-time things and then maybe you move that money elsewhere next year that's a little bit of bed well i would hope i hope that the money stays steady and we don't have to do that i mean that's often a um a choice that school committees make when budgets are tight um because we're a labor-intensive business and our goal is always to keep children teachers in front of children and sometimes we sacrifice supplies in order to pay for teachers and
▶ 1:24:58 Monica C. Medeiros: sometimes we sacrifice other positions to pay for teachers because that's what we want most of all as teachers so i'm thinking like you know sometimes some of these things may be uh these are you know maybe these are real these are these are these are you know these are reoccurring costs and could you just talk a little bit about the timeline I know you said that June 11th is when you're expecting the school committee to ratify the teachers contract the timeline and you know when you'll make the final decisions about some of the positions for hiring and when those will go out to post so they're posted now the ones that we can post we posted immediately on April 3rd everything we could post such as the middle school
▶ 1:25:48 teachers the high school teachers the guidance counselor other positions have taken more conversation we want to make sure that we're hiring correctly for our current needs it's a long time since last September to April and sometimes needs arise during the course of the year that helped define what you're looking for we also had to write some job descriptions so we have posted for the social worker and a social emotional coach so those two the social emotional coach is a variation of the social worker that we worked up with the elementary principals we have not posted for the two administrators I have to impact bargain actually I'm scheduled to impact bargain tomorrow with the Teamsters who represent unit B so until we impact bargain those positions we
▶ 1:26:34 cannot post them what else remains the specialists of the specialists that's a that's a little harder nut to crack we have a committee of teachers and administrators who are who are literally physically planning how many specialists does each building need in order to give teachers their prep I don't know if everybody understands that but in order for our classroom teachers the generalists at the elementary school to have their preparatory period the specialists cover their class so we have to see how many teachers do we have how many periods do we need how many specialists do we have what are we what are we down with the increase in enrollment how many specialists do we have to hire so it's really splitting hairs to some degree am i hiring another
▶ 1:27:26 0.4 art teacher or 0.2 music teacher or a 1.0 digital literacy so that is literally the process we are going through now and once that committee reports back to me what they've come to we will post those as well okay and the Beebe school is there a plan in place yet for that school we're still negotiating with seam about their vacating the lease and we've done a preliminary walkthrough miss Gaffney mr. Schenner and I have all done preliminary walkthroughs we have an idea of the scope of work but right now planning that really depends on when seam leaves the building that will impact what work gets done when and perhaps mr. de la russa could speak to I know the override includes the money for the loss of the lease.
▶ 1:28:25 What happens since we, are we going to lose the lease immediately in September? This coming September, no. No. So what happens in this fiscal year that we're coming into to the money that we're collecting for the loss of the lease that's in the override? Does that go into a special fund or? We have set up a fund, a school department fund for facilities slash BB that just records all the revenue coming in from the BB from July 1st forward separately. Absolutely correct. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Alderman with questions. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you again for being here this evening. a few questions of in the section on special education so I know that interventionists are worth their weight in gold they do very credible work in
▶ 1:29:28 Michael P. Zwirko: identifying students that may be on the cusp of needing some extra additional instruction and can actually prevent those students from leaving the districts which thus can raise costs so that discussion came up a lot as you were going through and preparing the budget this year so I'm looking at the page 20 of the immunist document and I believe that the two line items that are applicable for my questioning have to do they are called I believe it's a collective tuition and the non-public I don't know if those are the areas but though I have it seems that they're projected to raise considerably and I don't know if something occurred in this past school year or what we're anticipating for the next school year with respect to these costs could is it
▶ 1:30:19 something with our student population could you address those so so it's much more than the interventionist the interventionist work with that was a good description all the things were ago they work with the general students who are showing some need that if you do a targeted and speedy intervention will prevent further need the special ed costs on page 20 of Munis for those students who have already been identified as eligible for special education under the process and have a individualized education program so again the numbers flux depending on what the need is and and the type of position fluxes on depending on the type of need so for example one of the things that came up this past year that was an unexpected cost is as students came into
▶ 1:31:15 the early childhood center out of early intervention we had an uptick in students needing speech-language services so we had to add a point to speech-language pathologist over the course of the year to meet those services one of the things we talk about is our occupational therapy and our physical therapy as we have students who have some more involved needs where typically you do not see OT and PT following students to the middle in the high school we're seeing more of that so that's a consideration that impacts the choices we're making I reference that we are in the process of setting up a a program for special ed students that have more significant and severe needs and that will be a new teaching position for us that we will add in response to
▶ 1:32:09 that again with the goal goal of keeping kids in district it's not just a money matter it's a matter of what's right they belong in their neighborhood schools so that's our effort so that's why you see these costs fluctuate so with those two specific lines it's it's just what we anticipate for this coming fiscal year and the the lines are ninety four hundred ninety three hundred I guess is the best way to identify them okay it says it's about halfway down on page 20 collective tuition non-public no that's collaborative tuition well I'm sorry the same collaborative right so again that number fluctuates also how many students we have out of district we did have an issue this year and I think you may have been at the meeting that we discussed addressing it again so special
▶ 1:33:08 education law requires that any student moves into the district from another district in which they are receiving collaborative services we are immediately responsible for those collaborative services so if I have a child let's say who's going maybe not to seen but is going to shore collaborative and the bill is 73,000 and they move in halfway during the year right away Marianne knows that she now has a $35,000 bill we did not anticipate plus transportation the move-in law for private special education schools and I again for the public sake they are not private that's just a term we use there's seven six six schools run by private nonprofits but they are recognized public schools and we were obligated to them the move-in law on
▶ 1:33:54 that is if a student moves in prior to April 1st we pick up the tuition the next fiscal year if they move in Apple after April 1st the their previous district picks up the tuition for the next school year and we pick pick it up the subsequent right now I will tell you we and I have shared this with school committee we are anticipating two rather heavy-duty move-ins miss white Lambright is trying to negotiate on one of them right now hopefully doing a car share with another district but we're waiting on a ruling from Jesse to tell us whether or not that is successful and we will know better probably at the end of June the beginning of July what the impact of those two move-ins are on us I wanted to just draw the distinction on the intervention to send these line
▶ 1:34:49 Michael P. Zwirko: items I don't know if they're necessarily applicable but that was that was the purpose of my questioning I know that we've gone to great lengths to identify and hope to improve the program so we can keep kids not only from a moral standpoint but also practical in the district so I wanted to highlight like that no and I appreciate that because well how we got to that that model is as our title one money was shrinking and we had less title one tutors I felt it was important that every school have some sort of person that could do that type of work so as a district we added those positions and we're paying for those positions in most schools however we still do have title one money at the Lincoln and and the position in that school is paid for by
▶ 1:35:36 Michael P. Zwirko: title one clearly there's a need at the Lincoln school for yes yeah another question has you talked earlier with respect to the override and the fact that the positions were really restored so does that mean that now the the team program at the middle school is fully restored so it will be for the upcoming school yes great it's great news and then two other questions both related I i know that we had vacancies recently could you um appointments uh new principals uh horace mann in the middle school could you speak to those that the process yes um it the process is a pretty well established process it was established by the school committee several years ago and we've tweaked it a little bit time
▶ 1:36:17 um we have a as the final appointing authority for principals i do not participate at the search committee level we have a search committee that is usually made up of parents of teachers other administrators it is led by either miss white lambright or dr adams typically we do a survey of parents we post on school spring which is the website that most school systems post on the search committee goes through all the qualified applicants it's sometimes interesting who applies without qualification and then narrows it down to those people they want to interview they write their own questions they're not preset by me they bring people to interview they narrow that down to hopefully at least three finalists we do a day of meet and greets where the
▶ 1:37:14 finalists come out and tour the schools meet the students meet the staff meet the parents I am present on all those taking notes I do a final interview then I do my due diligence call references and make a choice and so as you all know we recently hired doctors ackery best for the middle school and dr. Stephen Goodwin as of today for the harvest man thank you for the update on the process and the announcement late breaking news those are all the questions I had at time madam chair thank you very much for being here this evening alderman forbes i didn't think i thought i'd be in the queue all right sorry um just a a couple of quick things in the system-wide section on munis the 1.3 million dollars for contractual obligations is that your salary
▶ 1:38:05 Scott M. Forbes: holding account yeah okay so then once those salaries or once those hirings are determined those salaries will be reallocated to whatever schools that where there is a critical need that's the contract negotiations okay correct and you're not allowed to say anything because of the ratification which i get so the fact that we're looking at what the hoover horace man winthrop and franklin of having negative budgets for right now doesn't necessarily mean that they will be negative moving forward once those salaries are allocated to those specific budgets right exactly thank you very much um final question i know uh alderman medeiros talked about the the bb school and the fact that you walk through it do you have any kind of rough timeline
▶ 1:38:50 Scott M. Forbes: as of what you're going to do or are you just still in that process of now that you have this option available to you you're kind of trying to check off the boxes as to how that's going to take place um i know what i want whether or not um mr schenner and ms gaffney can make it happen and in according to how i want it remains to be seen but my goal is to be able to take possession of the building and use it for next september a year for september so in terms of classroom space for right now do we do we look good moving into the next year as far as the available space that we have now in the student enrollment that we're projecting for september we're a little tight um Mr. Scherner and I did our elementary walkthroughs last week of the week
▶ 1:39:40 Peter D. Mortimer: before and next week we will do the middle school in the high school we're a little tight we're going to have to return to a combined music art room at the Hoover we're creating some speed space at the Winthrop right now we're going to do move a lot of rooms around at the Roosevelt so that we can subdivide some bigger rooms and in rooms that are now using a lot of space but We don't need a lot of space. We're going to downsize into smaller rooms. So we're doing a lot of that type of work right now for the fall. Very good, thank you very much. Thank you for being here this evening. Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to move the bottom line for this budget. The city side contribution, the amount of 32,338,667 dollars and 50 cents.
▶ 1:40:28 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: Second. Thank you. We have a motion to move the bottom line for Department 300 made by Alderman Mortimer and seconded by Vice Chair Wojcicki. I just had a few quick questions for you. Did I hear you say that the projected enrollment for next year is at 4,100? It's approximately 4,100, I believe. That's already exceeding both of the studies, is that right? Am I reading that correctly? The NASDAQ and Collins both brought us at under 4,100. I think, unfortunately, it's on my phone, and my phone's in my bag, but when they ran my, the registrar runs my numbers every month, and we were at about 4,026, 27 at her last run. We know that we have at least three more months to go in K registration. Last year, we had, I think, approximately 100-odd kids move back into the middle and the high school level.
▶ 1:41:24 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: so you know there's a lot of movement and if you ride around town there's a lot of signs with for sale okay well that's great that we're still in demand and also challenging in a good way for you all in terms of figuring out how to space for that and and then in the budget document that was produced on May 21st it's very helpful in the way that you've highlighted where override money is going to be appropriated and just for for my edification perhaps for others examples of that includes that said there'll be seven new paras that are available and where will they be they'll be building level paras what we're finding is it's no secret that everybody in cross the state has a problem getting substitutes so we think if we put a building para into each building that'll
▶ 1:42:17 help one of our challenges with substitutes is the amount of meetings our teachers go to whether it's iep meetings or professional development or meetings with you know parents who have concerns and we're pulling teachers from classes so having a floating power in the building should help with coverage for those those teachers and can you speak to the addition of two curriculum leaders that's what i spoke to that i'm impact bargaining tomorrow i see and that would be for system-wide no 6 through 12. if you remember correctly three years ago we reduced our directors by three it was cost saving in order to keep teachers and it's been a struggle people are doing double duty and if those of you who are familiar with
▶ 1:43:07 the education evaluation system demands every teacher is evaluated every year constantly and it and what happens is sometimes they're making choices about with what do I do do I evaluate do I do curriculum work do I go model a lesson so having back to curriculum leaders is very important to the work we're doing in the advancements we're trying to make right and just maybe two more one assistant principal is that going to be so that the Winthrop and the Roosevelt aren't sharing right exactly okay so each will have its own dedicated assistant principal and those are both schools that have more than 400 students you know again off the top of my head I think Lincoln's about 425 and Winthrop and Roosevelt's about 435 and even Winthrop's up at 410 again those are my
▶ 1:43:59 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: you know don't anybody hold me to that but they're all for over 400 and then lastly for me and I think it's still it's located in system right now and this is probably getting to what you were describing before about waiting to see how everything plays out in terms of your numbers but you're holding space for the override funds to accommodate the hiring of it says three elementary full-time employees those are the specialists I was talking about that's great all right thank you those are all my questions thank you Alderman Wright Thank You madam chair superintendent I just wanted to follow up on Alderman Forbes question you talked about the when as to the BB school can we talk about the what and the how and what i mean by that is somebody who's lived in that neighborhood for
▶ 1:44:47 Francis X. Wright Jr.: many years and who was there when the bb was open and when the bb was closed and i know the impact that that had on the neighborhood the ward 3 neighborhood the cork city neighborhood i for one hope that what you're going to tell me is that the plan is to make that a k-5 school because that neighborhood was devastated when they lost that and deserves to have their own k-5 school so can you confirm that this evening no I cannot confirm that this evening it's the school committee's choice as to what the educational program will be and they have not taken that up for discussion yet well I have talked to residents in the neighborhood who would hate to see one not getting that as a k to five school in that neighborhood and two would hate to be in
▶ 1:45:37 Francis X. Wright Jr.: a position where they have if it were to go to say the k to two school we have somebody in the kindergarten at the bb and another student at the horace man and another student at the middle school the high school all that have to be dropped off traffic is a mess as it is in melrose and so uh i'm going to put my plug in this evening as a long time resident and a long time ward alderman to see that return to us as a k-5 school thank you thank you any additional questions before we take a vote on the motion that's before us all right all in favor aye aye all right we'll make that recommendation to the full board thank you again for your time tonight thank you motion to adjourn madam chair give a motion to adjourn made by alderman mortimer seconded by alderman
▶ 1:46:24 Kate Lipper-Garabedian: and Forbes and Vice Chair Boisselle, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? They're adjourned. Thank you.