School Board Work Session   2/10/2025

Who said that?

How are you?

Good evening everyone it's 5 p.m.

on Monday February 10th and I'm going to call to order our joint work session between Charlottesville City Schools and Charlottesville City Council.

Burns?

Here.

Ms.

Barton?

Mr. Wade?

Here.

Mr. Meyer?

Here.

Ms.

Here.

Ms.

All right.

Yes.

I called it a Charlottesville City Council school board meeting to order.

Here.

Can we have it?

Do we need to do a motion to give Michael the authorization?

And first of all, Michael, can you hear us?

I can, yes.

Can you hear me?

Further ado, I'm getting some feedback.

I don't know where that's coming from.

All right, we will get started.

Thank you all for attending our joint session today.

And Ms.

Gooden driving us up.

We can go to our next slide, please.

This is our agenda for the evening.

And so we will talk about our operating budget, capital projects, and any upcoming meetings.

I'd just like to remind people that we have an amazing finance team.

So I'd like to start just by making sure that we always acknowledge the hard work that they do.

that they have won consecutively the Meritorious Award.

Just kudos to the team.

Our priorities remain the same since our last meeting.

Improving student outcomes, class sizes, enhancing student achievement and equity, improving our student attendance, competitive salary, competitive wages benefits, attracting and retaining teachers and staff.

and the modernization in our schools and the sustainability initiatives.

Next slide, please.

So I will jump right into our operating budget.

As you see here, just a reminder that a large portion, the largest portion I should say, of our revenue source comes from city appropriation, followed by state revenue.

This slide just shows our seven-year trend in terms of our revenue.

And so during this period, the state revenue has averaged about 23% of all of our division revenues.

for the fiscal year 24 saw the highest state budgeted revenues within the time period.

I just want to remind people listening and in the room that we did see changes to our LCI, which changes what happens with our funds locally.

So the decrease is largely due to a significant change in our local composite index, which reflects our locality's ability to pay.

The LCI rate increased to 77.2%, 0.2%, resulting in the state contributing just 22.98%, almost 23% towards our SLQ funded positions.

So it does change what happens with our SOQ funded positions.

And we are not expected to see any changes until we do re-benchmarking.

As it relates to our state revenue, we are estimating an additional $538,000 in state revenue.

And this increase is in the following areas.

It's the compensation supplement.

So this represents the state has said that there will need to be a 3% raise for our SLQ positions of teachers and staff, which you'll see that reflected differently as it relates to our collective bargaining, which I will talk about later.

Our at-risk funds, the lottery funds, there's been some increases there and then the increases in our English as a Second Language programs.

As it relates to the trends, this slide does show the city's appropriation over the past seven years.

And of course, I can't say it enough that the city is a critical component in supporting the operations and for our student learning.

Next slide, please.

The majority of our expenditures, like many organizations, falls within our salary and benefits.

Salary and benefits make up about 74% of our total expenditures.

And then our next largest area are the contract services with our maintenance agreement and transportation.

And I know we've had some changes there for the positive.

which we will talk about later in the presentation

our staffing allocation.

Since a significant portion of our budget is in salaries, we did want to break it out for you so that you could see how our staff are allocated.

So 70% of our staff are in the area of instructional roles, which include teachers, librarians, and instructional assistants.

and 19% are focused on school-based services such as custodians and nutrition workers and then lastly 11% of our positions are in the area of administration which includes human resources, finance, technology, etc.

Next slide.

So here are, this is how it breaks out in terms of salary and benefits for budgeting purposes.

And this is different.

This is different since the last time we have met in terms of how we are presenting the information.

So within our proposed collective bargaining agreement, one of the first things that we are addressing, we are evening out the steps.

Prior to collective bargaining, the steps were not equal.

and we would use terminology like the average of, because some steps were one, some was one and a quarter, it ranged.

So one of the things that we are addressing, which this would be a one-time cost because we would fix it this year and would not need to do this again, we would make the steps even for 1.5%

which is a total of 2.2 million dollars.

Next we have in the collective bargaining agreement which addresses compensation is that the staff would get they would get their step of one and a half percent plus a raise of four percent and this is at a cost of 2.5 million close to 2.6 million dollars.

Next, we are proposing in alignment with the governor's proposed recommendations for SLQ positions.

We are proposing a salary increase of 3%, and this is an average of 3%.

So this would be the step plus the raise, which is inclusive of the, which would bring the employees to the average of 3%.

Our healthcare costs, we projected a number much higher the last time we met and that when we met back in December and that number is the increases lower

6%, which is a total of about $585,000.

And then lastly, we saw a savings, and this is a one-time savings from BRS for a total of $2.5 million.

with the savings.

So this is a total of everything, including the savings.

So the increase of the personnel cost is about $3.5 million.

In terms of our discretionary,

category.

We did do conversations with the city.

We did see a big change here, which revealed a no net increase under transportation.

And then for our facilities, for our maintenance, I should say, we initially presented a three year average.

And so once we did look at the actuals, and I know that we will be talking about some actuals this evening from the city side.

So once we did that, we found, we identified an increase of about $73,000 over the three year.

So the contract will be $434,000.

Question.

Yes, question for you, sir.

So the KTEC, is that going to be an ongoing

Technology standpoint is about $65,000.

That was my question.

Right, so as long as there's not a significant decrease in the Albemarle slot, so we anticipate that this year we saw this change because they opened up a new program.

So we've increased some students from like Rivanna,

Um, but it, it wasn't, of course, as you can see, it didn't net zero there, but I mean, we do, we did expect that this year that we would see because they decreased some slots for some specific programs because they did open up some new programs this year.

Okay.

So, I mean, I think next year when we come back, we don't expect them to decrease, to see a significant decrease from that.

Okay.

Sorry about that.

All right.

And we're showing this slide because we talk a lot about our English language learners and the supports that they need here.

And this table just shows the staffing ratios.

I will say that where you see level one, level one are our students with very limited to know English and then

Level four are students who have acquired the English language and require less support.

So you see the ratio changes significantly from level one to level four.

Because of the

the leveled requirement.

We initially had presented to you all five additional positions when we had this conversation back in December.

Since that time, we've gone back and done some recalibrating.

And based on the numbers, we are projecting an increase of about three additional positions instead of five, which is a total of about $283,000.

And again, this is to support the continued increase in the students who are English language learners.

Next slide.

I just want to remind everyone that the SOQs are changing for, I'm sorry, that the accountability system is changing for next school year.

And so we will be evaluating another new model.

And so while our enrollment is plateauing, we know that the needs of our students has not changed.

And so we are looking at how we differentiate staffing at schools.

And you'll see that reflected in the budget request.

And so we are going to be adding positions, but placing those positions where there are greater needs

Next slide.

And so you'll see that reflected here.

So we've requested three additional FTEs for the English Language Learner Program, a family engagement liaison.

And so that position will work directly in our communities doing a lot of the engagement with our

with our family and really being a bridge between the classroom and the community.

And the additional FTEs for readings, for the reading and math specialists, that's two additional positions, one reading, one math.

And so those positions are division level and they will be hired.

knowing that their school may change year to year after we review the data.

We are expanding our opportunities for our students.

So here you see half of an FTE for health and medical sciences.

That's to increase the pathway of students who have been interested in the health sciences.

a recruitment specialist.

A lot of times I'm sure the same thing may be true on the city side that you know the human resources team they come to work with the expectation of getting a lot of things checked off the list but then sometimes things get in the way and so

We are proposing a recruitment specialist, someone who can focus on the retention and recruitment of all staff, not just teaching positions, custodial positions, IA's and things of that nature.

We were fortunate enough to bring over Ms.

Duvall, our transportation coordinator, and she's hit the ground running and done an amazing job, and we need to embed her salary into our budget.

And then we also have, we have positions, clinical social workers, who those positions are funded on one-time money.

We moved those positions over

We've moved some funds over through the year 2026 through June of 2026.

And so this is our attempt to now bring two of those positions into the operating budget.

And you see that reflected here.

And then lastly, there's a one-time retention bonus for the Walker staff.

With the reconfiguration, we have a lot of concerns that it

may be hard to keep staff here because with the uncertainty of knowing what will happen and so we are baking into this budget a one-time bonus of two thousand dollars for licensed staff and fifteen hundred dollars for support staff and so and that will be dispersed

and equal payments, one payment in December, which is the end of the first semester and then the second payment in May of 2026 at the end of the second semester.

Here's a summary of our budget changes here.

That's pretty self-explanatory.

And so our net request is the $4.9 million, which is over our formula amount, which we appreciate.

And we will move on to the next slide.

Our proposal for budget changes.

And so here, this is just a summary of our funds, of all of our funds.

And what you'll see is a total operating budget of about $124 million, which is a change of about $6 million.

School capital projects.

And so as you all know, we collaborate with the city on our CIP and we really work to address some of our long-term facility needs.

And so while critical maintenance is our priority, modernization of our facility is equally essential.

And so, as you know, some of our buildings are 50 years old.

And I think we have a couple that are approaching their 100 year that century mark.

And so we will be just continue to have conversations with you all about how we can address the safety, efficiency and maximize learning in these spaces.

So as we talk about our CIP, one of the things that we do want to make sure that we keep talking about is the modernization of our schools.

I know in our CIP meetings that we've talked about that the one and a quarter just really does not give you the same thing.

So what a one and a quarter can do in a year 2025 is not the same as what it did 10 years ago.

In 2001 alone, construction costs rose about 20%.

And so I shared at our board meeting that, you know, I'm appreciative of the funds that we get, but we did walk through Trailblazer on last Thursday.

And so the principal wanted to just show what the teachers select for the modernization.

And so the 1.25

Aesthetically, you won't be able to see it from outside the building.

You won't see it from the hallway.

But it will transform two spaces so that it can serve as eight intervention spaces, which the staff is very appreciative to have that as a resource.

But it's not the same as when you walk into some of the schools and you see the bright colors, the signage, and just the revamped spaces.

And so we really would like to have some ongoing conversations about how do we move that 1.25 and increase it by another $250,000, which

is a lot of money, but it's definitely not a lot of money when we're thinking about construction.

and so we also, but what we do also know is that the adjustments have been critical to our school, to the track, the lighting for the track project, our restroom renovations, ceiling replacement, daylight enhancements.

So there's a lot of work that has happened, but I think our principals and our families, when we talk about the modernization of our schools, this is one of the areas that

Thanks.

You mentioned intervention spaces.

So right now there are a few teachers who sit in the room.

I mean, the room is smaller than the area in the center here.

And so sometimes there are about three or four teachers meeting with groups of students and they're talking over one another.

It's just really not conducive.

to provide students who are probably some of the most vulnerable learners.

It's just not ideal.

So they're working with them on maybe reading fluency or some attack skills, and they're doing it.

But then there are other groups of students who are right beside them, and their noise are canceling each other out.

And so when the principal put the survey out, that was the thing that rose to the top.

How can we create better spaces where we can provide intervention to our students?

We're talking about spaces that would hold about three to four students, five to six students.

And then for this list, daylighting enhancements, is that like with windows?

Yes.

So over at Summit, we did a window.

We've done the windows.

So they are in progress or should be near.

I remember when they started, so I don't know where they are in it.

But yes, so we've done.

Next, and so as we look at our fund balance, some of the things that we've done.

First, we've allocated funds for our track lighting.

I know that members of council and you all have received some emails back during the fall

with regards to track lighting.

So that's something that we need to address.

We've allocated the funds, but we've not started on that project.

And then there's $379,000 to invest in new furniture.

When our students transition back to the elementary schools, we want to ensure that there's adequate appropriate furniture.

So that's another area that we are in the process of doing.

And so our board did the first reading of that.

No, we voted, we approved it.

Yeah, that was approved at the last meeting.

So at our meeting on Thursday, the board approved

to use fund balance for the furniture transition for fifth grade.

On this question about the lighting for the CHS track and field, is there any private money that's going into that?

I know when I was getting fundraising requests, there was some talk about whether it would be city funds, whether it would be school board funds, whether it would be private funds.

Yes.

So this is not your all money.

This is not coming from your CIP.

I was curious because I was the recipient of the fundraising request and I had mentioned some suggestions to them and I hadn't heard anything further about how the money actually wound up coming in.

So it's all new to me at this point.

I think if I could also, we did approve the funding for the furniture package of fifth grade, but I think that's another item that was conversation if that should be done from the small cap side or where that money should come from.

And we appropriated it to

get the savings by doing it in February and putting the placeholder with the vendor.

But I'm hopeful that that conversation is not over.

Again, coming out of our surplus versus small cap or where that comes from.

All right.

So back during the fall, I'm sorry.

So this is addressing the critical safety.

So I'm going to just highlight some things.

So we recently had the safety audit.

I know that components that we were able to share, we did share with the facilities.

That was the facilities team.

We shared it with the facilities team.

Back before we did the safety audit, there were about $250,000 in door replacements that were identified before the safety audit.

Then there was about more than a million could be allocated to address deferred maintenance.

we've selected some priority things.

I mean, there were a lot of things.

And so the hope and what we want to, I think really have a conversation is how can we address some of the things from the safety audit so that we can just really get back to baseline.

So it's like, we're not just chasing these things and placing them on a capital improvement, placing them on a capital improvement

How can we get some of these things knocked out?

Some of the things identified are lighting and fencing, upgraded markings.

Those are some things that we can do.

Those things do have a healthy price tag when you're talking about multiple schools, repairs to exterior stairs and sidewalks.

And I know that a lot of times we have conversations about who's responsible for what when it comes to outside.

the need for closed circuit TV and security cameras, addressing some of those vulnerabilities.

And then we still have schools where we need secure festivals, you know,

You buzz someone in and then they're right in the school.

So how do we address the need to have secure vestibules at all of our school?

I mean, there is access control at all those schools, but they're not those secure vestibules at all of our schools.

I think one of the things that we've been talking about long range is just really the need for our dedicated project manager.

I know even like with our track lighting, that project has not gotten started because part of it is, you know, I think it's the manpower on the person power on your side.

And I think that

on our end, I think we, you know, people are wondering like, well, where are we with this project?

And I think that one of the things that I know would be helpful is having a dedicated person.

And I think that this is true even like just for many of the facility requests as we look at the safety audit and just the things that we do on a daily basis.

We've seen the benefits of what happens when there's this good partnership.

Ms.

Duvall,

Mr. Albemarle really

does a really good job of communicating with you all on the city side and keeping us abreast and just serving as a liaison.

Dr. Gurley, if I could add, I have that number for you, Mr. Snook.

It's $78,575 that the athletic club in conjunction with the Perry Foundation, donors from the community, and let's see.

No, it was the $350,000 less what they've received.

And I think just to Dr. Gurley's point about the rising cost, if we wait on this any longer, it's going to go up more.

Thank you You want me to go back to that spot?

Trailblazer has a vestibule, so when you buzz, you go into a space that's squared off.

You can't go straight.

You have to go into the main office.

Right now, Greenbrier, you're walking right into the school, and you're also walking right into Summit.

Oh, and K-Tech, I'm sorry.

Excuse me.

Are these items that have already showed up on a CIP list somewhere?

Not the things that are from the, not the things that are from the safety audit.

It was just, it was just done.

The board just went through the October.

Okay.

And I think the city has a presentation.

Mayor, did you want to?

First, I do have a short.

Yeah.

Sorry, I could.

Yes.

Oh, yeah, sorry.

So can someone speak to me a little bit?

I had a good conversation with a person last night about the collective bargaining process.

How did that go?

It seemed like it was a success.

Yes, I mean, I think, I mean, we have to, we have our CEA president back there.

I mean, I think it was a success.

I mean, we have a little kink that we need to work out.

had a little misstep on the city school side.

But we're going to come back together.

And I know we're going to resolve that very quickly.

But I mean, I think the process went really well.

I think both sides were heard.

OK, great.

I remember at this presentation last year, there was discussion about how because the state revenue was measured on a couple years ago, there was the 2021 numbers and it didn't reflect accurately what we needed.

That is not helpful.

That was the local composite index that I talked about.

Yes, yes, yes.

I'm sorry.

It'll be re-benchmarked in 2026.

Yeah.

So it'll be re-benchmarked.

Okay, I was looking to see who's controlling this for me because I have no controls.

All right, so good evening school board members, counselors, and members of the public who are participating in this meeting.

I prepared a couple of slides.

Ms.

Hamwell is going to join me in producing part of the information, sharing the information that we've prepared for you.

I guess what we really wanted to do is there's been an inquiry that has been made to us to look at a three-year review of our budgeted, budget to actual performance in transportation and facilities.

We have concluded that, shared with council in a recent series of meetings with them that we would be doing this work and this will be the result of that effort.

The goal is to be able to share with you what we were able to discover.

We're also looking at the idea of there are a series of questions and me being the newest member in this seat of decision making as to how we propose and ultimately develop the budget.

I see a number of questions and I don't see answers to questions.

So I'm more or less highlighting them for us tonight.

because I feel like that's what I do all the time.

And more or less want to speak to that because there are questions, I think we do need to really wrestle with the idea that some decisions need to be made and we're going to need to carve out some time to look at those things.

Even some of the items that we've discussed this evening add to that whole sentiment.

Next slide, please.

Just reminding everyone for setting the table.

My job is to implement council's vision.

The vision is to be a place where everyone thrives.

That includes every child in this community who attends one of our schools, every teacher, every staff member of schools who works.

So that is the vein in which I am doing the work, that I'm trying my best to make sure that we can support all the things that have been identified as a priority.

And there are many things on that list.

Next slide.

Discussion points for tonight is to look at the budget to actual results, talk about agreements, talk about our funding formula, and then also open more of a conversation on the idea of long-term capital needs.

There's a real conversation that needs to happen there.

Next slide.

The budget to actual comparisons that we were able to conclude, we did this work.

And what you'll see is yes, there is money that has been left over after the end of each year for the past three years of doing the work of spending money on people transportation and on school maintenance.

That collectively you see to the right of your chart there is $908,000 is what that adds up to.

But I think it is important for no one to get excited about that number because with context, everything starts to shift a little bit.

And that is part of what I see my job as being as I've asked questions and seeing the results of this is okay so we have that.

Why is that?

And then what becomes of that?

And it does.

It rolls up into the surplus that we have each year when we don't spend funds, but technically it doesn't necessarily roll if we're doing other things and we are doing other things that do add up that are not captured here.

Just want to point out just line by line there you see 180,000 FY22, 335,000 FY23 and 191,000 FY24 for transportation, 84,000 for FY22 school maintenance, 37,023 school maintenance and 75,024 school maintenance.

Those are the balances left over at the end of each year.

But that bullet that we added there is we did not offset what were additional expenses that were allocated to provide the incentive for bus drivers that would have changed the end result of those numbers because that came in at a $332,000 expense.

We did work with schools on receiving a portion of that in reimbursement and we know that we did not spend all of that money because we didn't have all drivers that we were seeking even during the period that we offered the incentive.

But the point of the matter is there was still an expenditure there and we're just pointing that out.

Next slide.

Part of what I'm pointing out to you all is the questions that we have is we have a 40% formula and that formula is based on personal property tax and real estate tax increases being the 40% that is shared with schools and then the other portion of that is kept by the city to invest.

We don't operate under that 40% formula.

We rarely, if ever, have

So in my mind, the person that I am who believes strongly in process, then why do we have a 40% formula?

It means that something is a bit off in my mind because if we're going to say that it's 40% and we don't stick to that, then maybe it's not 40%, maybe it's something else.

But we also have various agreements that we have established to work between the city and the school division.

And we have four different categories.

Is that the next slide?

Okay, if you would go to the next slide for me, please.

I'm going to have you go back also.

These are four agreement areas.

This is basically identifying what are performance areas for city staff on behalf of schools.

Facilities development, that is Mike Goddard's team for the construction work of physical buildings and things like that.

Transportation is our pupil transport.

Facilities maintenance would be our team under Joe Shifflet's direction of going into the daily management of spaces.

And then Parks and Recreation does grounds management.

Today we have two agreements, not four agreements.

That is also something that I point out as there's an issue in my mind there because we're not necessarily capturing what is the responsibilities that we each are owning.

And I think that's really the importance of an agreement because it would make it clear some of the questions.

We find ourselves with these questions.

The superintendent and I just recently had questions about snow removal and we're about to get ready for that again tomorrow.

And that is part of what I'm speaking to, if we're going to have agreements, we need to have good agreements, we need to have the right agreements.

Should we have one agreement, one major agreement, or should we have four agreements if we're doing four things?

That's the question.

So I'm just pointing that out again.

It's something else that I see that needs attention.

It is the work that I'm absolutely ready to dig into and get to work on.

But just again, highlighting it for everyone's benefit.

If you could go back a slide for me.

and then services outside of agreement.

So that really is what the reference to the Parks and Rec agreement.

It is pretty substantial.

I didn't realize how significant it was of the things that are being done on the park side that are not a part of any shared expenditure.

It is all on the city side.

Again, that's something that I think we should take note of, take stock in and really place that in the conversation for the various things that we're trying to do.

And then facility modernization and construction is something that is a big question for me.

As we've discussed, we have schools that are 50 years old and others that are approaching 100 years old.

We don't build buildings like we used to, and kids don't come like they used to.

So we all know that and we need to think about that.

But what I would say is that we have these buildings, we are limited in space, as we all know.

what a 10.2 square miles or 6.6 square miles whatever it is we can only go up we can't really go anywhere else so for that there's a conversation that we probably need to engage in on what do we do to change the current design of buildings do we knock something down and replace it these are very very tough conversations i've been in other communities where it's hard to talk about tearing down a hundred year old building but if that hundred year old building is not working for what it is needs to be today then it's a conversation we need to have

Next slide, please.

Next slide again.

So in that note that I made to you in regards to the 40% formula payments, I know this is hard for you all to see.

That's why we printed a copy for everyone in front.

And I'm going to ask Ms.

Hamel to walk through.

But this was one of the things that I asked her to do is we have very interesting conversations when I say, OK, Chrissy, what gives?

And then she goes and figures it out and brings it back to me.

So she did some work here.

It's good work, but the point of it is, again, to just try to shake this out in a way of helping everyone see how broad the investment relationship goes and that it really isn't adhering to a specific number, hence the 40% formula question that I'm posing.

Thanks.

So at the top of this chart, we basically, our formula as it is now in during the budget process, we look at what the budgeted revenues are for real estate, personal property, and then any growth of that 40% of that is what we designate or set aside as part of the local contribution to schools each year.

So the part at the top that's not shaded in blue is basically just that calculation.

It shows you what those budgets were, what the annual change was, what the 40% formula netted, and then it shows you the annual school contribution each year based on the formula.

That is correct.

Over, yes, from the year before.

Yeah, thank you.

Just real quick.

The funding formula is in ordinance or it is again just like the agreement that has been in place again for decades that we don't really know.

It's like a written agreement.

Somewhere or is it?

So when you allow yourself to operate without an actual document, it just becomes practice.

So the bottom section, as you see on the screen, that has the lines or the blue section for the handout that we gave out, we actually took a look at the actual revenues collected for each of those years and then calculated the 40% to see what that would have netted for the school in each year.

In most years, you see that the school board actually

made off better by looking at the budgeted revenues.

You'll notice in the years of 23, excuse me, 22, 23, 24, there were those years the school would have actually gotten more based on the actuals.

However, I will note

In 24, most of that is a portion of the result of a tax increase, which when the taxes were passed, those dollars were not to be used as part of the formula.

In addition, I believe it was 22 or 23, and I meant to look this up before we came because I have the years mixed up.

Council also raised the real estate tax another penny and that also was not to be included in the formula calculation as that was put in the debt service fund to help offset the increased debt that we knew that was coming for the Buford project.

So what I found striking in this part of the analysis is that, again, we're using a formula.

We're not sticking to the formula.

We end up with a surplus at the end of the year.

There has been a question of whether or not we should also provide a share of that surplus to schools as well.

And then we have other questions.

So I think that's kind of what's framing where I am.

I'm feeling a bit of unease in that there is not the clarity that I believe we're all striving for.

And the only way to arrive at that is for us to probably begin digging into some hard conversations and making some decisions.

I don't want to contribute to us versus them mentality.

I am not that person.

I don't operate like that.

Ideally, this is a numbers matter.

What adds up?

We have to say yes and no to things in order to make it fit within whatever the beginning number is and the end number is.

Right now, I can tell you that two people sitting at this table have not been getting enough sleep in the past few days trying to make these numbers add up, and they're not adding up.

in the current budget that we're working on.

And I also want to say thank you for a number that does work better, for sure, because the number that we're now working with, actually we have a chance of making it fit, but we still have some work to do in order to make these numbers work.

I guess, again, just pointing out the idea that

The questions are fair questions to be asked.

They're reasonable questions to ask.

I think we have to make sure we do a better job of responding to those questions.

I think we owe that we should have shared an actual to budget resolution or reconciliation at the end of the year.

and that's something that we can make sure that we go forward in doing.

But I also think we have to use the right context and that there are other things that are not captured in the current agreements that we have.

So at some point, where's the ability for it to be a wash?

So I think those are questions and I'm framing that as tonight I'm lighting the match.

And then I'm walking away from the match.

Cause I'm really looking for y'all to talk about this and let's figure out what it is that we do next.

I think I have one more slide.

Maybe or not, I might not.

Nope, I ended on this because I intended to light a match and walk away from it.

Yeah, the $4.9 million figure for the operating match is there.

We have that number factored in.

We have a gap in the budget that we're working on right now to close, even with that number in.

But that's just the result.

That's part of the process where we're working through all of that, going over various department budgets, making some different decisions on what it is that I'm going to say yes, I'll support that or no to try to make it come together.

Okay.

Yeah.

So what we have done is we've taken a look at the CIP.

I think I've gotten my last version of the

I've gotten what you have called the final version of the CIP four times maybe and I changed a lot on Saturday because we've met on Saturday too.

I think I know what we have done at this point is we have increased on the school CIP side.

We looked at both categories, the modernization category as well as the

Small cap or lump sum.

We've looked at both.

There are increases in both categories.

I can't tell you what that number is right now because I'm not sure that it's going to stay.

So we'll work to try to get that concluded.

So that is an unfortunate matter for us at this time because we have not looked at anything unless it was already a part of the list within facilities for projects.

I would assume possibly some things could be forthcoming.

Yeah, there could be some things that are on that list that are already in our churn.

But I'll say that at this time, those would be new things.

And I'll just add, we're making a final swipe at the revenue.

So we have about another week or so to look at those.

Mr. Sanders, can I ask you a question about the audit items not being budgeted to this point?

I think and this maybe speaks to your point about the agreements not being robust enough or thorough enough, because I think we are operating from a thought that they should have been on the list all the time.

Like those were items that we have been paying the city

to be keeping on top of.

They weren't.

They've now shown up on this audit.

And so now we're asking for money that we've already paid to go towards rectifying this.

I was trying, trying not to have him come up if I could, but I'll say before Mike starts is that my opinion would be that we should have some of these projects, some of the items, some of the findings in the audit should be somewhere on some list.

I would think just because we're doing condition assessments of buildings and those are the types of things that would come up.

There may be things that go beyond that.

Sure.

You basically said what I was going to say, so I'll go back to my seat.

Some of the things, it was a pretty comprehensive list of things in the safety audit.

Most of those things are things that would normally be picked up by our lump sum.

Some of them are small, some of them are large, some of them are structural.

We're challenged by the fact some of the things that are on a list like that are going to be things that are always going to need to be fixed.

Some of them are things that have changed.

There was no call for vestibules in schools 10 years ago.

But we've started to add them in since that started to become a demand.

Some of the schools weren't built with any vestibules in mind.

So to build a vestibule specifically for schools like Greenbrier,

You're building a new building outside the building basically.

So it is a bigger lift in those cases.

Would we eventually get to all those things?

Yes.

Are some of them already on the list and were they before we even got the safety security audit?

Yeah, some were.

And some of them are going to roll on and roll off because a lot of that's just maintenance stuff.

I would also, I guess what I feel like I'm hearing in the question and the answer is that we also have to determine what can be done and when can it be done.

So it's not a if it can be done, it's a matter of when can we get to it.

So I think there's a reconciliation of the audit report and our laundry list of things that need to be done that we can do.

And from there, try to figure out

and what would it take to be able to get more done, but I would also say that we would need prioritization.

I also appreciate your framing this as a collective.

concern in budgeting.

These are your schools too, counselors.

We as a school board carry really heavily and deeply the weight of ensuring our schools are safe.

But we need you to feel equally strongly about that need.

And so I'm eager to

I don't know, try to put out the flame that Mr. Sanders has lit.

And looking at the blue revenue sheet and the 22, 23, 24 years where the school board, I guess, didn't fare as well.

Is that the correct understanding in the math?

Just drawing attention to that, those are also post-COVID years where the demands that are being made of our teachers and our schools are significantly

One is the safety audit report.

So I want to assume that I haven't seen it.

I've heard about it and I understand the reasons for not making it public for maybe some of the information that's in there.

I want to assume that

We can work together to address the most critical ones, the ones that the consultant said, hey, you need to get to this yesterday type of thing.

That, to me, is non-negotiable.

So I don't know what they are, but we need to make sure that we have those, Emily, for the budget this year.

And I believe that has been shared with facilities.

Oh, yes.

So just like we've seen a lot of efficiencies in our practices with the with the transportation, I think that we would see the benefit.

Right, right.

And I understand that.

I don't want to know what did I have an impact on the

Well, that's what I mean.

I believe so.

And Mike's much smarter in this area than I am.

But I do think that having someone who can project manage and not beat up someone from his team.

Right.

Yes.

And my last kind of question or comment is to you, Emily, as leader of the school board.

No, I mean, I think we are required to make a needs-based budget and that is what Dr. Gurley and his team have put together and presented to you.

We could certainly add more things to it.

I think if we could, we would beef up the number of interventionists that we have that are providing that really intensive small group instruction.

We've got some of those in the budget, but I think his team has put together a budget that doesn't have fluff in it that

Thank you.

Just a couple questions for me.

First off, I want to say thank you, Mr. Sanders, for what you brought to us.

And I really do appreciate the tone of the conversation, the working together.

I mean, we've kind of been talking about something's got to give, something's got to change a little bit.

So I'm really excited to hear just that that door is opened.

And I think that

We as a council and a school board can continue to work together to make this.

As much as you all work, we work equally as hard to try and find a balance and bring to you a balance.

in the ask that's going to impact our budget.

The list, you know, as far as the critical safety items, you know, to Mayor Wade's question, and I mean, we appreciate the fact that facilities have seen that.

I think a person,

I'd be curious to like be able to turn time back and to see what this list might have looked like before COVID years ago.

I mean, I think COVID has impacted all of us in so many different ways and trying to just kind of stay on top of things and keep things running.

So no fault to anybody.

But I do think

having somebody on site who can kind of monitor these things more consistently and continue to be that liaison between the schools and the city and just to keep so that we don't have another list like this in a few years and again so I look forward to that.

I'm curious, Mr. Sanders, on your first sheet, the white sheet, you know, where you drew attention to the nine hundred and eight thousand dollars.

And again, all in teamwork.

I don't know if you guys were able to when you pulled those figures together to just kind of see specific areas where that money may have come from and that in that work, that could be something

I don't need an answer to that unless it was really blaring, but that is money that could have made a difference, whether it be for lighting or for other types of things, maintenance around the schools.

Again, more than anything, I just wanted to express gratitude for saying, for lighting that fire.

I mean, I think it's a fire we all need and I think we all welcome it and to do this work and to find whatever that happy medium is, again, I mean, I think

Hopefully in your tenure and in working with us, you've seen that we're willing to go back and really, what can we do to bring a better number to the city?

And it's not fluff.

And to Ms.

Dooley's point, I mean, I think we asked Dr. Gurley a similar question last week, like, what would you do?

What would you add?

What positions, you know, do we really feel like we could have used?

And I think it is.

Any other questions?

I still despise you.

I had to move.

I could have used the five when I was sick.

Me too.

Counselors, are there other questions?

We'll try.

He's feeling better.

That's OK, we can catch up with him.

Council is here.

Yeah, I just would second what the mayor said about whatever this critical pieces are for the security audit.

I think

I'm not an expert on that topic, so I'm not going to try to weigh in on what the priorities for that should be.

But I hope that there will be a fulsome discussion about what on the assessment of the priorities of those items in sort of a timeline for what we think we could do and when.

I think that's something that we owe ourselves in the public.

Maybe that already exists.

I don't know.

Yeah.

What do you envision, I guess, is the next steps to clean up the agreements, consider whether for two and change becomes one?

Have you gotten that far in thinking through

amounts to four working agreements in play, whether they exist in writing or not.

We have that.

So I need to get more out of it.

This exercise has informed me in a way that I just now have details that I didn't have.

I knew there was a reality.

I just didn't know what it was.

And then, of course, Chrissy is always sitting right here.

And it's an angel and a devil at times.

It just depends how that works.

It's a finance thing, that's right.

I imagine that that's why Renee is over there.

So it's that.

I do think

I feel like for me, I want to always make sure that I am listening to what council is saying as to what they're hearing.

So I think there is still more conversation for us to have about what they've heard tonight and how they would like to prioritize.

As I've already said, and being perfectly clear and not hiding anything at this moment, an addition today is increasing the gap because the gap still exists.

So that's a problem and my job is to bring a balanced budget and I will bring one and that means that I'll just continue to cut and chip away until we get to a point of it balancing and then I will show them what's not in and then they will make a different decision as it relates to is there more revenue to bring to the table.

There are probably a few questions I can ask between now and Thursday to get a little more clarity.

But I think there's some internal conversations we need to have.

I think the superintendent and I probably need to have some specific conversation about things that we can each do.

and then bring that together and then go back to our respective bodies and kind of invite you in to some of those conversations and see what comes.

I imagine a joint work session is needed at some point, maybe in summer when some of you are a little freer than others.

That never happens.

I'm just saying that.

But there's probably a work session to have there.

And it's a looking forward session.

I think we're probably going to need to look back.

Part of what I know

That's got to come from somewhere.

So I've got to figure out if we're going to be able to do that.

How do we do that and make it fit?

Yeah, and I just want to add, as far as that agreement, I'm glad you mentioned it, Emily, is that I'm glad that that's the approach that I would take.

But even if it takes, if it's not done by next budget season, I think that it's ongoing.

I would rather get it right.

than to kind of rush it to do it because as we can see we're going to be living with that agreement even though we can update it and things for a long time so we want to make sure it has all of the contingencies and things that we can anticipate as possible and at least for us our really public hearings and work session really kind of begins in March and you know later this month and

where we're going to have a lot of public hearing.

We know we're getting a lot of requests not to raise the taxes.

We're at the limit pretty much on meals, lodging, and so real estate is already pretty expensive to deliver.

So anyway, we have some constraints as well.

Assessments are going up.

I'm sure everyone got their own homes that got theirs and it went up.

Anyway, so that's kind of where we are.

Excuse me.

Chair Dooley, we have, I think, two committees.

We have a CIP joint working committee, right?

And I might posit that

you know a little bit after budget season that group get together and take a look at the audit questions and where those and how prioritize that could be I think a thing at least I'd be interested to see that happen in order to I think make sure those are things are moving forward not saying that's not going to be prioritized but we do have a joint committee that could be utilized to review those things a second is we do have a finance committee that is

Occasionally me and Councillor Snook, I remember last year we were sitting here and you suggested the same thing that we look at school funding formula because your tax kind of basis and how you guys tax in the city has changed a lot.

You've been moving up different taxes, down different taxes, et cetera.

Obviously our student body has changed, is dynamic also a lot of it based on the public housing and the affordable housing and monies that you all support.

It's changed.

So I think, right, we need to think about and look at, it can't just be hooked to real property and personal property tax.

This formula that again is archaic in my mind, but more of a how many students do we have?

You know, again, what type of students do we have?

What are the needs of those types of different students and a budget that reflects that?

And again, I think

Mayor, why do you always say, you know, it's a needs-based budget, like, okay, what are those needs of our students?

And the funding should reflect that.

So that's my two cents.

Maybe I'll put up some ideas on how we could go.

I do think we should be trying to finish something up before the next budget season, though I think that is possible.

Any other questions from school board members?

All right, with that, we can move on to comments from members of the community.

Is there anybody in the cafeteria that would like to give public comment?

No takers.

Do we have Zoom going?

Nobody on?

And then we're going to do our best to get sound through this small speaker on our computer.

Are you able to hear me?

Hello, can you hear me?

How about now?

You got me now?

Okay.

All right.

I'm assuming I can be heard.

Sorry.

Hi, my name is Peter Davis.

I teach at Charlottesville High School, and I've been a teacher there for 16 years.

Absolutely love the city schools.

Good evening, everybody.

I'm sorry I couldn't be there in person.

I usually love to be at as many meetings as possible.

Mr. Cuomo, if you could ask him to stop.

Ms.

Alright.

Yeah, Miss Gilligan is here.

I think she's going to try to OK, make some comments, OK?

OK.

While we're getting that set up, the school board did receive a letter from Mr Alan Wong.

We've all received that and it will be.

Hi, so my name is Peter Davis.

I'm a teacher of Charlottesville High School and I hope that my comments are worth all this effort.

I just wanted to hop on for just a minute.

I wanted to be there in person but couldn't be there tonight.

I just thank you all for working really hard on this budget and overall I'm really excited to see they coming together

for everything that we're asking for.

I did want to just kind of make a quick observation from my perspective of talking about modernizing our facilities.

I don't have a better term for it, but I think that we need to think a little bit more about how we talk about the modernization of our schools.

I think a lot of our schools are really

I don't know how this works.

I'm not an expert in budgeting and finance, but I do know how long projects take in the school system to get things done.

And I don't see a lot of like serious, you know, talk of

what projects need to be done.

As I walk through CHS, we've got paint peeling, we've got tons of rooms, most of the rooms with no windows, the ceilings look really, really bad and out of shape.

Bathrooms definitely need updates.

We haven't had, and the lighting in most of the classrooms are kind of migraine inducing.

And it's just not conducive to learning, it's not conducive to working.

in a lot of these spaces.

And I think we really need to look at how we fund our capital improvements to see where we can put in more money to make bigger investments in this.

I would encourage anyone in this decision-making process to spend the day walking through and trying to work in these spaces and see how you're feeling.

Like I said, I love Charlottesville City Schools and I don't try to disparage anything we've got going on, but I just think that we really need to find

ways to make these projects happen in a timely manner, because we've talked about tonight, the longer we wait on these things, the more expensive they get, and there's just kind of a vicious cycle.

So if we can find ways to add more to this and get serious about really planning out what needs to be done in the schools, I would love to be a part of that possibility, community help from teachers or whatever to get ideas.

I'm happy to help out, but I just wanted to hop on and say that.

But thanks again for all that you are doing.

I know it's hard work, and it's a difficult thing to make a budget like this.

But as we talk about a needs-based budget, I would challenge you to think about how we look at what the word need is and what the needs really are, because I think a lot of other work needs to be done when it comes to our facilities.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Gilliken for making that work.

Any other takers for public comment?

All right, we have

No school tomorrow, so our rezoning meeting will be rescheduled.

We are also canceling our Thursday school board budget work session.

So our next meeting will be Thursday, February 20th for the approval of this budget, followed by March 6th, our regularly scheduled school board meeting.

to our city council partners.

Thank you.

And we look forward to a more normal Virginia snow tomorrow that will be followed by 60 degrees and rain, maybe so a little bit easier cleanup conditions.