00:00:02,770	There. Good evening. I’m Danny kate, president of the Bismarck Public School board, It’s 515 on Monday. April 22nd. I call this meeting to order. Welcome to those of you who are joining us both here and also online. You can find our agenda and follow along online under the school board tab at Bismarck, schools.org.

00:00:25,270	Mr she can you call the roll for us, please? Mr. Eastgate. You’re Mr Hager here, Mr Lee here, Mrs Peterson here, Miss preskey Here All board members are present accounting for Dr. Foz, would you please lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance? The United States of And to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God. He did.

00:00:54,070	Justice. Sir. Item one C, the BPS mission vision and values. The BPS mission is to empower every learner to thrive. The bps Vision states together our strong relationships, build inclusive, collaborative and innovative environments that create agency and inspire a passion for learning excellence and discovery. The bps values are inclusion, excellence, innovation and leadership.

00:01:24,030	You also find a link in the agenda to the BPS strategic plan. Item two is to adopt the agenda. What are the wishes of the board. Mr lee. I moved there we adopt the agenda. A second. We have a motion in the second. So. No discussion, Mr Share hager. Yes, Lee Peterson preskey Sea Gate. Yes.

00:01:49,000	Motion passes Item three. We have the audit report. Dr. FSN will hand it over to you, Um Good afternoon board members. Nice to see all of you, Uh, I’d like to introduce tonight. Um, Mr, dan Cox and Lindsey sloppy from the North Dakota auditor’s office.

00:02:05,670	They’re gonna do the presentation of for us this evening, but before they take the podium, I think, uh, um Just wanna address that after you have some, Um, I’m Sure the board will have some questions of the auditor’s office after they’re done with the presentation. I think that’d be a good time to do that? I’m Sure You have some questions about our corrective actions.

00:02:21,730	And, then I think Mrs Mr Share and I will round that out with how we Responded with any corrective actions, or, um, Advice that the auditor’s office given us for operations, so we’ll do that at the end, so I think if the auditors office ready, we’ll let them take the podium. Good evening. My name is Dan Cox.

00:02:45,230	I’m, a CPA and the director of audit services for the North, Dakota state auditor’s office auditor. Gal would like to extend his gratitude and having us be able to speak to you. He is not able to be here this evening. As. It turns out the Williston school district.

00:03:03,930	Uh, petition audit is also being presented at this exact same time and so he is participating in that and I am participating in this one. So again, thanks to the board for allowing us to present this audit report.

00:03:25,530	I’d also like to thank Mr chair and his fiscal staff, uh, for their willingness and and quick, responsive time in getting this information, answering our questions and things of that nature, Uh and then lastly, I’d also like to thank Brady Martz for working with us to prepare the financials so that we could focus on just doing the actual audit report itself. So with that I’ll turn it over to Lindsay Slappy.

00:03:43,800	Uh, CPA, who is the director of quality assurance for our office and she will go through the report and the findings. Thank you, Mr Cox. OK, um, I’m gonna present the report. This report is for the fiscal year. Uh 2023 So.

00:04:06,270	It’s a June 30 2023 year end The audit was completed by our office because of assisted a citizen initiated petition that is set in north quarter century code 54 1015. This audit does meet the requirement for political subdivisions that they need to receive an audit in 5410. This audit is a financial statement audit, and it does include a federal single audit.

00:04:26,600	Uh, the main Difference between a traditional financial statement, audit and a petition audit is we do include testing of some of the areas that were provided as citizen concerns within this audit, if you turn to page two of the report, uh you can see that there is an unmodified audit opinion that is a clean audit opinion and the highest level of opinion, uh, that you can give, so that is our

00:04:44,300	opinion on the financial statements. If, you continue through the report you can have, uh, you find the management discussion and analysis, the financial statement. And the note disclosures. Um and then on page 67, you’ll see their statement of expenditures of federal awards.

00:05:03,870	So that’s their statement that shows all of their federal expenditures by program and then on page 69, you’ll see our report on internal control and compliance when you go towards the bottom of that report, you can see that we have identified that there were two audit findings that we deem to be significant deficiencies, which I’ll get to at the end of this, um, so those were the two findings

00:05:21,600	that are within the report. And then if you continue to page 70 Two. That’s Our report on federal compliance for our federal single audit. We did, uh, audit for major programs. Those were the emergency connectivity program, education stabilization, Comprehensive literacy, State Development and Head start cluster.

00:05:43,530	Uh, for all of those programs you can see on page 74 that we issued an unmodified opinion. That means we didn’t identify any material, non compliance or any material weaknesses in internal controls and any of those federal programs. Uh, if you turn to page 75, you can see the start of recommendation. One recommendation.

00:06:05,370	One is related to the construction manager at risk. Uh, for our audit. We tested three of 11 public improvements, uh, that received payments within the fiscal year. Uh, of those two of them, we noticed had a a few errors. Uh, what we tested for was we look to make sure that public notice was provided for at least 21 days.

00:06:25,100	The contract was awarded to the lowest Responsible bidder. The contract was approved here by the school board and that the construction manager at risk was obtained following North Dakota century code. Uh, so those two contracts that we found errors in were Silver Ranch, the silver Ranch school.

00:06:44,430	Um the areas that we found is that the selection committee did not have all the required individuals on that selection committee. There was not a registered architect that was included prior to the creation of the request for qualifications development, um, which is required in law, and there was not a licensed contractor included and then we did not have evidence of scoring so we couldn’t validate That, the contractor that was

00:07:05,730	awarded was awarded based on the scoring that was provided by that selection committee. Uh, the next one was the Legacy High School Edition, uh, dot selection committee did not have a registered architect. Uh, they did not have a licensed contractor or a registered engineer on the selection committee.

00:07:25,530	There was no proposed budget limits included and then the same thing with the documentation for the evaluation of scoring. There was no evidence to show how they scored. All. Those submitted proposals to ensure it went to the the lowest responsible bidder. Uh, so we recommended that BPS update their procedures to ensure all elements of North Dakota century code 48 01.

00:07:45,730	2 20 are followed during the selection of a construction manager at risk. Uh, if you flip to page 79, you can see that the, um BPS did agree with that finding and they identified several changes that they’re gonna be doing with their corrective action plan. Um, back on page 77 is the other finding within the report.

00:08:07,200	That finding is related to conflict of interest. Uh, the district does have a conflict of interest policy related to staff. Uh, that policy states that a conflict exists whenever the employee has a personal, professional or financial interest in a district contract, or matter to be decided by the board or its designee.

00:08:26,800	Um the policy defines the type of situations or contracts. This applies to so those, uh, for example, would be like building and construction projects or contract. For services like cleaning snow removal, um, as well as several different situations that are identified.

00:08:45,930	Uh, currently the district doesn’t have a process for their staff members to identify any potential conflicts of interest so that they can evaluate those or identify those, um, when they bring up potential contracts to the board, Uh, since we couldn’t determine whether there were any potential contracts, we couldn’t audit to see whether any contracts were entered into that had a conflict. Um we also couldn’t ident.

00:09:04,900	By the reverse whether there weren’t any conflicts at all that would have been identified by staff members. Uh we did recommend that BPS develop procedures to obtain potential conflicts of interest in order to reasonably assure that conflicts are absent when entering into contracts or conducting business with vendors.

00:09:27,230	Um, that response again is on page 79 and the district did agree with that finding I can answer any questions you guys might have. Thank you very much M. SLA. I appreciate that. UH, board members. Questions for Mrs Slappy. Remember lee Thank you, President. Eastgate, Um I just have a couple clarifying questions for Mr share. How many accounts does BPS have We have about 16,000 active accounts accounts and then How many line items Well.

00:10:14,070	I think that it’s a lot because that’s the individual account codes and then you’d have multiple under each right. So You, say 32,000 OK? Um M Lappy. Thank you for being here to answer questions? Um So. There were no financial findings. Uh, no. These were internal control related findings or non compliance with law.

00:10:40,330	It had nothing to do with the financial statements themselves. The findings or the audit. The of the findings did not relate to the financial statements. There were no errors within the financial statements. So in that, um Yeah. That’s impressive to me, Um There’s a lot To get right.

00:11:03,730	I was expecting a couple of small things to pop up during such an extensive audit, but to come through that clean is is It’s pretty remarkable. Um, one of the findings. Had to do with some of our processes surrounding the sea Mar the construction manager at risk So I was, uh Well.

00:11:29,000	It was stated that we did not include a registered architect in this committee prior to establishing the content. For, the RFQ. And. So, just as a, uh Little confused, but I. I sat on the selection committee for a Silver ranch in Elkridge. And clearly remember both Todd Mitchell and lee pierce with icon. Participating in the rankings and interviews for the For. The construction manager.

00:11:56,570	Uh, is this a process thing that we didn’t? Is it a timing thing or that we didn’t declare them to be. Can you clear that up for me, I, I would have to verify in the documentation. My understanding is they were involved in the scoring, but the way the law reads is that they should have been involved in the development of the RFQ.

00:12:14,300	And there. There was no evidence that that um architect was When they developed the RFQ. But. I believe they were involved in the scoring. So. It was the front end process that the law required them to be included on OK. So. My. Other question was, Um we didn’t include a licensed contractor. And again.

00:12:36,670	I recall having a contractor in that selection committee and rankings, so I’m guessing it’s a similar Answer. There was a law change. Uh, one or two sessions ago. I believe that changed the language in the law firm just being contractor very general to saying licensed contractor and I believe the individual that was on the scoring committee may have had some contracting

00:12:56,630	experience was not an actual licensed contractor. So by law that didn’t meet that requirement. OK? Um And. Then I realized documentation could not be provided by the district for the ranking and evaluations of the three highest ranked C Mars. Including. The final selection. Is that correct? Yes, yes. Um Yeah.

00:13:24,770	I would have expected a S to retain those records. So. That’s unfortunate I I’m confident we’ll Clear. Clean that up. And I also recognize that I have a certain Comfort level because I was present at the the interviews, ranking the firms, the most privy to the process. Being completed. So.

00:13:47,770	I guess I would say, you know, the process is is important. But the documentation of the process is equally important if we are to engender trust in the process and and transparency, I, I think we can all Agree on that point. So, Mr president. If. You. Don’t mind I just a couple of comments to finish up.

00:14:07,430	I don’t really have any more questions, but thank you so much so You know all in all is this really was a fantastic audit, And. I wanna thank you. The auditors, Um and really all of our people who who work hard each day to account for every dollar we spend. It’s no small task.

00:14:27,770	Um, I also want to encourage for a future boards, Um, to maintain the practice of annual audits. We have to do them every two years, But I believe doing them every year like we do is is warranted. Um BPS is A large entity. Uh, just so many moving parts. And.

00:14:51,730	It’s truly the only way, uh, board members and the community can rest easy knowing that an independent third party has combed through the financials and put their stamp of approval on our book, so I think it’s important that we do those every year. So again. Thank you and that’s all the questions I have. Thanks, Mr lee. Yeah very well, said Mr lee. I, appreciate those sentiments and and miss Slappy.

00:15:08,730	Thank you for being here tonight to to present us the findings. Um as Mr, Lee stated, You know we’re We’re in the education business if you will, so I think all of us on the board and at the district we want to be learners, too.

00:15:22,200	And so when there’s things that we can do to improve, we want to improve those. So we appreciate um First of all. I’m in a third party audit every year, as Mr lee stated, And, even if there’s you know, when there’s community members that feel like we need to take a deeper dig, and they had you come in.

00:15:34,630	We can take a look at those things and learn as well, Um, on a similar kind of line, uh, as Mr Lee because he was a part of that Silver Ranch Elementary Committee. I myself. I was on the Legacy high school selection Committee. Um it was just mentioned.

00:15:49,400	I know in the report that we did not include a registered architect for the committee prior to the establishing of the RFQ very similar to what Mr lee just established at at Silver Ranch, but I do think it’s important to clarify for the community. Um, you know, I. I was on that committee.

00:16:03,570	We had the same same question james Devine with J two studio was on the selection committee. Um, we did not include a licensed contractor, I believe was noted, uh, we had the same experience contractor for this This selection committee as we did for Mr Lee’s committee with Silver Ranch.

00:16:19,330	So, uh, we can see where we have those processes and we can we can improve upon them, but just also let people know that we are getting what I would call experts in the field to definitely be there to be in the room to help us make those decisions. Um Same with the engineer.

00:16:34,800	We had a we had the same engineer on the select Committee from Silver Ranch, um, as we did at the Legacy one Uh, so just the last thing I guess I would just say is that you know, we understand that we need to We can improve. We can do it better, and I think that’s OK. Um, so as far as like the scoring sheets, same deal, As Mr Lee stated I was president. Those.

00:16:48,670	Um I believe our board, um, had the trust that when we come and say that this committee met, it wasn’t just us. There was many members of our district leadership that were in the room as well as these experts just at our community knows that what we want to improve that we’re doing our due diligence to make

00:17:00,900	sure that we’re having the right people in the room for these Um So with that, Miss Slappy. I mean in there the questions But, Mr lee, and you already kind of went over those so very similar but on a different committee, So thank you for for helping us out with that board members Hope, Mr

00:17:15,330	Hager. Yeah. Couple of things, I. Guess the the first one I wanted to touch on, um When you when you look at the the audit as as a total package, it’s it’s a It’s what you hope for.

00:17:33,700	You know the the reason we do these annually is is we wanna see what what we’re doing as a district and we want to make sure financially that we’re doing things the right way. So that’s why we do these on annual audits.

00:17:50,130	We we wanna We wanna do things the right way and and and find those those Potential issues or or things that we need to potentially correct, So that’s why, um For the general public if you if you’re not aware every October, we we get our audit report back. So, so normally we get these audit reports back in October. It gives us a chance kind of earlier in the school year to kind of address any potential issues that are out there.

00:18:06,600	This is a little later in the year than we’re used to, typically seeing you in October, Um I guess. One One question that came to mind. I guess this would be for Mr share so because we do these annual audits If. Somebody in the community. Want to go out and look at a past audit. Where. Could they find those? So.

00:18:24,130	Those are all published on our website for They go back as far as I can remember. And. Then there’s even a an archive section, so the most current ones are right there. Then you click in archive and you can get even older ones. OK, Thank you, Mr Chair.

00:18:40,730	Uh, Mississippi get get a question, just kind of a kind of a point of curiosity for me. Um More around the conflict of interest rather than the the other. Significant deficiency that you had addressed. You’re with this staff member potential conflict of interest. Note. Um To me. It looks like this is a procedural thing.

00:19:06,070	I mean Is this something that You normally test for when you guys go out, and do you know school district reviews? Um I would assume other school districts have policies similar to ours. Um, do they have a procedure where they’re annually? Checking those as well. Um so I’d have to verify what the auditors actually do the school district audits.

00:19:24,230	But the reason this became a bigger risk was it was a petitioner concern, um, related to conflict of interest. There are laws that surround conflict of interest, So. That’s why we’re able to pull it into a financial statement, Audit and then BPS specifically, uh, they have a policy that extended it all the way down to the staff and all of the staff, So.

00:19:41,630	That’s Why the expectation then was that all of the staff needed to meet that because that’s how they had interpreted the law and From a significant standpoint, BPS is a very large district with a very large number of employees, so that made the significance much greater because they extended that all the way across all of

00:20:00,200	this, uh, staff members. Good. Yeah. Thank you, missy. So, I guess with that. Now you Dr. F is not Mister Cher. Um, what could could you elaborate on what the district’s done to to address this one? Yes. Um, um, Remember I would be glad to I.

00:20:20,900	I do wanna just emphasize that we do have a staff con conflict of interest policy DEBB that’s from School Boards Association. We use it as not a coherent governance policy but administrative policy. So if patrons want to see it, it’s in that section of our policy book. Um, it does say, staff. We kind of reference it.

00:20:41,500	They’re using their example. Um, we did take their findings or their recommendation and took that to heart. Like you said, Uh, President OK if we can be better. Let’s be better, um, really focus that in on people within the institution that have Power and control over a con contracts and and disseminating dollars and, uh, through the system.

00:21:04,430	I think most people understand that brand new Aid that we hired yesterday probably doesn’t have that level of control over those dollars, so we wanted to focus on those people that have that decision making control. So right after the, um otters report came out, we re evaluated the policy. We’ll retain this policy.

00:21:22,770	This year we went to our HR department created a form that, uh, we could disseminate to those correct groups. We We really narrow that down to the administrative group. That’s bigger than just what you think of building administrators. It includes Some directors. Um 85 people I went and checked today. How.

00:21:43,330	Many People got that email saying you had to review and declare any conflicts that you may have, Um, it really is a check box. Yes. No. I’ve reviewed it and a narrative box to say I have conflicts in these areas. I’m declaring them, Um 85 people got that and 85 people have already completed it. So.

00:22:01,930	We had about a seven day turnaround to to say you need to complete that in one week, and everybody in that group has met Already and and our plan is to just retain that. It just becomes an every summer after hiring.

00:22:18,830	Um Mrs Peterson is probably used to that every time we get hires in the in the August time we’re all signing forms and reasserting that we’ll just make that part of our annual practice. Any further, Mr hager. Board members OTHER? Yep, Miss preskey. Yes, Thank you I. I. Guess I agree Like As far as an audit goes this this turned out to be You know as good as we could hope for.

00:22:38,270	And yeah, we can learn to make some corrections along the way for those that Um, were found that need some attention. Um, I. Guess. My question is probably not for Miss Slappy. But for, um Mr Share, or Dr. SS, not what was the total cost then of this year’s audit.

00:23:01,870	For that one since he’s had experience, uh, board member preskey, so we we don’t have our final billing yet, but just based on what we’ve been told, uh, for this year, it’ll it’ll be right around $80,000.

00:23:25,470	And Can I continue And then what is the cost of a normal year? So this, uh, this year if it would have been done by our By Brady March who we had under contract for this year. We it would have been under 26 like 25 5 or something around there. So I think I know the answer to this question, but it is probably good for the public to know as well. So. We’re under contract with Brady Martz to do an annual audit. And. Then.

00:23:50,530	The petition came forward and Brady Marts was able to let us out of that deal. Um Or did we have to have two audits? No, they let us out, so we had a three year agreement.

00:24:06,970	So what we’re able to do is just push that into the future, so we forego this year with Brady Marts and then had the state auditor’s office due this year’s audit. And it it costs that much more to have the state auditor’s office do the audit. Yeah, and I, I. I’ll let them talk about the why I would imagine part of it was doing all the testing for the petition.

00:24:25,900	Um you know, if they I don’t think it would have been that high if it would have been a non partition audit I would imagine, But I. That’s I don’t wanna put words in their mouth. Um, so I do have the number. Uh, I believe it’s gonna be right around.

00:24:41,170	71,000 is where it’s going to come in, and he he’s exactly right. So when those petition audits come in the first process of what has to happen is we have to evaluate the petitioner’s concerns and then on top of evaluating those concerns, we have to determine whether they’re actually auditable concerns.

00:25:00,330	Um and by auditable for financial statement audits, it’s does it impact the financial statements or does it impact some sort of law? Some significance with law, So we have to go through? That entire evaluation, period or process, And, then that does require additional testing, so there was probably more testing and expenditures than there were previously.

00:25:21,370	Um, there’s probably more inquiry on different processes that were related to controls over cash collections. Those type of things, um, and those all get built into to those costs. They do cost more. And. I’m Not. Sure, um, so there are two components to this too. I’m Not. Sure, If. Typically.

00:25:40,900	What that 26,000 If that Who, the financial statement preparation piece because Brady Martz prepares your financial statements and then the audit, so I don’t know if that that 26 would have been with both or if it was just the audit side separate from the financial statement, prep Yeah, So. That is the difference so normally with the 25 5 that would include our kaffer.

00:25:58,200	So this This would be the state auditor’s Office bill and Brady Marts bill is a pro would approach 80,000. OK? That normally would be included in the 25 5. OK? Any other questions or discussion. Ms Peterson. I thank you so much for coming And. I won’t belabor what some of my fellow board members talked about. But. You know I.

00:26:28,100	I have the I guess joy of seeing a lot of different audits in in my job, and and I was actually, um, pleased to see this because of the lack of financial concerns, and then I want to just talk a little bit about the vocabulary because that’s kind of my background and sometimes, um, even as I was learning how to read these

00:26:44,930	myself, some of the vocabulary used is a little bit challenging. And I know you You touched on it right in the beginning, But, can you define again? What the, um for the public What unmodified audit means like on page 74 where it really starts to break down the, um Kind of what? What type of

00:27:04,800	report you are are doing plus then kind of the level of deficiencies and so on. Can you just define that unmodified again. For. Me? Yes, So. Typically. There’s there’s four different types of opinions that you can give on financial statements.

00:27:21,930	Unmodified, we say, is like a clean opinion, so there was no material errors to your financial statements we were able to obtain an audit language sufficient appropriate audit evidence when we were testing things so that we were ensuring that the numbers were accurate. So unmodified means we didn’t have any. Areas errors in that area. So that’s that’s the highest level of opinion you can give on financial statements.

00:27:40,100	Thank you and if I can continue president at eastgate, and then I think the other words you know when we see the words in the internal controls like material weaknesses, significant deficiencies in the non compliance.

00:27:59,200	Um, First of all, I was happy to see that the majority of all of those check boxes were none noted, and I think the public should be happy that they see that but then talk a little bit the level of severity in those three when you talk about material weaknesses and significant deficiencies and non compliance. Is there a level of severity to those.

00:28:15,730	And can you just talk us talk to me and then talk the public through it as well. Yep so material weaknesses and significant deficiencies are auditing terms. They’re in all of the standards. So when you’re making that evaluation, a material weakness would be the highest level. So to me.

00:28:33,470	It’s like Greater dollar values or more pervasive, and then the next step down is saying that Yeah, it’s still significant, but it may not be as pervasive of a problem. There is another step below that where you kind of consider in other internal control, where it’s not quite as significant. Um, it would be the same with non compliance.

00:28:50,600	There’s material non compliance, and that is a standards term to where it’s significant, and it is material so high dollar value or you go to other non compliance, so it’s less severe, so this would be a significant So it’s kind of in the middle where we’re saying yes, it it could have a material impact, but, um, not pervasive problems.

00:29:10,300	Thank you? I think that’s what I needed to hear? Just because when we when we talk about these, and and those of us that have read through this and kind of scoured and made our notes, um when we say that this is a good audit, I don’t think that we mean anything in the sense that it’s not good.

00:29:24,770	It’s good that we find out the things that, um, that it brings up so that we can correct them. And I, you know, it sounds like from Dr. not and from Mr Cher and from the team that they are already putting processes into place that will. Hopefully if this audit was done.

00:29:41,670	That next year, we would have the documentation to to prove that these things weren’t happening. But. I also think it’s a good audit. Because if you’re doing these things regularly, you can catch them in time for it to be so significantly bad that you have to overhaul your entire system. And.

00:29:58,300	These are things that I think are, um More easily remedied than in other cases. So, uh with that, I think that’s the end of my questions. But. Thank you so much for your time and um and putting together this report, Peterson. Any other questions or comments from the board members from Miss Slappy. Thank you very much for presenting and answering all of our questions.

00:30:16,330	You know before we move on in our agenda, too. I. Just Wanna say, um again. Thank you to the state auditor’s office. I’d also like to thank Mr share our business operations manager and our whole accounting team actually at the district office.

00:30:33,100	It is not something, uh, getting an audit that the board is is certainly not intimidated or afraid. Afraid of because, like Mr lee pointed out, we’re required to do it every other year and we choose to do it every year by a very reputable, Uh, Third party accounting firm here in town, and it’s It’s one of those things where we want to look at that.

00:30:46,270	And if there was something That should be fixed or get done. We. Wanna do it and at the same time we know we have good people and places to do it. Well, um to kind of just also summarize some of that. I think it It’s good to see it. There was not a conflict of interest.

00:30:58,670	I think that’s important to say, Uh, there’s a there’s a better process there to make sure that we keep doing that so that we don’t run into that. Um, but I certainly appreciate the communication that went on between both our office, state auditor’s office and the timeliness that we that our office did in getting everything back.

00:31:14,670	I heard from, um, the state auditor’s office that they appreciated how quickly Everybody was able to provide from our district getting back numbers and accounts and all the things it took to get this done so Um I appreciate that Dr. S. Not any, uh, anything else from you on that or should I continue on the agenda? I Think I’m. Good.

00:31:29,800	Thank you very much board members. Thank you for your time and consideration. That was a lengthy report. Yes, please. We’ve all thanked the auditor’s office and thank you. Will say without naming the team.

00:31:49,430	Um Mr share his business office team did a really good job to your point getting the materials back? That was happening even as I was coming on board, but, uh, very responsive. Really appreciate it. Um, and we’ve extended your kind words to them. Um, as you as we’ve met with them, just appreciative of their hard work to do this, right. So thank you. Absolutely. Um and M preskey. Also to your point.

00:32:06,330	I think that cost is also important to bring up as well, though. I mean it’s it. We’re looking at Um 40 $46,000 spread between the two from what I could come up with, um, based on round number, So, Um, but it’s not nothing So I. I appreciate you bringing that up and pointing that out as well. Um, we’re gonna move on with our agenda.

00:32:24,000	We’re gonna go to Item four. Focus on success. And four, a BPS website update and I’m going to invite to the podium. Mr Steve Coons, director of communications. Mr Eastgate, members of the board and Welcome to give you, uh, a little update here on what’s going on with our website. Um, I think the main point.

00:32:43,970	We want to give a little bit of rationale as to why we’re getting a new website if you’ll remember? Maybe a year ago, I stood up here and said, Hey, we’re getting a new website, and it’s gonna be awesome. And, then we turned it on. And.

00:32:59,300	That was, uh, going well, Um, However, you can go to the next slide, brad. Um We found out about a month after we turned on that new website that blackboard had been acquired by final site and other companies, So We turned it on. We were happy and then one month later, they’re like Nope, It’s, uh, gonna be going away here. So.

00:33:16,730	Um I just include a little bit of background history on BPS, Uh, just so you can understand kind of how we have arrived where we’re at, Um in 2016 the the district had been using another platform and realized they need really need a more robust system. Um, to handle all the On our website, so we switched to blackboard in 2017.

00:33:35,630	And. Then. We had this this idea in 2021 things have been getting a little, um, outdated and thought, you know to extend the lifespan will do this redesign.

00:33:50,570	Um and that really was the whole intent of the original redesign was to just extend the lifespan so we wouldn’t have to go through the cost and the the labor of turning on a a whole new website. But again, it’s unfortunately, um Uh, blackboard was acquired and blackboard.

00:34:10,200	Uh K 12 was that our vendor since 2016 so, but you can go to the next slide, and, um, just a a few additional details about that, Um, final site gave us a deadline, they said 2025, they’re going to discontinue support for blackboard. Meaning, Uh, if we don’t come up with a replacement, we won’t have a website. So. We looked at what final site had to offer and and decided it actually could meet our needs pretty well. So. We moved forward with a partnership.

00:34:30,530	Uh, there And just a little update on on what’s been done so far. We have been through the design phase on that website. We’ve got a new site built out and have migrated all the content from our old site over to the new website.

00:34:47,600	Um, so we do have the a new website up and running right now it’s just in draft form. Um, and we’re just working on optimizing that content we’ve got around 4000 pages right now to go through individually and make sure they’re optimized. So it’s a little bit of a process. Um, and that said We’re looking at, like a mid July. Uh, roll out for this this new website And, Although.

00:35:05,270	This really wasn’t something we wanted to do. Um, there are a few benefits. Um each elementary school will now have its own dedicated website, Um, on the blackboard site. There’s the elementary pages are a little more limited. They don’t have their own website. So. That’s an improvement. Um, it’ll be a more streamlined site.

00:35:22,830	Um, we’re able to kind of go in and and clean things up. We’re always cleaning things up on the website, but you know, we’ve got over 200 users, Um In, the website any given time, So. Things always get, uh, a little bit jumbled. And so this is a fresh start, right? And? Um, Finally an another.

00:35:42,170	Important, Uh, improvement will be that there’s a translation feature that’s far superior to what we have on blackboard. And there’s been a lot of interest in that, um as well and it was also designed with mobile in mind. So School websites are always a little interesting because they’re designed with the the desktop computer in mind as well.

00:35:58,630	And so the mobile optimization will be On this one. And so just what to expect. Um, you You shouldn’t see any disruption. So anything that you need to access my payments plus things like that Those will continue to work as planned. Um, navigation will be similar, so it’s not like you’re gonna go there.

00:36:14,770	You’re not gonna know how to get around and we’re trying to keep it where the continuity is, is pretty good. So, um, minimal disruptions and right now we’re looking at July 15 is our planned rollover date, So I think that’s about all I have on that. Um, I’d certainly answer any questions. Board members. Any questions for Mr Coons on the new website.

00:36:35,430	Remember Lee. Thank you President eastgate. Um So, you said improved accessibility Translation features so translating into multiple different languages, So, we do have that ability on our current website. But.

00:36:56,270	It’s not maybe as robust as what it could be so there’ll be like, especially for EL population right? They’ll be able to go in and choose their preferred language and it’ll be all you know, seamlessly translated for them. Yeah, That’s awesome because I think one of the statistics that blew me away the last few years and I think the last time I heard it was There’s 87 languages spoken in BPS, which so that’s pretty incredible, but that’s an awesome feature.

00:37:15,130	So Thanks for the presentation. Dr. if I can just add, Um Mr Koontz has been sharing me copies of this. I do think, um People are going to enjoy the similarity.

00:37:38,400	The the flow of the pages and how they very, um There’s an ease of navigation in there, which I will I think you’ll enjoy? Uh, I was gonna same thing as board member lee. The Translation feature is huge. We’re doing that with newsletters now making them in a platform so they can be easily translated by families because there’s so many different languages, So. I think that’s a A great, uh, tool as he indicated optimization for phones.

00:37:57,670	I mean honestly, very few people access our website. I think on a mobile or a device. It’s All Mobile. Everybody’s accessing it that way. I think that was a great choice, And.

00:38:17,570	I know he’s um, kind of just slid right past that 4000 pages in the work being an old tech guy that managed a very small school districts, 350 pages and Dreamweaver when you decided to do a changeover to a new format, a new design a new Rev. You might say that is huge work so him and his team are doing a very good job do that. That’s not an easy project. So thank you, Steve. And see no further questions from board members.

00:38:36,270	Mr. Coons, thanks very much for presenting tonight we look forward to seeing the new roll out of the website. And like Dr. Foz not said the mobile device will be huge for us as well. So. Good luck. Good luck with those thousands of pages. We appreciate you. Item five is public comment.

00:38:53,330	The board recognizes the central role parents play in the education of their Children and support active parent involvement in the educational process. The board’s practice of public comment reflects in aligns with policy BC B a and the spirit of its intent for classroom issues.

00:39:08,670	It’s best to follow the chain of command from the teacher to the principal to the assistant superintendent to the superintendent. For district issues. Please Reach out to Dr. Fs NOTT’s office. No. Public comment to address from last board meeting. Uh, if you do approach the the podium to speak today we ask that you be responsible, be helpful and be respectful.

00:39:27,330	Our BPS students deserve to have adults model the expectations that we have for them. Groups are urged to select one spoke spokesperson. Individuals be limited to no more than four minutes and we notified with 30 seconds remaining to conclude your remarks.

00:39:43,200	The board will not present debate issues as presented, but will take such matters under advisement with that, please stand and approach podium if you’d like to speak tonight. You can state your name for the minutes and the agenda item which you’ll be speaking. There’s also a sign up sheet if you choose to sign in, Thank you. Good Evening.

00:40:08,930	Everybody good, um, didn’t have plans to speak, but since it came up and the audit is on the agenda Um, I did wanna bring it up and just briefly, was you guys did talk about the cost? Of. The State Audit versus your annual audit. Um, he made it sound like it was a burden. You know, we all wanna be physically responsible. But. One thing I would ask the board to, uh, consider in the future. Is over 5000.

00:40:29,270	People did sign that petition for an audit. Um, so instead of putting or making the cost on like a burden I would say that maybe we should figure out ways that the public is more trustworthy or, you know, trusting, um, of the process.

00:40:50,700	Because like I, said 5000 people That’s That’s a fairly big number within our community. Um, and those people thought that it was necessary, and that was That was the way to have their voice heard. Um, so as As represent representatives elected representatives of the community. You know, Miss preskey You kind of made it sound like it was a a bad thing, And.

00:41:13,000	I would say that, you know, uh, Mister eastgate and Mister Lee hit the nail on the head and sometimes we have to look at Where we can improve, take it and run with it. And continue to keep it in mind. Um, it was You know as uh, the state A’s office has said it’s not meant to be a bad thing.

00:41:28,500	Nobody’s trying to villainize nobody’s trying to do any of that. It’s simply how can we better ourselves and one take away as a community member that I’d like to see the board do is, uh, How can we instill that trust and how can we continue that transparency? Um, to keep the people knowing that That

00:41:45,000	things are on the up and up. Um, so that’s kind of my takeaway. I know that it was an added cost. Um, but what is the value of trust? Thanks for your time. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Jan Wangler. I’m from Bismarck. Here.

00:42:20,870	I was lead petitioner on the Request for the audit. Um, I saw that it was a necessary evil. Um, I spoke with tons and tons of community members who had the same feeling that we did, which was that we asked lots and lots of questions, both at board meetings through FOIA requests and through meetings with the superintendent’s office, and we

00:42:44,270	did not get all of the information that we were hoping to gain and the Walls went up and we were not answered. So when we were not answered.

00:43:05,300	We asked for what our next option was on how we could get the answers to our questions so that the transparency of not just the school board but the entire BPS at administration. Really, um, could be Further. Communicated between both the stakeholders and those that were in power per SE at the time. Um Mister.

00:43:35,730	Brad Miller came up here and he was given time from other stakeholders to present information that we had done as a group and, um, as a result of the questions that were asked, and as a result of the time sharing the board then changed its policy to only allow us four minutes to speak, no matter what the topic or no matter how much information we were seeking, Uh, we found it very stifling for that to happen to And.

00:43:56,430	We took the legal action that was available to us through the state and through century code and we went forward with it our whole premise when we did, it was to say that we hope that this audit comes out squeaky clean and that we can brag to others that our school system here in Bismarck, which is the largest one in the state, um, has that

00:44:16,230	good ranking. Um we had questions on construction. We saw it go to the same contract. All the time we saw that, um, in the audit report that it did find that there were some things that were deficient in that. So. That was a little bit of a validation. Um and I. I do.

00:44:34,800	Um, find some joy in finding out that the numbers, uh, had no discrepancies and that all of the, um fiscal responsibility that we entrust the school board and the administration with were found to be good. We do liken this a little bit to a crime scene. Where. Um, the yellow tape is put around the crime scene.

00:45:02,600	And, then, um, it is left in the open for months and And it is contaminated. We did feel a little bit like we should have been able to do a look back to the time period that we had first had issues and questions and because of the federal auditing system and what was on

00:45:23,570	the table that was not possible, and that’s been explained to us why we could not get the answers that we sought. But. We do not think that this should be a pat on the back. Um, for the entire Board and the system here because there are still some things broken. There are some things we know happened.

00:45:42,600	We know that there are some conflicts and we, um do not have a way to validate whether or not On paper that those took place because though there is a, um Policy in place. You don’t have a procedure to follow the policies, so that kind of lets you off the hook.

00:46:03,470	Um, I wanna thank all of the people that went out and got signatures? I want to thank all of the people that took the time to sign and I want to make sure that the public understands that no one in the administration or the school board was willing to do so. Thank you. Thank you, Mr W.

00:46:35,530	Good Evening. Hi. I was just looking at, um OE three treatment of community. Um Under 3.3, a Um, Superintendent interpretation. It says processes for input values. Processes for input values and ways diverse opinions of staff with diverse meaning. Racial, ethnic gender. And Social, economic, I guess to me when I think of diverse opinions. I.

00:47:17,230	Don’t Think of race. I. Don’t Think of ethnic. That’s not opinion. That’s a Group of people. Um People that are black are allowed to have diverse opinions. Whether I don’t know if we wanna do conservative liberal or or whatever continuum we’re talking about, but To me diverse opinions.

00:47:48,070	Has nothing to do with your skin color, your gender, your social, economic, um, status. Diverse opinions are a variety of opinions of the public. So. I guess I. I would just say. The superintendent. Interpretation should should be Um, we welcome a diverse amount of opinions from whoever it comes right. I mean, People, so that’s Seemed weird to me. OK, thank you.

00:48:21,730	Thank you. Anybody else for public comment tonight. See. No. Public comment is now closed. Item six is monitoring district operations. Six A is OE three treatment of community stakeholders. And I believe Dr. FSN has a report for us. Mr. Ask Mr Koons to provide you both these reports.

00:49:03,800	OK, uh, President Eastgate members of the board. Um OE three looks specifically at, uh, confidential information. Uh, formal complaints, organizational culture and information sharing. Um, we did find ourselves in compliance in all of those categories, um, and links to the relevant documentation were included in that report.

00:49:25,800	Um, one area We, Always like to report on is the community survey that’s held every year. Um, this year we had a little bit over 3500 respondents to the survey. And, Uh, from that we garnered a lot of useful information.

00:49:45,030	Um and I given the board a comprehensive report on that and stakeholders who are interested in the results can find that on the Bismarck school’s website under the community Relations area and we’ll go into that a little bit more on OE nine, But. Um I would say an OE three section 3.3 Indicators. Three says that the district should look for overall positive public perception and we did have a strong majority over 80%. K.

00:50:04,130	An overall positive perception of the district so I thought that was was really good to see. Um And just with that in mind, based on the evidence in the report, Um, the community survey results we’d recommend OE three be found in compliance by the board, and I would stand for any questions about OE three at this time. Board members. Any questions for Mr Coons. They have no questions.

00:50:28,870	What a RE the wishes of the board. Mr President. That would be. I would move that we accept OE three treatment of community stakeholders. Uh, As in compliance as presented A second. Motion of the second. Any discussion. Yeah, Mr.

00:50:55,930	Preskey, Um Just given the comment that was made, um in public comment about the suggestion that when I look at that 3.3, a Um You know I understand what they’re saying and and agree. Is that something that, um the board would like to strike. Will end a sentence a processes for input values and ways diverse opinions of staff period.

00:51:21,370	Or Do we keep it as it is and work on it. For the next time. Mr President. We just just to weigh in I. I agree. I. Uh, I didn’t catch that. But but Thanks, Uh, sorry It didn’t catch your name. But thanks for bringing that up. It makes complete sense to me. These are the superintendent’s indicators. However.

00:51:45,300	They’re probably not yours, right? So, Um, that would be more of the work of the superintendent if he chose to, uh, change that which I wouldn’t I would encourage you to look at it. Please. Dr. I, actually. And again. My. Uh, I applaud you looking at that better than I did and seeing it with fresh eyes. Um, I did.

00:52:05,330	I already made my two notes? Public opinion is this uh, is this too constricted? Should? We. Look to expand it. I can put your note Louis make a period here. Um, I do agree. Um Remember lee.

00:52:22,600	This is kind of what? My statements are of how I interpret it so I can bring you back some revisions taking into consideration and I’ve already made note of that. I think that’s a good Recommendation so Thank you to the public for helping me do my job better? I guess my question is, Can. We. Just make that change and approve it. With the change. Procedural wise, I would prefer since they are not really mine.

00:52:41,700	I’ll come back to you next year with a new revision. That’s mine. This is kind of last year’s report. Um, but, uh, I do see the need to change it. I can bring you back a recommendation. We’re probably bringing back some of these recommendations.

00:52:57,730	Honestly, Maybe Not this one, though, because this probably isn’t high on the list for our strategic priorities, But, I can bring a revision back next year. Thanks for that input. Dr F. I appreciate that for preskey. Is that is that OK, OK. We do have a motion to second any other follow up questions to that. So you know, Mr share the role, Please lee? Yes Peterson. Yes. Preskey.

00:53:19,130	Yes Hager. Yes, he’s gay. Yes. Motion passes and thank you again, uh, for bringing up a great point for us to discuss, um Moving on to the next. OE nine. Communicating with the public, Mr Koontz. All right. OE nine deals with the district’s communication efforts with the public. Um again.

00:53:47,400	We have some expectations in that associated with the community survey, um with an OE 39.1 indicator. Four says that we should look for at least 70% of stakeholders supporting district direction. So. We did see nearly 80% little over 79% expressing support for the district’s direction, so we’re definitely in compliance with that. And again.

00:54:08,200	That was that was really nice to see. Um overall in the survey results we saw, um overwhelmingly, uh, a majority of positive favorable responses for the district. So. Um, those are were really good results, Um, for indicator five. We use the board’s community involvement. Forum is an example of a community engagement event.

00:54:29,070	Um, I know the boards had two of those already. We’ll have the, uh, next one next week. Um, but I would also notice that the district does, uh, a lot of such events. Um, every year. Um, you know, uh so just something to be aware of, Um, I would call your attention to, um 9.2 Indicator one which we did.

00:54:49,330	Mark, um in compliance with exception on that one. I feel we We met the intent of it, but it does state that we’ll put the entire annual report and Bismarck Tribune. Um, since, uh, the this document was written. We’ve moved to like a full color. Um, annual report.

00:55:07,170	That’s kind of a Web based thing and so putting that entire document in the Tribune, um, is costly. Um, the annual report used to be like a a newspaper type document. So that was when when it was originally written, so right now we’re putting the link in the Tribune and like little ads with, you know, a link to the entire document, So we’re trying to match the intent

00:55:26,130	there, but just, you know, Full disclosure that you know the entire thing isn’t in there is, it says it should be an indicator one. So, um and based on all the overall evidence, I recommend we, uh find, uh, OE nine and compliance and I stand for any questions.

00:55:44,270	Thank you, Mr Coons and I would just start, I guess by saying that for for the board and Dr. Faz not maybe we want to make this note as well. But that indicator one just like we’re looking at some other ones. We definitely wanna make this readily available to the public. There’s no question about that, And I appreciate that The link is still That.

00:55:57,700	It’s a Web based like you said, multicolored, full form and everything, so we wanna make sure it’s available to everybody without anything, but maybe we look at what that indicator actually entails. And what we’re what we’re trying to accomplish there. Um, board members. Any questions for Mr Coons. Mrs Peterson.

00:56:14,200	I have a question, Um and and in a comment. I think one of the things that I thought was really, um, interesting or or important about this report, And I think you kind of hit the nail on the head is when you talked a little bit about the fact that we’ve added the community forums, which was a

00:56:29,230	better way to do two way communication. I know, Um some of the public comment today discuss just feeling stifled or not the not having the ability to maybe get some of those Answered in those forums.

00:56:46,800	I also think that one of the things that I think is to be noted, but it’s still fresh and new as these excellence committees that Dr. Foss not has just started. That is kind of a little bit of an extension of board work, but an opportunity to delve a little bit deeper into those strategic priority areas and just the streamlining of communication. Based on the street strategic plan.

00:57:07,070	Um, I think is is just something that hopefully brings clarity to I know it brings clarity to us, but it also hopefully will eventually trickle down to the public. And the only question that I have that was a long, um, statement to then ask you a question.

00:57:28,470	I think that having 3500 plus respondents is an excellent goal? Um, you know, having 13,000 students, Plus, Um I would say that we want to keep that goal. I was pleased just as both a parent and a community member to have seen a lot of Publicity around the the survey.

00:57:45,130	So this is more of AAA question to you, Um, steve, but also just a plea to the public that please fill those out. We do get those reports. We did We were we have the ability to read the the comments? Um, plus the obviously overall aggregate data. Um, but what are some of the other places that you guys have? Maybe? Maybe, so the public knows like other than just social media and email.

00:58:03,170	How, can they, uh, maybe find more about where? How Long is that survey open? Um, I know it’s closed now, but like just in the future, so that they’re looking for that so that these are opportunities for them to to do in the future. Um, great question. So.

00:58:18,770	We do make that available in the Bismarck Tribune as well. And. It’s, uh, you know, we did stories with KX news, KFYR. So all of our local media. You know we did put it in there for people who might not be on social media and obviously we know we put it on Twitter and Facebook and instagram and things like that

00:58:31,400	as well, Um, in our district Web page, so those are and then you know, we do direct emails and press. Leases and things with all of our, um internal stakeholders and external community groups, So. That’s kind of what we’ve done this year and we’re always looking for ways to expand.

00:58:47,400	Thank you so if people didn’t find it, um you know, that’s kind of on on them cause I. I do think it’s a really great number and the results um, especially in the environment that we’re in right now with, um, education.

00:59:00,730	We want to see those positive results, and we want our teachers and our students to feel that as well. Thank you. Thanks for member Peterson. Yeah. Thanks, Mr Coots. Uh, you know, I’m I’m glad to hear we’re hitting that 80% and that, you know, I. I appreciate the recommendations in compliance. I would just also saving for myself. I know, you know, communication is a It’s an ongoing thing.

00:59:17,830	It’s something we wanna continue to be good at, um, like any friendship or relationship that anybody else has it. It takes two you get you have to keep working at it.

00:59:30,400	You can’t just stop and so we’re hitting that close to that 80% mark which I’m happy to hear, and at the same time, I know, and as a board, we continually trying to do a better better job at that. We’ve talked about the community forum. I mean, I’ve I’ve talked to him about as great as it is, It’s still hard to close the loop that we talk about for getting back to folks.

00:59:44,000	And so, um, I just wanna wanted to just acknowledge that that we’re doing we’re we’re trying to do better, and there’s still work that we can continue to do even while hitting that 80%. So for sure. Thank you for that. Four members any of their questions or what are the wishes of the board? Mr President.

01:00:03,670	I would move that we accept OE nine, communicating with the public as in compliance as presented A second. We have a motion in a second. Any other discussion. Mr She Peterson. Yes preskey? Yes Hager? Yes lee? Yes, he’s gay. Yes, motion passes. Thank you, Mr Koontz.

01:00:30,200	Item six C is BS R two single unit Control, which I have a public reading for everybody. And, then we can retain or amend it as well as determine if we’re in compliance, or with the exception or out of compliance. Single unit Control BS R two, The board will direct the superintendent only through official decisions of the board.

01:00:48,630	Number one, the board will make decisions by formal recorded vote in order to avoid any ambiguity about whether direction has been given. Item two. The superintendent is neither obligated nor expected to follow the directions or instructions of individual mem members, officers or committees unless the board has specifically delegated such such exercise of authority. Excuse me. Item three. Should.

01:01:10,970	The superintendent determine that an information request received from an individual member or from a committee is unreasonable or requires a material amount of staff time. The superintendent is expected to ask the committee or the member to refer such requests to the full Board for authorization. This is the end of the reading for single unit control. BS R two. Board members and discussion. Or.

01:01:31,900	What are your wishes for this? Remember lee. Mr president. Thank you, Um No, I think again. This is a really important, uh Part of our our governance. Um, clearly lays out continues to lay out the responsibilities of the board and the relationship to the superintendent, and it prevents one board member from, uh from directing the

01:01:59,130	superintendent’s work. Um So it’s just really good. I would, uh, I would certainly move that we retain BS R two single unit of control. Mr Trager. Second.

01:02:19,930	Then I got a I second that motion and in just a comment, you know, kind of similar to the the reading we had last week with the single point of contact I. I think this this policy in conjunction with that? Really help. US run. Doctors in particular run this district efficiently. So that you don’t have multiple voices directing multiple things. We.

01:02:43,930	We we run that through the superintendent and having that channel to work through really makes a difference and really helps kind of the district run overall in a in a A very efficient manner. So Policy. Agreed. Thank you, Mr Hager. Dr. snot. Please, sir. Um I will say I I very much. Thank you for reaffirming this policy. I appreciate the safeguards that it kind of puts in place. Maybe. The guardrails is better than safeguards.

01:03:08,470	Some guardrails for operations and how we get things done. Um, but I will say this. So You know if I have to deploy this policy. We’re going to have a We’ll have a conversation about like, I can’t do that for you. And. Here’s why we’re going to talk about it.

01:03:23,000	But what I Want to make sure you understand even to Public out there and I pick on the lady in the back row again. I’ve never beyond some good advice. If. You have thoughts. Please share them. I’m not here to say I only do stuff that you tell me to board me. That is not me.

01:03:38,930	That’s not how I operate, And, So if you have good advice, thoughts, I mean just like the last two documents went over. Hey. We should consider changing that. You bet I’ll make a note. I.

01:03:53,330	I don’t need five people to tell me to change that, cause I think I just need good advice and I will I work to do my job the best I can and I appreciate that from you and the public, So thank you. Thank you, Doug F. We have a motion in a second to retain BS R two single unit control. Mr She If. You can call the roll, please. Ha? Yes Lee? Yes Peterson? Yes eastgate! Yes motion passes.

01:04:16,370	And then regarding, uh how you guys determined how the board determines us. I moved to find us in compliance. Mr lee. Second. We have a motion in a second, any further discussion. Mister share. Hagar? Yes Lee? Yes Peterson? Yes, preskey. Yes, he’s gay. Yes. Motion carries. Thank you.

01:04:43,530	Item seven on the agenda matters reserved for board action. We have school visits board members. I didn’t have a chance to check in. Does. Anybody have a school visit to report on this evening. See no lights coming on or nodding them ahead. We will. Oh right here. Just, Mr Eastgate. So. I’m done. I just I just wanna be clear How.

01:04:59,530	Many we have left, so we know when we can take that off the agenda. I Think Miss preskey has has has just picking a board member preskey right now. I want to I want to? It looks? I’m sorry. It does look like that, but I but I, But you have you have a couple too? I have one.

01:05:15,130	OK, so I’m picking on you too, Mr. We can take it. It’s OK and for the record, I was contacted about a spring visit, not a fall visit. I. You don’t have to explain to me and President is gate.

01:05:34,900	I know that one thing that we had discussed is we We have had, um several, like operational personal excellence up. Oh Gosh learning excellence and then What’s your What is I Can’t Remember your environmental environmental excellence committees and we did talk about, um, as those get rolling.

01:05:53,470	Those are those are fairly new, but having perhaps an opportunity in that same line item of school visit updates there may be times where those updates might be appropriate. As of right now it’s just new information and getting to know each other, and there’s some some work happening in several of them. But that might be something as we take one thing off or or add another. That would be helpful, absolutely. Board member Peterson.

01:06:07,630	I think that’s great, Great idea, and it’s something we should look at adding to the A As you said as they get rolling and they all get going, so that’d be great. OK so no school visits tonight. Item eight is the consent agenda where the which is the board? That. We adopt the consent agenda. Second We have a motion in a second.

01:06:27,200	Mr Chair. Lee? Yes, Peterson preskey Haar Eastes Item nine is the superintendent’s report. Dr. FSN Uh, thank you again, Uh, President eastgate. I’ll hand the first part off for financials to Mr share. Alright.

01:06:54,870	Thank you, uh, Superintendent FSN, Uh President eastgate members of the board today we have the monthly financial report in front of you ending the period march 31st really he to sound like a broken record, but everything’s tracking very well. Though one thing I’ll 0.2 things I want to point out to you. The.

01:07:15,200	First one is, um, one of my kind of favorite reports is how we’re tracking based on our revenue collected and then expenditures and I will I’m predicting that variance to budget will continue to decrease you can see our largest amount is federal Again that ties to how we collect federal funds. It’s on expense base, so we have to expend the funds and then we can request. Uh, the reimbursement. Uh and then on the The expense side.

01:07:34,400	You can see that it’s very favorable that we’re we’re under budget. Um, the second thing I want to point out, is we, uh My team and I are gonna have the opportunity think one of the big things that we how we look at is continuous improvement on financial transparency.

01:07:54,070	So, um, we’re gonna share with him our idea and how we can even make our website more kind of dynamic for our users so pretty excited to have that meeting and then roll that hopefully out in the future, um, for our taxpayers, just to, uh, show our expenditures using kind of a power bi model for those of you that are familiar with that. So.

01:08:12,270	That’ll be. It’ll be, um Dynamic and you’ll be able to toggle between months and pretty cool. And answer any questions A board would have on the financial report. Board members. Any questions for Mr Chair? Seeing none. I think we can go on to nine B Budget Update All right.

01:08:33,730	So what I’d like to present to board members. And really? I’m presenting this to you. You. You’ve had some discussions about this, but really for the patrons at large, Um, this similar document went out to staff a couple months ago to help just again it.

01:08:56,030	We’ve heard it 20 times today about clarity, communication, openness, transparency to talk about those decisions that deal with the finances of the district. So. I made some revision of this for public consumption. Nothing too big. So just making it up to date. Um, numbers haven’t changed, but I’d like to just share with you some of the big snapshot things dealing with the budget because it’s that time of year.

01:09:13,230	Um, jokingly, uh, as long as I’ve been a superintendent, March, April may are the most disappoint. I disappoint more people than I run into. Um, because all I do is say no, I. Just say no, we can’t do it or I can’t get that done or I’m out of money. I can’t do this.

01:09:29,670	It’s really about it’s really a disappointing time for my job. Um Till you get to graduation, then it’s good, but I just wanna share with you on this OK revenue projections at this time and again, That’s something you have to do in July and August and September before you firm up the the budget.

01:09:48,500	We’re just projecting out based on student enrollments, valuations, taxing capacity, things like that if we’re holding steady, uh, and using conservative projections were were looking at next year. We should be up about $8 million in revenue.

01:10:08,830	OK, so that’s Just a projection that helps me define what I can say Yes to is really what it does OK? Um, future planning if we slide down a little bit there, Miss Barnhart. Um, just so you’re aware you are aware we did the salary study that’s received actually met with some support staff last week to talk about the findings of that salary study.

01:10:29,400	I would tell you that’s a multiyear issue for us to get up to maybe a little bit more of, um, community level. Um, averages as far as what we pay some of our support staff, and, uh, that’s gonna take some work, But it’s gonna The budget not as much this year but more into the future consideration.

01:10:45,930	And as you’re aware, because it went to the Operational Excellence committee, the transportation report came back and we’re working on that again, not as much next year’s budget but could have impact a way to. That’s a savings. Really. How, Can. We save money by improving our transportation system and also improving quality, so those things we’ve done, uh, at the bottom left of that page. You’ll see Esser funding Now.

01:11:03,630	That was the funding that was tied to the pandemic. Right we received, Um um all districts in the nation received AAA. Bucket of cash and how we’re using it. Um, this district this year we have 7 $68,000 of Esser funds that are no more So.

01:11:24,600	We have to say this is the last year we can spend them. They’re gone. We’re the only can spend a dollar once is my grandma said so the they’re gonna get spent, and we can’t get him back. So. Um, those funds are not being replaced by the Fed. So we have to do those. I just am noting those three programs that are presently funding.

01:11:42,170	We have nursing services. Uh, three. Are funded out of Esser funds. We have school and school program that’s for kids that need, um, an alternate location. Alternate support system inside of their school to be successful, and then we also have been, um, supporting some counseling and social work positions through SR funds.

01:12:02,330	Those for me, I’ll be really honest, are making my art my team’s job challenging because there’s not any There’s no other money coming to fund those, So we have to decide. Are. They important and if they’re the most important Of the important things. Then.

01:12:20,070	How do we find ways to fund them? And if they’re not the most important of the most important things, then they’re gonna probably not be in existence anymore, And we just got to find a different way to do it just to be really Frank and, uh, that stuff we’re continuing to weigh right now. And. So. You’re aware I have meetings with, um Mr.

01:12:35,030	Chair coming up here at the end of the month to look at a new projection to see if my where I’m at is kind of where it’s settling out to make sure we make good choices. OK. So you go to the top, right? Um You should know of that $8 million of new money that for next year 7.

01:12:55,770	1 million has already been allocated due to, um agreements last year with teachers and support staff for 4% increase in salary and benefits Total. That’s A. That’s a total number An aggregate number may not be 4% for everybody, but just an increase in the budget of 4% for salaries. Um, so that’s 7.1 million. Um, that takes a lot of it. There’s not much left.

01:13:15,600	So. What my team has done is we’ve kind of said that’s about 1.1 million. Uh, we’ve looked at that. We’ve not we have not. I have not approved all those dollars yet because I’m being Good.

01:13:38,930	Good conservative rancher from um, just playing it and playing my cards close, but we have probably approved already about $800,000 of additional spending in the programs shown in the bottom right now you’re gonna say, Jeff. How can you do all that for 800,000? Well? There’s some new money in there and I will tell you there’s some contraction in there.

01:13:56,200	There’s some positions that we didn’t get filled that are just sitting in the budget allocated money that we can’t put anybody. We contracted them. Um, because why do you Why have it there? If.

01:14:13,670	It’s not helping kids, Right? Let’s put it in there and do something good with it, so there’s spending in there and there’s contraction in there, um, of what we’ve done to make sure we can serve the kids. You should know of the list that we waited through to do that that total expenditure was about 6 million. So we’ve cut $6 million of requests down to less than around $800,000 and done that through. Again contraction and some addition.

01:14:36,270	Um, but when people see these Please know that we’re making choices that these are really important. Not that anything is not important. We honestly I don’t know what we do. That’s not important. It’s all important, It’s just a matter of how important is it and what what’s gonna give us the best bang for a buck to, um, serve our kids and, uh, make sure that they’re successful. So.

01:14:53,230	You can see. Um, in there, um That. Um, we did like I know I’ve had questions about LD director. We did that one. But. We also didn’t hire uh, an example of the contraction. We didn’t hire the assistant director for technology.

01:15:13,470	We didn’t rehire that position to make that one a wash, um or close to a wash? Um, we contracted some elementary positions to make a P school to school. Some. Uh um Some other programs work, and I still think we’re going to be well within our enrollment targets.

01:15:35,930	So, Um, elementary Division helped with that tuition costs, you should know for CD courses because as you say, Miss preskey sometimes are unintended consequences of good legislation. Right. Um we’re probably gonna be, um short 100 to maybe 100 $50,000 just in tuition costs for center for distance ed courses that are now required to be paid by the district.

01:15:55,630	We don’t have an option, Regardless, so we’ve talked about that, I think before that’s gonna have to be addressed, and we do have an Increasing demand for substitute teachers and I know there are some adjustments with how many days they have and when they could use them last year that and I just think in general, we’re having more need for substitute teachers. So that’s pushing a little pressure on our budget.

01:16:12,200	In that area we’ll have to. We’ll have to backfill that to some degree to help get that in budget, so just again, informational for our patrons for public can see that and what we’re doing within the Expenditure and revenue realm realm. So Dr. FSA thanks a lot for putting this together.

01:16:31,400	I think this is very helpful for us as a board and also for community members, I. I know my school email as well as I believe other board members have there’s different topics on here that we hear a lot about and I appreciate you stating it the way you did, that it’s all important doesn’t mean it’s not important doesn’t

01:16:45,430	mean that we don’t want all these things. But for instance, that lower left when we look at Esther funding ending, it’s not that we don’t want those those things. Those positions those programs. It’s that though that funding was there for a period of time, and it’s not.

01:17:01,330	We can’t guarantee that it’s there anymore. Um, so I think as a board we We’ve been aware of that we’ve obviously we’ve talked about this at other board meetings that things are. It does tighten up and that’s when you don’t have all those funds. There. Um And. I. Think as a district.

01:17:13,170	We’re going to continue to work hard to make sure as you said that we’re we’re putting dollars where it makes sense and and how we can support our district and in our educators is and and of course, all of it going back to how are we impacting kids? So I. I just really appreciate this one. You know for a one pager.

01:17:27,630	Um, for somebody that’s not awesome at mining data all the time. Um and and looking at thousands of pages of of files. This is very helpful. So. Uh, Mr Hager? Yeah just just a common kind of along the whole budget process that we’ve we’ve gone through this year and I. I really appreciate.

01:17:46,730	Um not only this having this very condensed version that’s very easy for the public to look at, like Mister Eastgate just touched on, um, being able to See these data points real quick, But I. I appreciate hearing from you on on.

01:18:04,870	Your philosophy when it comes to budgeting and how you look at things and And I appreciate Um, back this winter when we had the the Budgeting workshop and the fact that we’re so far out in front of the budgeting process and working this through So that we don’t get to July and Ha and have this kind of stressful scramble at the end.

01:18:23,770	To to try to, you know, make all this this fit, so I just wanted to to tell you how much I appreciate. Um The communication and the transparency that you’ve provided us with the budgeting process and your philosophy behind it. So, so thank you for that. MM preskey. Uh, I echo of that as well. I really appreciate this. It’s really nice to have Kind of AAA Look Right. Now At.

01:18:48,070	What where you’re at, um and putting the budget together. Um, I just I just wanna touch on the SR funds a little bit because I remember when we voted to accept those as her funds. Um, I specifically said, Yeah. OK. We’ll take the federal dollars now, But. That doesn’t mean that we’re committed to doing those programs in the future.

01:19:07,830	And. I think that that we really need to to highlight that. While. Those are good programs you are going to make the best decision that you can on whether or not they fit into that. Yes, they need to be a top priority continuing forward, um, because we knew those dollars would not continue on.

01:19:26,270	They were Essentially a a one time Commitment over a certain amount of time, um, that the federal government was giving, um as Part of the whole covid pandemic. So.

01:19:48,870	Um I appreciate you noting it, and I think that it definitely has to be noted that it is funding that we were Provided thank you, but it is ending. Ms Peterson. And. Thanks. President is getting and along that kind of lines. I mean, Um, a board member, preskey raised her hands at the exact same time I was going to echo.

01:20:06,530	Kind of exactly what, Um Miss, preskey said, and then also just to know And and just make sure I’m reading this correctly, it does look like from if I look at the Esser funding on the left, and then some of the choices that you made, I do see a few things like that. Obviously the I see school within a school, which I believe was kind of, um, tried in in multiple buildings, But.

01:20:20,930	I do see that there is some school in a school. School program on the right side, as well as a counselor and a social worker. So. It.

01:20:35,930	Looks like you’re a as you’re able and as you, you know, you’re able to move things over if the the funding allows, so I just wanted to point that out to the public like as things, um, get shifted or that there’s priorities and the data is showing a need and maybe a building or a a set of buildings or a specific group of students. I appreciate that.

01:20:53,670	Those are some of the, um decision points that you’re that you’re using to make those Um, just wanted to know because it didn’t seem like there were just all off. It’s that you are looking for ways and different funding streams and, um, different tightening up in other areas to make sure that that happens, so just wanted to note that thank you. Thank you board member Peterson. Any other questions for Dr. Foz.

01:21:12,200	Not on that one. Thank you and we’ll move on to item nine. C strategic planning and Cogn, um, can again very similar attack or Track here about communication where we’re going, Uh, just to let the community know.

01:21:34,130	You Know board members strategic plan and you have it right on the front of your agenda is done on 2025, right? Uh 2020 to 2025. So. Uh, just so you’re aware, um Dr. Ben Johnson and he’s taken on the charge of leading us through that strategic plan last year. Remember last time you did it, uh Dr.

01:21:54,570	Schatz helped guide that I do believe we have that skill set internally to help guide us through that without Expenditure of using Dr. shots so we’ll start next year, another cycle of garnering input from all the different stakeholder groups that we have. I mean parents to students to staff to teachers and start to garner that input to help drive that next revision of our strategic plan.

01:22:14,670	I would tell you my team, I would tell you that I think your strategic plan as far as, uh, a framework Is right on point. We just need to give it a good fresh face. We need to give it a rook. Do. We need to change the, uh, expected outcomes. The goals.

01:22:31,270	Uh, let’s just give it a good next shot into the future For really? You hate to say this, but this is 2025 to 2030. That’s a long ways out there. Um, but, um, it’s um I. Just wanna let you know that Dr. johnson is gonna take the lead on that? And with that kind of goes hand in hand? Uh, cogn.

01:22:50,470	Is what Mrs Peterson gets to worry about and at DP that’s at school improvement process. That’s part of our DP requirement and our new LD I director, Ms Amanda Meyer will be taking the lead on that they’re going to be some cross talk between those two as we go through, so this you’re aware Board members.

01:23:08,800	Any questions doctors not on that. See none. All agenda items have been considered. I declare this