"You can observe a lot just by watching." Yogi Berra

The August 20, 2007 BOE meeting probably seemed pretty uneventful to people who were not tuned into the many nuances of the ECASD recent history and the issues. But I can really say that under the surface there is a LOT going on and most of it is for the better. So I hope you take time to read my "unofficial" minutes of the meeting and share the small pleasures of accomplishment and change that are taking place in the district. Comm. Bollinger was not in attendance at the meeting.

Again, adequate copies of the Agenda and supporting material were available for the public in attendance. Two weeks in a row! Materials included full copies of the 2 Power Point presentations about the 2006-07 budget and information about relocating the Central office. Very comprehensive, professional looking and helpful to all.

Announcements and reports included info. on starting the new school year including:

Butler met with the new teachers and substitutes for the year. Normally there are 70 or 75 but this year only about 35. I don't know why that was or what it means. No explanation was given. Anybody?
Pam Gardow (sp?) at Memorial HS was honored at the Governor's Mansion for her Teen Literacy initiative.
Board Docs demonstration will be at the Sept. 10th BOE meeting.
The Comprehensive Facilities Report has been updated.
America's Promise voted EC one of the 100 best communities for young people. I don't know what their criteria are but it sounds good.
Pam Rewey of WASB will be coming on Sept. 10th from 4:30 to 5 for a short meeting with the BOE to discuss the community involvement in the search for the new Superintendent.
And now for the TWO BIGGIES:

1. Dr. Leary will be meeting with all the staff at MHS on 8-28 at 8:00 a.m. to conduct an activity with them to begin the new year. Again, seems minor, but over the last several years Dr. Klaus and Pres. Carol Olson discontinued meeting with the staff at the beginning of every year. When my friends who are teachers told me that, I was absolutely dumbstruck that the relationship between leadership and staff was so poor that spending 20 minutes at the beginning of the school year was not considered worthwhile by the leadership nor valuable by the staff. So we are off on a NEW footing this year!

2. Dr. Leary also indicated that on Sept. 10th for the Grievance process that is scheduled at 5:00 p.m. a **NEW** law firm (Davis and Kolthoff??) from Madison will be representing the district. WHOA!!! Finally some recognition that having Pres. O'Brien's employer represent the ECASD in a quasi-judicial proceedings is unacceptable. Again, small but significant changes. Dr. Leary continued to speak in glowing terms about the expertise that this person has regarding Conflict of Interest and that having him back for a session would be valuable for the board members. Pres. O'Brien stared straight ahead with no expression.

Approval of the Minutes was delayed when Comm. Craig questioned a sentence about the Comprehensive Community Plan (CCP) process which appears to be under major revision. Dr. Leary indicated that his initiatives are "in no way" a CCP as it is an internal only process. The Needs Assessment document is being reviewed in Administration and soon it will be out to staff in buildings. (More on this topic later.)

The motion to approve the Little Red Study Committee passed unanimously. I am still not sure exactly the membership of that committee. Comm. Cummins volunteered to be on the committee in place of Comm. Bollinger if he does not have the time to attend meetings with his work and travel schedule. (My guess is that this is in response to the pathetic attendance record of Comm. Wogahn on the Gifted and Talented Advisory Committee that he managed to attend only once or twice in 2 years of meetings!)

Dan VandeWater gave an extremely comprehensive report about the preliminary (unaudited) budget results for the 2006-07 year. He reviewed the history of his tenure since the Fall of 2005 where he recognized the strengths of the district: Curriculum, staff, infrastructure and community partnerships as well as "strong leadership in the schools" (but not in Administration or the BOE!) my parentheses.
His goals were: get control of the debt service data (after the district blew the calculation of the levy!), improve communication between his dept. and other parts of the district, reconstruct the budget process (which was completely inadequate, inaccurate and broken), restore a couple of positions that were cut and engage a benefits consulting firm (to collect data and manage benefits programs more effectively.)

Goals were accomplished as follows: he verified outstanding debt and created an amortization schedule (it is absolutely incredible to me as an accountant that this had not been done before Dan's arrival!), he increased meetings and site visits to schools and other departments to improve communication and information, he totally streamlined and revised the Chart of Accounts to make the budgeting process easier and more informative, changed outdated practices and improved and consolidated others, eliminated "carry-forward" of budget dollars and implemented Zero Based Budgeting (which is best in scenarios of scarce or declining resources), and, in the end, only needed the one additional position (not two) since other efficiencies resulted from changes.

AMAZING. He stepped into a disaster, assessed what was needed, planned and prioritized and accomplished the work. It seems kind of sad to get so much enjoyment out of a professional doing the job they are supposed to do and being totally accountable for the result, but that shows how little of it has been seen at the ECASD over the last many years.

Then Dan went thru a mini Accounting 101 lesson for the BOE and community that explained that Fund Balance is the accumulated surplus of revenues over expenses but is not a revenue stream that should be relied upon to fund on-going expenses. The Fund Balance of the ECASD has been growing (mostly) from approx. $9 million in 2000 to an anticipated $19 million at the end of 2007. Reminder: The BOE planned to take $4.4 million out of fund balance in '06-'07 so it was expected to be only $15.2 million.

The reason for the favorable variance in the budget was mostly due to increased revenues ($0.3 million), and lower than budgeted expenses in Salaries and Benefits ($1 million), $1.8 million in lower costs related to transportation (gas costs for buses did not increase as much as budgeted) and heating costs in buildings were lower due to the mild winter), savings in supplies ($.5 million) and decrease in Workman's comp ($0.2 million) from efforts of the Safety Manager.

Dan repeated his concern that the Fund Balance should not be used to fund ongoing expenses (even though that is what the BOE planned to do last year). In summary he graciously thanked his staff and the many others in school buildings who helped make so many critical changes last year to accomplish so much. He said that the district now has an ability for more accountability, control of data and attention to detail. While 2006-07 ended on a positive note, the ongoing budget problems remain.

There was a lengthy discussion by the BOE. Comm. Faanes indicated that he would not be "comfortable" with a $13 million fund balance (neither would I). Comm. Cummins was concerned that the community might think that the '07-'08 cuts were "reactionary" and Comm. Craig pointed out that the BOE was willing to use Fund Balance for the '06-'07 shortfalls. Comm. Wogahn waxed philosophical about the similarities between the Fund Balance and he and his wife's VISA bill when it is less than anticipated and then thinking they can spend more on other things. He said the community reaction to the referendum was to tell the school district to "live within your means". Comm. Cummins indicated that her information from the community was a response to the "failure to plan" on the part of the leadership of the BOE and Administration.

Pres. O'Brien graciously thanked Dan and his staff for all their hard work. He added that "the budget is now understandable and that was not the way it was for my first several years on the board." So you didn't ask questions until you did understand it? So it never crossed your mind that the district had no real financial expertise on board? So you just kept your fingers crossed that nothing bad would happen and you might be part of the problem?

MAJOR DIGRESSION: I am sorry, but I met with Butler and the Director of Finance, several years ago with some BASIC questions about the School District finances. Neither one of them could answer a darn thing. I literally left that meeting and went home to my husband shaking my head and told him "All is lost" with the school district. Shortly afterward the tax levy error occurred and, I guess, I was the only one who wasn't one bit surprised. I told former BOE commissioner Evans about my serious concerns and she confessed that the BOE knew that this area was "the weakest link" and former Pres. Olson just rolled her eyes when I mentioned my concerns. They knew. They did nothing. They hoped for the best. Leadership at its finest.

Back to the Meeting...

Charie Kramer gave a comprehensive presentation on the costs associated with relocating the Central Office. Options were as follows:
1. Stay as is. Annual cost per sq ft. is approx. $4
2. Remodel the building at a cost of $14 million then lease it out to another tenant (parking limitations) for an annual net cost per sq. ft. of approx, $10.
3. Move Central Office to Montessori (Lincoln School) building. This plan would require performing the facility work planned at Lincoln, but does not include costs to relocate the Central Office nor Montessori or additional parking or additional AC req's. Annual cost per sq. ft. would be approx. $7 but Comm. Faanes pointed out that if the costs that are planned anyway to update the facility were remoced, the incremental cost would be approx. $3 per sq. ft.
4. Move to another leased site that costs $10 sq.ft. This estimate does not include the relocation costs.
5. Build a new 50,000 sq. ft. facility at a cost of $100/sq. ft. 20 year cost would be approx. $10 pe sq. ft.
6. Relocate to Little Red. Not reasonable since the LR building only has half of the needed square footage.

Another fairly lengthy discussion about the technical considerations for moving the NOC (Network Operations Center) which would be extremely expensive as we would lose a very favorable deal with Charter for the fiber network and it would cost $1 to $2 million just to construct and a little less than $1 million to buy new servers (not the SAN). Comm. Faanes inquired about contract servers but the IT people indicated that they are very specific for educational functionality and such servers are not available for contracting.

So it seems that for the short term, staying in the building is the right decision. In the long term, this would require a new look.

Final Discussion: Planning

Another update from Patti Iverson about the City/County Planning effort that is now named "Clear Vision Community Plan" and will kick off in October and, presumably an BOE member will be the designated ECASD representative.

Dr. Leary indicated that his initiatives, called the School Improvement Plan (SIP), are well underway with the Philosophy Policy being reviewed by the BOE and the Needs Assessment (NA) filtering down thru Administration. Again, this is an INTERNAL assessment process. From the NA a Goals statement will be developed and so on... Carol Craig again interjected that in February the BOE made a commitment to the community to do the Comprehensive Community Planning (CCP) with their involvement and she was concerned how that will happen. Had enough acronyms?

A lengthy discussion ensued about these 3 (three!) planning initiatives. There was agreement that the BOE had "a lot on our plates" (Pres. O'Brien) with the new Supt. search, the little Red Study Committee, etc.... Dr. Leary indicated he was not on board in Feb. so he could not speak to that commitment but he is not opposed to it. Comm. Craig reiterated her concerns that the BOE made a commitment to involve the community and that they must explain to the public why that did not happen. Dr. Leary said that in his meetings with community members (approx. 100 so far!) he hears that they want to see a strong organization with a clear plan and when they hear of the internal assessment they seem to be pleased with that.

Comm. Cummins said that she is hearing from the community: "Get us a leader." She supports Dr. Leary's initiatives and believes that the new superintendent should be on board for the full engagement of the plan. Comm. Faanes requested that the BOE meet before the next scheduled BOE meeting and find where these different plans are co-dependent and what the timelines are and to define the goals for the outcome. He indicated that there is information that they can and should be gathering along the way. Comm. Wogahn indicated that a timeline would be helpful. Comm. Kneer wondered what is the benefit of a strategic plan because it won't tell them that they don't have to make cuts (!?!?)

ENOUGH!

You can take 15 minutes and be involved. Please go to the separate postings about the Needs Assessment or the Philosophy Statement and look them over and then communicate SOMETHING to the BOE members. What parts of either of those proposals seem important/valuable/critical/essential for the future of our district? This doesn't have to be lengthy. Just let them know that you are reading what is being considered and tell them what is important to you, for our students, for our schools. Thanks!