2023-03-28 - School Board Work Session

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7:46 - Good afternoon.

7:47 The March 28th, 2023 board work session is now in order.

7:49 Paul, roll call, please.

7:51 - Mr. Susan. - Here.

7:52 - Ms. Wright. - Here.

7:53 - Mr. Trent. - Here.

7:54 - Ms. Campbell. - Here.

7:56 - Ms. Jenkins. - Here.

7:57 - Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

8:01 - Thank you.

8:04 - I pledge allegiance to the flag

8:06 of the United States of America

8:08 and to the Republic for which it stands,

8:10 one nation under God, indivisible,

8:13 with liberty and justice for all.

8:18 - Just so everybody understands,

8:19 when I do the Pledge of Allegiance,

8:20 I wait for everybody to stand up

8:22 because usually there’s some veterans inside

8:24 that take a little bit longer because of,

8:26 or elderly that take a second.

8:27 So if you hear me pause,

8:28 it’s just as I’m waiting for other people.

8:30 No way, Dr. Schiller.

8:32 The first item is a public hearing and rule development

8:35 for policy 5136, wireless communications devices.

8:39 Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item?

8:49 Is there anybody here that wishes,

8:51 any board members wish to discuss it?

8:54 - I would like to add that this is one of the policies

8:57 that we passed that I’m getting a lot of positive feedback.

8:59 I’ve had teachers, every school I go into,

9:00 they say, I am so thankful

9:02 that the district is supporting us.

9:04 We feel like we finally have someone who has our back

9:06 when it comes to taking these cell phones.

9:07 So I’m excited that we are making sure

9:10 that our teachers know we have their back.

9:13 - And I’ve had the same discussion with many of them,

9:16 even students, I’ve had some students email.

9:18 I mean, I think we’re in a good place.

9:20 Any other discussion on this item?

9:22 - Yeah, I just wanna make it clear

9:23 to the public who is listening.

9:25 The only changes that were made to this policy

9:27 was to reiterate that you cannot record

9:31 and post on social media, whether it is audio or video.

9:36 There have been no other changes to this policy.

9:38 This policy has always existed.

9:41 - Thank you, Ms. Jenkins.

9:41 I would like to reiterate the fact

9:43 that it was not being implemented,

9:44 or it was not being enforced.

9:45 And that was the issue that I think many of us

9:47 were happy to do so with.

9:49 And now that it’s being enforced,

9:50 we’re seeing positive results across the entire county

9:53 and like to move on.

9:54 Next is the public hearing and rule development.

9:55 - I would like to follow up on that.

9:56 - For board policy 2521 instructional materials program.

9:59 - Point of order, you don’t get to decide

10:00 when the discussion is over.

10:01 - I didn’t know you were discussing.

10:02 - You moved on very quickly on purpose.

10:04 So Mr. Susan, if you’d like to rebuttal what I’m gonna say,

10:07 I’m gonna go ahead and follow up on that.

10:08 There is actual data that proves how many times

10:11 wireless communication device policies

10:13 were actually implemented.

10:15 So please stop making blanketed statements

10:17 to make an assumption that our staff

10:18 was not doing their jobs.

10:20 It’s wonderful that we’re reiterating it to staff

10:22 that we have their backs as well as to families

10:24 to do it with their children.

10:25 But stop making negative accusations against our staff

10:28 and the school district.

10:29 - Thank you, Ms. Jenkins.

10:30 I would not say that it was a negative.

10:31 - Mr. Susan, you don’t get to rebuttal a third time.

10:33 - I am finishing my conversation

10:34 and it’s a point of order that I’m allowed to do it.

10:36 So here’s the– - Third time.

10:38 - Excuse me?

10:39 - That is your third time.

10:40 - I don’t, I’m allowed to follow up here.

10:42 - Mr. Susan, you don’t get to follow up

10:44 more than everyone else. - Point of order.

10:44 Mr. Gibbs, am I allowed to speak without being interrupted

10:48 by a former chair, a board member?

10:50 - Everybody’s supposed to have two turns

10:51 to speak on a matter.

10:53 I hadn’t finished mine before I had to reiterate.

10:56 So anyways, moving on.

10:58 Next is a public hearing and rule development

10:59 for Board Policy 2521 Instructional Materials Program.

11:02 Is there anyone present who wishes to address this item?

11:06 If you guys are gonna address the item,

11:08 if you guys can come over here and stand

11:09 so that I know who it is and we can just roll pretty good.

11:12 Sir, if you can state your name ahead of time,

11:14 that’d be great.

11:15 - My name is Gregory Ross.

11:17 I’m a Palm Bay resident.

11:19 Thank you, good afternoon, board members.

11:21 Thanks for allowing public comment on this proposed changes

11:24 to the instructional materials program policy.

11:28 Let me start off with an email response

11:30 from board member Megan Wright to a parent

11:32 that was concerned about the impacts

11:34 of your book banning policy

11:35 and the changes you have proposed.

11:37 In response to this concern, parent, Ms. Wright wrote,

11:40 quote, “Certain books reflect extremely explicit

11:43 “sexual encounters, drug abuse, abuse, and other matters

11:50 “that are not appropriate for children to be exposed to.”

11:54 First, I’ve yet to see examples

11:55 of these explicit sexual encounters.

11:58 Can you point to some books in BBS schools that have it?

12:02 Additionally, the policy that you’re implementing

12:05 does not address explicit sexual encounters, does it?

12:10 It does mention pornography.

12:12 Are you suggesting that explicit sexual encounters

12:14 are pornography?

12:15 If so, Florida statutes, US Supreme Court rulings,

12:19 and common sense do not agree with you.

12:22 The policy also does not define pornography.

12:25 Why is that?

12:26 I will tell you why.

12:28 Because if you define it for all the world to see,

12:30 everyone will know that pornography by definition,

12:32 statute, and court precedents has to be very specific

12:36 in its purpose, right?

12:38 That purpose is that the materials must be intended

12:41 to cause sexual excitement,

12:43 intended to cause sexual excitement.

12:46 Can you provide your evidence that there are books

12:48 in BBS schools that are intended to cause sexual excitement?

12:52 If not, then you have no business using sexual encounters

12:56 as an excuse to ban a book.

12:59 Are you suggesting that reading about drug use and abuse,

13:02 which exists in life, are damaging to children?

13:05 Are you suggesting that these books condone

13:07 the real life behavior that is replicated within the text?

13:11 Do you believe that children are unable

13:12 to separate fact from fiction?

13:15 Again, the policy under review does not address

13:17 drug use, abuse, and the very undefined other matters,

13:21 does it?

13:22 Interestingly enough, your email does not go on

13:25 to explain why you believe these things are inappropriate.

13:28 Why is it inappropriate for children to be exposed

13:30 to real life issues, to learn from others’ experience?

13:35 You do state your goal is to protect children.

13:37 Of course, you don’t ever specify exactly

13:39 what you’re protecting them from, do you?

13:42 The point is that some of you are hypocrites.

13:44 Some of you ran on the platform of parental rights,

13:47 yet here you are creating a policy that removes

13:49 the parent’s right to decide what is appropriate

13:51 for their children.

13:53 Even worse, you are putting that decision

13:54 into the hands of a small group of unqualified non-experts.

13:59 You are blatantly removing the systems

14:01 and the very people, media specialists,

14:04 whose jobs are dedicated to educating children

14:06 through literature.

14:07 Your policy is a slap in the face to them.

14:10 In closing, I only ask two things

14:12 from my school board members.

14:13 Follow the science and the data,

14:15 and most importantly, do the right thing.

14:20 - Thank you, next speaker please.

14:28 - So I apologize if I ramble slightly more than usual.

14:31 I didn’t think this would happen quite so early

14:33 in the meeting and I haven’t written anything down.

14:36 So I’ll try to stay on track.

14:40 The proposed changes to the book review policy,

14:50 apart from making it incredibly easy,

14:53 obviously part of the stated objective,

14:55 easier to challenge a book,

14:57 that it’s even been discussed in meetings

14:59 that someone can challenge the book

15:01 without reading the entire book,

15:03 challenge it just based on excerpts,

15:06 which Ms. Campbell, in an earlier meeting

15:09 when somebody suggested as the straw man

15:12 of somebody challenging the Bible,

15:13 and you said, “Well, I can talk about

15:14 “how it’s more than that.”

15:15 It’s more of those, yeah, reading the whole book

15:17 might give you a different impression

15:19 than just those sections.

15:21 Now the rule in place is that the entire book

15:24 must be challenged, although as we found out

15:26 with the last round, the person submitting

15:28 some of those objections admitted

15:30 not having read the whole book.

15:31 And now we’re talking about maybe the people

15:33 reviewing the book won’t have to read the entire book,

15:35 which again, I can find an excerpt from almost any book

15:38 that makes it look boring and pointless

15:40 and harmless and uninteresting to read,

15:42 or in many books find something that makes it seem

15:44 completely racy if you think that’s the entire structure

15:47 and meaning of the book.

15:50 And as someone on the board had said,

15:53 I can’t wait for that Miller test to be removed.

15:57 Luckily we still have some laws,

15:59 hopefully that one sticks around.

16:02 But also removing any accountability.

16:07 I do not have the latest red line draft memorized,

16:09 but I know that it has been discussed

16:12 that book challenges might be allowed

16:15 to be submitted anonymously.

16:18 Or again, reviewed by people who have not

16:22 read the entire book.

16:27 Obviously, and I’ve mentioned this before,

16:29 but initially removing the media specialists

16:32 and other subject matter experts,

16:35 removing their voting status on the committee

16:37 was bad enough.

16:40 Actually removing them from the committee

16:41 so they’re not even there to offer input.

16:43 Again, from the people who know what they are talking about

16:45 and who devoted their lives to this,

16:47 and we’re gonna keep them out of the conversation

16:50 is insane, is honestly the best word

16:53 I can think of right now.

16:55 Over some, it was mentioned in a previous meeting

17:00 and elsewhere recently, conflict of interest.

17:03 I don’t know for anybody listening,

17:05 if you’re aware of this, media specialists don’t get paid

17:08 by the book on the shelf.

17:10 Their jobs are not in danger

17:12 if there are fewer books on the shelf.

17:14 They don’t get promoted for having more of them.

17:16 And if you’re worried that they don’t want

17:18 to acknowledge a mistake in putting a book

17:20 on the shelf first, if you’ve got employees

17:22 who are worried that making a mistake,

17:24 a simple mistake in good faith in the course of their job

17:27 might cause their termination,

17:28 then you need to work on the workplace environment.

17:30 That is not a situation anyone should be in.

17:33 Thank you very much.

17:35 - Thank you for your comments.

17:37 Anybody else that wishes to speak?

17:42 - Hi, I’m Rick Beaver.

17:47 I gotta agree with him.

17:48 The state legislature does not know what they’re doing

17:52 when they’re writing legislation.

17:54 This push for, by the governor,

17:57 is just politically motivated, it seems like.

18:02 The consequences are ridiculous.

18:04 These books are coming off the shelves.

18:07 That is making teachers’ jobs more difficult.

18:10 It’s a waste of resources, a waste of time,

18:12 a waste of money.

18:13 Do what you can to limit this damage that’s being done.

18:18 If you can have, perhaps, just your people overseeing

18:24 this book review limited to maybe five selections

18:29 that they can put forth, maybe they’ll think more in depth

18:32 about the quality of what they’re having

18:34 taken off the shelves.

18:36 And media specialists out of the equation,

18:39 that’s crazy, too.

18:41 Thank you.

18:41 - Thank you for your time, sir.

18:43 Anybody else wish to speak on this?

18:46 Anybody else present who wishes to speak on this item?

18:55 - Thank you, my name is Katie Delaney.

18:58 I wasn’t gonna speak on this today,

18:59 but I just felt like I had to say something.

19:03 Many of these books are written at such a low level

19:07 that it’s intended for children at a young age,

19:12 yet the content that’s in them is everything

19:16 from sexually explicit material to pedophilia,

19:23 to rape, to incest.

19:28 This isn’t stuff that our kids should be reading.

19:31 We shouldn’t be filling their minds with this garbage.

19:34 And as far as the Miller test goes,

19:36 that was intended for adults, not children.

19:41 So I am all for this policy.

19:45 I hope that this board passes it.

19:48 And I feel like we should fill our schools

19:53 with the classics, with things that actually are rigorous

19:58 and make our kids think, and that’s not, again,

20:03 not stuff that’s filled with things of violence and evil.

20:09 Thank you.

20:12 - Thank you, anybody else wish to speak on this policy?

20:14 Anybody else wish to present?

20:17 Anybody wish to speak?

20:19 Nope.

20:20 - I would like to just add one thing to this.

20:22 So I wanna just cite the fact that there are two books

20:27 to date that have been held back behind the counter

20:30 because they were not deemed appropriate for the age.

20:33 There have been no books that have been banned.

20:35 And by saying a book is not appropriate

20:38 in an elementary school or secondary school,

20:40 it’s not the same as banning a book.

20:42 It’s just saying we should err on the side of caution,

20:44 protect a child’s innocence.

20:46 Parents still have the right to buy that book

20:48 or to rent that book for free from a library.

20:51 It is just strictly a measure

20:53 to protect our children’s innocence.

20:55 And if anyone is spending it differently,

20:57 I apologize for the confusion.

20:58 It is not at all what the intention is

21:01 on the change of this policy.

21:03 - Thank you, Ms. Wright, Ms. Campbell.

21:05 - Yes, thank you.

21:06 You know, it’s so easy on an issue like this,

21:08 as in so many issues, to run to the extremes.

21:11 And I just think it’s not helpful.

21:13 It makes headlines, but it’s not helpful.

21:14 So I just wanna go back to some facts

21:17 and some responsible ways of looking at things.

21:19 This is the way I look at things.

21:20 I’m not saying I’m the only way or the most responsible way,

21:23 but just looking at the facts.

21:25 First of all, it’s been mentioned to us many times.

21:27 I know that my fellow board members are included

21:29 on all the emails we’ve been getting the last few days.

21:31 It is not any parent’s responsibility

21:34 to dictate to any other parent what books are on our shelves.

21:37 Whose responsibility it is, is this school board.

21:40 By statute, this school board,

21:42 school boards across the state of Florida,

21:43 are responsible for every instructional material

21:47 purchased with school district dollars in this state.

21:51 And so it is our responsibility to form these policies.

21:54 This process, which has been revised,

21:56 but even in its original form, was not suggested by NEOLA.

21:59 This is our Brevard-specific process,

22:03 and we can revise it however we’d like to

22:04 within the bounds of the law.

22:07 We’ve hashed some things out, especially the last session.

22:10 We’ve come to some compromises.

22:11 There’s not a single person on this dais

22:13 who got exactly what they want out of this policy.

22:16 But we came up with something, and this is where it is.

22:19 And so the responsibility for ultimately,

22:21 it’s not the media specialist or the parents,

22:23 it’s this board’s.

22:25 Now, we obviously can’t read through every book,

22:27 and that we have designated to the superintendent

22:29 the responsibility to oversee the people who do.

22:31 And the media specialists still have the responsibility

22:35 to review, according to our policy,

22:38 and according to their procedures,

22:39 their collection, to add books to the collection,

22:43 to follow the law, to follow the DOE’s recommendations

22:46 that have been put out.

22:47 That is the responsibility.

22:48 This committee is for when,

22:50 after they’ve done the responsibility,

22:52 if there’s a challenge.

22:53 And the challenge could be from a conservative person,

22:56 from a liberal person, from a parent.

22:58 By state statute, it can be by any parent

23:01 or resident of our community.

23:03 It doesn’t even have to be a parent.

23:05 So we’re following the law on that.

23:07 Just to clear up some misconceptions, our committee,

23:14 the committee is now only going to be made up

23:16 of five school board representatives,

23:18 as well as an ex officio person from the district.

23:22 But the committee, according to our policy,

23:24 even though we talked last time about doing it differently,

23:26 the committee members still are responsible

23:28 to read the whole book.

23:29 I just want to clear that up.

23:30 The person applying, it doesn’t necessarily have to.

23:33 But this process, this formal review,

23:36 the committee members are still going to have to read

23:38 the whole book.

23:39 We’re giving them a week for every 100 pages.

23:42 They’re responsible.

23:43 Now I will tell you that I’ve watched

23:44 those two committee meetings

23:45 and I actually think there have been some committee members

23:47 on that who didn’t read the whole book.

23:48 That’s my opinion, I’m just guessing.

23:50 But they’re responsible too.

23:53 There is also an informal and a formal process.

23:56 And the first thing in the informal process

23:58 is not yank the book off the shelves.

23:59 It is a formal process.

24:01 But I will tell you board,

24:03 I think one of the things

24:04 that we’re going to have to be careful,

24:05 and this is the beautiful thing about policies,

24:08 if they’re not going well, we can revise them.

24:11 I think one of the things that might happen

24:13 and that we have to keep an eye on,

24:14 and I’m sure these are all going to come to us

24:16 through leading and learning,

24:17 so I’m sure we’re going to be aware,

24:18 unintended consequence that we may have to guard for

24:21 in the future is people frivolously putting books on shelves.

24:28 And I don’t necessarily agree with one of the commenters

24:31 who says all classical, I mean honestly,

24:35 I don’t think that, what’s the book about the sixth grade boy

24:39 and it’s totally a boy book and I’m not a fan

24:42 ‘cause of the grossness, and when I say grossness,

24:44 I mean like sixth grade boy grossness.

24:46 I’m not a fan of that.

24:47 I wouldn’t call that classical literature,

24:48 but I don’t have a problem with it being on the shelves

24:50 ‘cause it gets sixth grade boys to read.

24:52 So too many potty humor jokes.

24:56 It’s fine, it’s on there, right?

24:58 But we’re not talking about,

24:58 if we have people start frivolously putting these things,

25:00 we may have to come back and refine our process.

25:02 And again, this is a Brevard-specific process.

25:05 We can make it what we want to,

25:07 but I think a lot of the concerns that people are having,

25:10 it’s not gonna take everybody’s away.

25:11 Some people would rather us not have done this at all.

25:13 But we’ve not done what people are purporting

25:15 that we’re doing, and we can always go back

25:18 and if people do abuse or take advantage

25:22 of this opportunity, I would hate to think

25:24 that anybody would do it spitefully.

25:27 But the world that we live in, you never know.

25:29 Thanks.

25:32 - Thank you, Ms. Campbell.

25:32 Anybody else wish to speak on this item?

25:34 - Yep.

25:35 - Okay, Ms. Jenkins.

25:37 - So I just wanna clarify something.

25:42 There have been two books pulled behind the shelf,

25:45 and one was removed, not saying I agree or disagree,

25:48 but just to clarify the facts,

25:49 there was one removed from our district.

25:53 I agree, sometimes we’re running to the extremes,

25:57 but I also understand people’s hesitation

26:00 because the modification of a policy can also open the door

26:04 for us to continue to run to extremes,

26:06 so I understand the hesitation there.

26:08 I just wanna read into the record

26:10 the three lines that are being,

26:12 I mean, there’s more than just these three lines

26:14 being stricken out, but it’s something that resonates

26:16 with the public here today, as well as emails we received

26:19 and things that just, I’ve already stated that bothered me,

26:21 but I wanted it in the record one more time.

26:23 So we are removing two school media specialist

26:25 representatives of the grade band of the book in review,

26:29 a principal or assistant principal representative

26:31 of the grade band book in review,

26:34 and a content specialist or a resource teacher.

26:36 And the reason we made these decisions in our discussions

26:39 was because we believe that we should remove the experts

26:43 because of an unsupported argument of bias

26:45 or a conflict of interest.

26:47 And I feel like this is just another time

26:51 where we have made decisions

26:53 with no real fact or reason behind it.

26:56 There’s no real actual logical explanation

26:59 to remove more people who have an expertise in those areas

27:04 off of that discussion.

27:06 Because as we’ve said ourselves,

27:10 the process was already in place,

27:13 it was working, one book removed, two put behind a shelf.

27:17 So it leads me to believe that there is a reason

27:20 why we’re removing these people.

27:23 Again, I know where the majority of the board sits,

27:26 hence why we’re here where we are today.

27:27 I wanted to read that into the record one more time.

27:31 - Thank you, Ms. Jenkins.

27:31 Anybody else wish to speak on this item?

27:34 Without hearing any, we move on to the next one.

27:37 Next topic is board policy 3210, standards of ethical conduct

27:42 does anybody wish to speak on this item?

27:45 - Those are not, those aren’t public hearings.

27:48 - I know, I’m talking about us.

27:50 I apologize board members, yes, you’re right.

27:53 Does anybody from the board wish to discuss this item?

27:57 - Really quick, sorry.

27:59 - No, it’s okay.

28:00 - Dr. Green, can you just, the appeal process

28:06 that was added in, I’m having a hard time.

28:11 So we basically shortened it up, right?

28:15 The policy part.

28:16 - Yes.

28:17 - And added the appeal process in the procedures,

28:19 is that correct?

28:20 - In the administrative procedures, I believe it’s number Q.

28:26 It’s either OP or Q, we had to–

28:28 - Okay, okay.

28:29 So and that, that’s just adding that little part in there.

28:35 Right, appeal.

28:36 - Yes.

28:37 - So that, whatever the appeal,

28:38 and it doesn’t explain how it worked,

28:39 but it would just go straight to the superintendent

28:41 or his designee, correct, whatever the decision is.

28:43 Okay, thank you.

28:46 - Anybody else wish to discuss this item?

28:49 Hearing none, move on to the next.

28:51 Next topic is board policy 5500, student conduct.

28:54 Does any board member wish to discuss this item?

28:58 Nobody hearing none, move on to the next one.

29:00 The next topic is board policy 5511, dressing and grooming.

29:05 - Okay, hang on, actually, sorry, sorry, sorry.

29:08 And I know we’ve got a lot to get to.

29:10 I, so for all of these, I think we can probably get through

29:15 the 5500 and some of the other ones pretty quickly,

29:19 but I know that Dr. Schuller had asked us,

29:22 and he’s not our boss, so he can’t tell us what to do,

29:24 but he had asked us to go out to the community

29:25 and get some community form,

29:26 and I’m the one who’s done that.

29:27 I do believe on this particular one,

29:30 on the, one of the things that was brought to me

29:32 by several parents and actually a teacher,

29:36 the community form that I held was on this,

29:39 it might be good to have student buy-in, it’s buy-in.

29:42 It’s not students telling us what to do,

29:44 but it’s a good idea to get to know

29:46 what battles we’re gonna be facing.

29:48 I don’t think we’re looking at going

29:49 to a district-wide uniform policy,

29:51 but if we’re gonna make some changes,

29:54 the dress code one, when we, sorry,

29:56 I was wondering if we were getting there.

29:58 I think we’d, I would like for us to just kind of

30:00 push that one off a little bit

30:01 until we get a little more buy-in.

30:03 We said we have the deadline–

30:04 - Are you speaking to the dress code?

30:05 - Well, yeah, but I wanna go back,

30:06 well, let me go back to 5500 really quick, sorry.

30:08 - 5500, right? - See, Mr. Sussan,

30:10 I’m a little 80. - So we’re on 5500.

30:12 - So 5500, the one thing I just wanted to point out,

30:15 and that is that the one-year calendar,

30:21 so we have, if you go, ‘cause this has been an issue for,

30:25 since we had our first discipline meeting back in December

30:29 about attacks on school board employees.

30:32 So there is, we have, and again,

30:37 this is something that’s also Brevard-specific, I believe,

30:41 Mr. Gibbs, we have the one calendar year penalty

30:48 for laying hands with a battery,

30:53 it’s not physical attack anymore, it’s,

30:57 thank, Dr. Webley helped me,

30:58 ‘cause I asked you this question.

31:00 - Is it harassment? - Assault, the battery?

31:02 - It’s simple, they changed it to simple.

31:04 - Simple assault. - Simple battery.

31:05 - Simple battery, it used to be called physical attack,

31:08 it’s the same acronym. - Right, so,

31:10 but for the same offense, we have,

31:12 that it’s going to be one calendar year penalty.

31:15 I just wanted to point out

31:16 that the state actually gives options in 1006.07,

31:19 they give options, so we actually have a pretty stiff,

31:24 stiffer than the required by the state,

31:26 if I understand the statute correctly,

31:28 by saying one calendar year, and which is,

31:32 ‘cause we’ve had that conversation

31:33 when we had expulsion hearings before,

31:35 but if I, I don’t have the statute pulled up,

31:37 but if I read that correctly,

31:38 the state actually doesn’t give that

31:45 as a requirement, so I’m not suggesting that we change it,

31:48 but I just wanna make the point that Brevard’s is more

31:52 than the state requirement.

31:54 - It does say, though, under the next section

31:56 that the superintendent may consider,

31:58 may reconsider or make a recommendation to the board

32:02 for reentry, basically, and–

32:04 - I think that’s, ‘cause I look at that, too,

32:06 there’s a very specific, okay, what number are we,

32:09 ‘cause I lost my place.

32:10 - It’s number three under zero tolerance, if you–

32:12 - Yeah.

32:13 - So I think there’s two things, perhaps,

32:15 being conflated here.

32:17 Zero tolerance, when it’s talking about a superintendent

32:20 may consider a full calendar year on a case-by-case basis,

32:23 it seems to particularly dealing with the firearm or weapon

32:26 and the making a false report.

32:28 When we flip on to the next one,

32:30 the threats to school safety,

32:31 that’s where, Ms. Campbell, I believe you’re referring to,

32:34 which says– - Yeah.

32:34 - Number three says the minimum period

32:37 shall be one full calendar year.

32:38 It doesn’t seem to give any discretion.

32:41 - Right, and it doesn’t, because I–

32:43 - It’s just separate bullet points.

32:44 - Right, that place with the superintendent,

32:46 ‘cause I noticed that, too, I was like,

32:47 wait a minute, it’s a full calendar year.

32:49 That is separate, ‘cause we’ve actually had

32:52 those expulsion hearings in the past

32:53 where the superintendent has told us,

32:55 I cannot recommend by policy anything else

32:57 besides one calendar year.

32:58 Only the board can make that, can make an exception.

33:02 - When we act in a quasi-judicial area,

33:03 we can overturn that if we need to,

33:05 and that’s what the process is set up for.

33:07 But having strict policies is what it is, so.

33:11 Any other questions?

33:14 - No. - Okay.

33:15 I think moving on to the next board policy,

33:19 student discipline.

33:20 Is there any board members that wish–

33:21 - Wait, we’re on the dress code now.

33:22 - I’m sorry, dressing and grooming, sorry.

33:24 5511, dressing and grooming.

33:26 Any board member wish to discuss any of this?

33:29 - Yeah, I have a couple things–

33:30 - Ms. Wright.

33:32 - Under section C, when it speaks about the lower garments,

33:37 pants still have no holes and rips.

33:38 We’re taking that out, ‘cause that is now the trend,

33:40 obviously, kids are wearing.

33:42 Tights, spandex, bike shorts are not permitted.

33:45 That’s a pretty common thing that a lot of the kids wear.

33:48 I mean, the cheer team wears,

33:49 and the volleyball players wear ‘em, so I–

33:52 - As long as they’re appropriate lengths, right?

33:52 - If they’re appropriate length and that nature,

33:54 I don’t see why we should make that

33:56 a violation of dress code.

33:58 - Right. - Yeah.

33:59 - I would agree there.

34:00 That’s one of the things I was looking at,

34:01 because, yeah, you’re right about that.

34:03 Do you have any other concerns on this item?

34:05 - No, that was the main one I had.

34:07 - Okay.

34:08 Anybody else have any?

34:10 We should wait.

34:12 You wanna speak, and then I’ll–

34:13 - Yeah, yeah, and this is where I was going.

34:15 Sorry, I was having my moment.

34:18 I think this is one that I don’t want us to,

34:23 it’s not the most important things

34:24 of all the things that we’re doing,

34:25 but I think this is one, like I was trying to say,

34:27 that this is one we probably want students to buy in.

34:30 Or at least student listening.

34:33 I think we should listen.

34:34 And the other thing is,

34:36 other people I think we should listen to here

34:37 is our principals and school administrators,

34:40 because they’re the ones who have to administer this,

34:42 and it can get quite awkward at times.

34:45 So, and maybe everyone’s done that.

34:48 Maybe everyone’s had a listening session with students.

34:49 I didn’t have any students at my session,

34:51 so I can’t say I’ve done that,

34:52 except for the three teenagers that I have in my house.

34:55 But it would be good to have those conversations

34:59 with the principals.

35:00 I will tell you, I had two principals at my session.

35:02 One was an elementary school principal,

35:03 and one was a middle school principal.

35:05 And one of the things that was brought up,

35:07 I thought this was very important,

35:08 was that we really, in a lot of our policies,

35:10 in particular this one,

35:12 need to consider differentiating between the levels.

35:15 So we’re thinking of dress code,

35:17 I guarantee you we’re all thinking high school.

35:20 But some of the things having to do with elementary school,

35:23 for example, I wanna point out in the third paragraph,

35:28 it talks about,

35:33 I know, hang on, the third paragraph,

35:34 where it was, second paragraph,

35:36 where it talks about the school committee.

35:38 So this is if a school wants to have

35:40 something beyond the minimum of what we’re setting up.

35:43 If they wanna say everybody has to wear uniform shirts,

35:46 or if you have to have closed-toed shoes, or whatever,

35:48 there has to be a committee.

35:50 Well, on the committee, it talks about

35:54 representatives from the student body.

35:56 I would suggest that at an elementary school,

35:58 that’s not necessarily the best way of doing things.

36:03 So some of our things that we might have,

36:05 we wanna differentiate between elementary.

36:08 So that was one suggestion.

36:10 And then in the third paragraph,

36:12 this is on a different topic,

36:14 it talks about gang-related,

36:17 I don’t know how much we want to put,

36:21 how much of that do we want to keep,

36:22 how much of the gang language do we want to keep?

36:26 It was my suggestion to take out some of the,

36:28 about the extreme hairstyles and colors,

36:30 except for, unless it’s blocking someone’s view,

36:32 that’s a safety issue, and it’s a learning issue.

36:37 I’m fine with changing the other things

36:39 besides the holes in the garments.

36:41 And then also under accessories, tongue rings,

36:43 I don’t know that it’s worth fighting that battle.

36:45 I mean, I just think there’s some updating

36:48 that we need to do, but it might be good to look at it.

36:52 And then if you look at the neola,

36:54 which is what we had at first,

36:55 the second neola, they scratch the line that says,

37:03 students who violate the foregoing rules

37:04 will not be admitted to class,

37:05 may be suspended from school.

37:06 I’m not sure what the, do we have a reason why neola?

37:10 - No.

37:11 - That we don’t.

37:11 - No, I don’t, I don’t like that.

37:14 - I mean, we have,

37:18 there’s other options for principals, for administrators.

37:21 I don’t know, do we have that in ours?

37:26 - I think, yeah, but the students–

37:29 - Oh, we do, right, that was one of the red line.

37:33 Right, it was red lined.

37:34 - Right.

37:36 - And then one other thing I would say

37:38 about the neola version too,

37:39 that I think actually might consider adding in,

37:42 is there was something on page 14 of the packet

37:46 that talks about reasonable accommodation.

37:49 And this was for, I think it was on page 14.

37:54 Actually, y’all changed it and I lost my spot.

37:57 There was something about reasonable accommodation

37:59 for religious, disabilities, medical conditions, et cetera.

38:02 And I think it would probably be good to add in there.

38:04 And I, obviously, we have students who come,

38:06 we have some students who come from certain

38:08 Muslim backgrounds and they wear a head covering.

38:10 Also, we’ve had students who have had either cancer

38:13 or some other type of medical condition

38:15 who we’ve allowed to wear scarves.

38:17 It might be good to add something in there

38:21 related to those conditions where normally

38:24 you can’t wear a head covering,

38:25 but under those circumstances, we would certainly allow it.

38:32 That’s all I’ve got.

38:33 I’m just, I don’t know if we’re ready

38:34 to make all those changes today.

38:35 - For point of clarification, the gangs portion of it,

38:38 you were not wanting to keep that in there?

38:41 Or were you–

38:42 - No, I’m not the expert on that.

38:43 I just, you know, it’s an old policy.

38:48 - I just didn’t know.

38:50 You know, I’m just, let’s take a look at it and go,

38:52 does that still, do those things still replicate?

38:54 When I was in school, back, you know, 20 years ago,

39:01 at the time, there were certain sweatshirts,

39:05 and this was the location.

39:07 This was designated the location.

39:08 There were certain sweatshirts that that,

39:09 in our area, represented a gang.

39:13 Are these things still?

39:14 This might be where district security might be able to,

39:16 in their research, help out.

39:18 I mean, are we putting things in that are necessary,

39:20 or are some of the things that we’ve said,

39:21 oh, you can’t do this because it’s related to a gang,

39:23 that now are just accepted, and everybody’s wearing it,

39:25 because of just cultural references.

39:28 So I would just want to be careful with that.

39:29 - Mr. Neal, can you give us the thumbs up or down

39:32 if we still have gangs inside of our county?

39:35 Do gang– - There’s a gang activity.

39:36 - Okay. - Yeah, there’s a gang

39:37 activity, right, right, right.

39:38 - I also want to note, and I don’t know,

39:41 I know we put on the principal meeting

39:43 to review this agenda, correct?

39:46 The policy, the upcoming principal meeting.

39:51 Didn’t we, Dr. Cody?

39:53 Okay, I know we talked about bringing it

39:55 to the principal’s attention. - Thank you.

39:57 Anybody else? - Yeah, I love

39:58 what you’re saying about that we should be cognizant

40:00 of the students’ religious disabilities.

40:02 I think we need to add that into this policy,

40:04 that we need to be cognizant of that

40:06 and make accommodations accordingly.

40:09 Yeah, that’s, I, other than that,

40:12 no, I don’t have anything else.

40:13 - Okay, the idea of us bringing it

40:18 to a principal’s meeting is, I think it’s huge.

40:21 Those are the people that we should be calling upon,

40:24 and the ones that are in the trenches daily

40:27 on what they see could be a roadblock

40:30 that could help their day,

40:31 that would be okay already with the students.

40:34 Trust me, the deans have conversations

40:35 with students every day about the dress code,

40:40 and so they would have the input from the students,

40:43 but as much as we can get conversations going

40:48 with the administration before we–

40:50 - What you may wanna do is– - Stamp this.

40:52 - Instead of calling them all in,

40:54 is just submit what we make the challenges for today,

40:56 and then if they have any revisions, then they can do that,

40:58 because this is the first part of the discussion,

41:01 and that they can bring that back at the next meeting.

41:02 I think that that would be appropriate,

41:04 because sometimes those principal meetings

41:06 are kind of long-lasting,

41:07 and if they have the opportunity among themselves

41:10 to say something with their deans,

41:12 rather than at a principal meeting

41:13 where everybody’s together, it may not.

41:15 You see what I mean?

41:16 That way we can do that.

41:17 I think that that’s appropriate.

41:18 - We can get to them,

41:18 but we need to call in their experience.

41:20 - That’s where this came from for me,

41:21 was from a principal, so thank you.

41:23 - So are you suggesting,

41:24 so this is where I was suggesting earlier is,

41:26 is that rather than next time just being on a workshop,

41:30 that this particular policy is still in a work session,

41:32 so we have some time still to work it, and–

41:35 - I think the direction of the board is to send out an email

41:37 and maybe at the next meeting have those results come back

41:40 to us for discussion and then move this thing through.

41:43 I think the concern that we have is,

41:45 is that we need a policy prior to next year.

41:47 We print out the student progression plans

41:53 and all the booklets and all the, you know what I mean?

41:55 All that stuff starts to go and has deadlines,

41:57 so there’s a concern that we get this thing taken care of

42:00 prior to that, and so with the lengthy schedule,

42:02 I get kind of concerned, ‘cause as of right now,

42:05 I think that this section doesn’t get us through ‘til May,

42:08 so then if we start delaying, we end up in June,

42:11 we end, you know what I mean?

42:12 So that was my only thing,

42:13 but I definitely think where your mind’s going,

42:15 if we’re gonna develop a policy,

42:16 we need to have our stakeholders come in,

42:18 but I think one of the things when I was,

42:20 when this came up for conversation the last time,

42:22 is that we have a policy that is almost unenforceable

42:25 because of some of the things on there,

42:26 so the idea is, hey, let’s come up with the bare bones,

42:29 and I think Dr. Shiller has some conversations

42:31 wrapped around maybe a larger committee

42:33 to discuss larger changes maybe that direct into next year.

42:36 Does that make sense?

42:37 So I think with that, I think I agree with you,

42:39 so anybody, so do–

42:41 - I did find the gang thing that’s like,

42:43 it says rolled up or split pant cuffs.

42:45 I don’t even know what that is.

42:47 - I do.

42:48 - Okay, good.

42:49 I mean, I’m thinking about how we rolled our pants

42:50 back in the day, but I don’t know if that’s still, you know.

42:54 - I think, to be honest with you,

42:55 I think that that would be something

42:56 that those principals could get back to us

42:58 because they know what’s best.

42:59 Dr. Shiller, I’ll come back to you when you get the,

43:01 when you get your opportunity with the agenda

43:04 in relation to the item that you had,

43:06 we’ll have plenty of discussion about it.

43:08 So anyways, so moving forward, is there anybody else?

43:11 I mean, does anybody know where Ms. Jenkins took off to?

43:14 No?

43:15 All right, is there a way to see,

43:18 is there a way to see Ms. Green?

43:19 Is there a way to see if you could just pop out

43:21 and see if Mrs. Jenkins is like standing out there

43:23 just so that we can see if she is?

43:25 I would hate to have her not have discussion

43:27 wrapped around this item.

43:29 That’s all.

43:29 And I mean, I can go right now.

43:30 So I agree wholeheartedly with all of your sentiments

43:36 in Ms. Campbell, Ms. Wright, Mr. Trent.

43:39 I think that this is good.

43:40 I think one of the issues that we were having that I had

43:43 is many of my principals were saying

43:45 that part of it was unenforceable.

43:47 So they have some parents that would come in and say,

43:48 “Well, if you can’t enforce this,

43:49 “then you can’t enforce that.”

43:50 And it became a quagmire,

43:51 and our school district was caught in a bad situation.

43:53 So I think with the revisions that we have,

43:55 and I wanna thank you guys for coming forward with these,

43:58 I think we’re in a place where we can get there.

44:00 And I think the actionable item is–

44:02 - Trouble appearing.

44:03 - Yeah, okay.

44:05 The actionable items is gonna be to have the principals

44:09 go ahead and have some sort of reflection,

44:11 and then set this on a probably two-week window to come back.

44:15 That should give plenty of time to have those.

44:17 And if you can make those principal comments

44:19 available to us in some sort of like a Survey Monkey

44:22 or something so that we can take a look at them,

44:24 and then we might be able to have some more discussion

44:26 wrapped around it.

44:26 I think with that, the other thing that I was gonna say

44:29 is the one thing that I had was that it says,

44:31 “District staff shall enforce the school’s dress code

44:33 “in a non-discriminatory and uniform matter.”

44:37 I think that that is part of it,

44:40 but we don’t want it to where the district staff

44:42 is enforcing the uniform in each one of the school districts

44:45 is that the school, does that make sense?

44:46 So that’s not the intent of this is all I’m saying.

44:48 And I just wanna make that on record.

44:49 So if I can go through,

44:51 I think we want principal review on the gangs,

44:54 but we wanna keep it in there.

44:55 I think that we all agree that the religious components

44:59 along with the other things that Ms. Campbell spoke

45:00 to that item are also agreeable.

45:04 I think that there was conversation wrapped around

45:07 suspension and not admitting back into class.

45:09 I know how we used to do that before was that you were,

45:12 if like the school teacher would say,

45:14 “Hey, you may not have the appropriate clothing on,

45:17 “here’s an option that you can use to go back to class.”

45:20 But in the event, but giving them that option to suspend,

45:23 I think is an option that I think everybody kind of agrees

45:27 to that we give that local to the schools

45:30 for suspension or not being admitted to class.

45:33 And I think that there’s been a very long track record

45:36 of principals being able to find a way to get that message

45:39 without making those kids lose class time.

45:41 So does that give you direction?

45:43 Okay, thank you very much.

45:44 Now, next up, we can move on to board policy 5600,

45:49 which is student discipline.

45:50 Does anybody wish to speak on this item?

45:54 No, all right, hearing none.

45:57 The next topic is board policy 5610,

46:00 removal out of school suspension, disciplinary placement

46:03 and expulsion of students.

46:04 Does anybody wish to speak on this item?

46:09 Nobody wish to speak on this item?

46:10 Okay, moving on.

46:12 The next topic is board member district

46:14 boundary adjustment process.

46:15 We have a presentation by Ms. Suhan.

46:17 Thank you, Ms. Su, for coming forward.

46:19 - Thank you guys, yeah, thank you.

46:21 - Thank you for all of your work and dedication.

46:23 We truly appreciate it.

46:32 Great points, Ms. Campbell.

46:42 Ms. Han, the floor is yours.

46:43 Present when you’re ready.

46:50 - Good afternoon, everyone.

46:52 So I have four topics on the agenda this afternoon

46:54 and I’m going to cover them sequentially,

46:56 hopefully, in one presentation.

46:58 We’ll see how technology works.

47:01 - Ms. Han, would you like to stop

47:02 at the end of each part of those presentations

47:04 and have us give input?

47:05 - Absolutely.

47:06 - Okay, good, I just wanted to make sure.

47:07 Thank you.

47:08 - There are opportunities for that.

47:09 So the first topic is the board member district boundaries

47:11 and I just wanna kind of brief everyone

47:15 on why we’re here talking about that.

47:18 There’s Florida statutes around

47:21 board member district boundaries,

47:22 similar to county commission district boundaries

47:24 and the idea is that each district

47:26 needs to have approximately the same number of people in it

47:29 based on the latest census.

47:32 That is number of people, not number of students,

47:34 number of voters, there’s a lot of numbers of things,

47:36 but number of people is what is the parameter.

47:40 You also have school board policy around this,

47:43 same information that is provided in state law.

47:48 This is required to be done in odd number of years

47:51 and note the language shall not disqualify

47:54 an incumbent member during his or her elected term.

47:58 So I just want you to be aware of that

48:00 as we go through and take a closer look

48:02 at the maps and such.

48:04 So a couple of key points,

48:06 the 2020 census data arrived late due to COVID

48:09 and so that didn’t even come in until August of 21.

48:13 And then the county stood up a pretty extensive project

48:16 for the county commission redistricting.

48:18 And you have attached to the board agenda item,

48:21 there’s something called additional information package

48:25 regarding the county’s process.

48:27 And I’ve pulled down all of their minutes,

48:29 there’s links to their website.

48:31 So you can kind of see the extensive project

48:34 that the county undertook

48:36 to analyze their district boundaries.

48:38 - Ms. Sayan, that document was I think 380 pages.

48:42 - It’s huge.

48:44 We had six or seven meetings, seven meetings.

48:46 - Nine pages was awesome.

48:48 - Yeah, the front end was relating to the school board,

48:51 but the back end had extensive data

48:54 about the county’s process,

48:55 just to kind of give you a perspective

48:57 on what that type of process could look like.

49:00 So the county commission has a somewhat different scenario

49:03 because they are under a charter

49:05 and their charter prescribes their process.

49:08 So their process is not necessarily our process.

49:12 So they created a 15 member redistricting committee

49:16 and they had several meetings.

49:19 Five of them had content that was more robust

49:23 and it was kind of an iterative process.

49:25 Let’s move lines here, move lines there.

49:27 And ultimately they accepted the committee’s recommendation

49:30 with a vote of three to two in November of 2021.

49:33 And that to some extent answers the question

49:36 of why we didn’t do this in 2021

49:38 because there just wasn’t enough time

49:40 for us to do anything regarding this

49:43 from the time that the county commission

49:46 concluded their work and the end of 2021.

49:50 So our process is a little less robust

49:53 or a little less prescribed in that our process requires

49:57 just the adoption of resolution that adopts the maps.

50:00 We can do a more robust process

50:03 similar to what the county did,

50:04 but that’s not required by either state law or board policy.

50:09 So again, we can only change districts

50:11 in odd numbered years and we can not disqualify

50:14 an incumbent member during his or her term.

50:17 So this chart shows the data

50:20 for the school board member districts

50:22 and then for the county commission districts.

50:25 And you can see that we are over the 10% kind of,

50:30 I know Paul, what’s the correct phrase that–

50:32 - The presumptive.

50:33 - Presumptive.

50:34 - Yeah, presumption of compliance.

50:37 And so our goal would be to end up under the 10%

50:44 when we do the redistricting.

50:46 And that is where the county ultimately landed

50:48 and you can see the changes that were made

50:51 in their districts.

50:53 So the next slide shows the board member maps

50:57 and the pastel colors are the maps

51:01 for the school board boundaries

51:03 and the red lines are the boundaries

51:06 of the county commission districts.

51:09 And then on the right side of this graph,

51:10 you’ll see a blow up of the kind of the center of the map.

51:14 And this is where a lot of the growth has occurred,

51:17 as well as in South Brevard that is kind of driving

51:20 the fact that we need to adjust our boundaries.

51:22 And the black stars that you’ll see in districts three,

51:27 four and five are the location

51:29 of our incumbent board members.

51:31 And so drawing the lines exactly as the county has them,

51:36 would potentially create issues

51:38 for district three and district five.

51:41 District four is also very close to the line.

51:44 So if we were to consider a very iterative process

51:49 of moving lines around to try to get us

51:52 in a smaller differential than what the county has,

51:56 I believe all of our districts would be affected

51:58 and three of our board members would be affected.

52:00 So I just want you to be aware of how the location

52:06 of our board members homes plays into the conversation

52:08 around redistricting for the board member districts.

52:12 And then the next slide has two different colored charts.

52:17 The slide on the left just shows the distribution

52:21 of schools in each district

52:25 with the school board districts on top

52:28 and on the bottom it shows what the distribution

52:31 would look like under

52:33 the county commission district boundaries.

52:35 And then on the right,

52:36 it shows you the schools that would change.

52:40 So for example, the blue colored schools would change

52:44 from district five to district three

52:47 and the green colored schools would change

52:50 from district three to district four and district five

52:53 and the yellow colored schools would change

52:55 from district four to district two and district five.

52:57 So you can see how the number of schools is affected

53:01 and you can see how the distribution of schools

53:04 is affected within each of the districts.

53:09 So the board has several decision points.

53:13 The state law, if you recall,

53:15 noted that we can have seven members

53:18 and we can have either seven members with two at large

53:22 or seven equal districts.

53:25 If we were to create seven equal districts,

53:27 that would be quite a substantial process

53:29 I would imagine to go through that.

53:31 And then in terms of options for the board,

53:35 the simplest option to get through

53:38 is to adopt the county commission districts

53:40 and when I’m finished in a moment,

53:42 I’ll ask Paul to kind of provide his reference material

53:46 on that topic.

53:47 And then another option is if the board were to choose

53:51 to adopt the county commission districts

53:53 with some very minor changes,

53:55 we can handle those at a staff level

53:57 if you are very specific as to what you would like changed.

54:00 What we are not staffed to do is the iterative process

54:04 that was done at Brevard County.

54:05 We just simply cannot handle that in a timely manner.

54:09 And I think in terms of engaging the public

54:13 and doing a very robust process,

54:17 it would be better handled by a consultant.

54:19 We do have a planning consultant

54:21 that is under contract with the school district.

54:23 We did a solicitation for general planning services

54:26 a year or so ago.

54:28 And they are onboard and under contract.

54:31 I talked with them about this

54:33 and their estimate would be between 50 and $100,000

54:36 to do a very robust process.

54:39 They have the qualifications.

54:41 They are doing the Hillsborough redistricting process,

54:45 not the board member redistricting,

54:47 but the school zoning redistricting process.

54:49 So if you’ve been reading about that in the news,

54:52 that is the same firm that’s doing that process.

54:54 And the process is very similar

54:57 in that you’re drawing boundary maps

54:58 and evaluating who’s in the numbers in each district.

55:03 So with that, I simply ask for some board feedback

55:06 and we can from there decide which way to go

55:09 and also ask Paul if you want to talk a little bit

55:12 about your memo.

55:13 - Quick question just for your presentation.

55:16 Do we know how much the Broward County contract was for

55:21 for that company by any chance?

55:24 Hillsborough, sorry.

55:25 - Hillsborough. - Sorry.

55:26 - No, I don’t.

55:27 I suspect it was quite a bit more

55:28 because it was bigger and there was more to it

55:32 than just the board member districts.

55:34 - Okay, thank you.

55:35 Is that ‘cause they have at large districts

55:37 or there was more?

55:37 - No, they were districting schools, not board members.

55:40 So it was a different process, but similar.

55:44 - A lot more nightmarish.

55:45 Okay, thank you.

55:46 All right, anybody else wish to discuss this item?

55:49 Anybody wanna throw it in there?

55:51 Okay, Ms. Campbell.

55:53 - Yeah, let me start with elephant in the room

55:55 ‘cause I, you know, unseating a sitting school,

55:58 remember that’s obviously an issue.

56:00 And I did reread through the memo that I actually sent,

56:03 the AG opinion that I actually sent to Paul.

56:06 He sent it back out to all of us

56:07 and that makes me feel a little bit better,

56:08 but I’ll be completely honest.

56:10 I’m not super comfortable spending almost my whole term

56:14 not living inside the boundary of my district.

56:16 So, but with that, I just wanna go through,

56:19 when you look at the maps and I don’t know,

56:22 Sue, could you go back up to the maps?

56:26 And it’s hard to see some of it

56:28 when it’s laid on top of each other.

56:29 But if you look at the county commission,

56:33 I’ll just look district five, for example,

56:35 county commission district five there on the left,

56:37 that’s in the red boundary.

56:38 Wait, it goes all the way from Palm Bay up into Melbourne

56:41 and then just this kind of weird, not weird,

56:44 but kind of weird, very 90 degree turn over.

56:49 Oh yeah, good, big pictures.

56:51 That’s better for old eyes.

56:53 To the right, so that it can go across the causeway

56:56 and it basically then over on the beach side

57:00 goes from the, between the Melbourne Causeway

57:02 and the Oak Valley Causeway.

57:04 So, and then the same thing if you look at district four,

57:08 county commission, remember we’re looking at the red lines,

57:11 it covers a lot of this Viera area,

57:13 of course on the left there’s nothing out there but swamp,

57:15 but for right now, a lot of Viera area and Melbourne

57:18 and then it also does this jaunt over to the beach side.

57:22 You know, I’ve looked at that and I recognize

57:25 that that makes a lot of sense for our county commissioners

57:29 because in Brevard, our big economic

57:33 and environmental drivers are the Indian River Lagoon

57:38 and the beach side, tourism.

57:40 So it really makes sense for our county commissioners

57:42 to all have a piece of the river and the beach side.

57:49 Because they make a lot of decisions

57:50 that affect all of those.

57:52 You know, I thought about something this morning,

57:53 the port actually is one of the biggest economic drivers

57:56 of our county.

57:57 That’s probably why they completely separated that out

57:59 and just so you know, people in the south

58:00 then don’t get to vote on port people,

58:02 even though it affects us all.

58:03 But you know, this idea of making their maps

58:07 kind of do these swerves makes sense in Brevard

58:10 because of the decisions they make.

58:11 The school board however, doesn’t have the same needs

58:15 because we’re not making decisions based on the beach,

58:17 based on the river.

58:19 So the even number of schools to me is really important.

58:24 And also the other thing is that making this change

58:27 is going to cause quite a bit of disruption.

58:30 Now just, I acknowledge that any kind of redistricting

58:35 that we’re going to do when it comes to our board members

58:39 is going to disenfranchise some people for one.

58:42 And let me define what I mean by disenfranchise.

58:45 There are people who, and no offense Miss Jenkins

58:50 or Mr. Susan, there were people who’ve been really excited

58:53 to vote for the next school board race

58:55 in district three and district four.

58:56 If we redo this, there are over 40,000,

59:01 actually almost 42,000 voters.

59:04 I’m not going by population,

59:05 I’m going by supervisor elections website.

59:07 Almost 42,000 voters who were supposed to be able to vote

59:10 in 2024, who now would either be in district two

59:13 or district five and would not get to vote

59:15 in a school board race until 2026.

59:18 Those include voters in Rockledge, in Palm Shores,

59:22 the North part of West Melbourne,

59:25 India Atlantic and around India Atlantic,

59:27 parts of Oak galley, other parts over on the beach side,

59:30 the area North of 192, Lake Washington area,

59:33 another Lake Washington area, Melbourne along the river

59:35 and South of Oak galley along the river.

59:37 A lot of those areas then would be in districts now,

59:40 either district five or district two and would not

59:43 be voting in the next election.

59:45 They would have to wait two more years.

59:47 And we would have almost 38,000 who would get to vote again,

59:50 who just voted and maybe that’s not as problematic,

59:52 but to me that almost 42,000 is 9%

59:55 of the total voters in Brevard.

59:56 So we’d be telling 9% of the voters in Brevard,

59:58 you thought you were gonna get to vote next time,

1:00:00 but now you’re not.

1:00:01 Now, anytime we do redistricting,

1:00:02 that’s gonna happen with some.

1:00:04 So my, to me, besides having even number of schools

1:00:07 because of our responsibility to visit schools

1:00:10 and it’s not that we have oversight over those schools,

1:00:15 which many people misunderstand,

1:00:16 but those are our schools to build relationships with,

1:00:19 to, when somebody has a, you guys have been on the board

1:00:23 long enough to know that if someone has a complaint

1:00:25 about a school, they’re gonna come to you.

1:00:27 It doesn’t mean that you’re the one who’s gonna fix it all,

1:00:29 but that’s who you build relationships with.

1:00:31 So it’s important to have an even number of schools.

1:00:33 But to me, the biggest thing is this change.

1:00:37 And so my priorities, as I look through,

1:00:40 is one, even number of schools,

1:00:41 but as little disruption as possible,

1:00:43 and to disenfranchise as few people as possible.

1:00:45 - In fact, over 50,000 will require board approval.

1:00:47 So if you choose to go this way,

1:00:50 I would get a scope of work and a price

1:00:52 and hopefully get that on your next board meeting,

1:00:55 potentially the 25th, depending on how long

1:00:58 we work through the details.

1:01:00 - In that scope of work, in order for you to go to do that,

1:01:02 would have to be that we would give you

1:01:04 what that scope of work is currently today.

1:01:06 Then you would go get to procurement to get the individual,

1:01:09 to get the company at our next board meeting,

1:01:12 which I think is April 11th, right?

1:01:15 - Yes, sir, the next board meeting’s April 11th.

1:01:18 Probably would have them come in maybe during the workshop

1:01:21 and talk with you about scope,

1:01:24 just to make sure that we are, in fact,

1:01:25 meeting everyone’s needs with scope.

1:01:29 They’ve been advised that we’re having

1:01:31 this conversation today, and depending upon the outcome,

1:01:34 they’re prepared to support the project.

1:01:36 - Okay, and then just in curiosity from you,

1:01:40 when we talk about the level, you had mentioned

1:01:43 that there was one way of doing it,

1:01:45 which was just a couple of little quick decision makings

1:01:48 involved, do you have any concerns over

1:01:52 if we were to go to a consultant over time

1:01:54 for staff and stuff like that?

1:01:57 - So I think the only way to do a robust process

1:02:02 in a timely manner is through a consultant,

1:02:04 and we would manage that, that’s just part of our work.

1:02:08 I don’t feel like we would be able to adequately support

1:02:14 the entire effort of moving lines around

1:02:16 and generating reports and things like that,

1:02:18 so we certainly could support the logistics

1:02:20 of having a consultant on board.

1:02:22 - And Ms. Hand, just for point of clarification,

1:02:25 over the summer, is that not your largest, heaviest amount

1:02:28 because of the procurements and all of the work

1:02:30 that we do inside?

1:02:33 - So yes and no, so like Dave Lindemann is buried,

1:02:39 Karen Black, our planner, would be working through

1:02:41 this with me, we’re both buried too.

1:02:44 - Okay.

1:02:45 - She’ll be working on the educational plant survey

1:02:47 that I probably will talk about a little bit later,

1:02:49 so that’s her big project coming up.

1:02:53 So yes, we’re thinly staffed, but we do our best.

1:02:56 - Just wanted to try to figure out the whole scope.

1:02:59 Okay, all right, thank you so much for those questions,

1:03:02 and thank you so much for that presentation,

1:03:04 I think it’s well written.

1:03:07 Anybody else wish to speak on this topic?

1:03:09 Ms. Jenkins?

1:03:11 - So, I am gonna say first and foremost

1:03:16 before the naysayers have something to say about it,

1:03:20 I’m well aware that even with what I believe should happen,

1:03:25 my seat will no longer be in District 3

1:03:27 just ‘cause of where I live in my district.

1:03:30 I’m a realist of that.

1:03:31 So what I’m saying has nothing to do with where I live

1:03:35 and what district I’ll end up in.

1:03:36 And Ms. Campbell, it’s different for you,

1:03:40 ‘cause I hear you when you’re saying

1:03:41 you’re gonna be sitting in an entire full term,

1:03:44 and I hear you and I acknowledge that.

1:03:47 And you actually are right there on a line

1:03:49 that could possibly be manipulated

1:03:50 to where you stay in your district

1:03:52 if we do something different than county commission.

1:03:55 I don’t do this job, so I don’t even see

1:03:58 how that would even be a possibility for me.

1:03:59 So, just before naysayers use that as an accusation

1:04:02 as to why I’m about to say what I say,

1:04:05 I too believe that it is our responsibility

1:04:08 to draw these maps to best serve our students

1:04:10 and our schools and the communities

1:04:13 in which those schools serve.

1:04:15 I understand, just like Ms. Campbell had expressed

1:04:19 why county commission drew their maps

1:04:20 the way that they did,

1:04:21 because of their roles and responsibilities.

1:04:23 And I think it’s our obligation to do the same

1:04:25 for the population in which we serve.

1:04:27 So, there will be a disproportionate amount of schools

1:04:31 in certain districts if we do redistrict

1:04:33 to county commission.

1:04:35 But it’s not even just the numbers of schools,

1:04:37 it’s also the type of schools.

1:04:38 And so, one of the largest districts

1:04:40 which would become district two,

1:04:42 would then have eight secondary schools.

1:04:49 Which is extremely disproportionate to the other districts.

1:04:55 I think the other thing to consider too,

1:04:56 again, it’s not saying I would even stay in district three,

1:05:01 but if district three became what county commission is,

1:05:03 there’s something to consider is,

1:05:05 the voting base in that district,

1:05:09 there is a significant portion of the population

1:05:12 that’s voting that doesn’t have children in schools.

1:05:15 And so, that’s just something to take a consideration of.

1:05:19 The amount of schools that would be in that district

1:05:20 and the voting base that would be voting for it.

1:05:23 Not to say community doesn’t have an input on their schools,

1:05:25 they absolutely do.

1:05:26 But again, it would be very varied

1:05:28 from the other districts that are voting.

1:05:30 So, I think that’s something for us to consider.

1:05:35 I think another thing we need to pay attention to as well

1:05:38 is the county commission redistrict

1:05:39 because they were above that 10% line,

1:05:43 but they only brought themselves down to 8.5%.

1:05:45 And we all know, especially in the world of education,

1:05:47 we’ve got growth in four and five happening.

1:05:50 Right now, four and five are the largest districts we have.

1:05:53 Three’s not that far off from it,

1:05:55 I think it’s about three or 4,000 below.

1:05:58 So, I don’t know if it makes sense for us

1:06:01 to simply redistrict to just have to do it again

1:06:04 in the near future because we know

1:06:05 of the expected growth rates

1:06:06 that we’re gonna have in those two areas.

1:06:11 It’s not as simple as a potential suggestion of carve-outs.

1:06:16 Number one, that doesn’t serve the purpose

1:06:18 of the claims I’ve heard

1:06:20 that it’s easier to mirror county commission.

1:06:22 If we’re not gonna mirror county commission,

1:06:23 then carving out doesn’t make any sense either.

1:06:27 And it’s confusing because four and five

1:06:29 are stacked on top of each other.

1:06:30 They’re the two largest.

1:06:31 One can’t just simply give to the other

1:06:32 because then it creates a new problem and it floods.

1:06:35 So, I believe it is in our best interest

1:06:39 to have an outside consultant deal with this.

1:06:41 The other reason why I think it’s important

1:06:42 to not even remotely attempt

1:06:44 to ask our internal staff to do it,

1:06:47 just gonna tell it like it is,

1:06:49 this has political ramifications

1:06:51 and I don’t think that burden should be on our staff,

1:06:53 nor on any member of this board.

1:06:55 If we put it out to an outside agency,

1:06:58 there’s no accusations there at all

1:07:00 and that isn’t even a conversation

1:07:01 that could really be had in the community.

1:07:03 So, I think that would be really important for us.

1:07:08 There has been many comments out there

1:07:13 that mirroring county commission would be easier

1:07:15 for the supervisor of elections.

1:07:17 And so, I spoke to the supervisor of elections

1:07:20 ‘cause I wanted to understand what that meant exactly

1:07:24 and he did say to me, yeah, it would be easier.

1:07:29 And when I asked further questions

1:07:30 as to what does that mean, he told me,

1:07:35 it doesn’t change the polling location.

1:07:38 It doesn’t change the number of polling locations.

1:07:41 What it could potentially, keyword, potentially change

1:07:45 is there’s a rule in place where your precinct

1:07:48 has to be all encompassing.

1:07:50 So, you can’t have a precinct where someone votes

1:07:53 in one county commission and a different school board

1:07:55 and someone in that precinct is voting,

1:07:58 I’m sorry, I said that backwards.

1:07:59 You’re all voting for the same county commissioner

1:08:01 but people in that same precinct

1:08:02 are voting for two different school board members.

1:08:04 You can’t do that because you can’t print ballots that way.

1:08:07 But right before I was about to ask my follow-up question,

1:08:10 he posed it for me.

1:08:12 He said, we don’t know how many of those

1:08:14 even actually exist though.

1:08:16 We’re looking into that.

1:08:17 So, yes, it’s a theory that it’s simpler

1:08:19 and it’s easier for the supervisor elections

1:08:21 but we actually don’t even know what the actual problem is

1:08:24 and how much simpler it would make it.

1:08:27 And to be fair, they’ve been doing it all along.

1:08:29 It’s not that they can’t do it.

1:08:31 But he felt like it would be unfair to say,

1:08:33 no, it wouldn’t be simpler.

1:08:35 But very readily admitted, he doesn’t have the data

1:08:38 to prove what actually would be fixed

1:08:40 if we did that for him.

1:08:42 Another thing to consider that we’ve been hearing

1:08:45 out in the public is that it’s gonna save us money.

1:08:50 Sure, it’s gonna save us money

1:08:51 on the one-time consultant fee.

1:08:53 But we’re still going to have to pay the supervisor

1:08:56 of elections for reprinting those voter cards

1:08:58 ‘cause it’s in statute for those voters

1:09:01 whose precincts and districts

1:09:03 for school board members would change.

1:09:06 I spoke to the supervisor election.

1:09:08 That was very, very clear.

1:09:10 I know there was an odd proposal

1:09:13 over at the county commission recently

1:09:15 in which Mr. Tobia had some conversations with someone here.

1:09:21 Before we even get into that conversation,

1:09:22 I’m just gonna say I have questions for Mr. Gibbs on that.

1:09:25 It makes me uncomfortable about the ethics behind it.

1:09:29 I don’t know if we should even play that game

1:09:33 to accept money from a county commissioner

1:09:35 who’s running for the supervisor of elections.

1:09:37 Makes me feel a little weird.

1:09:38 I think we should stay out of that for $20,000.

1:09:40 I don’t think it’s worth it.

1:09:43 But again, my ultimate concern here is,

1:09:45 nope, not my house ‘cause I’m pretty sure

1:09:47 it’s gonna be out of district three no matter what,

1:09:49 even with the suggestion I’m making.

1:09:50 My concern is for the schools and the students that we serve.

1:09:53 I think the disproportionate representation

1:09:55 doesn’t make any sense.

1:09:57 And are we discussing increasing school board members yet?

1:10:03 - No, that’s not gonna be this way.

1:10:05 - Okay, ‘cause it’s on there.

1:10:10 I’m sorry, say that again.

1:10:11 - No, we’re not discussing that.

1:10:13 - No, I just simply disclosed

1:10:14 that that’s part of what’s in the statute.

1:10:16 - Got it, okay.

1:10:17 - We all wanted to consider that.

1:10:18 - Okay.

1:10:19 I just wanna make that clear to the public

1:10:21 who’s paying attention ‘cause people are absolutely

1:10:23 watching this part of this workshop.

1:10:24 So I just wanna make that very, very clear.

1:10:26 Okay, thank you.

1:10:30 - Thank you, Ms. Jenkins.

1:10:31 Does anybody else have anything to say?

1:10:32 - Yeah, I am.

1:10:33 So this process is not gonna be,

1:10:36 it’s not gonna be an easy process to redistrict.

1:10:39 I would like for the public’s perception

1:10:41 and their understanding, what is the ramifications

1:10:44 for us being over the percentage?

1:10:46 Mr. Gibbs, can you share that?

1:10:48 - Yeah, we’re subject to lawsuit under federal laws

1:10:50 for disproportionate representation.

1:10:53 One citizen, one person, one vote laws and things like that.

1:10:55 We’re supposed to be equal.

1:10:57 - Okay, all right.

1:10:58 And Brevard poses some challenges because we are so long.

1:11:01 And so it’s a little frustrating

1:11:03 when they’re looking at the population,

1:11:05 not necessarily the number of children

1:11:06 that are in the schools.

1:11:07 It causes some complexities that we have to look at.

1:11:11 I understand that this is a huge undertaking.

1:11:14 So Sue, thank you for what you’ve presented to us so far.

1:11:17 There’s still work to be done.

1:11:19 I am in favor of looking at the consultant

1:11:23 because I think we are going to need someone

1:11:25 that is going to take a deep dive into this.

1:11:28 And that’s all that I have.

1:11:35 - It definitely is gonna be a process.

1:11:38 It pains me to agree with you on that.

1:11:41 Many of you hear that maybe we need to look

1:11:43 at the consulting area ‘cause it’s easy to say,

1:11:47 no, don’t wanna spend any money on this.

1:11:49 Let’s just do the easy fix, but that’s not always the best.

1:11:53 But we’ll hear them out.

1:11:56 They’ll make a presentation.

1:11:58 Is that what you’re saying?

1:11:59 - Yes, sir.

1:12:00 That’s exactly what I will do next

1:12:01 if that’s the board’s direction

1:12:02 is to get that on schedule now.

1:12:04 - All right, so that’s, ideally, again,

1:12:08 pains me to voluntarily spend the money.

1:12:11 But in this case, I think it’s part of the process

1:12:14 to at least hear them out.

1:12:16 - Thank you.

1:12:17 So when we started going through this,

1:12:19 there were some questions that came out.

1:12:20 The first one is that it’s not legal for us

1:12:23 to develop our districts based upon schools.

1:12:25 It’s not.

1:12:26 We’re supposed to represent all schools.

1:12:28 And what I would propose in that relation,

1:12:29 because it’s going to create a layer

1:12:33 of just chaos to try to save.

1:12:36 So here’s, for instance,

1:12:38 if we take that and separate that,

1:12:40 we can get very close to being evened up.

1:12:43 And let me explain how.

1:12:44 My northern border, I have McNair, I have Anderson,

1:12:48 I have other schools that are a part of my school.

1:12:51 I represent people that are inside of it,

1:12:53 but I don’t represent the school

1:12:55 because the geographic location is not in my school.

1:12:57 But there is nothing against all of us taking the time

1:13:02 to separate that aside,

1:13:03 which by statute we’re not even allowed to define as,

1:13:06 and say, we wanna just take a look at

1:13:09 defining which schools we can represent.

1:13:11 And it might be that the geographical location of that

1:13:14 is not in our actual district,

1:13:16 but actually we can represent them.

1:13:18 Even if it’s not inside of our geographical location,

1:13:21 we can still take that on.

1:13:22 And I love that idea better because we have,

1:13:25 just like it was pointed out, many different variables.

1:13:28 So you have some of us that have more Title I schools

1:13:31 than other schools, we have more high schools

1:13:33 than other schools, we have more.

1:13:34 And it’s set up that if you try to take that as a layer

1:13:37 and put that into the development of it,

1:13:39 it becomes a significant problem.

1:13:40 So I have students, just for instance,

1:13:44 400, I think 400 of my students attend Edgewood.

1:13:47 Like 200 of my students attend West Shore.

1:13:50 So when we even start talking about

1:13:52 representing those schools in those districts,

1:13:55 it becomes a quagmire because when you look at

1:13:58 the cross references, you have people that like,

1:14:01 you know, my district has kids that are in satellite,

1:14:04 Delora, you know what I mean?

1:14:05 Like it’s just, it’s not the same thing.

1:14:08 So I would say that if we are to move forward

1:14:11 in whatever direction, the first thing we should do

1:14:13 is separate the conversation of schools out.

1:14:16 And that’s what I would like to talk to you guys about

1:14:18 before we even get into the rest of it.

1:14:20 Because I think that the consultants would like to see

1:14:22 part of the conversation.

1:14:24 What we’re talking about doing is trying to meander lines

1:14:28 based on two factors right now.

1:14:29 One, schools, which was a large conversation,

1:14:32 and two, based on our population that we have, right?

1:14:37 So I would like to entertain removing that component

1:14:40 and separating it and then ask staff to just,

1:14:43 hey, give us a kind of a judgment of what you think.

1:14:46 And then that way, I don’t mind reducing a school

1:14:49 that may be geographically in my area,

1:14:51 but is actually gonna help.

1:14:53 Because if we have an even number of Title I,

1:14:56 an even number of middle, elementary, high schools,

1:14:59 and the other thing is, is that I might disagree

1:15:02 in the fact that having those beachside schools

1:15:06 brings in a host of other type of situations

1:15:09 that we would also be able to talk about.

1:15:11 So I think that there’s a lot that we discuss

1:15:14 in relation to schools that have not only

1:15:17 a statutory ruling on this, but also that we can’t.

1:15:21 But I think it would also help us in this process

1:15:23 make it easier for staff.

1:15:24 What do you guys, I’d like to open up discussion on that.

1:15:26 - Yeah, I’ll respond first.

1:15:30 We are the School Board of Brevard Public Schools.

1:15:33 I am absolutely not okay with removing school proportions

1:15:37 from the conversation.

1:15:39 No one’s saying that it has to be 100% equal.

1:15:43 It wasn’t already.

1:15:45 That’s literally impossible because of our landscape.

1:15:48 When you make the argument about middle schools,

1:15:50 high schools, and Title I,

1:15:52 actually they are pretty balanced,

1:15:53 as balanced as they possibly can be to our geographic area

1:15:57 right now.

1:15:58 There’s no reason why we can’t chew gum

1:16:00 and walk at the same time and conform to the statute

1:16:04 and make sure we’re good with population,

1:16:06 but do our best to also be as proportionate as possible

1:16:10 with our school representation.

1:16:12 We’ve done it before.

1:16:13 I think we can probably do it again.

1:16:15 And if we can’t, I’m pretty sure a consultant would tell us,

1:16:18 there’s literally no way for you to do this

1:16:19 because the numbers are way off base.

1:16:23 In terms of a host of situations

1:16:28 having a beachside school,

1:16:29 I would like a specific example, again,

1:16:30 ‘cause we often talk in broad statements

1:16:32 without any actual example.

1:16:35 And not every district would be represented

1:16:39 with beachside schools with county commission either.

1:16:42 So that statement is a little confusing for me

1:16:44 ‘cause District 1 wouldn’t have any beachside schools.

1:16:48 And District 3 would be left with one singular

1:16:53 elementary school that’s kind of off.

1:16:56 It’s a teeny tiny little one as well.

1:16:57 So, and all of those schools are a little bit different

1:17:00 and have their own situations going on.

1:17:03 And I think Mr. Trent can agree with me too,

1:17:05 like the ones in Cocoa Beach are unique

1:17:08 and kind of like their own little community.

1:17:10 So I don’t really understand that argument,

1:17:15 but yeah, no, I’m definitely not with removing

1:17:18 the school language.

1:17:19 We can absolutely do both things at the same time.

1:17:21 - Let me respond because it’s a statement towards what I,

1:17:23 I wanna clarify, no, no, no, no, no, no.

1:17:27 I wanna clarify the fact that what I’m saying,

1:17:29 I did not say that we take any of the schools

1:17:32 based on any of our boundaries.

1:17:34 So whether it’s county commission

1:17:36 or something that we develop or anything else,

1:17:38 that is not the question.

1:17:40 The question is, is developing an equal opportunity

1:17:43 for us to represent the schools?

1:17:45 So let me explain.

1:17:46 There was no comment that I said,

1:17:48 because I’m telling you that I feel it is illegal

1:17:51 to justify our district boundaries based on schools,

1:17:54 because it goes against what the statutes say,

1:17:56 which is that we have to represent all schools.

1:17:58 So the conversation gets in there.

1:18:00 I was just simply saying that we may be able

1:18:03 to create a situation that we all agree on

1:18:05 that includes some of the beach schools

1:18:06 and some of that other stuff.

1:18:07 It doesn’t have anything to do with the district boundaries

1:18:10 or the school board boundaries.

1:18:11 I just wanted to clarify that, yes ma’am.

1:18:14 - So I wanted to make a couple of clarifications.

1:18:16 First of all, you use the term not legal.

1:18:18 I don’t know that it’s illegal,

1:18:21 ‘cause not legal to me means same as illegal.

1:18:23 It’s illegal for us to consider the schools.

1:18:26 I would suggest it’s not illegal.

1:18:28 Mr. Gibbs, am I off that?

1:18:31 - Statute just says board members

1:18:33 represent every school in the county.

1:18:35 So it doesn’t say you can’t draw lines

1:18:38 to try and balance schools within your districts.

1:18:41 If you can do it and still comply

1:18:44 without gerrymandering for discriminatory purposes.

1:18:47 - Right, right, right.

1:18:48 So I understand, but it’s not that it’s illegal

1:18:49 for us to consider that as we’re having the conversations.

1:18:52 And the other thing is, and I think this takes,

1:18:54 I’m not completely opposed to what you’re suggesting,

1:18:57 Mr. Susan, if we get to the place

1:18:58 and we’re really off and we know that, for example,

1:19:03 Sunrise is within the boundaries of District Five,

1:19:06 but a lot of the people who go to Sunrise

1:19:07 actually live in Malabar.

1:19:09 And so if we need, if we get a little off,

1:19:12 then maybe Sunrise becomes a District Three school

1:19:15 instead of a District Five school, or something similar,

1:19:17 especially where District Two and District Four

1:19:19 are really tight in there.

1:19:21 We make some adjustments there.

1:19:22 I’m not completely opposed to that.

1:19:25 But what I would say is, I think the whole idea

1:19:28 of representing, I don’t represent the 17 schools

1:19:33 that I’m responsible for.

1:19:35 I’m just responsible for visiting them,

1:19:36 for building relationships where we’re,

1:19:38 so because we have been criticized actually by staff before

1:19:42 in our board reviews, that we frequently in the past

1:19:45 have said, my school this, my school this,

1:19:47 like I’m only looking out for my schools.

1:19:49 The County Commission does that.

1:19:50 I think they’re probably a little more,

1:19:51 you know, there’s probably more of the responsibility.

1:19:54 But we can’t get that, we can’t get territorial,

1:19:57 I’m taking care of my schools.

1:19:59 Because that absolutely is not, by statute,

1:20:01 we are responsible for making decisions.

1:20:03 Once we’re elected from our districts,

1:20:05 but we make decisions for the whole county

1:20:06 for the good of every school.

1:20:07 And we have to stay that, keep that focus.

1:20:09 So I, that language, because language is so important to me,

1:20:13 you know, of, we’re not representing, we are visiting.

1:20:16 So I’m okay with maybe making some adjustments

1:20:19 if we get there, but I still think this is important,

1:20:24 not the most important,

1:20:26 but is an important part of the equation.

1:20:28 And I do have to, actually I have to point out

1:20:30 what Senator Jenkins says, it’s actually true.

1:20:32 I’ve looked before and I’m like, you know what?

1:20:33 We all do have a low income area.

1:20:36 We all do have a high income area.

1:20:39 We all do have some areas of growth.

1:20:41 And we have some areas of atrophy.

1:20:44 You know, we all, we may not all have rural areas.

1:20:47 I’m not sure how much rural is going on on the beach.

1:20:50 Oh, you’ve got Malabar, so, yeah.

1:20:52 So we all have a little bit of, you know,

1:20:54 chicken raising going on in our districts too.

1:20:57 So, you know, we have a,

1:20:59 we actually have really good boundaries, I feel like,

1:21:02 to represent so much of our county.

1:21:04 I mean, no, I don’t have beach-side schools,

1:21:06 but I have other affluent areas.

1:21:08 I have West Melbourne and, you know, Bayside Lakes.

1:21:11 And so, but I also have a lot of Title I

1:21:15 in the Palm Bay area and around University Park.

1:21:18 And so I think we’re really well balanced.

1:21:21 And again, another reason for just trying to make

1:21:23 those few tweaks rather than a lot.

1:21:25 So I don’t wanna take it, I don’t wanna make,

1:21:27 I’m not comfortable with making a resolution

1:21:29 that says we’re just not gonna talk about that anymore.

1:21:31 But I am comfortable when we get there,

1:21:33 and we don’t hold that up as the highest value.

1:21:36 I’m okay with that.

1:21:39 - Anybody else?

1:21:44 - So what I was looking for is you have two members

1:21:47 that are not in favor of trying to create a separate system.

1:21:51 I was trying to see if there’s anybody else

1:21:53 that would like to try to create it,

1:21:54 because to be honest with you, all it is

1:21:57 is I’m asking to have it separated from the conversation.

1:22:00 And then once we set up the districts,

1:22:04 then all you do is turn around

1:22:05 and then figure out the schools from there.

1:22:07 Because if we don’t, and we go the other route,

1:22:10 it becomes a two layered conversation and very cumbersome.

1:22:13 And then what you end up with is a lot of conversations

1:22:15 that are wrapped around that too.

1:22:16 - So just to be clear, can I just clarify.

1:22:18 I’m making sure I’m understanding what you’re asking.

1:22:20 So you’re asking for us to look at redrawing the maps,

1:22:24 set aside the schools that are in each of the districts,

1:22:25 just balancing out the number of voters

1:22:27 that are in each one of these.

1:22:28 And then– - Residents.

1:22:30 - Residents, yeah.

1:22:32 And then we would introduce the schools back in

1:22:35 at a later point and figure out

1:22:36 how we have to balance those out.

1:22:39 - Yeah, and the idea is that the consultant

1:22:42 would not have to have a double framed conversation

1:22:45 and go through it all, because what we would do

1:22:47 is develop our districts, then figure out an equality.

1:22:51 Because it doesn’t, the state statute, as Paul said,

1:22:54 states that we should represent all schools.

1:22:57 So there’s no difficult thing that defines it

1:23:00 and says you have to represent the schools that are,

1:23:02 so we can go ahead and add one up the top,

1:23:04 one up the bottom, and we can have that

1:23:06 as a separate discussion.

1:23:07 But to say that we wanna develop voter-based

1:23:10 based on schools too is a double-headed snake

1:23:12 that’s difficult to run.

1:23:13 That’s all I saw it as.

1:23:15 - Can I ask a question of Ms. Hahn?

1:23:18 And you may not know the answer to this,

1:23:20 but would it be more cost effective,

1:23:25 or maybe it won’t change the cost.

1:23:26 This is really ultimately my question.

1:23:28 To tell a consultant straight up,

1:23:30 number one priority, obviously, is population,

1:23:33 ‘cause that’s what we have to do.

1:23:35 But show us some examples of population

1:23:38 with as much balance as possible with our schools,

1:23:40 rather than asking them to do two separate renderings.

1:23:44 Or are they probably gonna come to the table

1:23:45 with more than one in the first place?

1:23:49 - I suspect they’re going to watch the tape of this meeting.

1:23:52 (laughing)

1:23:53 And then they probably will talk to each of you

1:23:56 individually, and then they will develop a scope of work.

1:24:02 And so I think there are a lot of ways

1:24:05 to get to the end of this process,

1:24:08 and they will try to navigate among the different opinions

1:24:12 as to how to get there, including engaging with the public.

1:24:16 When I had talked to them a month or so ago about this,

1:24:18 they indicated they could do a lot of this

1:24:20 via Zoom meetings with the public, that type of thing.

1:24:24 And that would reduce the cost.

1:24:29 But I do think that there will be some iterations

1:24:31 in the lines, but also perhaps in the data

1:24:35 that you’d like to see.

1:24:36 I heard several different types of data that you may want.

1:24:39 The census data is pretty robust.

1:24:42 So we can pull all sorts of different data

1:24:45 if that’s what you’d like to consider.

1:24:47 And so the broader of that we look at,

1:24:52 the more costly it will be to look at different options

1:24:55 considering different data sets.

1:24:59 So anyway, a very long answer to your question.

1:25:02 - No, I appreciate that.

1:25:05 So what I’m hearing is that no one’s opinion up here

1:25:11 is going to be unheard.

1:25:12 So if I don’t agree with Mr. Susan

1:25:14 and he wants to see it that way,

1:25:15 they’re gonna hear him say that

1:25:16 and put it together in their decision.

1:25:19 - And I think there is a possibility of different lines

1:25:23 that go with different opinions.

1:25:25 That there may be a board member

1:25:27 who would like to see this line over here

1:25:28 and another board member would like to see

1:25:30 that line up there.

1:25:31 And so that probably will be somewhat of a starting point

1:25:35 for them to meet with you and talk with you

1:25:37 and try to get some kind of base boundary.

1:25:40 And similar to the approach that I’ll be talking with you

1:25:43 about on the middle school, you have to start somewhere.

1:25:46 And then we just move the lines around

1:25:47 from that base starting point.

1:25:50 - So I’m gonna steal a Miss Campbell line real quick

1:25:52 and just say, so it doesn’t have to be an either or.

1:25:55 (laughing)

1:25:56 - Can I add two things just to take into consideration

1:25:59 when we’re looking at this?

1:26:00 Future growth, so there are certain areas

1:26:02 that are developing significantly faster

1:26:04 so that we are not having to come back

1:26:06 and do this again really quickly.

1:26:09 I think this process is a tedious one.

1:26:11 And then transportation.

1:26:12 I know we talked about the causeways and how that affects.

1:26:15 - It wouldn’t affect this conversation.

1:26:17 - Well, no, it won’t affect it.

1:26:19 This is just two votes for who.

1:26:21 - That’s good.

1:26:22 The problem we run into is and what I was trying to avoid

1:26:25 is we’re going to have this conversation

1:26:28 where if we don’t separate the schools,

1:26:30 we will then begin this conversation over the schools.

1:26:34 And what ends up happening is we have gerrymandered districts

1:26:37 like we do, like if you look at it the way it’s written up

1:26:39 through Rockledge and everything else it is.

1:26:41 And so the issue is is that we end up in a situation

1:26:44 where we’re trying to add and do these different things

1:26:46 and it just becomes an issue.

1:26:47 So I was just trying to reduce costs

1:26:50 because I’m sure it would add to the cost

1:26:52 and also create a different, get to the bottom line

1:26:55 to make a recommendation and then go from there, that’s all.

1:26:58 - I’m not, I don’t know why we have to shut it down

1:27:00 right now ‘cause what you’re asking is just,

1:27:02 let’s just shut this down right now.

1:27:03 And I don’t think it–

1:27:04 - I didn’t ask you to shut anything down.

1:27:06 I’m just saying–

1:27:07 - That we don’t, you want us to, well–

1:27:10 - My ultimate goal was to ask–

1:27:11 - Rewind the tape.

1:27:11 I think what you said was,

1:27:13 and maybe this wasn’t what you intended,

1:27:14 but what I heard was, using my good counseling technique,

1:27:18 what I heard you say was that you don’t want us,

1:27:21 you want us to right now just to say,

1:27:22 we’re not gonna consider schools.

1:27:24 We’ll come up with a different frame for that,

1:27:25 but we’re not gonna have the number of schools

1:27:28 be a part of this conversation.

1:27:29 - I just think, no, I think to be clarified,

1:27:31 the discussion needs to be in two components.

1:27:33 It needs to be set, let’s set the voters

1:27:36 and then based upon that set that we have

1:27:38 that becomes very easy to do that

1:27:40 without regarding all these different cuts with schools,

1:27:43 and then we say, okay, here’s what the plan is,

1:27:45 and then we see where the schools are,

1:27:46 and we say, okay, this one has these students in it,

1:27:49 so you can represent that one, and we just do that,

1:27:51 and it’s a lot quicker and a lot easier,

1:27:53 and I think that it would be less expensive.

1:27:54 It was just part of a conversation

1:27:56 that I wanted to bring to the table.

1:27:57 So, Ms. Wright, did you have any other questions?

1:27:59 - No.

1:27:59 - Mr. Trent?

1:28:01 - No, except for if we are, I guess I do that,

1:28:04 if we are gonna bring a consultant in on that,

1:28:07 I would hope that that’s exactly how they would start,

1:28:11 is, you know, based on what we have already,

1:28:13 here’s the simple movement based on residents,

1:28:18 irregardless of schools,

1:28:20 and then it looks like we’re gonna be paying them

1:28:23 for their experience, so I think we’re up here guessing

1:28:25 on what they’re gonna do,

1:28:26 but I bet you they’re gonna tell us what’s,

1:28:29 this isn’t gonna be their first job,

1:28:31 so I think I’m looking forward

1:28:32 to putting it in their hands for a little while,

1:28:35 and they’re gonna ask our input.

1:28:38 - Okay. - I’m good.

1:28:39 - All right, so I guess to continue with the schools

1:28:41 as being part of the conversations,

1:28:42 I wanted to go through and discuss now my options

1:28:47 that I would like to talk about,

1:28:48 which is if we were to go with the county commission plan.

1:28:51 So, Paul Grid Gibbs has legally approved it.

1:28:55 It has been approved by law and approved by,

1:28:58 it has already gone through the legal process,

1:29:00 which I think part of this, Paul,

1:29:02 and I’m sorry I didn’t ask you,

1:29:04 but I think after we set these,

1:29:06 they have to be legally reviewed,

1:29:08 or is that part of the consultant?

1:29:10 Does that make sense?

1:29:11 Because there is a voter law in the state of Florida

1:29:13 that says you cannot draw districts.

1:29:15 They have to be within a specific,

1:29:18 it basically has to be a circle.

1:29:19 You can’t have the gerrymandered districts,

1:29:20 and this was done before that law.

1:29:23 Do we have to have certification of our districts

1:29:25 by any outside entity once we’ve written them?

1:29:28 - I’m aware of.

1:29:29 I haven’t said anything. - I think there is.

1:29:29 - The board can, the statute says the board can adjust

1:29:33 its boundaries for districts at any board meeting.

1:29:37 So, I mean– - Okay.

1:29:38 - Consultants will probably follow that law.

1:29:40 - They have to post, they have to be posted for 30 days.

1:29:43 - Right. - So, here’s the problem

1:29:45 that we run into when currently,

1:29:48 ‘cause I met with the supervisor of elections too,

1:29:50 and he said some things that may have been

1:29:52 a little bit different than what you said, Ms. Jenkins,

1:29:54 but the bottom line is is that currently

1:29:56 there’s 110,000 people who are out there

1:29:59 that have a difference of a school board

1:30:02 and a county commission seat.

1:30:04 And I will tell you, it is a significant issue

1:30:07 when I go to knock on doors when they say,

1:30:09 I have a county commission, I’m county commission three,

1:30:12 I’m not your school board, you’re not my school board,

1:30:13 happens all the time.

1:30:15 And I will tell you that that,

1:30:17 when I proposed this two years ago,

1:30:19 it was for complete transparency,

1:30:21 for complete ease, for complete to get the thing done,

1:30:23 and on top of that, it was so that we could

1:30:26 create the transparency for the voters.

1:30:28 So, that was, we have 110,000 people,

1:30:31 according to the supervisor of elections,

1:30:33 that are out of districts because of that.

1:30:36 The other thing is is that it will save on precincts

1:30:38 because he has to create extra precincts,

1:30:41 whether they’re manned or not manned,

1:30:43 which is part of the conversation,

1:30:44 he has to create more precincts to develop our plans

1:30:49 if they’re different than the county commission.

1:30:51 He also will save, we will save on cost all the way around

1:30:55 because what you’re not seeing in that 380 page document

1:30:59 and the 50 to $100,000 that staff,

1:31:01 that we pay that consultant is how much time

1:31:04 our people who are understaffed currently

1:31:06 are going to be working on this item.

1:31:08 They’re going to be working on this item around the clock

1:31:11 to try to make sure we’re gonna have all of these inputs,

1:31:13 we’re gonna have all this stuff,

1:31:14 and then we’re gonna have more discussions,

1:31:15 we’re gonna have more debates,

1:31:16 we’re gonna have all that stuff,

1:31:17 and I think that that was part of the reason

1:31:19 was the ease of being able to develop another one.

1:31:23 This also saves on time overall,

1:31:26 at a time when we’re getting ready

1:31:27 to take the superintendents in.

1:31:30 If we’re going to have a new superintendent come in,

1:31:33 one of the things I was trying to do as board chair

1:31:35 is to alleviate any of the conflict that goes on between us

1:31:38 and have as much of it out of the way

1:31:39 because as soon as that person comes on,

1:31:42 we have to move towards strategic planning,

1:31:43 we have to move towards finalization of budgets

1:31:46 and everything else, and this becomes part of that.

1:31:48 So it’s trying to avoid that.

1:31:50 I will say that some of the issues that were brought up

1:31:54 as far as geographically set up, I think I made that point,

1:31:57 is that we can set any of our schools up the way we want to.

1:32:01 There is no law that says that we can’t write

1:32:03 how we want the schools to be in any way.

1:32:06 So saying that it’s geographically this

1:32:08 or that it’s an argument,

1:32:09 that is part of another conversation.

1:32:11 I didn’t feel like that was a very strong one.

1:32:13 Disproportionate amount of schools, there is, again,

1:32:18 geographically or the disproportionate amount of schools,

1:32:20 we have the right to just say who we want in there.

1:32:22 It’s not defined as the redistricting boundaries.

1:32:27 What will happen is is that you had mentioned

1:32:29 the 42,000 people, I was gonna ask you, Ms. Campbell,

1:32:33 how did you come up with the 42,000 member target?

1:32:38 Like, what was that?

1:32:39 Just for point of clarification.

1:32:41 And I understand that the board has voted

1:32:43 to go the direction, I just want these on message right now.

1:32:47 - Yeah, so if you go to the supervisor of elections website,

1:32:53 there is a page that lists all the precincts

1:32:55 that are in the county commissioner districts,

1:32:57 and then also lists on that same page lower down

1:32:59 all the precincts that are in the school board districts.

1:33:02 And so literally just put because our,

1:33:06 because the county commissioner is theirs are very,

1:33:08 you know, it’s easier to tell if you’re in the 100s,

1:33:11 you’re in district one, except for 141,

1:33:13 which got moved to district two for county commissioner

1:33:16 and 999, I don’t know why we have 999.

1:33:18 - 999 is it’s veterans.

1:33:20 - Right, right, okay.

1:33:21 And so the 200s, if you’re in district two,

1:33:23 county commissioner, it’s with addition of 141,

1:33:27 and then 300s, 400s, 500s, right?

1:33:29 So then it, so I just all those that were in,

1:33:32 so 200, 211, 237, 238,

1:33:35 I basically listed all the precincts that are not,

1:33:38 that are now in district three or four,

1:33:41 that if we went with county commissioners,

1:33:42 then those would either be in two or five.

1:33:44 And so that’s, and if you go,

1:33:47 there’s actually a stats page where it says

1:33:48 how many voters are in each precinct.

1:33:50 These numbers, by the way, are as of like February,

1:33:54 so they may be a little, you know,

1:33:55 I’m assuming they’re all gonna be within

1:33:57 a dozen of each other, so that’s almost 42,000 voters

1:34:00 that will have to wait two more years to vote.

1:34:02 - So I think there might be some issues with that

1:34:05 in the fact that some of those precincts

1:34:08 may or may not include all,

1:34:10 so like a school board may have precinct 217,

1:34:13 but they may only have a portion of it, so.

1:34:15 - There’s actually, no, actually if you,

1:34:17 because if you go to the supervisor’s elections website,

1:34:20 it lists these precincts are in this district,

1:34:22 and these, there are no haves, there’s no haves,

1:34:25 there’s no parks. - I would, and I,

1:34:26 and I’m not disagreeing with you.

1:34:27 What I’m saying is is we might wanna have

1:34:29 the supervisor do that evaluation,

1:34:30 ‘cause he did the real quick one for me,

1:34:32 so not an issue. - Well, and–

1:34:33 - Out of the, out of the, okay, I’m sorry, go ahead.

1:34:34 - Well, I was gonna say it to,

1:34:36 I can wait to address it until you’re done,

1:34:37 but what I was gonna say was one of the things

1:34:39 we can avoid alleviating him having to create new districts,

1:34:42 new precincts, is we can say okay to the consultant,

1:34:46 can you just move this precinct,

1:34:47 move this precinct into this district?

1:34:50 So that way we’re not creating,

1:34:52 it’s not necessary that, it’s not automatic

1:34:54 that we’re gonna have to create extra havoc for this person.

1:34:56 - I would say if we’re gonna move these precincts

1:34:58 into this district, it would be creating

1:35:00 the same thing that we did.

1:35:02 But I would love, it’s a moot point right now.

1:35:06 You know, the other issue was the growth

1:35:08 as far as that we had heard from you guys

1:35:10 as part of the argument, and I would say

1:35:12 that no matter what, we don’t,

1:35:13 like we were on a gangbuster path in 2008

1:35:16 to expand and all that stuff, and then it froze, right?

1:35:19 And then we have, just so you know,

1:35:21 we were out of compliance by just about the same amount

1:35:24 that we were out of compliance now a year or two years ago.

1:35:28 So to say that we’re gonna increase because of the 8.6%,

1:35:32 I would say that it’s close enough

1:35:35 that we can continue to be under that

1:35:37 because we didn’t see a large, in the last two years,

1:35:40 we haven’t seen barely any movement

1:35:42 and there’s been all that growth.

1:35:44 So I feel confident that they also had conversations

1:35:47 wrapped around the growth when they wrote their districts

1:35:50 ‘cause I saw some of that inside of there

1:35:51 when they did that.

1:35:53 The other piece is that the overall argument is,

1:35:59 is if we cannot argue based on where our schools

1:36:02 are going to be and you take that out,

1:36:04 and we start to develop a plan based on the other way,

1:36:07 we have to get to a place where we are creating transparency,

1:36:12 we are going into the fact that we have our staff,

1:36:15 which is overworked, but we have the fact

1:36:18 that this is gonna cost us between 50 and $100,000.

1:36:21 The fact that continuing, there will be more people,

1:36:24 tens of thousands of people that are going to be

1:36:26 in different districts for the rest of the time,

1:36:29 we have one opportunity to do it right.

1:36:31 And I would feel that in the 50 to $100,000

1:36:34 would be something that we could utilize

1:36:35 towards our schools.

1:36:37 I feel that the time that our staff has,

1:36:39 that we could utilize that towards the things

1:36:41 that we really have important.

1:36:43 And I feel that moving towards

1:36:44 the County Commission District seat

1:36:46 would be better for us in the long run.

1:36:49 I just, these things are the reason that I brought it up,

1:36:52 and I’m glad that you guys all had lengthy conversation

1:36:55 about it, and I appreciate that,

1:36:57 because I think that we’re in a better place

1:36:58 and we understand the process more.

1:37:00 So does anybody else have anything else to say on that?

1:37:02 - I do, just, I’m sorry.

1:37:05 - Just very briefly, I think I can say this quickly.

1:37:09 You know, transparency is, I just wanna be very clear,

1:37:12 because if we’re gonna be transparent,

1:37:14 I want to share the precincts who would not get to vote

1:37:17 in 2024 if we adopted the county commissioners,

1:37:21 and that would be precinct 200, precinct 211,

1:37:24 precinct 237, 238, 243, 502, 503, 504, 505, 506, 507,

1:37:35 which has almost 5,000 voters in it, 508, 509, 511, 515,

1:37:41 518, 528, 529, and 532.

1:37:47 - Yep, and that’s basically redistricting,

1:37:49 because as you move forward with any of the redistricting,

1:37:52 whether that’s state, senate, state representatives,

1:37:54 it happens that way.

1:37:55 - Right, it does happen, but you know,

1:37:56 the county commissioners made a very small change.

1:38:00 - Right.

1:38:01 - And they made as small a change as possible,

1:38:03 and again, it’s–

1:38:05 - For the, and the other thing that I forgot to mention

1:38:08 is that for the next decade, decades to come,

1:38:11 we could save and work collaboratively with the district.

1:38:13 Ms. Jenkins, you had something to say.

1:38:15 - Yeah, so I want to highlight that word, transparency, too,

1:38:19 because it gives this illusion that something’s being hidden

1:38:24 just because somebody has a different school board seat

1:38:26 versus their county commission seat.

1:38:27 That’s not a lack of transparency.

1:38:30 It’s on your voter registration card.

1:38:32 You get a sample ballot mailed to you

1:38:34 before you even go into the polling location.

1:38:37 I trust that voters are educated enough to read that

1:38:41 and understand who their candidates are.

1:38:43 You can’t accidentally vote for the wrong school board member

1:38:45 ‘cause you’re given the ballot based on where you live.

1:38:47 So I don’t like when we throw around that word

1:38:50 as if something is being deceptive.

1:38:52 So let’s be careful about the words we’re using.

1:38:55 Also, you alluded to us having different conversations,

1:38:58 so I’m going to clarify something that was said again.

1:39:02 It was said that it could potentially reduce

1:39:06 the amount of precincts.

1:39:08 Ms. Campbell, you already started doing some of the work

1:39:10 that they’re doing.

1:39:11 That’s exactly what they’re doing

1:39:12 at the Supervisor of Elections

1:39:13 is taking a look at what precincts were created

1:39:16 because they don’t overlap with county commission

1:39:19 because they actually weren’t able

1:39:21 to even give me that answer.

1:39:22 They didn’t know.

1:39:23 The Supervisor of Election himself yet,

1:39:25 that’s what they’re working on currently.

1:39:28 And you said manned, not manned.

1:39:29 Precincts aren’t manned.

1:39:31 Polling locations are manned.

1:39:32 This would not change the amount of polling locations.

1:39:34 This just changes the precincts

1:39:36 and the kinds of ballots that have to be printed

1:39:38 by the Supervisor of Elections.

1:39:40 So I just want to be very clear to the public

1:39:43 how that actually impacts their voting.

1:39:49 When it comes to growth,

1:39:51 I hear you that we had this conversation in 2021, I believe,

1:39:56 and I think it went up like 0.5%.

1:39:59 I absolutely hear you.

1:40:01 But we have a flourishing economy here in Brevard.

1:40:05 Our housing development has more than sustained its value.

1:40:09 Those houses are flying up like nobody’s business.

1:40:12 We know where they’re being grown.

1:40:14 This decision, yes, we can change it at any point,

1:40:16 but this decision is intended to be based off of the census,

1:40:19 which is every 10 years.

1:40:20 It’s not just two years like we’re discussing right now.

1:40:23 And I would argue there were people

1:40:26 at the county commission making an argument

1:40:27 that that number wasn’t as low as it should be.

1:40:29 There were commissioners who wanted it to be lower

1:40:32 to avoid it potentially getting over that to 10%

1:40:35 because of growth coming in the near future.

1:40:37 So again, agree to disagree here,

1:40:40 but I think it’s important for the voters

1:40:42 to be aware of everything that’s out there.

1:40:45 - Thank you, Ms. Jenkins.

1:40:46 And my point in the transparency comment was that you have,

1:40:52 it is very easy to transparently understand

1:40:55 that you’re in District 1 for both school board and county.

1:40:57 Definition of transparency is the quality

1:40:59 of being easy to perceive or detect.

1:41:01 That is an easier way of detecting and understanding

1:41:04 how or who it is that you represent.

1:41:07 - I’m gonna pretend you just Google the word transparency.

1:41:07 - I truly believe that our situation

1:41:09 that we have here today is that we had an opportunity

1:41:12 to move forward without costing us district time

1:41:15 and money and energy and everything else

1:41:17 in a place where we could have gone that route.

1:41:19 And I just wanted to make it known that, you know what I mean?

1:41:22 This is something that we had an option to.

1:41:24 And with that, I think that we’re good.

1:41:25 Ms. Su, do you have direction that you need currently?

1:41:30 Yes.

1:41:31 My understanding of the direction is that I will proceed with

1:41:34 talking with our consultant, developing a scope of work,

1:41:37 scheduling some time with you in a workshop session to discuss

1:41:41 the scope of work and the contract execution.

1:41:44 So we’ll be working on that.

1:41:46 Potentially you’ll be receiving a call from the consultant, but

1:41:48 I’ll give you some fair warning before that happens.

1:41:50 So I’ll be working through that in the next few days.

1:41:53 All right, thank you.

1:41:54 The next topic is middle school boundary process.

1:41:56 Mr. Chairman, just a clarification.

1:41:59 We’re just going to hear from the consultant, correct?

1:42:02 We’re not at this point saying we want to enter into a contract.

1:42:05 Assuming the contract is over $50,000, you will have to act on

1:42:08 the contract.

1:42:09 I may do a small contract with them just to kind of get going

1:42:13 and do some initial research,

1:42:15 so there might be something that’s a few thousand dollars that’s

1:42:17 under my purchasing authority,

1:42:18 but anything over 50 will come to you as a contract.

1:42:21 And just so you know, there’s going to be a conversation prior

1:42:24 to us approving that,

1:42:26 so they’ll be here at the workshop, they’ll be discussing it

1:42:28 with us,

1:42:29 and if that direction doesn’t go right, you would have that

1:42:32 opportunity at that time,

1:42:33 because I think that also is a fair thing to say that if you’re

1:42:37 looking at a proposal

1:42:39 that this might be something different than what we thought it

1:42:42 was, you’ll have that opportunity.

1:42:43 I think that’s fair, but I would say also for the individuals

1:42:46 that are about to put in all that work

1:42:48 that we may want to be generous about, unless there’s some major

1:42:52 red flags, that we move forward with that.

1:42:56 I believe it’s critically important for everyone involved to be

1:42:59 on the same page when we start,

1:43:01 so I will be asking them to ask you about things like public

1:43:05 engagement and what their plan is

1:43:07 and make sure that we are all on the same page.

1:43:10 If you have particular parameters, data, things that you want to

1:43:14 see in the proposal or in the analysis,

1:43:16 I will ask them to ask you that so that we make sure we have a

1:43:19 complete scope

1:43:20 and that everybody’s on the same page when we start.

1:43:23 And I think that regardless of if we pay a consultant and we

1:43:26 move down that road,

1:43:27 that there’s an opportunity at any time to say, you know what,

1:43:30 we’re going to go with the county commission.

1:43:32 So it’s not that far away to do because you could have that as

1:43:34 part of an option, that’s all.

1:43:36 I think if we’re going to go through the process of doing all

1:43:39 that, that that’s the direction of the board

1:43:40 and that’s where we should go.

1:43:41 So anyways, go ahead, Ms. Suhan.

1:43:44 So the next topic is the middle school attendance boundaries,

1:43:46 and I want to give you an update.

1:43:48 I’m going to start with our starting point.

1:43:51 So we did a briefing for you a month or so ago, maybe two now,

1:43:55 that stood up a base boundary proposal,

1:43:59 and that’s the red line that you see.

1:44:01 And then we had areas one, two, and three defined as kind of

1:44:05 areas we wanted to talk about

1:44:07 whether we include those in the boundary or not.

1:44:09 And so this is where we started.

1:44:12 And just to give you some graphics on overlaying those areas on

1:44:16 the current middle school boundaries,

1:44:18 it shows you that.

1:44:20 It shows you how those boundaries overlay on the elementary

1:44:24 school boundaries.

1:44:26 And then the third slide shows the potential boundaries overlaid

1:44:30 on the high school boundaries.

1:44:33 And this slide shows you the development – I’m sorry, the Viera

1:44:37 development of regional impact area,

1:44:39 those outlined in orange or peach.

1:44:42 And this becomes important as we went through some of the public

1:44:45 engagement exercises

1:44:47 that there were areas of Viera East that were not included in

1:44:51 the base boundary,

1:44:53 and those folks expressed some significant concerns about not

1:44:56 being included.

1:44:57 So I wanted to show you where they are on the map.

1:45:04 The next two slides just give you a sense of the proposed growth

1:45:08 in the Viera area

1:45:09 just to kind of understand where we’re going in the future

1:45:13 and how that impacts the decisions that we will be making in the

1:45:16 next few months about the boundaries.

1:45:18 Village 2 is kind of the south end of the Viera development. It’s

1:45:23 under construction for a large part.

1:45:24 A good part of this is 55 and older,

1:45:27 but still we’ll be developing a number of single-family lots

1:45:31 that will be bringing children to our schools.

1:45:35 Village 3 is basically west of where we are now, and Village 3

1:45:39 is another 4,000 units.

1:45:42 Again, we really don’t know what percentage might be over 55,

1:45:47 multifamily.

1:45:48 That all will remain to be seen, but there certainly is the

1:45:51 potential for some very significant residential growth

1:45:55 west of where we are today that will build out Viera over the

1:46:00 next 10 years or so.

1:46:02 So the next two slides just show you a little bit more detail on

1:46:06 Areas 2 and 3.

1:46:07 This is the area we’re referring to as Viera East.

1:46:11 There’s about 77 existing BPS students in that area in 5th and 6th

1:46:16 grade that would be our middle school students,

1:46:19 and then there’s about 5th and 6th graders in charter schools in

1:46:24 this area, both 2 and 3 combined.

1:46:28 Area 1, this is basically the Sun Tree area.

1:46:31 There’s roughly 200 students that are BPS students in 5th and 6th

1:46:36 grade,

1:46:37 and there’s 26 students that are in charter schools in this

1:46:43 geographic area.

1:46:45 And then this slide just, again, kind of summarizes all of the

1:46:49 enrollment data.

1:46:50 This also includes the base area, so if we just are looking at

1:46:53 the base,

1:46:54 there’s about 549 existing 5th and 6th grade students in that

1:46:58 area,

1:46:59 and there’s 273 charter school students in 5th and 6th grade

1:47:05 within the base boundaries.

1:47:06 So that’s the big red line.

1:47:08 So as we go through the next few slides and I talk about the

1:47:12 implications of bringing areas into the boundary,

1:47:16 keep in mind we are not accounting for any current charter

1:47:20 school students moving.

1:47:22 So I’m talking about existing 5th and 6th grade students in our

1:47:30 BPS schools.

1:47:32 So after the last board discussion on this, we stood up a

1:47:35 community engagement process,

1:47:37 and we put out an online survey, and these are the questions

1:47:40 that we asked our residents,

1:47:42 and I want to briefly go through the responses that we received.

1:47:46 Also attached to today’s workshop agenda is a multi-page summary

1:47:50 of all the comments that we received,

1:47:52 and there’s 300 or so of them, and you can get a flavor of what

1:47:56 our constituents are thinking about

1:47:59 when they looked at these potential boundary areas.

1:48:03 So just to summarize some of the questions, we asked are you a

1:48:07 parent, are you a student, an employee,

1:48:10 and a large preponderance of the results and the folks who

1:48:14 responded to the survey are parents.

1:48:16 So you can think about the responses in that context.

1:48:21 We did have a fair number of potential 7th and 8th grade

1:48:25 students for our middle school opening in August of ‘24.

1:48:28 This slide just shows the distribution of the elementary school

1:48:35 students within the respondents of the survey.

1:48:39 So we had a pretty good representation from most of our

1:48:42 elementary schools.

1:48:43 It was interesting to note that the Viera Elementary School was

1:48:46 not that well represented,

1:48:48 but most of the Viera Elementary School area is within the base

1:48:51 boundary.

1:48:52 So we didn’t pick up a lot of respondents from that area.

1:48:58 And we had a question about transportation, just to kind of see

1:49:01 how folks got their children to school.

1:49:04 And then we asked if your rising middle school student were to

1:49:07 be zoned for the new middle school in August of 2024,

1:49:11 what would you do?

1:49:12 And you can see 75% of the respondents said that they’d come to

1:49:16 the middle school.

1:49:18 And that’s especially important if you look at the next line,

1:49:21 which is the not applicable line.

1:49:23 So that takes another 20% out of the equation.

1:49:26 So for the most part, most people who responded to the survey

1:49:31 indicated that they would be sending their student to our new

1:49:35 middle school.

1:49:37 So you can see there’s pretty strong community interest in being

1:49:40 a part of the middle school.

1:49:42 And then we asked their thoughts about the different boundary

1:49:44 areas.

1:49:45 We asked should you definitely include a particular area in the

1:49:49 boundary, don’t include it or include part or not sure.

1:49:53 You can see that for the base boundary, the general agreement

1:49:57 that that made more or less sense.

1:50:00 Option one in the Sun Tree area, they had some – there were

1:50:03 some different opinions about that.

1:50:05 And keep in mind that some of the opinions about the Sun Tree

1:50:08 area might be folks that are in the Viera East area.

1:50:11 So it’s not necessarily coming from your home area.

1:50:15 So you could parse that out a little bit if you read the

1:50:18 comments about we should be in and they should not be in.

1:50:21 You can see that in the comments a little bit more specifically.

1:50:26 And then this slide shows the thoughts about the Viera East

1:50:31 areas, both area two and area three.

1:50:34 And again, the folks in that area felt very strongly that they

1:50:38 would like to be included generally around the sense that they

1:50:42 were some of the first residents in the Viera area.

1:50:44 And you saw that in the comments.

1:50:49 This map shows you as of March 24th the general location of the

1:50:54 people who responded to the survey.

1:50:58 So we felt it was important to map that so you could see that

1:51:01 there’s a pretty good distribution of folks.

1:51:04 We got a lot of comments from the Viera East area in the north

1:51:08 and we got a fair number of comments from the Sun Tree area in

1:51:11 the south as well.

1:51:12 So pretty good distribution of respondents to the survey.

1:51:18 So a couple of things came out of the survey.

1:51:21 The first was there were folks in some of the Chelsea Park area.

1:51:26 These are basically you can see in the green shaded area that is

1:51:30 within the yellow line.

1:51:32 These are folks that are zoned for Manatee Elementary and would

1:51:36 like to be included in the boundary.

1:51:39 There’s a little bit of piece of Williams in there as well on

1:51:42 the east side.

1:51:43 This boundary represents 74 existing fifth and sixth grade

1:51:47 students.

1:51:48 So just keep that in mind as we go through this.

1:51:53 And then in this area, this is the area of south of Sun Tree

1:51:59 Elementary.

1:52:00 And the residents in this area generally these are Grand Haven

1:52:06 residents.

1:52:07 If you’re reading the comments they identify as Grand Haven

1:52:10 residents.

1:52:11 They would also like to be included in the boundary.

1:52:14 And their numbers are 111 fifth and sixth grade students in the

1:52:19 area that’s within the yellow line.

1:52:22 And this yellow line is drawn on the high school boundaries.

1:52:26 So we’ve kind of tried to pick up what is the Viera High School

1:52:30 area just to again try to have a starting point for the

1:52:34 conversation.

1:52:35 And then the next two slides reflect a conversation that we

1:52:38 actually had today.

1:52:40 Our staff had a briefing and went through this presentation with

1:52:44 the PTO presidents for all the schools, the elementary schools

1:52:48 in this area.

1:52:49 And everyone was interested in the process and heard comments

1:52:54 pretty similar to what you’ve seen already.

1:52:58 But an idea came up that I wanted to just mention to you if you

1:53:02 would like us to pursue this.

1:53:04 The idea came from the Sun Tree PTO and Sun Tree principals that

1:53:10 they’ve heard from some of their parents.

1:53:14 And neither could say whether some meant 50 percent or 2 percent.

1:53:20 So we don’t really know.

1:53:22 But there was a comment made that perhaps some areas in here

1:53:29 could remain zoned for Delora.

1:53:33 But they would like to also be rezoned for Satellite High School.

1:53:37 And so we hadn’t had that in the mix yet.

1:53:40 Certainly willing to take a look at that and we literally had a

1:53:43 half hour to put this together so I haven’t looked at this too

1:53:46 closely.

1:53:47 But it is something that we could consider.

1:53:49 We could run the numbers.

1:53:50 We could do a survey of the folks in this area and see what they

1:53:54 think and get some better data.

1:53:57 But I have no data on this other than this idea came up as part

1:54:00 of our community engagement process.

1:54:03 And we’ll be meeting with the – we worked this through the Sun

1:54:06 Tree Home Owners Association but basically meeting with the Sun

1:54:10 Tree community on April 3rd.

1:54:12 So this is another opportunity to have that conversation with

1:54:16 that community.

1:54:17 And then this just shows you the same areas.

1:54:20 The area 1A I think was in green and area 1B was in purple drawn

1:54:24 on the high school boundary map.

1:54:27 So it just kind of gives you a sense of how that overlays the

1:54:31 high school boundary.

1:54:33 So this is the most important slide to pay attention to I think.

1:54:38 And if you look at the bottom number in blue, we’re at 91.8%

1:54:44 projected in terms of the consumption of the capacity at the

1:54:48 school if we include the base area and areas 1, 2, and 3.

1:54:54 And, you know, if you look to the right, you’ll see as Viera

1:54:57 continues to grow, that certainly is going to stress the

1:55:00 capacity of the school.

1:55:02 Now, in other areas of the district where we’ve had this

1:55:06 circumstance, that capacity has been provided by other providers.

1:55:11 And so with charter schools and HB1, this is not necessarily our

1:55:16 responsibility to provide seats for these students at this point

1:55:21 in time.

1:55:22 But you may see competition coming in because obviously there’s

1:55:28 going to be more demand than capacity available for students

1:55:32 assuming that Viera continues to grow in the patterns that they

1:55:36 have had in the recent past.

1:55:39 So as we’re talking about potentially adding new areas as a

1:55:43 result of community engagement, this is where I would start to

1:55:47 get concerned that we don’t want to open the school and not have

1:55:51 enough seats for the students that we have zoned into the school.

1:55:56 This slide is one that was in the prior presentation, and this

1:56:01 is a proposal by transportation. I just wanted to put it out

1:56:06 there because it also has some merit.

1:56:10 It picks up areas 2 and 3 and divides the Suntree area.

1:56:15 They had some thoughts on their busing routes relative to areas

1:56:19 where they can and cannot cross the railroad due to the short

1:56:23 distance between the railroad and US1, so they have some really

1:56:27 quirky routes in this area.

1:56:29 So this is something that they proposed, and this starts off at

1:56:34 about 77% of capacity, but it doesn’t include a large portion of

1:56:39 the Suntree area.

1:56:41 And so this gives you a summary of our next steps. We did have

1:56:46 our PTO meeting this morning, and we will be briefing the Suntree

1:56:51 Master Homeowners Association on the 30th, and then we have a

1:56:58 community meeting on the 3rd.

1:57:00 So we’ll be continuing to compile our survey responses. Our

1:57:05 intention is to have this on the information agenda April 11th.

1:57:11 And I’ve tentatively scheduled it there, but what I’d like to be

1:57:14 able to provide to the board is a recommendation along with that,

1:57:18 and we’re not quite ready to do that.

1:57:20 I wanted to get some feedback from the board today as well as

1:57:23 conclude some of our community engagement processes next week

1:57:27 before providing a recommendation, but I do want to be able to

1:57:31 do that on the 4th.

1:57:33 That leads to the action agenda on April 25th at which the board

1:57:37 will schedule the public hearing, which has to be 30 days out,

1:57:40 and that will occur on May the 3rd.

1:57:43 Our goal is to really get this done before summer break so

1:57:47 people know where they’re going to be zoned.

1:57:50 It certainly can go a little bit longer if we find that we need

1:57:54 to do that, but my goal is to have this completed by May 30th.

1:57:59 And so these are kind of the board discussion points for you.

1:58:04 You know, we heard through the surveys and just, you know, phone

1:58:08 calls and some of the emails, the community is very supportive

1:58:11 of the new school. There’s a lot of excitement out there, and

1:58:14 folks want to be part of the new school.

1:58:16 Our leading and learning side of the house, they had some

1:58:18 exciting programs. There’s been some news in the Viera area

1:58:21 about it. It’s just an exciting project, and you can see it

1:58:24 being built, and people want to be part of that.

1:58:28 But there’s a lot of things that make enrollment very difficult

1:58:31 to predict right now.

1:58:33 Just the changing landscape with HB1 and how that might impact,

1:58:37 you know, whether the students that we’re estimating are

1:58:40 actually going to enroll in our schools.

1:58:43 So we don’t really know, and so we’re kind of riding the fence

1:58:46 of we don’t want to under enroll the school, we don’t want to

1:58:49 over enroll the school, so trying to be very strategic about

1:58:53 that.

1:58:54 And then if you look carefully at some of the charts that were

1:58:57 in this presentation and the prior presentation, the impacts to

1:59:01 Delora, McNair, and Kennedy could be kind of dramatic.

1:59:05 Just, again, depending on where people choose to send their

1:59:08 students, especially in the environment of school choice.

1:59:12 So we’re not really prepared to make any hard and fast like we

1:59:16 know this is going to happen because we just don’t know what’s

1:59:20 going to happen, and we want to see what evolves over the next

1:59:25 year with school choice and how folks make decisions about where

1:59:29 to send their students.

1:59:30 So from our perspective, a smaller boundary leaves room for

1:59:36 growth, but it is definitely contrary to community input. We

1:59:42 heard people loud and clear they want to be part of this school.

1:59:42 And I think in the environment of school choice, we have to be

1:59:46 cognizant that the choice might not be between a BPS school and

1:59:50 a BPS school.

1:59:51 The choice might be between a BPS school and either a charter or

1:59:56 private school or other educational options. So I think that’s

2:00:00 the risk on the smaller boundary.

2:00:02 On the larger boundary, we’re limiting our ability to

2:00:06 accommodate future growth. It is more responsive to community

2:00:12 input. We might have to look at boundary changes later, and I

2:00:17 won’t be here for that under any circumstances.

2:00:21 But the boundary change process is painful. It’s painful with a

2:00:26 new school, so it’s even more painful when you try to redistrict

2:00:30 folks out of the schools that they’re used to attending.

2:00:35 And then we have a concern about not opening the school over

2:00:44 capacity. We have to be careful about that. Now, there’s room

2:00:52 for growth on the site, so it’s not impossible to accommodate

2:00:52 additional growth, but I think from an educational perspective,

2:00:52 a big, huge middle school maybe is not the best approach. So I

2:00:56 think there’s different ways to handle growth pressures. Our

2:01:00 relationship with the VR company requires some additional school

2:01:04 sites in the future.

2:01:06 So when we’re ready to invest in more schools, they have the

2:01:09 obligation to provide more school sites. Most likely they’ll be

2:01:13 to the south and to the west.

2:01:15 So not an insurmountable problem, but it is pretty challenging

2:01:19 trying to figure out exactly what the sweet spot is for opening

2:01:23 the school.

2:01:24 So with that, I ask for some guidance and some perspective.

2:01:30 » Thank you, Ms. Han. Just so everybody knows, this has been rezonings

2:01:36 and everything for the past six years of the school board, and

2:01:41 this is intimately my community that I live in. I have done some

2:01:45 extensive work in here, but I’ll wait until everybody else

2:01:46 speaks, and then I’ll be able to give mine.

2:01:47 Does anybody else wish to speak on this to open up the

2:01:50 conversation?

2:01:51 » Thank you, Sue. I know how much work goes into this as well

2:01:56 as your team. I know it’s not just you. And I don’t envy any of

2:02:01 you that have to participate in all of those briefings and those

2:02:03 conversations.

2:02:04 It’s definitely challenging and probably often sometimes feel

2:02:08 like you’re leaving people a little dissatisfied or just

2:02:11 disappointed sometimes if they’re not hearing the things that

2:02:14 they want to hear.

2:02:16 I think this puts us into a peculiar situation, especially

2:02:19 because of House Bill 1 putting us in a situation where we have

2:02:23 to decide if we want to be reactive or proactive, which is

2:02:26 dangerous when making decisions because we’re not really always

2:02:31 going to make the right decision because unfortunately it’s

2:02:35 clouded by pressures externally.

2:02:38 Where do I hear you? There is a concern if we exclude Area 3

2:02:42 that seems to be very responsive on the heat map that wants to

2:02:46 be included that they very much could choose to go to a charter

2:02:49 school in the area because there’s so many available right

2:02:53 nearby, and that’s something that we need to think about.

2:02:56 And correct me if I’m wrong, but I feel like the data you

2:02:58 presented, it seemed like most of the respondents weren’t yet in

2:03:01 middle school. So they are very likely potential students that

2:03:05 can go somewhere else.

2:03:07 I am hesitant and nervous to open a school at such a high

2:03:10 capacity when we know they’re absolutely going to grow. I’m also

2:03:13 concerned about the staffing of a school at such a high capacity.

2:03:19 I’m concerned that we may not be able to fulfill the needs of

2:03:21 those students in that school and we don’t want to necessarily

2:03:24 start off with substitutes in our brand new school that parents

2:03:27 are really excited to go to either.

2:03:29 So I’m a little bit concerned about that. You re-highlighted it

2:03:38 for me and I wrote it down immediately. The enrollment at those

2:03:42 other middle schools will significantly decline.

2:03:46 The fact that we would potentially have a middle school with

2:03:50 under 300 students is alarming. I mean, it’s a number that’s

2:03:54 close to some of our smallest elementary schools in the district.

2:03:59 The one positive for those students is they get a lot more

2:04:01 direct attention and probably decrease behaviors in those

2:04:04 schools.

2:04:05 But it is concerning because what are we going to see the future

2:04:08 of those schools look like? We still have to run those buildings

2:04:12 and their operational budget is maybe not going to meet the

2:04:16 needs anymore of that building.

2:04:18 So I’m definitely concerned. I’m sorry, I’m not going to help

2:04:26 you here. I don’t have a strong opinion either way right now of

2:04:34 who to include and not include. I’m more towards the being

2:04:39 proactive versus reactive right now because of the external

2:04:39 pressures, but I’m not ignorant of the fact that they exist.

2:04:39 I do have a clarifying question, though, because I got a little

2:04:45 lost here. So you had mentioned these requested areas to add. So

2:04:52 there was a part of Manatee and Grand Haven. Those are not in

2:04:56 areas one, two, and three, correct? Those are addition to?

2:05:01 Correct. The Manatee areas on the north side, that’s part of

2:05:05 Chelsea Park, if you’re reading comments, it’s Chelsea Park for

2:05:09 the most part. That is not in either area two or three. And then

2:05:13 the Grand Haven area is down south of Suntree and that is not in

2:05:18 area one.

2:05:19 Okay. And so the numbers that you presented for the projected

2:05:24 student membership at 91.8% is not including those additional

2:05:30 students. And again, this is – we’re zoomed in on a map here

2:05:32 and my question might be ridiculous because it may not line up

2:05:35 with any other school boundaries, but in order to potentially

2:05:38 meet the needs of some of these – and I’ll use Grand Haven as

2:05:42 an example because I just know where it is. Sorry, everybody

2:05:46 else on the map.

2:05:48 Is there a potential consideration of offering to those areas to

2:05:52 be connected to the other one? So I believe Delora’s line is

2:05:56 over there somewhere on the Pineda to potentially include them

2:06:01 in Delora to just bring them over Pineda instead. Is that a

2:06:06 conversation maybe to include other areas?

2:06:10 So let’s see. I don’t have the middle – let me go back to the

2:06:18 middle school boundaries. Okay. So the area that we’re talking

2:06:26 about is basically below the gray line. So the area one area is

2:06:33 in sort of white.

2:06:36 So as you get into the blue area there, those are students that

2:06:40 attend Johnson right now. So their area is adjacent to Delora.

2:06:47 It is not – they’re not in Delora at this time.

2:06:50 Right. I’m sorry. So what I meant by that was some of – and I’m

2:06:53 only speaking to one situation, but there’s all different

2:06:56 variables in here that would be a little bit different if there

2:06:59 was some consideration for some of these to be offered different

2:07:03 lines than the ones that they have or I don’t know. Just

2:07:06 throwing that out there.

2:07:07 So if we did not include all of the areas, like at what point

2:07:14 are we closing the out of area for students to opt in?

2:07:21 I think it’s – I don’t know if it’s 90 or 95. So we’d be pretty

2:07:37 close. I don’t know that we’d be – we have to see how that goes,

2:07:40 but – Yeah. Is it 90 or 90? Like what’s the number? 95. Okay.

2:07:40 Because, I mean, I know that’s not an answer for people who are

2:07:41 in areas two and three that really want to be included in this,

2:07:41 but it’s also in the first couple of years if your kids in fifth

2:07:43 and sixth grade, they very likely have the opportunity to opt

2:07:46 out of area into that school as well.

2:07:48 Yeah, I don’t have an answer for you, but thank you.

2:07:54 Anybody else wish to discuss?

2:07:58 Thank you, Sue, and your whole team, because I know from reading

2:08:02 the comments and the e-mails that this is very passionate and I,

2:08:05 you know – and a lot of it is misunderstanding. I think if you

2:08:08 guys read the comments, it’s a lot of I paid these taxes for

2:08:12 this school and not realizing that the taxes you pay actually

2:08:15 pay for the schools where your kids are attending right now.

2:08:19 They pay for all the schools.

2:08:20 And the other thing is just the funding. You guys probably saw

2:08:23 Sue’s response to my question, which is the impact – she

2:08:26 addressed the impact fees.

2:08:28 So the impact fees that we’re using to build this school almost

2:08:32 completely debt-free, yay, also came from homes at lots and

2:08:36 businesses that were built in the West Melbourne area and the

2:08:39 Palm Bay area and the Melbourne area on the south end of the

2:08:43 beach side, which there’s not a whole lot of building down there,

2:08:45 but there’s some.

2:08:46 So those impact fees are going to build this school, so it’s not

2:08:49 – this is our Viera money, Viera school.

2:08:52 So it’s a misunderstanding, and I’ll give an example. There’s a

2:08:54 charter school that was built in Sawgrass Lakes, which is a

2:08:57 development in West Melbourne, and there were realtors who were

2:09:00 telling those residents that that’s their school, and if they

2:09:04 bought a house in there, they were guaranteed to get in that

2:09:05 charter school.

2:09:06 And, oh, they’re surprised when they found out, no, you had to

2:09:10 apply, and it – because they were promised something, which

2:09:13 they shouldn’t have been promised.

2:09:16 So, you know, there’s also a lot of talk, some priorities for

2:09:19 people as I was reading the comments, that they wanted – you

2:09:21 know, everybody from this elementary school should go to the

2:09:24 same middle school.

2:09:25 Everybody from this middle school should go – everybody who’s

2:09:27 going to this high school should all come from the same middle

2:09:29 school, and that’s also – I actually love that we’re doing this

2:09:31 on the same day as you’re doing the student accommodation plan,

2:09:33 because I know the student accommodation plan is really long,

2:09:35 you guys.

2:09:35 123 – it’s 123 pages, but it’s a fascinating document.

2:09:39 I look forward to looking at every year, the from-to charts and

2:09:42 everything, but if you go to that, and it’s on the next agenda

2:09:44 item, if you want to open it up, on page 34, it has our feeder

2:09:48 system chart.

2:09:49 And, yes, we have some areas, especially in the north, where one

2:09:52 middle school, for example, Madison, they all go to astronaut.

2:09:55 Jackson all goes to Titusville.

2:09:57 Those three elementary schools, Atlantis, Challenger, Enterprise,

2:10:01 all go to Space Coast.

2:10:02 But in the other parts of the county, that’s just not the way it

2:10:06 is.

2:10:07 You know, Palm Bay, Heritage, Melbourne, Bayside, Satellite, Vieira,

2:10:11 Oak Alley, Rockledge, even a little bit of Merritt Island.

2:10:15 There are, you know, different schools make up just because of

2:10:18 the way – where the schools are, it makes sense.

2:10:21 And so it’s – we’re just not going to be able to make everybody

2:10:24 happy, and that is one of the hard realities of being in the

2:10:27 position we’re in.

2:10:29 We have to make hard decisions.

2:10:31 But, you know, one of the things that was mentioned by a few

2:10:33 commenters had to do with, you know,

2:10:35 why are you taking an area out of Johnson Middle School or Oak

2:10:38 Alley?

2:10:39 But that area right now currently doesn’t have any – that’s a

2:10:42 future development, correct, that area at the very south end of

2:10:46 the main boundary?

2:10:50 Am I correct in that?

2:10:52 Yes, the south end I would say for the most part is under

2:10:57 development.

2:10:59 Okay.

2:11:00 In the west area that is future.

2:11:01 Right.

2:11:02 So it’s not like we’re going to be taking kids who are right now

2:11:04 going to Johnson and Oak Alley and then we’re going to move,

2:11:06 and we’re just saying that’s where the development is going.

2:11:08 And transportation-wise I think it makes sense to keep those on

2:11:13 this side of the highway.

2:11:15 So I just – to me, I don’t have a specific answer, but I do

2:11:21 have a couple of things.

2:11:24 My input is one, I would rather us start – like we started Viera

2:11:29 Elementary where we kept the zone – we kind of had a hard zone

2:11:33 and a soft zone.

2:11:34 We keep the zoning for the new development area for like what

2:11:37 you have.

2:11:38 Maybe add tiny bits if you feel like that at the recommendations.

2:11:42 But we’ve got such huge growth coming, I think we have to keep

2:11:46 it open.

2:11:47 And we will have, until it reaches that 95% capacity, we will

2:11:51 have the choice option.

2:11:52 Families from anywhere in the district, from MIMS if they want

2:11:56 to, from Malabar if they want to,

2:11:58 can ELO into this school until we get to the point that they’re

2:12:02 frozen.

2:12:03 And just for the board’s sake, knowledge, we have very few

2:12:06 schools that are frozen.

2:12:08 Like this year I think Satellites frozen, Viera is frozen, and

2:12:10 maybe one or two elementaries –

2:12:12 I won’t make Jane quote them right now, but it’s only very few

2:12:15 schools that we have frozen.

2:12:17 So what we did with Viera Elementary, we said if you live in

2:12:22 this newer area,

2:12:23 you’re automatically zoned for this elementary school, but

2:12:25 anybody can choice in.

2:12:27 And they still can until it reaches capacity.

2:12:30 And via Open Viera Elementary, actually less students because it

2:12:34 was COVID year

2:12:35 than we thought we were going to be able to have.

2:12:37 And then it has continued to grow over years with population and

2:12:40 with people choiceing in.

2:12:41 So I think that’s a better option.

2:12:43 But then also considering our transportation crisis right now,

2:12:47 to me,

2:12:47 keeping the routes that we can cover more easily is also a

2:12:52 really high priority for me.

2:12:55 So I would just say I would rather start small and let people

2:12:59 choice in

2:13:00 and be able to accommodate this massive growth that’s coming and

2:13:03 then prioritize transportation.

2:13:07 Anybody else want to speak on it?

2:13:10 Yeah, I’ll speak on it briefly just really quickly.

2:13:13 It’s a new school, so it’s exciting.

2:13:14 Everyone wants to be part of a new school, right?

2:13:16 Everything in there is new.

2:13:17 There’s all kinds of great things happening.

2:13:19 I think that what would be very good for our board to do is proactively

2:13:22 look at these three schools

2:13:23 that are going to really take the hit with the students that are

2:13:27 going to be pulled from there

2:13:29 and start considering reimagining what those middle schools look

2:13:33 like

2:13:33 so that maybe that becomes an option that a parent is attracted

2:13:36 to as well.

2:13:37 So maybe something very specific, and it’s something that we can

2:13:40 discuss in future time,

2:13:41 but just to start thinking outside of the box, because these

2:13:43 numbers are going to change.

2:13:44 Obviously when I look at this presentation that Sue has given us,

2:13:47 a five- to ten-year capacity of 160% for this new middle school

2:13:51 isn’t going to work,

2:13:52 so we’re going to have to do something different to make sure

2:13:55 that the other schools

2:13:56 are viable options for our parents as well.

2:13:58 So I think I’m with you, Ms. Campbell, on not necessarily

2:14:02 starting at the very max

2:14:04 because that poses some potential with incoming families that

2:14:07 are moving in.

2:14:08 But it is exciting. It’s very exciting.

2:14:10 But I also want our families that are part of Delora, Kennedy,

2:14:13 and McNair to know

2:14:14 that they won’t be forgotten about, that we will make sure that

2:14:17 those schools are viable options

2:14:18 and that there may be something fun that comes in the future

2:14:21 that will be very unique

2:14:22 and specific to that school that their student might really love

2:14:25 and thrive in that environment.

2:14:27 That’s all.

2:14:29 Gene?

2:14:32 I’ll echo that.

2:14:34 We just need to make it clear that we have set those initial

2:14:40 boundaries for the growth,

2:14:42 and not that we forgot about anyone that’s already here, and we

2:14:45 appreciate all the input that we’re getting,

2:14:48 but then stress that they can opt into this school just the same.

2:14:53 And we expect that to happen until the growth gets to a point

2:14:59 where we can’t.

2:15:01 Boundaries are – I won’t use that phrase.

2:15:04 Boundaries are difficult in this.

2:15:07 There’s just no way around it.

2:15:09 You’re always going to make somebody feel like they’ve been left

2:15:12 out when they’re not.

2:15:13 But they can take advantage of this.

2:15:15 That’s what’s nice about how we have school choice already kind

2:15:18 of set up here in Brevard,

2:15:20 that they’re able to take advantage of this.

2:15:22 So thank you for all the work so far.

2:15:25 We’re not done yet.

2:15:28 So thank you, everybody.

2:15:30 One of the things that when we speak about the impact fee

2:15:32 argument and the Viera promise that was going on –

2:15:34 I’m just going to start from the top – is that many families,

2:15:37 when they came here before, were in Viera in the ’90s,

2:15:41 and they were told that we were working on it by our own school

2:15:45 board.

2:15:46 Karen Henderson, the school board prior to us, made her literal

2:15:49 eight years on fighting for this middle school, right?

2:15:52 So that was promised to them, and what happened is every step of

2:15:56 the way, something happened.

2:15:58 In 2008, we had the crisis.

2:16:00 They then were getting ready to build it, and then it fell down,

2:16:01 right?

2:16:02 And it just seemed like every step of the way.

2:16:04 So what was happening was is that the impact fees, while the

2:16:07 growth was in Viera, not down south, was going to other areas.

2:16:11 So that’s their argument, which I would – and if Ms. Han will

2:16:15 tell you,

2:16:16 I explained to them that that is the most poor argument to make

2:16:20 in getting your school to get here

2:16:22 because it’s disingenuous because the revenue that we’ve

2:16:25 received now has come out of the south end of the county.

2:16:28 So like that’s a moot point, but I did want to just say where

2:16:32 that came from as far as a perspective.

2:16:35 Our discussion with our parents – I will tell you what’s going

2:16:37 to happen.

2:16:38 So right now that’s not inside of this.

2:16:41 In Arizona, the equivalent of HB1 had a 30% impact on higher

2:16:46 affluent areas because the families were able to do it.

2:16:50 So literally right now, as soon as HB1, which was signed

2:16:53 yesterday, a family can go to home school, receive the money,

2:16:57 okay?

2:16:57 A family can go to – right down the road to the private school,

2:17:01 Holy Trinity, receive money.

2:17:04 They can now go to the charter schools, you know what I mean?

2:17:07 They can give that money to them.

2:17:09 The charter school Pine Crest is now building an addition,

2:17:14 correct, to include more, which is not reflective in here.

2:17:18 The other component is that there’s an Anglican church that just

2:17:21 opened up, and I just found this out just talking to somebody.

2:17:25 They’re opening up a K through 12, and they’re going to have

2:17:27 that – it’s right there in Suntree.

2:17:29 So there’s that component.

2:17:31 You have one more that the gentleman’s been discussing with us

2:17:35 for over a year and a half that is going to be a 7 through 12.

2:17:41 So those numbers are going to significantly decrease the area,

2:17:45 without a doubt.

2:17:46 So whereas we’re looking at these systems around here and we say,

2:17:50 oh, well, if everybody goes in right now,

2:17:53 we’re going to be at 92 percent capacity, I will promise you

2:17:56 that that will drop significantly.

2:17:59 So with that, I would make a very strong argument that just

2:18:02 those components will do it.

2:18:04 Now, years ago, when I came on, I looked at these bottom – Sue,

2:18:10 can you put up those Johnson and those areas down there

2:18:13 where we have Delora, the Grand Haven where they’re all – you

2:18:16 know that area real quick?

2:18:18 I want you guys to see something.

2:18:20 So – and I’m sorry, I can’t even get online, so I’m going to

2:18:23 have to look over at somebody else’s because it logged me off.

2:18:27 There we go.

2:18:28 Mr. Susan?

2:18:29 No, the one that has – the ones that are zoned for satellite –

2:18:32 you know what I mean?

2:18:33 Pineda.

2:18:34 Is that – can you show Pineda?

2:18:36 He wants the middle school map.

2:18:37 The bigger one?

2:18:39 The big middle school map.

2:18:40 Big middle school map?

2:18:41 That’s up for me.

2:18:44 This one?

2:18:46 Yeah, that was the one you pulled up.

2:18:48 All right, so here’s what happened.

2:18:50 Many of our rezones and many of our instances in the past inside

2:18:54 of our schools, we have turned around and said,

2:18:57 “We’re going to rezone this group,” thinking that one thing was

2:18:59 going to happen,

2:19:00 and what ended up happening was completely opposite of that.

2:19:03 So Pineda Crossings, which I can’t pull up here because I don’t

2:19:06 – for whatever reason, I can’t get it,

2:19:08 rezoned from Longleaf to Sherwood, and only a third of the

2:19:14 students stayed.

2:19:16 Right now, our conversations that Sue and I had at some of our

2:19:19 meet-and-greets inside the community,

2:19:22 one of them, they were – the parents just said flat out, “We’re

2:19:24 not coming if we’re not zoned for it.”

2:19:27 So when we look at these other schools and we say, “Delora, McNair,

2:19:31 Kennedy,” and all of those,

2:19:33 we’re looking at as if those people are going to stay there.

2:19:36 And there’s a significant chance with HB1 and what happened in

2:19:40 satellite over in Arizona

2:19:43 that actually we’re going to see a drop.

2:19:45 So there’s a significant drop across.

2:19:48 The other component that you have is that with the charter

2:19:51 schools, the homeschool options are increasing.

2:19:55 I would very much say this is my community that I know.

2:19:58 These are the families that I go to soccer with.

2:20:00 These are the people that I understand.

2:20:02 They are not going to stay in Kennedy.

2:20:05 They’re not going to stay.

2:20:06 They’re getting to the point where they can receive and go other

2:20:09 places.

2:20:10 So our numbers are going to be lower than what we anticipate.

2:20:14 That’s the first argument.

2:20:16 The second piece is that when we look at some of those, Delora,

2:20:21 McNair, and Kennedy,

2:20:23 McNair has been an issue where they’re at 60 percent right now.

2:20:26 It would drop them, according to this, to 49 percent, so a 10

2:20:30 percent drop.

2:20:31 Kennedy would be reduced and Delora would be reduced.

2:20:36 But many of you may not know, but CoCo used to have Clear Lake

2:20:41 next to CoCo High School.

2:20:43 And I will tell you that the junior/senior model is stronger

2:20:47 than the separate high school and middle school program.

2:20:51 So Delora is right next to satellite, and they can go ahead and

2:20:55 move to a junior/senior model immediately,

2:20:58 if that was the case, which would allow them to take care of the

2:21:01 capacity.

2:21:02 And McNair could become an only choice option where we pump a

2:21:06 lot of options inside there,

2:21:08 and then Kennedy could take the other options.

2:21:10 There are significant issues there that we could resolve.

2:21:13 There are former examples inside the community, and there are

2:21:17 actual examples that we can do.

2:21:20 Like, they’re not pie in the sky.

2:21:22 These are part of it.

2:21:24 I think the other component that we’re looking at is

2:21:27 transportation.

2:21:28 So right now, over the transportation that we would be setting

2:21:33 up,

2:21:34 the transportation of creating these zones rather than going to

2:21:37 Delora would significantly reduce about – you know what I mean?

2:21:41 We have 10 buses to 11 buses that go over the causeways every

2:21:45 day.

2:21:46 If we continue with allowing them to go to Delora, then we’re

2:21:49 going to continue to send them over.

2:21:52 To us, that’s going to cost.

2:21:54 That’s an extreme cost.

2:21:55 The other piece is that my families are screaming that they can’t

2:21:58 go over to Delora because they’re split.

2:22:01 So a lot of them go to the charter schools because they don’t

2:22:03 want to go to an elementary school,

2:22:04 and then their kid’s way over the things.

2:22:07 There are some parents that enjoy to go to Delora.

2:22:10 There are.

2:22:11 There’s a small percentage of them.

2:22:12 If you polled them, they would want to stay.

2:22:13 And you’ve seen that before in recent stuff.

2:22:16 The majority of parents use the charter schools in Vieira

2:22:19 because of the fact that they’re split.

2:22:22 So the other issue that I wanted to bring up was that we built

2:22:26 the elementary school with the footprint of having –

2:22:30 we can have middle school classes in there.

2:22:32 So innovatively saying that in the event that we have too much

2:22:36 in the future, you can turn that school into a K-8.

2:22:39 It is – K-8s are what every school district is building, what

2:22:45 every – it has 30 years of statistical data that goes back

2:22:48 and plays out that it is higher numbers and better.

2:22:52 So, like, the idea that we all of a sudden would not be able to

2:22:56 take care of the growth is not there.

2:22:59 The idea that the other schools that are out there that are in

2:23:01 the north and everywhere else are going to be decimated

2:23:04 and there’s no issue, they’re going to be anyway and to a degree

2:23:09 maybe not as bad,

2:23:10 but we’re going to have to have those conversations anyway.

2:23:13 And I will tell you that we are going to significantly reduce

2:23:16 our population of our attendees inside the area that we are

2:23:21 if we don’t include them in the middle school.

2:23:23 They have the affluence to do it, and I would recommend that we

2:23:26 keep all of the 1, 2s and 3s that are inside there currently

2:23:31 and move forward with that plan and then see if we want to take

2:23:34 the north and the south pieces to it.

2:23:37 Does that make sense to you, Sue?

2:23:39 Can you bring them back up?

2:23:40 There it is, areas 1, 2 and 3.

2:23:42 Currently, under the current one, my son will go to the middle

2:23:49 school.

2:23:50 My daughter will go to Delora because we live a quarter mile

2:23:52 apart.

2:23:53 That is significant in many of the other areas, too.

2:23:56 So if we don’t include area 1, you’re going – that’s what I

2:24:00 wanted to lay out for you guys,

2:24:02 but I would like to have more discussion about it.

2:24:04 The idea of going to this hybrid model is just they will not –

2:24:11 the hybrid model will not work because they’re not zoned.

2:24:15 They’re going to go to their other options.

2:24:17 They’re just not.

2:24:18 And the hybrid model, it’s going to grow – it will then become

2:24:21 an issue of thousands of kids applying to the thing

2:24:24 and parents not getting it, and then what’s going to happen is

2:24:26 the overcapacity of the applications,

2:24:29 the people that are over that will then not want to apply.

2:24:32 Significant issues all the way around.

2:24:34 I truly believe, being that I am from this community and I live

2:24:37 in this community,

2:24:39 that if we add areas 1, 2 and 3 to it,

2:24:41 we will not have a capacity issue that we cannot deal with with

2:24:44 the current infrastructure that we have.

2:24:48 Dr. Shiller.

2:24:50 Thank you.

2:24:51 I concur with what Mr. Susan is saying.

2:24:55 Sue and I have had extensive conversations about building for

2:24:58 the future,

2:24:59 and on Thursday we’ll be talking about – and I have a long

2:25:03 paper coming to you –

2:25:04 to talk about how this particular issue that you’re discussing

2:25:09 is a threshold issue

2:25:11 with regard to listening to what our stakeholders are saying

2:25:15 and what we will do or you will do in order to ensure the

2:25:21 multiple options

2:25:23 and that their needs, the stakeholders’ needs and students, are

2:25:28 met.

2:25:29 And one other point which will be also illustrated with the data

2:25:33 we’ll review later this evening

2:25:36 is the relationship between student performance and grade span.

2:25:42 And you’re absolutely right, Mr. Susan.

2:25:46 Nationwide there’s been a large, large emphasis in many

2:25:50 districts,

2:25:51 starting in Cincinnati about 10, 15 years ago, of K-8 districts,

2:25:57 as well as looking at different grade spans for middle schools

2:26:03 and what impact it has on maturation, grade span, age, as well

2:26:10 as performance.

2:26:12 But this particular matter, as well as the needs for brick and

2:26:18 mortar

2:26:19 in this particular area, among others, going down the road,

2:26:23 has to be looked at very carefully and strategically

2:26:26 in light of the multiple options that are available and becoming

2:26:31 available.

2:26:32 And I just would like to emphasize this is a critical issue

2:26:37 that folds into what we’ll be talking about on Thursday,

2:26:41 and I’ll be getting that memo out to you later today or early

2:26:44 tomorrow.

2:26:45 So this one needs careful, careful consideration, among others,

2:26:52 that we have with regard to future planning in the plan.

2:26:57 We’ve spent a lot of time looking at this and touring and

2:27:02 looking at the what-if scenarios,

2:27:03 and we’re dealing now with more of a fact base of what it

2:27:07 appears to be fiscal

2:27:09 and programmatic and planning implications due to the passage

2:27:13 and the signing into law of HB 1.

2:27:16 Thank you.

2:27:18 I think the other one that I wanted to point out–I’m sorry

2:27:21 because I forgot–

2:27:22 is that when we opened up Viera Elementary School, there was not

2:27:26 as significant of a need,

2:27:28 and that’s why we went to the choice because we just needed the

2:27:31 little section

2:27:32 that was already there and then to build into it.

2:27:35 So currently that’s not the same situation that’s here.

2:27:39 Anyways, Ms. Campbell wanted to speak.

2:27:41 Let me start backwards and address the thing that you just said.

2:27:44 There wasn’t as much of a need yet because a lot of the growth

2:27:48 has happened

2:27:48 and the building has happened since then.

2:27:50 And again, I’m so glad we’re talking about this accommodation

2:27:54 plan at the same time

2:27:56 because we have all those documents.

2:27:57 We don’t have any middle schools that are at capacity.

2:27:59 So as far as need by capacity, we don’t actually have that in

2:28:05 our middle schools, right?

2:28:06 What we have the need of is putting something closer to this

2:28:10 huge population

2:28:11 that we have in this area around us.

2:28:13 That is a need, but it’s not a need as far as capacity goes.

2:28:18 We did have actually a huge need when it came to elementary

2:28:20 schools in capacity

2:28:22 because Quest at the time was bursting at the seams and had all

2:28:25 these outbuildings.

2:28:26 They were over 100% capacity.

2:28:28 Manatee at the time was also – you can go back and look in the

2:28:31 historic data

2:28:32 for those two schools – bursting at the seams.

2:28:35 We had to have a new elementary something.

2:28:37 Even with the new charter schools that were built, one of them,

2:28:40 the same exact year,

2:28:42 we had to have elementary capacity in this area.

2:28:44 So there absolutely was a need for that.

2:28:47 You know, I will totally acknowledge, Mr. Susan, that you are

2:28:51 more familiar with this area

2:28:53 and the golf cart lifestyle that is Viera.

2:28:55 I recognize that.

2:28:56 But what I’m hearing from four board members is we don’t want to

2:28:59 overpopulate this school

2:29:00 and that we want to take advantage of the choice populations.

2:29:03 I’m not saying that I hear from four people don’t include any of

2:29:07 these extra people,

2:29:08 any of these extra areas, but to be judicious about it.

2:29:12 I think might we turn McNair into a choice school?

2:29:17 Yes.

2:29:18 Might we turn satellite into a junior/senior?

2:29:20 Yes.

2:29:21 And satellite is one of our high schools that’s at capacity.

2:29:23 Who knows what creative things we could do there.

2:29:25 Might we create a K-8?

2:29:26 Yes.

2:29:27 But that won’t necessarily change the problem that will be

2:29:30 created

2:29:31 by filling the school to the brim almost from the get-go.

2:29:34 And here’s the conversations that I really don’t want to have.

2:29:38 What I don’t want to have in two years is we promised all these

2:29:43 areas,

2:29:44 this is now your zoned school, and then we do get to overcapacity

2:29:48 and say –

2:29:49 we have to redistrict and say, oh, well, two years ago we said

2:29:51 you could be in it,

2:29:53 but now you’re going back.

2:29:54 I would rather us start smaller, and I understand the importance

2:29:58 of HB1 and all that.

2:30:00 Again, we have been a choice district.

2:30:02 And I think this area, they know how to choice out.

2:30:06 And you know that because when we had transportation a few years

2:30:09 –

2:30:09 before we stopped doing transportation for our choice programs,

2:30:11 when we had the regional busing, the year before we had to stop

2:30:14 that

2:30:14 because of budgeting and transportation issues, the majority of

2:30:19 the people,

2:30:20 the largest number of people who took advantage of that regional

2:30:23 busing

2:30:24 lived in the Sun Tree and Vieira area, except with the maybe

2:30:26 exception of West Mill.

2:30:28 West Mill run had a lot.

2:30:29 But those areas – so these people know how to choice.

2:30:31 They know how to choice to West Shore – West Wood – I made a

2:30:35 ship school.

2:30:37 They know how to choice to West Shore.

2:30:39 They know how to choice to Edgewood.

2:30:40 They’re taking advantage of those opportunities.

2:30:42 And I also want us to be careful because, you know,

2:30:47 there are some things that we’re dancing around talking about

2:30:53 other schools as inferior.

2:30:54 And it’s funny because some of the comments I said, I don’t like

2:30:56 the teachers at this school.

2:30:58 Well, guess what?

2:30:59 The teachers don’t make the building.

2:31:00 That can happen anywhere.

2:31:02 But I just – again, just have to reiterate the importance of

2:31:08 not getting – my view,

2:31:11 and what I’m hearing three other board members say, of not overfilling

2:31:14 the school,

2:31:15 but filling it with this choice option, which will mostly come

2:31:20 from all these areas,

2:31:21 because these are the families who have been wanting it,

2:31:23 and then just have that natural growth and that natural

2:31:29 recession or whatever the right word is as we get more.

2:31:31 And if we get this area built out even farther and we’ve got to

2:31:35 build the next Vera Middle School,

2:31:37 then we go ahead and do that.

2:31:39 But it’s not so much about what we can’t do creatively with

2:31:42 these other schools.

2:31:43 We might have to do that anyway with the impacts of HB1.

2:31:46 But I don’t feel like stuffing the school from the get-go is

2:31:49 wise.

2:31:50 And I’m hearing that from my other board members as well.

2:31:52 Well, and I would argue back that the percentage of

2:31:55 transportation that’s needed to accomplish what it is,

2:31:59 we are in a transportation nightmare.

2:32:01 So under that current position, you will be exporting many of

2:32:04 the kids over to Causeway,

2:32:06 some of them sitting on the bus for between 45 minutes to an

2:32:09 hour to try to get there, because that’s the better solution.

2:32:12 The other thing is, is that we have lost – if you look at BPS

2:32:15 right now,

2:32:16 we have lost every year in our capacity because we just keep

2:32:21 losing to all of these other charters.

2:32:24 You are setting up a situation where the other charter schools

2:32:27 will benefit from this and our schools will not.

2:32:30 We will lose the revenue that’s inside of there, and that is not

2:32:33 what we said as a board we wanted to do.

2:32:35 We wanted to compete with innovative options.

2:32:38 We wanted to compete as far as putting that together.

2:32:41 This school under the current one without one and two and three

2:32:45 will open up at almost three-quarters capacity.

2:32:48 It won’t even be nearly full, and you’ll watch all the other

2:32:51 guys from one, two, and three go to other charters that are

2:32:53 being built right now.

2:32:54 There is no question Pineapple Cove is expanding.

2:32:58 There is no – I’m sorry, Pine Crest.

2:33:01 There is no question that the Anglican Church is building.

2:33:04 There is no question that HB1 is coming.

2:33:06 And what we’re saying is that if we add one, two, and three, it’s

2:33:09 only going to be at – what was the percentage, 92%?

2:33:13 It’s just under 92.

2:33:15 If all of those other options don’t happen, if HB1 was wiped off

2:33:18 the board, if all of a sudden all of those charters were not

2:33:21 exposed, we are sitting at 92%.

2:33:24 And so that’s my argument, is that those people that are inside

2:33:27 of there that are in Suntree that are in those other areas,

2:33:31 Vieira East was the original Vieira area where they were the

2:33:35 originally platted Vieira area are screaming right now saying

2:33:40 that they wanted to be included.

2:33:42 And so the option is that if you don’t include them and you move

2:33:45 to a choice program, it is sending the wrong message and we will

2:33:50 end up losing them.

2:33:51 And that’s not what I think the intent of this board was.

2:33:55 So I would like to clarify with each one of the board members

2:33:58 what exactly their intent was.

2:34:00 Because if their intent is to keep the actual one, then we are

2:34:03 going to lose the rest of the capacity.

2:34:06 So I’d like to ask, there are one, two, and three zones, and I

2:34:10 am also going to let you guys know that there will be a large

2:34:14 contingent that will show up here of each one of those zones on

2:34:17 April 11th,

2:34:18 because they were told that we would just be discussing this,

2:34:21 and they’re going to come feed in right now.

2:34:24 So I would like to hear from everybody in here what they feel

2:34:27 about which zones should go in and which zones should go out.

2:34:31 All right.

2:34:32 Mr. Trent.

2:34:33 Thanks.

2:34:34 I keep forgetting about that HB1.

2:34:37 You made some valid points there.

2:34:39 And, you know, potentially losing some of those students.

2:34:44 And that’s as if, you know, those numbers seem high if everyone

2:34:48 takes advantage of the situation, which we know just doesn’t

2:34:51 happen in any situation given.

2:34:53 We have actual input from parents, not potential parents that

2:34:59 may move in in the next one to five years.

2:35:03 I would feel more comfortable opening it up to the parents that

2:35:09 are here now and not parents that the house isn’t even built yet.

2:35:15 I would feel comfortable, you know, allowing that, looking at it

2:35:18 on the map.

2:35:19 I think transportation has a lot to do with this, of opening it

2:35:23 up to the districts or the areas one, two, and three and see

2:35:28 where we go on that.

2:35:29 It is, you know, these people moved into this area for a reason.

2:35:33 And, you know, now that I have the opportunity for them to

2:35:36 potentially maybe not have that opportunity doesn’t seem like,

2:35:40 you know, we should be in that position to pick winners and

2:35:43 losers like that.

2:35:44 So, Mr. Susan, I appreciate you bringing your perspective to it

2:35:49 and the whole HB1 and potential losing those students.

2:35:53 And I just don’t think we should have that right to do that.

2:35:56 So that’s where I stand.

2:35:57 So are you saying to add one, two, and three?

2:35:59 Yeah, absolutely.

2:36:00 All right.

2:36:01 Ms. Wright.

2:36:02 Just for clarification purposes, I thought this was the same

2:36:04 thing.

2:36:04 We are, this is the beginning conversation of this process.

2:36:08 And here’s where I think that no matter what there’s going to be

2:36:11 some hard decisions that are going to come down the line.

2:36:15 And so when we look at our capacity on some of these other

2:36:17 schools, I’m not saying, I hear what you’re saying, Mr. Susan,

2:36:20 because you’re saying if we don’t do it we’re going to lose them.

2:36:22 So we’re either going to get them over here to the year of

2:36:24 medals or we’re going to lose them to a charter.

2:36:26 So which one is it?

2:36:27 It’s transportation, hang on, it’s transportation reduction.

2:36:31 It’s reduction in students.

2:36:32 Mr. Susan, point of order.

2:36:33 It’s that stuff.

2:36:34 So with that being said, I agree I do not want to lose these

2:36:36 students from Brevard County Public Schools.

2:36:39 I agree with you 100 percent.

2:36:41 If we don’t simultaneously look at the other schools, the

2:36:46 reality is the conversation is going to come up pretty quickly

2:36:49 that we’re going to have to discuss keeping those other schools

2:36:52 open or not based on the threshold.

2:36:54 And so that’s a conversation that we’re going to have to have at

2:36:57 some point.

2:36:58 I think, I mean, it shouldn’t be one or can it be both?

2:37:01 Can we not consider doing something with McNair in the process,

2:37:07 allowing the one, two, and three to go to the new Vieira Middle

2:37:09 School, see what that looks like.

2:37:11 But, I mean, what is that – if we get there and they’re at

2:37:14 capacity, Mr. Susan, that’s the struggle that I have is like are

2:37:16 we going to go back and say, hey, oh, by the way, we’re filled.

2:37:20 And I think you asked me a question, so I’ll answer it real

2:37:22 quick.

2:37:23 The issue is, is that what if we are at capacity?

2:37:26 The most the capacity will be is 92 percent right now.

2:37:29 So just so that everybody understands, this doesn’t open for

2:37:34 another year and like four months.

2:37:37 There’s plenty of time to discuss in between now and then what

2:37:41 to do, okay.

2:37:42 The other thing is, is that if it opened and it’s at 92 percent

2:37:46 and it started to increase, that still gives us another year to

2:37:50 have conversations.

2:37:51 For instance, not that this is something that we would want to

2:37:54 do, but many of our schools have functioned between 100 to 105

2:37:58 percent many different times.

2:38:00 They have options inside of classrooms and all of those things.

2:38:03 The time period to make those decisions, if we didn’t have HB1

2:38:09 and we weren’t in the throes of getting ready to do some of the

2:38:12 most innovative things, I would say that you are 100 percent

2:38:15 right and that the capacity is there, right, that we run into it.

2:38:19 But we are going to be reimagining all of them.

2:38:22 We are going to be reimagining McNair, Kennedy, all of it.

2:38:27 We may be talking K8s in some places and everything else, and we

2:38:29 have at the bare minimum two years before it’s a crisis

2:38:34 situation.

2:38:35 So the issue is, is that I truly believe that we have that as an

2:38:41 option of, when you’re asking me, but I wanted to clarify, it’s

2:38:45 not so much just about losing them.

2:38:48 It’s about the quality of a parent who has a kid who goes over

2:38:52 two causeways to Delora and has a kid at the elementary school

2:38:56 making that choice to just stay at the charter.

2:38:58 You know what I mean?

2:38:59 Like it’s a quality of respect.

2:39:01 It’s volunteers inside the school.

2:39:03 It’s all the way around having that holistic component.

2:39:06 That’s all.

2:39:07 So I didn’t mean to kind of go.

2:39:09 I just thought I’d help alleviate some of those issues.

2:39:11 You know what I mean?

2:39:12 Yeah, we’re coming to you, Mr. McNair.

2:39:13 Yeah, no, I appreciate that.

2:39:14 I hear what you’re saying, though, because I do think we have to

2:39:17 be of this mindset.

2:39:19 What does it look like if our student population is reduced by

2:39:22 30% with House Bill 1?

2:39:24 Because there are going to be more competitive options.

2:39:26 They’re not there right now, but they will start popping up.

2:39:28 That’s a reality.

2:39:29 So, I mean, do we want to build a brand new middle school that

2:39:32 we can’t even fill it because we’ve lost students?

2:39:35 Or do we want to attract those students now and keep them there?

2:39:38 So I understand that thought process and what you’re thinking.

2:39:42 You could even take the extra growth and put it into a K-8 at

2:39:45 the elementary school.

2:39:47 Mr. Susan, please stop responding to every single comment.

2:39:50 Do you need definitive board direction today on whether or not

2:39:54 we’re including Area 1, 2, and 3 in that boundary for the new

2:39:57 middle school?

2:39:58 Is that correct?

2:39:59 So some guidance along those lines would be very helpful,

2:40:01 because that way I can prepare for the April 11th agenda item

2:40:06 under information,

2:40:07 and then the public will understand where the board is.

2:40:10 Yeah. Okay.

2:40:13 Just hang on. Let her finish on her –

2:40:16 No, with that being said, I mean, honestly, if we have to make a

2:40:19 decision about this today,

2:40:21 I feel like it’s either we’re going to lose the student or we’re

2:40:23 going to put the student where the parents are wanting them.

2:40:26 That is the reality of what House Bill 1 now offers.

2:40:29 So with that being said, I’m not opposed to taking 1, 2, and 3,

2:40:32 but what I’m saying, and I want it on the record,

2:40:34 is I want us to immediately look at how are we going to reimagine

2:40:38 those other middle schools to make them viable options

2:40:42 that people want to continue to stay in.

2:40:45 Thank you.

2:40:46 Okay, Ms. Campbell.

2:40:47 This is – you know, one of the frustrating things about this as

2:40:50 I read all these parent comments is that they were promises,

2:40:52 they were promises, they were promises, and I would suggest that

2:40:55 they shouldn’t have been promised it.

2:40:56 They were promised it by candidates, they were promised it by

2:40:58 school board members.

2:40:59 I’m not just the one you mentioned.

2:41:00 They were promised even by someone that I ran against down in my

2:41:03 district.

2:41:04 Had a fundraiser built on the promise of a new middle school.

2:41:07 Those are promises that shouldn’t be met when there are

2:41:09 decisions made by a whole entire body.

2:41:11 I hear what you’re saying, Mr. Susan, but at the same time, you’re

2:41:14 saying that all these people, they’ll go somewhere else.

2:41:16 I would suggest that they’re already going somewhere else to say

2:41:19 that if we add them all in, it’s going to create this great

2:41:22 shift.

2:41:23 The people who bought their houses in that area, we didn’t have

2:41:26 a new middle school.

2:41:27 It wasn’t even on the radar until last year.

2:41:29 So they didn’t buy in that area – originally, yes.

2:41:33 But for the last however many years, it’s been 20 years, they

2:41:36 knew they were building that – they were going to that area.

2:41:38 The middle school was either Delara or it was Kennedy.

2:41:41 And now we’re having this opportunity.

2:41:43 So it’s not going to be this drastic shift because we will pull

2:41:47 people back,

2:41:48 because those families who just don’t want to go over the causeway

2:41:51 were already not doing that.

2:41:53 They were taking these other options.

2:41:54 We’re actually creating an option where we can get them back.

2:41:56 So I don’t think there’s going to be as drastic of a shift.

2:41:58 I would also suggest just practically, if you haven’t driven

2:42:01 around these areas at certain times of the day,

2:42:03 including morning times and dismissal times, I would need

2:42:10 transportation to back this up.

2:42:12 But I would suggest that from some of the Sun Tree areas across

2:42:16 two causeways to Delara wouldn’t take as long

2:42:19 as getting from some of these Sun Tree areas through Melbourne

2:42:23 and the Vieira area to get up here,

2:42:26 because there is nasty traffic on Wickham at pretty much any

2:42:31 time of the day, and it’s only getting worse.

2:42:35 So I don’t necessarily think that – it’s not – from some areas,

2:42:39 yes.

2:42:40 If they’re coming from closer to here, going across the causeway,

2:42:42 I get it.

2:42:43 But from some of those areas that are right by the river, it’s

2:42:46 not necessarily an automatic,

2:42:48 that that’s a shorter transportation issue for people.

2:42:51 But I understand they want to be here, so I get that.

2:42:55 But the problem for me with that 92% and saying that’s worst

2:42:59 case scenario, 92% is where we start shutting schools.

2:43:02 We say you can’t choice into this school.

2:43:05 I mean – but 90 is where we start considering it, 90 to 95%.

2:43:11 And we’re getting so close we don’t even have people who can opt

2:43:14 in at that point right from the get-go.

2:43:17 So, you know, you’re a great salesman, Mr. Susan, and you did

2:43:22 your job,

2:43:23 and you convinced two people to change their mind and to go

2:43:25 along with you, and that’s fine.

2:43:26 That’s the majority of the board, we’re moving there.

2:43:28 But I just – again, it’s not all as cut and dry.

2:43:32 And I agree with the options, and we’re going to have to look in

2:43:36 the future.

2:43:37 I really hate that we’re having all these topsy-turvy

2:43:39 conversations right now

2:43:40 because I think we’re actually throwing bombs of instability and

2:43:45 turmoil out into the world

2:43:47 as we’re having these conversations.

2:43:49 But, you know, I just think we need to be reasonable and

2:43:53 practical,

2:43:54 look at future looking in more ways than one, not just future

2:43:57 looking at, oh, my gosh, we’re going to get in a tizzy

2:43:59 and out of fear we’re making this decision that if we don’t let

2:44:01 all these people zoned into this school,

2:44:04 not just choice, but zoned into this school, we’re going to lose

2:44:06 every single one of them.

2:44:07 I don’t think that’s true.

2:44:08 I don’t like making my decisions based on fear.

2:44:10 But I also want to think – so future looking as future growth,

2:44:15 future growth we know is coming.

2:44:16 Unless we have crazy economy crash in this area, which you

2:44:20 yourself have said this area is more protected than others,

2:44:22 we know we’re going to have thousands of homes built in this

2:44:26 area in the very near future,

2:44:29 and we’re not going to have a place to put all those kids.

2:44:32 Thank you, Ms. Campbell.

2:44:33 I would say just for the point of record that during rush hour I

2:44:38 live in Suntree

2:44:39 and I go to the Vieira Regional Park in seven minutes through

2:44:43 Wickham.

2:44:44 There’s not an issue for – there’s not a same time period of

2:44:49 going over the two causeways.

2:44:52 I would make that argument.

2:44:54 Point of order.

2:44:58 Mr. Susan, being the chairman –

2:44:59 You’re making accusations.

2:45:00 I am allowed to.

2:45:01 Point of order.

2:45:02 Go ahead, Ms. Jenkins, go ahead.

2:45:03 Thank you so much.

2:45:04 Being the chairman does not give you the right to respond after

2:45:07 every single person speaks.

2:45:09 You do not need to rub bottle everyone else’s opinions.

2:45:12 It’s clear certain people don’t agree with each other.

2:45:14 You don’t need to rub bottle every single response.

2:45:16 But statements that aren’t true –

2:45:17 Mr. Susan, point of order.

2:45:18 – need to be reiterated.

2:45:19 Point of order.

2:45:20 Thank you.

2:45:21 I said it before and I’ll say it again.

2:45:23 There’s a difference between being proactive and reactive.

2:45:27 Yes, House Bill 1 was passed.

2:45:29 House Bill 1 doesn’t mean that we’re going to have more kids

2:45:32 going to charter schools.

2:45:34 It doesn’t change their ability to go to charter school.

2:45:36 They already had that ability to go to a charter school that’s

2:45:38 already in Vieira.

2:45:39 That is not different.

2:45:40 Those seats inside of those charter schools in the Vieira area

2:45:44 will always be filled.

2:45:46 So if you think you’re going to attract students out of those

2:45:48 schools into this new middle school

2:45:51 or stop someone from making the choice to go in there, there’s

2:45:53 just going to be another student to fill it.

2:45:55 They have tremendous wait lists.

2:45:57 So you’re not stopping children from going to the charter

2:46:00 schools that are inside of the Vieira area.

2:46:02 Sure, they can use those vouchers to go to private schools, but

2:46:06 we only really have one giant competitive one in the area.

2:46:10 And again, those seats are filled.

2:46:12 You’re not going to stop children from seeking those seats.

2:46:15 What I am concerned about, which Ms. Campbell touched on already,

2:46:19 is the message we’re sending to residents who are zoned for

2:46:22 these other middle schools.

2:46:24 There is nothing wrong with our other middle schools, so let’s

2:46:26 stop perpetuating out into the community that those schools aren’t

2:46:30 good

2:46:30 and that we don’t want to send our kids there and we have to

2:46:32 reimagine them.

2:46:33 We already have a plan to reimagine our middle schools just

2:46:36 because of in general,

2:46:37 because of the developmental age of middle schoolers and the

2:46:42 difficulties and challenges we’re having with them there already.

2:46:45 But we shouldn’t suggest that we need to reimagine these schools

2:46:48 because they’re failing or because they’re bad

2:46:50 and we shouldn’t want kids to be zoned for them.

2:46:52 They’re going to flee them to go to charter schools.

2:46:54 Again, these charter schools are filled.

2:46:56 They have massive wait lists already.

2:46:59 You can’t stop that.

2:47:01 And House Bill 1, sure, comes with $750 for transportation.

2:47:06 Whoop-de-doo, that’s not a lot of money for somebody who

2:47:09 literally cannot get to school.

2:47:11 So if money and transportation is a barrier, that’s not going to

2:47:15 change that choice for somebody.

2:47:17 So again, we need to stop being reactive and we need to be

2:47:21 proactive.

2:47:22 If you want to have conversations about including one or two

2:47:25 areas, that’s a way different conversation.

2:47:27 But including all three and starting off at 92%, that is wildly

2:47:32 dangerous.

2:47:33 And again, you need to consider the staffing of that new school.

2:47:38 If you open a brand new school at such a high capacity and

2:47:42 cannot have the qualified educators inside of it that the

2:47:46 parents are expecting,

2:47:48 you’re also not going to have happy parents.

2:47:51 The other thing to consider is with Choicing In, it’s scary for

2:47:55 parents to hear that for an elementary school option because you’re

2:47:59 not guaranteed to stay.

2:48:00 If your kid’s got six years in a school, seven years in a school,

2:48:04 you’re concerned that they may not be able to stay from

2:48:07 kindergarten to sixth grade.

2:48:09 But we’re talking about middle school. It’s two years.

2:48:12 It’s way less of a risk to choice your student into that school.

2:48:18 If you’re a choice into a school, unless you don’t behave or

2:48:23 bill or whatever, you are guaranteed your seat as long as you

2:48:26 reapply.

2:48:27 Okay. I’m sorry.

2:48:28 Well, when I was working, you had to have an IEP to keep you in

2:48:31 that school with a McKay scholarship program.

2:48:34 So, sorry.

2:48:36 So anyway, my biggest concern is I’m concerned about this

2:48:39 conversation because we’re making statements about picking

2:48:42 winners and losers.

2:48:43 And we’re talking about reimagining these schools.

2:48:45 And I think we’re doing ourselves a disservice here because

2:48:48 these schools are wonderful, our educators are wonderful, our

2:48:51 students are performing in these schools.

2:48:55 We need to stick to what we’re talking about and be concerned

2:48:57 whether or not we’re overstaffing this school – or I’m sorry,

2:49:01 overstaffing this school with students and not being able to

2:49:03 staff it.

2:49:04 That is my number one concern, my number one concern.

2:49:08 And we have to remember, when we opened Viera Elementary, we

2:49:12 have, like, what, 300 kids inside of it? Yeah.

2:49:15 I don’t even – I wouldn’t even – what was the percentage?

2:49:20 About 30.

2:49:21 Thirty percent? Right.

2:49:23 So, I mean, just remember that.

2:49:27 Right.

2:49:28 Because we needed to leave the room for growth.

2:49:30 And that was significantly lower than what we’re talking about

2:49:34 here with this middle school, significantly lower.

2:49:37 Ms. Han, you had mentioned earlier that if we were to set up a

2:49:41 bus, one bus, to drive some of the kids from the Sun Tree area

2:49:44 to the Delora area, that may be a way that gives those parents

2:49:49 that want to stay there an option for that.

2:49:51 That was something that you guys were looking at.

2:49:53 Yes, sir, that was something I asked Mr. Wilson to take a look

2:49:56 at.

2:49:56 Now, in the context of we don’t have enough bus drivers, you

2:49:58 know, it’s a lower priority, but certainly that is something

2:50:01 that could come into the mix as a special consideration when we

2:50:05 get to 2024.

2:50:06 And the majority, just so everybody understands, the majority,

2:50:09 because this school is being built, the majority of the buses

2:50:12 that were busing over the causeways, many of them will no longer

2:50:15 be needed because of the western piece that they have and the

2:50:19 buses within two miles of that school, which encumbers much of

2:50:23 that.

2:50:24 So I would say that there’s going to be a significant reduction,

2:50:26 so there would be that opportunity.

2:50:28 So with that, Ms. Han, you have your direction. I appreciate it.

2:50:32 I think so. So let me just reiterate where I think we landed. So

2:50:36 we’re going to focus on a boundary that includes areas one, two,

2:50:42 and three.

2:50:43 I would like to continue to talk to the Sun Tree community about

2:50:47 some of the options that came up today, just to get a little bit

2:50:51 more community data for you.

2:50:54 And that’s where we’re going. I think I heard a lot of other,

2:50:57 you know, we’re okay with this, but there are other things that

2:51:01 we need to talk about, and I absolutely agree.

2:51:05 And when you look in the details in the student accommodation

2:51:08 plan, this is not the only area that has stressors in both

2:51:11 directions that ultimately we’ll need to talk about.

2:51:15 So I think for me, when I get into talking about the student

2:51:19 accommodation plan, as the effects of HB1 and school choice

2:51:23 settle,

2:51:24 I think we’re going to have to stand up more conversations about

2:51:28 our schools based on who is attending the schools and the

2:51:32 enrollment versus capacity.

2:51:34 So this is not the only area we will have that conversation.

2:51:38 » Thank you, Ms. Hand. I really appreciate it. Now you have the

2:51:43 final, you know what I mean, capital planning and –

2:51:47 » No, I –

2:51:48 » Accommodate – sorry, go ahead.

2:51:50 » Sorry. Okay. So student accommodation plan. This is super

2:51:54 short.

2:51:55 I mostly just wanted to give you a sense of what’s in the

2:51:58 document. If you’ve not been on the board previously, this is a

2:52:01 great source of all sorts of information,

2:52:04 as Ms. Campbell mentioned, like the from-to charts are super

2:52:07 engaging and gives you a good sense of who’s going where from

2:52:10 where.

2:52:11 And so you can start to see some trends. So in the student

2:52:15 accommodation plan, there’s enrollment analysis, historical and

2:52:19 projected.

2:52:20 We have charts that show the accuracy of our projections over

2:52:24 time. But this really sets the stage for long-term capacity

2:52:28 planning.

2:52:29 And I really would encourage you to look at the numbers in the

2:52:32 student accommodation plan. And it’s not a conversation for

2:52:35 today.

2:52:36 But I think there will be more conversations about how we

2:52:40 utilize our schools. I think the discipline conversation is a

2:52:45 great example.

2:52:46 So the need for capacity and seats at the alternative learning

2:52:51 centers hinges on decisions that the board makes about

2:52:55 discipline.

2:52:57 And so as you are working through your policies and providing

2:53:01 more framework for those types of decisions,

2:53:04 that’s going to feed into what we’re doing at the school level

2:53:09 and how we invest our resources for school capacity.

2:53:13 So we also have the five-year work program. You see that in

2:53:17 October and the fall. And it kind of mirrors the student

2:53:20 accommodation plan.

2:53:22 And then Karen is working on updating our educational plant

2:53:26 survey. That’s a required Department of Education document that

2:53:28 we have to do every five years.

2:53:30 And our update is due in June. So it’s a lot of statistics and

2:53:34 such. But you’ll see that probably sometime in May.

2:53:39 And then there’s a lot of data in the student accommodation plan

2:53:42 that you might find interesting.

2:53:44 So one of the things that we touch on is our portable moves. And

2:53:48 we do have – we have one suggested portable move to Pinewood

2:53:53 that we’re going to be pursuing.

2:53:55 And this gets a little odd in that our capital plan comes to you

2:54:01 in the next few months.

2:54:04 The capital money doesn’t come in until December. But we

2:54:07 actually need to move the portable, like start moving now.

2:54:10 So it’s in the student accommodation plan as a potential project.

2:54:14 Working with Dr. Rebley and Dr. Filler on what we’re doing with

2:54:18 our alternative learning centers and whether or not we need to

2:54:21 make some additional portable moves in that direction or not.

2:54:24 We also talk about program accommodation, our career and

2:54:28 technical education typically.

2:54:30 We do – you know, there’s some different projects and such that

2:54:34 we’re doing in support of programs in CTE and other areas of

2:54:38 education.

2:54:39 And then the student accommodation plan also touches on new

2:54:42 capacity that we’ll be providing.

2:54:44 So what we’re doing at the middle school, the Vera High School

2:54:48 addition, Southlake Elementary, West Melbourne, the project that

2:54:52 we’re doing for a new classroom addition, we’re doing our

2:54:55 analysis at Myla.

2:54:57 So all of those things are mentioned and noted in our student

2:55:00 accommodation plan.

2:55:02 But we also have a lot of data. And I’m going to show you a

2:55:05 couple charts that just kind of give you a snapshot of the types

2:55:09 of information that’s included in our student accommodation plan.

2:55:13 And Karen’s really done a great job kind of parsing down

2:55:16 different data sources to give us these trends.

2:55:19 These two charts, the one on the left is the family empowerment

2:55:23 scholarship usage by grade and time frame.

2:55:27 And then the one on the right is really the one that I want to

2:55:30 highlight for you.

2:55:31 These are charter school use over time.

2:55:36 And so I think the top of the page in blue is school year 2014-2015.

2:55:44 And the bottom chart is school year 2022-23.

2:55:49 And what you can see from that trend is that charter school

2:55:53 enrollment at the lower grades is growing significantly.

2:55:58 And what’s keeping us in sort of an aggregate of 10, 11, 12

2:56:02 percent is the fact that there’s not high school capacity.

2:56:06 But it’s pretty obvious that charter schools are here and

2:56:10 competing and doing very well.

2:56:12 And so the growth at the lower grades is increasing over time.

2:56:17 And that has lots of implications. I worry about that relative

2:56:20 to our sales surtax revenue we share with the charter schools.

2:56:23 And so it affects capital planning as the legislation regarding

2:56:28 the capital share, I don’t know where that is today.

2:56:32 But if we are sharing capital resources with charter schools,

2:56:36 these numbers will affect our capital revenues as well.

2:56:40 So this is a great source of data that you can use to inform a

2:56:44 variety of decisions, including the ones that we’ve just been

2:56:48 talking about.

2:56:49 I also wanted to show you some new maps that Karen generated.

2:56:53 These are kind of heat maps as to where students are coming from.

2:56:57 And you can see the difference between 2019-20 and 2022-23.

2:57:02 So like I said, she does a great job kind of keeping track of

2:57:05 the different data sources that we have and providing charts and

2:57:10 graphs in ways that will help you make good decisions.

2:57:16 So this is really it on the student accommodation plan.

2:57:19 Just a quick summary of what’s in the document.

2:57:22 And this will be on your school board agenda for approval on

2:57:26 April the 11th.

2:57:28 So if you read through it and you have any questions or comments

2:57:31 or anything, please let us know and we’ll be happy to work with

2:57:33 you on it.

2:57:34 And if you’d like a detailed tour, I can do that for you as well.

2:57:38 And so if there are questions, I’ll answer them or I can move on

2:57:43 to capital.

2:57:45 I love the charts. I love the dynamic way you looked at it.

2:57:48 Thank you. I think if no other body wants any discussion, we can

2:57:53 move on to capital.

2:57:55 Thank you. And just as an FYI, you have 33 minutes before you

2:57:59 have 33 minutes.

2:58:00 You have 33 minutes prior to it sort of ending.

2:58:04 You know what I mean? Before I start getting hooked from

2:58:07 Campbell over here for too long of a meeting.

2:58:09 Thank you. So I’m going to finish this up in 15.

2:58:13 Maybe less. OK. So we talk about capital. I, I think some of you

2:58:17 have seen a couple of these slides before.

2:58:20 But starting with why in facilities, we are part.

2:58:25 Of why folks choose to send their their students to provide

2:58:28 public schools.

2:58:29 And this was part of the earlier conversation. It is a component

2:58:33 of what decisions people make about sending their children to

2:58:37 our schools.

2:58:38 And so we take facilities very seriously. And there’s some data

2:58:43 behind the idea of the facilities matter.

2:58:47 Right. The air conditioning matters. The lawn matters. The paint

2:58:50 matters.

2:58:51 And the next few slides just give you some research. It’s 10 ish

2:58:55 years old, but it’s pretty good source data.

2:58:58 And so if you’re interested in this data, I wanted to give you

2:59:00 these slides so you had access to it.

2:59:02 But it shows that students in deteriorating buildings perform

2:59:06 less successfully than students in new buildings.

2:59:09 Like it’s it’s a it is a something that we need to recognize in

2:59:13 our district when we’re dealing with 60 year old schools.

2:59:18 And so similarly, in teacher retention and recruitment, same

2:59:24 type of theme.

2:59:25 And, you know, you can kind of make sense of that anecdotally.

2:59:29 We’re in a 30 something year old building here.

2:59:32 And some days it’s not the greatest. So and then on the

2:59:36 technology side, I wanted you to have this this data as well.

2:59:41 You know, certainly moving into a more digital world.

2:59:45 And so from a historical perspective, I wanted to just kind of

2:59:51 set the stage for where we are today with capital.

2:59:54 Because we’re doing reasonably well with our capital revenues

2:59:58 today.

2:59:59 But back in 2009, we had a very significant decline in our

3:00:03 property values,

3:00:04 which significantly impacted our capital revenues to the point

3:00:08 where we really almost had nothing for capital investment.

3:00:13 And this was before the sales tax was enacted by the voters.

3:00:18 And so we had a huge hole. And this graph is not like, you know,

3:00:24 down to the nearest dollar.

3:00:25 But it kind of shows you the capital revenue over time.

3:00:29 And the purple line on the bottom is our annual debt service at

3:00:33 about 38 million.

3:00:35 That fluctuates a little bit. But you can see in 2012 and 2013

3:00:40 where the bottom of where the capital revenue was,

3:00:43 was right about the same point as where the debt service is

3:00:46 located.

3:00:47 And so there’s a pretty big hole that we’ve been trying to climb

3:00:52 out of ever since the sales tax was enacted in 2014.

3:00:56 So we have one hundred and seventy million dollars or so in air

3:01:00 conditioning investments.

3:01:02 Like we needed to do that because we had no capital investment

3:01:05 to speak of.

3:01:06 And we were constrained on the maintenance side as well.

3:01:10 And we’re still digging out of that hole. And I say that because

3:01:15 we’ve just recently in the last year started investing in

3:01:19 athletics.

3:01:20 That has been something that we’ve not been able to do. And

3:01:23 literally last year was kind of the first time we kind of made a

3:01:27 big push to do some investment in athletics.

3:01:30 And I wanted to show this graph so that you kind of understood

3:01:34 why we were there and and excited to be moving out of that phase

3:01:39 now.

3:01:40 The turquoise line is the maintenance best practice line at

3:01:44 about 60 million.

3:01:46 That’s based on our percentage of our we’ve got about two

3:01:50 billion dollars in assets.

3:01:53 And because ours are getting so they’re aging, you know, more is

3:01:58 probably better.

3:01:59 But this kind of just gives you the framework for the capital

3:02:02 discussion.

3:02:03 So now I’m going to talk about pie. And this is a slide from

3:02:08 Cindy’s presentation last year about budget and just kind of

3:02:11 gives you the framework that we start with.

3:02:14 And so the expected revenue was about 90 million.

3:02:18 We took the debt service off the top. We take off the transfer

3:02:21 to maintenance transfer for property insurance.

3:02:23 And then we had about thirty five million dollars left to

3:02:27 program in capital.

3:02:29 And we really do a good job of distributing capital resources

3:02:32 across different needs in the district.

3:02:35 So we have investments in educational technology.

3:02:38 We work with leading and learning on their mostly F.F. needs and

3:02:41 some program needs and secondary.

3:02:44 We support procurement and distribution services.

3:02:47 They need warehouse trucks and equipment, transportation that is

3:02:51 primarily school buses.

3:02:53 And then the rest of that is in facilities.

3:02:58 And we work through the process with kind of a cross functional

3:03:02 team.

3:03:03 So finance, educational technology, operations and facilities,

3:03:09 we work together to try to come up with the best match of the

3:03:14 money to the needs that we have.

3:03:17 So this graph shows you the off the top chart for debt service.

3:03:22 We take about thirty eight million. And where this cliff occurs

3:03:26 in 2033, that’s where a lot of our debt is retired.

3:03:30 So things will change in 2033.

3:03:34 But this is about where we are now with a relatively level debt

3:03:37 service at thirty eight million a year.

3:03:39 Our property insurance is about six million a year and that is

3:03:42 expected to go up.

3:03:43 And our maintenance and operations is certainly going up as well.

3:03:47 And then we’ve been working together with operations and Ms. Lisinski

3:03:52 on funding for the White Fleet and trying to do a little better

3:03:56 job of our White Fleet replacement at about five percent of the

3:03:59 stock per year.

3:03:59 And then again, whether the charter share is going to affect our

3:04:06 revenue.

3:04:07 And so every year we have kind of a slate of annual investments.

3:04:11 And this is a pretty comprehensive list of the things that you

3:04:14 see every year in the capital program.

3:04:16 And those are standard F F and E for elementary and secondary

3:04:20 and student services.

3:04:22 We have the school initiated projects match program, school bus

3:04:26 replacement technology, facility renewals.

3:04:29 That’s pretty standard normal stuff we do every year.

3:04:33 And then these are some of the projects that we started over the

3:04:36 last year or two.

3:04:37 And they will likely be continuing in the upcoming year.

3:04:41 So you will see these projects as well when you see your capital

3:04:47 proposal in in April.

3:04:49 And we’ll be finishing up the high school track renewal and

3:04:52 rubberization.

3:04:53 We probably will propose some elementary pavilions.

3:04:56 That’s been a big need that our schools have been talking to us

3:05:01 about for several years.

3:05:03 We’re continuing our investment in playground resurfacing,

3:05:06 getting rid of mulch and using rubberized tiles.

3:05:09 I think the schools really like that. And we like it from a

3:05:11 maintenance and safety perspective as well.

3:05:14 We are doing student rest room renovation and student locker

3:05:17 room renovations.

3:05:19 And if you’ve seen some of the before and after pictures,

3:05:22 it’s pretty amazing how much better they look after we’re

3:05:26 completed with our project.

3:05:29 And then we’ve been talking with our athletic customers and they

3:05:34 have a lot of needs.

3:05:36 And we are working towards trying to meet some of those needs.

3:05:40 And the ones that are in red are the ones that I think are most

3:05:43 likely that you will see.

3:05:45 I’ll be putting this together over the next couple of days and

3:05:49 we’ll certainly be going through the committee process.

3:05:51 But I wanted you to see the framework of what you what’s kind of

3:05:57 in the mix and what will likely be included in the mix.

3:06:02 And of course, middle school tracks are something that is

3:06:05 becoming important.

3:06:06 There’s now middle school athletics and we have some middle

3:06:10 schools that don’t have tracks.

3:06:12 We have a few high schools that don’t have tracks. So there’s

3:06:15 there’s that as well.

3:06:17 And then we have a few maintenance ish items that are pretty

3:06:20 expensive.

3:06:21 And those are some pool deck renewal. We have sound panels in

3:06:24 some of our gyms that are literally falling down.

3:06:27 Those to me are a safety issue. So you’re going to start to see

3:06:30 those as prioritized.

3:06:32 Our scoreboards and sound systems plan ops and maintenance has

3:06:34 been trying to do that kind of through their maintenance budget.

3:06:38 And we’re just not as successful as we need to be there.

3:06:41 So we’re probably going to be putting up proposing a project to

3:06:45 do a little better job.

3:06:47 Similarly, football goalposts. You know, we get the hey, the

3:06:51 goalpost doesn’t look quite right kind of conversation.

3:06:55 So we think we’re going to be a little bit more proactive.

3:06:59 We have continuing sore issues at both satellite and O’Gally

3:07:03 with their stadiums.

3:07:05 And we need to we need to deal with that. So we’re not sure what

3:07:08 the problem is.

3:07:09 But that’s something that I think you will likely see in the in

3:07:14 the capital plan.

3:07:16 And then we have two more tracks to rubberize and we will be

3:07:20 done with that project.

3:07:22 And then I just want to highlight, too, that, as I mentioned

3:07:25 earlier, we really hadn’t done much in athletics.

3:07:28 And over the last year or two, we’ve done quite a bit more.

3:07:32 So these are some of the highlights of what we have accomplished

3:07:35 with our capital plan.

3:07:36 And I think our athletic programs are benefiting from the work

3:07:40 that we have done.

3:07:41 And we’d like to do more. We are a little bit about

3:07:45 sustainability.

3:07:46 Need to just bring up that word because we we continually have

3:07:52 that push pull between things that we have and things that we

3:07:57 would like to have.

3:07:59 And the more we add to the we’d like to have bucket, the more we

3:08:02 have to maintain.

3:08:03 And we’re not collectively growing our maintenance function.

3:08:06 So and this applies to not just facilities, but security assets,

3:08:10 to educational technology assets, everything we add that we don’t

3:08:15 have today.

3:08:16 We have a maintenance responsibility for the future.

3:08:19 So we think about that. And I feel a responsibility to make sure

3:08:23 that I bring this up when I talk to the board about capital.

3:08:27 We have been doing really well with partnerships with the county

3:08:30 and municipalities.

3:08:31 And you’ll probably see some more of those coming up and then

3:08:35 just the school fundraising, especially at the high school level.

3:08:40 There’s a lot of differences, as you all have seen in past

3:08:43 discussions between what high schools can raise for athletics

3:08:47 and other assets in their district or in their school.

3:08:50 And then those also become maintenance responsibilities, which I’m

3:08:55 finding a few 30 years later, things that maybe need to be

3:08:59 addressed that were built by others that might need a little bit

3:09:04 of work because they’re used by the school for a purpose and

3:09:07 they’re not functional or not safe.

3:09:10 So we’re starting to look at those as well.

3:09:15 We talked about sustainability also in our operating budget and

3:09:19 probably the same with others in operations that the skill set

3:09:23 that we have in our trades is a traditional skill set.

3:09:27 And as we add more technology, like our chillers become more

3:09:30 advanced, our intercom systems become more advanced, our

3:09:33 electronics become more advanced.

3:09:35 We are going to need to change the skill sets that we need to

3:09:38 maintain these assets.

3:09:40 It’s going to be different in the future and that’s something

3:09:44 that we kind of keep on the middle burner in terms of awareness

3:09:49 and looking at evolving our job descriptions and potentially our

3:09:53 pay scales to keep up with the needs of maintaining the assets

3:09:58 that we’re acquiring.

3:10:00 And then again, just several more things that we’ve been talking

3:10:03 about and looking at and that you might see in the capital plan,

3:10:07 you know, we talked about ALC and Gardendale.

3:10:10 I will tell you that outdoor basketball courts and goalposts,

3:10:14 basketball goals in this district need some need some love.

3:10:19 And so I would like to try to show them some love.

3:10:23 So you might see that in the capital plan. As I mentioned,

3:10:26 several schools do not have tracks and several schools do not

3:10:29 have something.

3:10:30 So especially at the high school level, if you talk to any high

3:10:33 school, they will tell you we don’t have something.

3:10:37 And because we are doing assessments, we kind of have a sense of

3:10:42 who has what and who doesn’t have what.

3:10:46 We have auditorium performing arts center situations where some

3:10:50 schools have them, some schools don’t.

3:10:53 A lot of schools are asking for more parking.

3:10:56 And then there’s just the standard casework type things that we’re

3:11:00 doing, some with sales tax, flooring.

3:11:03 We had a great investment in flooring and ESSER made a huge

3:11:05 difference.

3:11:06 So all of these things kind of work together and we try to

3:11:09 strategize among the different pots of money so that we can

3:11:12 optimize how that money is invested.

3:11:15 So anyway, I just wanted to kind of give you a sense of what you

3:11:19 might be seeing.

3:11:20 And also mention that when you see the facilities capital

3:11:23 renewal, it’s been about 6.3ish million every year.

3:11:27 And I cover from that when maintenance runs out of money and I

3:11:32 also cover random events.

3:11:34 And we’ve had quite a few random events coming in this year that

3:11:38 just, you know, things catch on fire.

3:11:41 We’ve had an enormous, enormous cost in renting chillers this

3:11:46 year to the point where we could have bought some chillers.

3:11:49 Like it’s not, I don’t think, a fixable problem, but it is

3:11:56 something that we need to be aware of.

3:11:59 Because when a school is out of air conditioning, we have no

3:12:02 choice but to figure out how to get cool air in the school.

3:12:05 And it’s very, very expensive to rent those chillers.

3:12:09 If you look at the construction proposals, sometimes chillers

3:12:14 are like a year and a half out.

3:12:16 And so if the chiller is down, that’s a problem.

3:12:20 Now, we’re doing better. We have done really well with

3:12:23 redundancy at some of our schools.

3:12:25 As we’re doing chiller projects, we’re trying to build in

3:12:28 redundancy.

3:12:29 And that’s working pretty well, but we’re one or two chillers

3:12:34 away from a major expense.

3:12:36 So with that, I just – you know, we try to be strategic and we’ll

3:12:41 appreciate conversation with the board when we bring the capital

3:12:44 plan to you.

3:12:45 We’re moving, and I think Cindy’s group is moving towards more

3:12:49 multiyear capital and operating planning so that we have a

3:12:53 better sense of where we’re going.

3:12:55 Having a little bit of a mix of renewal and new assets.

3:12:59 And we in facilities, I’m very proud of what we’ve done in terms

3:13:03 of data.

3:13:04 We have far, far better data than we had five, six years ago,

3:13:08 and so we’re really making good decisions with data.

3:13:11 And I just have to say, too, from just a staff perspective,

3:13:16 collaborating with my colleagues on capital investment is a

3:13:19 pleasant experience.

3:13:20 Like, we work together and we try to make sure we deliver the

3:13:24 best value for our students.

3:13:26 And so I’m really, really proud of that.

3:13:29 And then, as I said, our capital allocation committee, we’re

3:13:33 meeting next week, and I believe Cindy’s planning to bring a

3:13:36 recommendation to the board on the 11th.

3:13:39 We incorporate that into the fiscal year ‘24 budget, and our

3:13:42 funding arrives in December and we get going.

3:13:45 And, Mr. Susan, that is the end.

3:13:47 Thank you, Ms. Hsu, and you did it in 15 minutes.

3:13:50 Really remarkably.

3:13:52 Thank you so much.

3:13:54 I’ll let the other board members go, but I did want to mention

3:13:56 to the board members,

3:13:57 Ms. Campbell had sent us an email in concerns with one of the

3:14:00 meetings I’d like to address here in a couple of minutes.

3:14:03 So if we can take five minutes at the end, but I’ll let you guys

3:14:06 all make your comments and I’ll make mine.

3:14:08 Anybody want to wish to speak ahead?

3:14:10 No.

3:14:11 No?

3:14:12 I just want to say thank you, Hsu.

3:14:15 I don’t think we praise our staff enough, and you are beyond a

3:14:19 wealth of knowledge.

3:14:21 It’s incredible, the scope that your job has, as well as your

3:14:25 staff.

3:14:26 Again, I know you’re not a one-woman show, as well as everyone

3:14:28 else sitting here.

3:14:29 Sorry, not trying to say you’re not important either.

3:14:32 But when you put these presentations on, it’s so impressive, and

3:14:35 I’m glad the committee gets to see the depth of your work

3:14:39 and how much goes into consideration every single day that you

3:14:42 do your job.

3:14:43 I don’t know how you turn your brain off at night when you’re

3:14:45 constantly pre-planning for the next three to five years,

3:14:48 but I appreciate you so, so very much.

3:14:50 Thank you.

3:14:51 Thank you, Ms. Jenkins.

3:14:52 Ms. Campbell?

3:14:54 I’m going to add mine as a big task.

3:14:57 I especially just want to appreciate and highlight slide seven,

3:15:00 which was the graph with the debt,

3:15:02 because I think that was just so important.

3:15:05 That kind of information was going around when we were having

3:15:08 the sales tax conversations,

3:15:09 especially in 2014, the first round, and even some in the second

3:15:11 round.

3:15:12 But that’s where we are where we are, and we can’t reduce our

3:15:15 debt payment.

3:15:16 We’ve reduced it by refinancing as much as we can, and I will be

3:15:20 so happy,

3:15:21 and I won’t be on the board then when we can get to – like the

3:15:24 debt is gone, right?

3:15:25 And I’m proud of this board for continuing to commit to build

3:15:29 debt free,

3:15:30 because we still have that $300 million hanging over our head.

3:15:33 But that graph was so important to explain why weren’t we fixing

3:15:37 air conditionings during that three- to four-year period.

3:15:39 We were literally just surviving.

3:15:42 And thankful these fires and chiller breaks didn’t happen at

3:15:44 that time,

3:15:45 but some of the reasons why we’re having the chiller breaks now

3:15:47 is because we weren’t able to maintain them.

3:15:49 So it’s really important information.

3:15:52 And I appreciate, too, the way the staff and the contractors you

3:15:55 guys work at,

3:15:56 because every time we do – and there may be a little wiggle

3:15:59 room budgeted into the projects,

3:16:01 but I love seeing when we have a sign-off that said, oh, we

3:16:04 budgeted this much, but it only costs this much,

3:16:06 so that’s $60,000 that gets back into the capital budget,

3:16:09 which I know you have a plan for once we get it back for fires

3:16:12 and lockers and things like that.

3:16:15 So thank you. This is very important information,

3:16:19 and I hope that the community paid attention this long to get to

3:16:23 see this important information.

3:16:26 Thank you, Ms. Campbell.

3:16:27 Ms. Wright.

3:16:28 I’m going to echo the sentiments of my fellow board members.

3:16:30 We appreciate you.

3:16:31 I mean, honestly, you are above and beyond.

3:16:33 Your team is amazing and very informative.

3:16:35 You were one of the very first people that I got to sit down

3:16:37 with and meet with,

3:16:38 and I walked away and I thought, I am so encouraged by the

3:16:41 wealth of knowledge that you have

3:16:42 when it comes to all things facilities, really.

3:16:45 So I appreciate you, and thank you for giving us this

3:16:48 presentation.

3:16:50 Thank you, Ms. Hsu.

3:16:51 I just wanted to mention, everybody, I think one of the dynamic

3:16:54 – oh, did you have something?

3:16:55 Go ahead.

3:16:56 I’m sorry, I looked over and I thought you didn’t.

3:16:58 Go ahead.

3:16:59 Again, thank you, but more than that, it gives us the background

3:17:04 knowledge when we visit our schools,

3:17:07 you know, of what’s going to be taken care of.

3:17:10 It solves the problem of us saying, I don’t know, I’ll look into

3:17:15 that, to just say, no, it’s on the list,

3:17:18 and we can get you some more information.

3:17:20 It just lets us tell our schools that, you know, we haven’t

3:17:23 forgotten about you.

3:17:24 You know, it’s just that things take time,

3:17:26 and we are going to be able to spend more of our efforts towards

3:17:30 the fixing up of things,

3:17:32 because that’s where we hear a lot of our concerns is, wait, you

3:17:35 forgot about us, you know,

3:17:36 and this just tells us, no, we have not, you know.

3:17:39 So thank you for all this.

3:17:42 So I just want to say thank you so much, Ms. Han.

3:17:45 A couple of things that I saw were some of the projects that we’ve

3:17:47 known about forever

3:17:48 that we’re needing to get to that you have on your list that we’re

3:17:51 trying to put this together.

3:17:53 So I think within the next six months we’ll probably put

3:17:55 something together in that scope of when these come on

3:17:58 in one, three, five-year kind of idea.

3:18:01 One of the things I wanted to say is just to put on the radar of

3:18:04 some of the board members

3:18:05 and some of the newly elected ones is that the pools inside of

3:18:08 our school district are a difficult situation.

3:18:12 I have this one individual that’s in the south part of the

3:18:14 county that does pool training,

3:18:17 and he pointed out a great point is that he feels that if we sat

3:18:20 down with the county with the –

3:18:23 what is the name of that workout place that they have that has a

3:18:27 pool inside of every one of them?

3:18:30 Is it LA Fitness?

3:18:31 LA Fitness has a pool, and they already train.

3:18:34 He trains them as a private individual, but he said they might

3:18:37 be open to letting us use that.

3:18:39 But I think that there’s an opportunity for us to sit down and

3:18:41 collaboratively discuss with many of our other entities,

3:18:45 both the cities and counties, on a one, three, five-year plan

3:18:48 for many of our things that we might be able to collaborate on.

3:18:51 To include the pools would be the number one because they can’t

3:18:54 get there,

3:18:55 but we’re already spending so much money to maintain these

3:18:57 things that there might be an opportunity to say,

3:19:00 “Hey, this is how much it might cost, this is how much we’re

3:19:03 spending,” just as a thought process for review,

3:19:05 and then do that in other areas.

3:19:07 So thank you, because I know we have talked about doing that and

3:19:09 stuff like that.

3:19:10 The other thing is I wanted to say thank you for the beach

3:19:12 volleyball.

3:19:13 That is the coolest thing in the world.

3:19:14 If you guys haven’t had a chance to get to any of those

3:19:16 competitions, it’s the first year, and we’re – you know what I

3:19:19 mean?

3:19:19 It’s some cool stuff going on.

3:19:21 And that’s it.

3:19:22 I just wanted to say thank you so much.

3:19:24 Thank you all.

3:19:25 Thank you.

3:19:26 One of the concerns Ms. Campbell was concerned about – and I

3:19:29 looked at it, and it’s a legitimate concern –

3:19:31 on the 24th, we have like literally Monday through Friday

3:19:34 meetings every day; right?

3:19:36 And I think that that was placed there as a, “Are we all

3:19:39 available?”

3:19:40 And we’re like, “Oh, yeah, we’ll be available,” but we didn’t

3:19:43 have on the other stuff.

3:19:44 So, Ms. Campbell, if you wanted to kind of mention where your

3:19:46 concerns were so that we can address them.

3:19:48 Yeah.

3:19:49 So the week of April 24th, if you want to look at your calendars,

3:19:52 we have scheduled now a nine-to-five workshop like we had last

3:19:55 Monday.

3:19:55 We have our regular board meeting day on the 25th, which starts

3:19:58 whenever it’s going to start and with whatever extra meetings

3:20:01 might be added.

3:20:02 We don’t have something on Wednesday.

3:20:04 We don’t, but I have SIAC on Wednesday, the 26th.

3:20:08 The 27th and 28th will be doing all-day superintendent

3:20:11 interviews.

3:20:12 And listen, I don’t have another job.

3:20:14 This is my only job.

3:20:16 But I can’t imagine – you know, honestly, my biggest concern is

3:20:20 I’m not sure that we’re going to have time to do this job

3:20:23 if we have all these back-to-back-to-back-to-back.

3:20:26 And we – our very most important work that week is the hiring

3:20:29 – is the interviews for the new superintendent.

3:20:32 So I would just suggest – can we just take off the 24th and if

3:20:36 we need – if we get through these other all-day things that we’ve

3:20:39 scheduled

3:20:39 over the next few weeks and we feel like we still need another

3:20:41 one that we can push that back to May,

3:20:43 I don’t think there’s anything so urgent that we’ve got to get

3:20:45 it done that week.

3:20:46 I think the concern is the 24th.

3:20:49 I think that we can give Tammy an opportunity to send out

3:20:52 another Google poll –

3:20:53 Doodle poll so that we can see about that.

3:20:55 I’ll have her add the month of May.

3:20:57 And then we’ll go – the concern that we have is, is that we –

3:21:00 many of the policies we have to go to review.

3:21:02 But the good thing is, is that many of the policies that we’re

3:21:05 about to come up on have been reviewed and already updated,

3:21:09 and they’re not in that crisis-type situation.

3:21:11 So I think that we’re going to be in a good place.

3:21:14 So I’ll do two things.

3:21:15 One, I’ll ask Tammy to add the month of May and some of the

3:21:18 other opportunities.

3:21:19 We’ll cancel off that 24th.

3:21:21 That’s a good point.

3:21:22 And then I think the other thing I’ll do is, is have – I’ll do

3:21:24 an evaluation of how many of the policies

3:21:26 that were coming into the next couple sections are actually not

3:21:29 updated within the last five years

3:21:30 to give us an idea of how long, because we may be able to move

3:21:32 through it quicker.

3:21:33 And you make a good point.

3:21:34 So I just wanted to say that.

3:21:35 Is that good?

3:21:36 Thank you.

3:21:37 I appreciate that.

3:21:38 Thank you.

3:21:39 My family thanks you.

3:21:40 All right.

3:21:41 With that, I think we have an opportunity to take a break, and I’ll

3:21:42 see you guys back at 5.30.

3:21:43 Thank you very much.

3:22:13 [ Applause ]