Updates on the Fight for Quality Public Education in Brevard County, FL
11:28 [ Music ]
11:58 » Good afternoon.
12:01 The September 10th work session is now in order.
12:03 Call roll call, please.
12:08 » Mr. Season.
12:09 » Here.
12:10 » Ms. Wright.
12:11 » Here.
12:12 » Ms. Campbell.
12:13 » Here.
12:14 » Mr. Thomas.
12:15 » Here.
12:16 » Mr. Tran.
12:17 » Here.
12:18 » Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.
12:19 » I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of
12:20 America and to the republic
12:20 for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with
12:21 liberty and justice for all.
12:21 » I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of
12:22 America and to the republic for
12:22 which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with
12:23 liberty and justice for all.
12:23 » I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of
12:24 America and to the republic for
12:24 which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with
12:29 liberty and justice for all.
12:32 » Dr. Undell, can you please speak to the board about the item
12:37 on today’s agenda?
12:38 » Thank you, Mr. Chair.
12:40 What we’re going to do is a short presentation on the fiscal
12:45 year ‘26-‘27 budget, the final
12:48 budget that will be up for approval tonight at the business
12:51 meeting.
12:52 So you have a PowerPoint presentation in front of you, and it’s
12:55 also on the screen.
12:56 In all honesty and all fairness, this is Sue Hans, PowerPoint,
13:00 and I’m going to do my best
13:02 to do it justice.
13:03 Sue is on a well-deserved vacation right now, hopefully not
13:07 checking her e-mails, not checking
13:09 her cell phone, not checking on the board workshop or anything
13:13 like that.
13:14 Hopefully she’s on a mountain bike trail somewhere.
13:18 So a couple things that Sue likes to start off with, so we will
13:21 as well, is to talk about
13:23 our big successes.
13:25 Obviously, an A-rated district, we’ve talked about that quite a
13:28 bit.
13:28 Highest graduation rate ever last year, 92.7 percent.
13:32 100 percent dedicated, I think all of our employees would agree.
13:35 And we do view everything as investments in our future and not
13:39 just expenditures.
13:41 So I think that’s her tagline there.
13:44 A couple things to just review, A-rated district for the third
13:47 consecutive year, 41 of 86 schools
13:51 are A-rated.
13:52 When she prepared the slide, we hadn’t gotten the results for
13:55 two of our schools had eyes,
13:56 but they didn’t get A, so it’s 41 of 86 A-rated, an increase of
14:00 11 schools over the previous
14:01 year.
14:02 Seventy-nine percent of our schools are in ARB.
14:05 And then we’ve talked about these great testing results over the
14:08 last few years, especially
14:10 last year, Banner year, ELA scores rose in all grade, all eight
14:14 grade levels, 6 percent
14:16 in third grade, math scores in seven of eight, 3 percent overall.
14:20 Science and social studies each increased 4 percent overall
14:23 across all grades.
14:24 In fact, in science it was 4 percent in every, in fifth, eighth,
14:28 and biology.
14:29 And we mentioned the graduation rate, college and career rate in
14:32 this rate of 77 percent,
14:34 or 75 percent, and the middle school acceleration of 77 percent.
14:37 Definitely a high level of success, as Sue notes in her little
14:40 red box there.
14:41 You know, we are doing very well in student achievement, and
14:44 that is the, you know, that’s
14:46 the main function of a school district, so doing some good stuff.
14:50 Now, financially, we are audited quite a bit.
14:54 How we spend the money is audited, examined in numerous
14:58 different ways.
15:00 And our audits have shown that we spend the money appropriately.
15:04 We have definitely been spending the money appropriately.
15:06 However, as is noted there in a couple of the bullets, we were
15:10 spending a little bit
15:11 more than we were bringing in the last couple of years in
15:14 dipping into our savings account
15:16 or our fund balance.
15:18 Now, we can’t continue to do that.
15:19 There are rules that say you have to maintain a certain fund
15:22 balance.
15:24 3% is our board policy, 2% is the state statute
15:28 and regulations.
15:29 And so we have to change some practices
15:31 and make sure we spend within our means, so to speak.
15:35 And the budget that is, before your final approval tonight,
15:38 does that, which draws us back to a good fund balance of 3%.
15:42 And actually, it will be higher, I think,
15:44 when we close out the year at the end of next year.
15:49 Yeah, so a couple of highlights about the budget.
15:52 A 3% general fund balance, probably more than that.
15:56 Capital transfer is similar to what we’ve
15:58 done in the last couple of years.
15:59 So we are allowed to pay for some operating costs out
16:01 of capital, stuff that’s associated with capital.
16:03 So we’ll do some more of that.
16:06 When we prepared the budget, we only
16:07 counted sales surtax from the half cent sales surtax
16:11 through December.
16:12 We did not budget for it after December,
16:15 because we don’t know if it’ll be renewed or not.
16:17 We were very hopeful it will be renewed.
16:20 So that’s reflected in the budget.
16:22 We do have personnel reductions that we have
16:26 planned to make and have made.
16:29 That will result in about 15% decrease in labor costs.
16:33 But we have to manage this throughout the year.
16:36 So that’s what this operating expense managerial control–
16:39 there are some things that we’re doing
16:40 to make sure we watch our expenses as we go through.
16:43 For example, out of county travel
16:44 is reviewed at the cabinet level.
16:48 We’ve talked with our schools about reducing
16:50 their substitute costs.
16:52 And for the last two years, actually, we’ve
16:54 been trying to reduce over time.
16:55 We’ve done pretty good at that.
16:56 So we have to just continue that.
16:58 No major changes from the budget that
17:00 was prepared and presented to you and approved back in July.
17:07 So tonight, at the board meeting,
17:09 there are some things that we’re going to do.
17:11 And this is the standard things that we do at this budget
17:14 meeting in September.
17:15 I’ll read a short statement about the millage rates.
17:18 We’ll have a public hearing on the millage rates
17:20 and the proposed budget.
17:22 And then we’ll ask you to adopt the proposed millage rates
17:24 and adopt the budget, and then authorize
17:27 transmittal of those adopted items to various entities.
17:33 So a couple of things about the millage rates.
17:35 This is something I’m going to try to explain.
17:37 If we can all follow along, hopefully I’ll do a good job.
17:43 The first column there are the proposed millage rates
17:46 for this budget.
17:47 So the proposed required local effort would be 3.054 mills.
17:53 That’s actually given to us by the state, that figure.
17:57 That is not in our control, so that’s the number, 3.05 mills.
18:01 The discretionary operating is 0.748.
18:05 Capital L.A. is 1.5.
18:06 And the voter approved millage is 1.0 for a total
18:10 of 3.248 mills.
18:17 So the rollback rate, the difference
18:20 there is, if you look at the rollback
18:24 rate for the required local effort is 3.0184.
18:28 Discretionary operating is 0.7373.
18:31 Capital L.A. 1.4786 mills.
18:33 And the additional voter approved millage
18:35 would only be 9.9858 for a total there of 3.2017
18:40 when you combine the 3.0184, the 3.2017, it comes to 6.2001.
18:47 When you combine our proposed millage rate of 3.054
18:53 for the RLE and then the locals, it’s 6.302 mills.
18:57 So our proposed millage rates are slightly higher
19:01 than the rollback rates.
19:03 So it’s a 0.0819 mill difference, 1.32% difference.
19:10 So the column on the left is the millage rates
19:14 we’ll be proposing for approval tonight.
19:17 And in reality, we really don’t have much control over those.
19:19 Those are the ones that basically dictated
19:21 to us by the state.
19:23 The rollback rates are basically what
19:26 we would charge if we wanted to maintain level funding
19:31 to bring in the same amount of revenue that the property
19:33 values earned us last year.
19:36 As you can see, even the required local effort is more.
19:40 The 3.0584 is more than what the rollback rate is.
19:46 But any time we ask you to approve an overall millage
19:52 rate that is higher than the rollback rate,
19:54 we have to declare that and share that with the public.
19:57 So that’s why we talk about the rollback rate
19:59 and the proposed millage rates today and tonight
20:03 when we do the budget approval.
20:06 Any questions on this before we go?
20:09 Mrs. Campbell understands it better than anybody.
20:11 Not really, not really.
20:13 The rollback rate is something that frustrates me.
20:15 But I would just say, even though we have to–
20:17 because it’s higher, we have to call this a tax increase,
20:20 even though the millage rate, the RLE, everything
20:23 goes down a little bit.
20:25 And we’re still required to say this is a tax increase.
20:28 But unlike some of the cities, there
20:30 are cities who occasionally adopt the rollback rate.
20:33 But we are actually not allowed to do that.
20:35 So I want to make that point, because by statute,
20:38 if we don’t do what the legislature told us to do,
20:40 which is use the 3.054, then we don’t
20:44 get the rest of our funding.
20:45 Correct, they can withhold some of the funding.
20:47 Right.
20:48 So I just want to make that point for the world who
20:50 might be listening.
20:50 We don’t have the option of doing
20:52 what some of the cities in the county
20:53 would do by adopting the rollback rate as our RLE.
20:58 Mr. Chair, on your previous slide,
21:04 you had mentioned about the sales surtax
21:07 and that you were only figuring into the budget through December.
21:09 Yes.
21:10 Can you just elaborate?
21:12 I mean, if somebody– if you were an outsider watching this,
21:14 you’d say, OK, we’re going to pass the budget.
21:16 They’re going to be able to operate without the sales
21:17 surtax.
21:18 So I’d just like you to elaborate a little bit on how
21:20 important the sales surtax is to our operations.
21:24 Yeah, so the bulk of the money from the sales surtax
21:26 goes towards maintaining our buildings.
21:28 13 million square feet of facilities.
21:30 So we really do need that money to keep our buildings
21:34 operating.
21:35 Air conditioning systems repaired and replaced.
21:38 Roofs repaired and replaced.
21:40 All the business side of the house
21:43 is supplemental funding from the sales surtax.
21:46 And so yes, we can prepare to operate without it.
21:50 But a lot fewer capital projects would be done without that.
21:54 And the bulk of it is maintenance
21:57 of our existing facilities.
21:58 So it’d be deferred maintenance or not getting done at all
22:01 if we didn’t have the sales–
22:01 Correct.
22:02 Yeah, it would be–
22:03 when stuff breaks, we might not be able to fix it.
22:06 Thank you.
22:07 And for clarification purposes on the sales surtax,
22:09 just want to mention this, because we are such
22:12 a tourist-heavy city, county.
22:15 This is a way that some of the tourism dollars
22:17 can come to us, because that half-cent sales
22:19 surtax is shared amongst anybody who’s purchasing things.
22:22 So for the residents that are out there thinking
22:24 this is a tax for our local residents,
22:26 that’s not necessarily true.
22:27 This is actually a way that tourism helps our school
22:29 system, because they share in contributing dollars there.
22:32 So just want to clarify that.
22:33 Yeah, absolutely.
22:34 This is a way for our visitors to contribute to our economy,
22:37 to contribute to our revenue.
22:39 Some of our neighbors yield a much larger amount,
22:43 because they have more tourists.
22:44 For example, Orange County yields a lot
22:46 on their sales surtax for capital.
22:49 And a lot of it’s from their visitors.
22:51 So definitely.
22:52 And I also want to thank our district, because we’ve
22:55 been putting out videos on our social media
22:56 that talk about where that sales surtax comes to the district
22:59 and what we’re using those dollars for.
23:01 And we talk about maintenance, but there’s other things
23:05 that they’re used for as well.
23:06 So I just encourage all the people that are out there
23:08 watching these, go onto Facebook, go onto social media,
23:11 look at what Brevard County Schools is doing,
23:13 because you’ll see some really amazing pictures
23:15 and tangible things that you can look at and say, hey,
23:17 these are what these dollars are actually going into.
23:20 So the next slide is something that I
23:23 feel is very important for the public to see and know.
23:27 This is the rates, the millage rates,
23:30 over the last several years.
23:32 And you can see the millage rates actually declining.
23:35 The dark blue is really what is the state required
23:40 local effort.
23:41 And as you can see, the state has
23:42 been reducing the required local effort ever since 2016.
23:47 And so part of that’s because property values
23:51 have been increasing.
23:53 So being a conservative state, we
23:55 don’t want to overtax our citizens, our residents.
23:58 So they’ve reduced the actual tax rate
24:01 that required local effort over the last several years.
24:04 Now, the 1.5 capital outlay and the basic discretionary
24:09 stay static.
24:11 We do that every year.
24:12 That’s what all the districts do, the same amount.
24:14 But the state generated or state required local effort
24:18 there has decreased over the years
24:20 as property values have increased.
24:23 And our voters approved that additional 1.0 property mill
24:28 four years ago.
24:28 And as you can see, that makes up a big difference.
24:32 If you look at fiscal year ‘27, the overall millage rate
24:37 that we’re asking to be approved tonight is 6.302.
24:40 And if you go backwards in time, you’ve
24:43 got to go all the way back to 2019
24:47 to see a millage rate even close to that.
24:50 So really, the tax rate has been lowered over all these years.
24:56 The reason we still have to characterize it
24:57 as a tax increase is because property values have increased.
25:02 So the tax rate is actually decreasing.
25:04 For example, the tax rate for the budget
25:09 we’re asking you to approve tonight for the millage 6.302
25:12 is less than the millage rate last year, 6.310.
25:18 So even though it’s technically an increase in taxes,
25:20 as Ms. Campbell pointed out, our tax rate
25:23 that we’re asking you to approve is actually lower.
25:26 So you can see just the change in trajectory.
25:32 And to Mr. Thomas’s point with the sales surtax,
25:38 you can see the importance of the 1.0 voter approved
25:41 millage, the amount of revenue that it makes up
25:45 for what was the tax rate all the way back to 2019.
25:52 So the budget summary, this is all funds.
25:55 This is what we’ll be asking you to approve tonight
25:57 as fiscal year ‘27 budget.
25:59 You can see the general fund budget is about $823 million.
26:02 Debt service fund, $36 million.
26:04 Capital projects, $408 million.
26:06 Special revenue funds, $149 million.
26:09 And internal service funds, $129 million
26:11 for a total of $1.54 billion, $1.55 billion.
26:16 That’s actually a reduction from last year’s budget.
26:19 It’s a reduction of $79 million from last year’s budget,
26:22 almost 5%.
26:24 So as we have seen a slight decline in enrollment,
26:29 that’s a decline in revenue then.
26:30 We’re right sizing the budget.
26:33 So this is actually us being fiscally responsible.
26:36 This budget is $79 million shorter, fewer, lighter,
26:40 skinnier than last year’s budget.
26:44 So some things that we have to do, though, moving forward
26:47 is to continue to monitor our expenditures
26:50 to make sure that we’re staying again within our means.
26:53 So we’ve put in place a lot of controls
26:55 in budgeting and finance and just in our operations
26:58 in general just to make sure we’re monitoring these funds.
27:00 For example, I mentioned substitutes earlier.
27:03 That’s an area we spent $5 million over budget last year
27:07 in substitutes.
27:08 So we can’t do that.
27:09 So we’re putting a lot of checks and balances in place
27:13 to make sure we don’t do that.
27:16 Going to a shared services model in some places,
27:18 property sales are on there.
27:20 There’s some vacant property that we’re not using.
27:22 We don’t have any plans on using,
27:24 so we’re going to sell that.
27:25 This is more capital revenue.
27:28 Just all of the things on this sheet you’ve seen before,
27:31 and these are the things that we’re committed to do
27:33 throughout the year this year.
27:36 And then we do have a TAN, a tax anticipation note,
27:42 on the agenda for September 22nd.
27:45 That’s an additional funding revenue source
27:47 for kind of like a bridge loan.
27:50 We do have on the agenda for tonight
27:52 the 2026 financial audit report, annual financial report,
27:57 rather, and the 2026 final budget amendments
27:59 to close out fiscal year 2026.
28:03 And we do have sales for tax and millage renewal upcoming.
28:07 That’s it.
28:08 - Thank you, Dr. O’Melony.
28:10 Board members, you discussed some of these items?
28:14 Any budget discussion?
28:16 No?
28:16 Everybody’s good?
28:18 Just so everybody knows, I moved the public speaking
28:24 to the board off-site.
28:26 We can add it to the next upcoming meeting,
28:29 but I thought it was more appropriate there.
28:31 Reason for doing so is that we have one, possibly two,
28:35 more board members coming on.
28:36 And I thought that it was appropriate to have them
28:39 be a part of the discussion eventually,
28:40 but I thought having that discussion in the off-site
28:42 would be good there.
28:43 You guys want to add it to the next one
28:45 at the off-site for the–
28:47 - I’d prefer to do it at a regular work session.
28:50 Just so it’s– because it’s normally broadcast live stream.
28:53 And I think that’s of public interest.
28:55 People will want to see it.
28:56 - Sounds good to me.
28:57 - Everybody else OK?
28:59 - To the 22nd?
29:00 - Yeah, you can have it.
29:01 - Yeah, she’s having–
29:02 I talked to Ling about it, and she’s
29:04 having difficulty with the agenda on here.
29:06 - She had it fixed.
29:07 - Yeah, she had it fixed.
29:09 - So it’s the 22nd that’s coming?
29:10 - Yeah, yeah, yeah.
29:11 - All right, thank you.
29:12 - All right, we’re good?
29:15 Everybody else?
29:16 Any important other reports?
29:19 All right, meeting’s over.
29:21 Oh, Dr. Ndak.
29:23 - Just want to remind the board that at the conclusion
29:25 of this work session, we were going
29:26 to go into a closed session to look at some memo use.
29:56 [MUSIC PLAYING]