Gee, things seemed to go so well without me last time, I wonder if I’m welcome back at the table. We’ll see. It DID seem to take you a long time to get through a 20 minute agenda, though, so that says to me that I’m not the cause of your late nights.

NON-AGENDA ITEMS:

1.0  Nothing New on Capital Project: I met with the Parent Connections group last Monday and they were very supportive. Barb did a presentation for the PTA the week before and they were as well. I may try to have a small flier for your perusal if I get time to prepare it before Tuesday’s meeting. Barb brought one in that Seneca Falls used and recommended it. I will put on agenda portion committee work on the November 10 presentation - to try to get it in the newspaper again.

2.0  CBO: Larry Driscoll has visited each school and has a meeting scheduled for Wednesday morning with the actual office staffs of each school to try to establish workflow. I spoke with Randy Bos at a different meeting this morning and he IS gung-ho about this. We both agreed we’d like to steal Gary Alger and put him in charge of it even if it’s only our two schools. I’m working on some estimates of my own to share with Randy if the three way thing doesn’t work.

3.0  Distance Learning: Been to the meetings, headed for some more. Between the Nozzolio money and the Grant, we WILL have a distance learning lab in September with or without a capital project. Dave Hubman will be representing us at the scheduling sessions, as he is the party most familiar with our timetable and student needs.

4.0  BOCES Board election: You’ll note on the attached that your change of schedule last time to accommodate BOCES need was fruitless, as the candidate you voted for ( the only one I heard anything from) was NOT elected. FYI.

5.0  Leadership Seminar last Friday was attended by Barb Quinn, Nancy Galusha (as VP of RFA), Tom Riley and me. Rick Bley joined us for much of the day as he was the only one in attendance from Midlakes. We did well representing such a little fishy in such a BIG pond. Thanks, Tom, for making the time. This is an issue which RCS will need to face in the future and you might as well recognize the problem now, so you’re prepared. Bonnie Saunders’ rumor has it that Waterloo is interested in the CBO as a first step to annexing Romo, and I’m sure that if and when I leave, someone will question the need to replace the superintendent at the smallest school in 8 counties. With the market shaping up the way it is ( there are only 12 applicants for East Syracuse Minoa’s superintendent opening) little schools are going to have a harder and harder time keeping people from fleeing to the higher paying jobs - teachers and administrators. There’s a potential legislative issue for you - insuring equity for small rural and urban districts in getting good people to work there.

6.0  OSHA Inspector Ray Sharp showed up on our doorstep Wednesday morning and we are under review. We haven’t been inspected by OSHA since 1991, and the fella who did it then has been asked to leave their offices for incompetence, according to his replacement. This will occupy our time for several days over the next month, and there may be some financial consequences to some of his findings. We’ll have to wait and see what they are. Thanks heavens we did that EPA work in the bus garage when we did. ( Wonder if OSHA’s been to dad’s garage yet, Mike)

7.0  XEROX wants to interview some of us about Docushare. They’re sending a crew out to BOCES on Tuesday to talk with Jack McCabe and others and they want to see a school where it’s being used. That’s us. See your bulletin board. Anybody want to fill in for Mike? They’d like to see somebody at home accessing the info from the school in your BOE collection. This is apparently for non-TV commercial use - a video clip for presentations, promos, demonstrations, etc.. Talk about on the edge....

8.0  2080 hour employee grievance avoidance. See attached memo(s) outlining a recent action and redaction regarding pay for snow days and this group of 8 employees. Brent Cooley says we’d lose the grievance if we fought it- so we’ll wait for a different day. Share this with you FYI and so that you can see I don’t say yes to everything ( at least not lightly).

9.0  Mellonkopf Letter distributed last time may be an issue this time out - we’ll see who shows up. I did put staffing wish list on the agenda to share with you in public session. Remember names are to be kept out of public discussions - in case some audience shows up to support Ida May Elliott. As I explained to Mrs. Mellonkopf- Ida May resigned; we did not seek that, encourage it, or look to eliminate her position. BUT when faced with the opportunity to not fill a slot, in this day and age, we need to ask ourselves to consider alternatives. I am not re-issuing you this letter, but ask that you remember that you did receive it last time.

10.0  County Wide Drug Survey: FYI our 6-12th graders will be asked to participate in a drug use survey on Tuesday morning ( quiet please), along with similar groups in all three other Districts in the county. This will be the 3rd time Romulus has participated in this every-three-year event. Longitudinal data will provide us with ammunition for services for kids and families, and a sense of how the “War of Drugs” is going locally compared to nationally. Tobacco Coalition of the Finger Lakes is funding a special tobacco insert which I’m curious to see. We have had a spate of smoking suspensions this year ( It’s easier for Mike to hide in the bushes than it was for Rick - he’s shorter and his nose isn’t as big). National data on teen smoking shows a dramatic increase.

11.0  Tax Collection seems to continue to go smoothly. Alice will be away the first week in November, and her sister Janet Alger will be covering for her for a day or two. We will have final numbers for you by mid-November when the books go back to the county for collection of unpaids.

12.0  Homecoming Weekend was marvelous! As Mike will tell you in his report certain staff went far above and beyond the call of duty in making this a very busy and exciting weekend for our kids. Dave Hubman, Allen Gelatt, Jeff Felice and Bob Ike stand out in my mind, along with Mike himself ( who continues to do an excellent job every day).

AGENDA ITEMS:

1.0  Jeff Felice and the seniors would like to break tradition in Romo - a dangerous thing to do- by having all blue gowns at graduation. ( We usually gender discriminate on attire for commencement with boys in blue and girls in white). I see no harm in change, and am thankful to be asked about it. Your thoughts are what they’re after. 5 minutes, tops. ( I hope you have better things to concern yourselves with- God forbid we turn into one of THOSE boards!)

2.0  Audit Report was distributed in last meeting’s backup material. PLEASE BRING IT ALONG - we will not have spare copies ( we have to pay for them). Please also consider leaving your copy with Leanne and me IF you do not want it. Spare copies of previous year’s reports are always at a premium around here. I expect Jack to say I told you so.... Heavily reliant on our treasurer, with little or no backup, we did miss Kay when she left, yadda, yadda, yadda. I’ve covered this with you before and I don’t expect Jack will surprise you or me at the meeting. Remember to look at the five year tracing of our fund balance - budget time is coming up. I expect Jack will take a half-hour or so.

3.0  Minutes, warrants etc., - ask away!

4.0  Acceptance of the Audit Report needs to be done at an open meeting and a copy of the resolution doing so needs to be forwarded to Albany, and a summary of same printed in our favorite paper.

5.0  Bond Counsel for the anticipated borrowing after a successful vote, also needs to be appointed.

6.0  Committee assignments for Public Presentation on Capital Project for 11/10. This is YOUR school - these are YOUR proposed improvements - YOU sell it! How about Gym: Mike and Tom; Auditorium; Anne and Cornelia; and Distance Learning: Rhonda, Laurie and Norm? Say it out loud with Lori Thillman at the meeting and it might get printed in the Finger Lakes Times. These are suggestions only, and you guys can dicker around with who wants to do what all you want. If I get time to do the brochure idea, we’ll also tie that in here and give a sample to Lori. Thanks for your indulgence.

7.0  Discussion of Staffing “Needs” for 1999-2000 (scary to see that year in print!). As a partial response to the Mellonkopf letter and in preparation for the discussions of budget which will ensue shortly, I wanted to bring to your attention in the public eye, the issues we may face around added staffing in the near future.

First on the list is Pre-K. As you know, the State is shifting away from the program we currently run, and allowing all Districts ( eventually - based on need as determined by %age of free and reduced lunch) to run aided pre-K programs. Remember our scare last year, when Senator Nozzolio was called upon to assure us of this year’s funding? We cut the “double-budgeting” for this program when Stuart Mattey was here. If we don’t get the money in grant form next year - you will need to make a choice about either cutting the program or offering it at taxpayer expense. The grant has been around $99,000 - but we haven’t heard confirmation of this year’s award yet, let alone our status for next year. From this we pay a teacher salary and fringe, an aide’s salary and fringe, transportation, food for the non-free and reduced lunch kids, materials, supplies and equipment. Until this year we also paid Ida May’s salary as a home-school coordinator, which was increased considerably when we put Head Start in place and never decreased after it left us. It would be a shame for us to lose this program because the State is ironically making it available to everyone else. However, $100K alone would be 5% on the tax levy. We have consequently gone slowly on Ida May’s replacement and have left the position unfilled to date. Why hire someone to lay them off in June if we cut the whole program? Why flesh out the program if it’s in danger of being eliminated or shifted to the tax burden? ( Shift less if you have to at all).

Second on the list is 1/2 time math. We replaced Ray Fox’s teaching duties 1/2 time this year and will need to expand that position over the next two years or drastically alter our program. We do not force all kids into one-year courses in Regents math, but instead offer year and a half options to those kids who need more time to grasp harder math concepts. This is the area we need to expand into. As the State puts a third year of math into the new graduation requirements, all schools will be advertising for math teachers. Not much of a choice here, maybe only one of time and the degree of part-time status we move to and how quickly. Cost from part-time to full-time +@$15,000.

Third on the list is a school social worker. With Ida May’s departure, Barb and I have discussed the desirability of adding a certified social worker to our staff. We run many groups for kids who have problems and our psychologist is often consumed with only special ed caseload and mandatory counseling. We contract with the county for a day and a half of drug-prevention counseling and could look to use the grant money which currently pays for this ( about $4K) to help fund a social worker instead. IF we continue to get the grant for Pre-K we could use some of that as well. This would be an addition to staff, however, at an added cost somewhere along the line. I would suggest that the person have K-12 responsibilities and be of assistance to all of our kids and families in need. Approximate cost of $35,000 plus fringe ( $45,000 or more total).

Lastly for tonight is consideration of additional time in Romulus for Sally Covert in School -to- Work. We currently share Sally 50-50 with Seneca Falls and draw BOCES aid on her salary - total @ $40K, our half = $20K, and we get 2/3 of that back to net out at @$8,000. She is highly used here and underused in Seneca Falls currently. I would like to explore sharing her 80/20 with BOCES, allowing us to still draw aid on her salary, increase her time from 2 1/2 days per week to 4, and still netting out at a reasonable $11,200. For $3,200 net we’d get a significant increase in staffing in this area.

These are discussion items only at this point - letting you and John Q. Public know that we’re thinking ahead about the needs of the kids in this District. Any/ all of these are added costs that would chew into our ability to keep taxes down with the breakage we gain on last year’s retirements.

8.0  Updates from Barb and Mike will include the approval of the Honor Society Trip dates in April of this year.

9.0  I’ll give you the read on SDM and the issues they are contemplating.

10.0  Shaking the bush has given us some names to approve as substitutes in various areas - all of which are badly needed.

11.0  And we have most of our winter sports covered....

12.0  CSE Minutes will round out the evening, unless you have executive material.

There it is. My guess is closer to ten tonight. What the heck - the World Series is over.

CM/CM

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