District audit, revenue limit among items covered at January school board

Choosing to skip the February board conversation that otherwise takes place the third Monday of the month at the high school, the Stanley- Boyd Board of Education will next meet February 21 at 6:30 p.m.

When it does, it could have company. LHB of Superior has been invited by the school district to appear February 21, after it was previously chosen as architect for the school remodel earlier last year of classroom space.

With 43,420 square feet to work with in the elementary portion and nearby, there’s still a lot to do. But while details are still out on just what a remodel will look like, there is one sentence description: less but larger classrooms, as updated by Superintendent Jeff Koenig at last month’s board meeting.

Currently housed in the space to be remod- BOARD UPDATE

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eled are 15 first through third grade classrooms along with eight fourth to fifth grade classrooms, and an assortment of other rooms, including for storage. The current size of the classrooms in question is 900 square feet, while art and music take up 1,200 square feet each. Group Learning and kindergarten space in the current (pre-remodel) order of things take up 1,000 square feet a piece.

With February scheduled for “Programming and Block Plans” on the two-year building itinerary for the project, the next step to tentatively look for by early March is Board approval on the project’s overall scope, followed with design and construction documents from late March through early November and periodic owner, CESA, and PEER Review of the project as this takes place. Should everything go well, the project would then pass to board approval and a contract in December to January, with review submittal and ordering of materials.

The remodel would be paid for with money from district savings, thereby avoiding a need for referendum. Demolition of the existing space would ostensibly take two weeks in the summer of 2023, with construction then following. But with much to do before anything concrete takes form as to remodeling classroom space, there was plenty else covered at the January school board meeting.

“Some thought we weren’t doing enough, others that we were doing too much,” district superintendent Jeff Koenig reported to the board as he shared that official enrollment in the district had dropped following COVID-era protocols as families had open enrolled out. The FTE (full-time enrollment) headcount used for aid calculations by the state dropped by 8.6 as of January’s count, the actual headcount itself being 1065. Enrollment to determine funding is taken on a three-year rolling average, meaning that one bad year can have an outsizing effect on how much money the district receives from outside, to the tune of $10,000 per student. Preschoolers and 4K are three-fifths or sixty percent of a person for state accounting purposes on school aid.

In the meantime, the current revenue limit (by which the school district is limited in local levy funds by the state unless it goes to referendum) remains in place, with Stanley-Boyd among those receiving less than most at $10,000 per student. Thorp is set at the same amount of aid per student, while Cadott just west is at $12,000 a student. The numbers, which were supposed to be part of a temporary fix back in the 1994 and based on district spending as it existed then, have remained in place some three decades later.

“I say this entirely in jest but maybe we need to do what businesses are doing and have a sign-on bonus if they stay,” board member Lanse Carlson said of enrollment in the district. Legal efforts are underway to get the revenue limit math fixed on a statewide scale, but these haven’t been successful just yet.

As to attendance at the WASB Convention by board members meanwhile, it didn’t happen this year, with COVID numbers influencing the decision to stay away. Also covered at the January board meeting were the first readings for the School Wellness Policy and Student Scholarship and Awards TES Program Eligibility Activities.

Regarding School Wellness, the Board of Education went on record as supporting, “the health and well-being of the District’s students by promoting nutrition and physical activity at all grade levels.” As such and pursuant to federal law, board policy for School Wellness seeks to “provide students access to healthy foods and beverages” along with providing “opportunities for developmentally appropriate physical activity” and nutrition education, finally requiring that all meals served by the District “meet of exceed the federal nutritional guidelines issued” by the USDA, or U.S. Department of Agriculture.

As to TES Scholarship Program Eligibility Activities, changes remove references to September 1, 2017 as start date, based on the amount of time passed since then.

With a second reading for the Equal Opportunity for Employment and Board Reimbursement Policy listed in the consent agenda, a string of policy reviews was also highlighted, including Academic Career Planning, Early Admission Policy, Food Service Management, Fund Balance, and Grading Systems. Also included in the consent agenda under policy review were documents related to evaluation of professional staff, graduation requirements, open enrollment, parent engagement policy, and student scholarships and awards.

As to the district audit report, a few items came up for mention, some routine and others not so routine.

As to the routine ones was an annual one stipulating that the district’s accounting should have another person for added accountability (it has two), while noting that a third person wasn’t feasible in staff terms for a small district.

As to the less routine, inaccurate mileage reports came up for mention, with mileage to addresses online not matching that kept by the school. A log book will be kept in the bus garage, while the audit also recommended the district keeping source documents that haven’t been.

Finally, there was heating to consider, as the school’s boiler had a life of its own, switching on and off at random times. The board approved recommended repairs to the tune of $63,645 using ESSR II money, being further defined as federal money sourced through the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund from the COVID era.

Repairs to the boiler meanwhile, will wait until after the heating season is over, just in case something goes wrong. Having a temperamental boiler, is better than none at all.

Following the meeting, the school board went into closed session to conduct a regular superintendent evaluation, under 19.85 (1)(c) of Wisconsin state law. But shifting back to remodel news?

“There is nothing new to report at this time,” Koenig related upon paper staff followup from the January school board meeting and architectural plans.

The above building was built in 1905 to house the Miller-Meyer Implement Company. Today, the building is occupied by the Grace Community Bible Church. For a good number of years it housed the South Side Chevy garage.