June 29, 2026 Board of Education Meeting
Good evening, everyone. We are now resuming the 06/29/2026 special meeting of the Croton-Harmon Union Group School District. We called to order. We approved the agenda. We then entered into executive session. We left executive session at 06:17PM. We are now moving into item 2.1, which is a presentation regarding the fund balance and reserves. And I will turn it over to assistant superintendent for business and finance. Denise, Karen, you're going.
So a part of our end of year fiscal cycle is the board approving reserve allocations for the end of year. So tonight, that is occurring. So this is a preliminary report just to show how that connects with our overall fiscal strategy. We'll begin by addressing both how the how both the components and the configuration of fund balance are critical to our process and at the core of the district's fiscal management plan. A stable foundation. So a a stable fund balance project a stable fund balance provides a financial buffer for the district for unforeseen shortfalls in revenue spikes in enrollment spikes in expenditures. Our strategic reserves are systematically secured so that they are aligned with the expectations as far as liability and future performance of the school. And then lastly, we have the mandatory compliance with the 4% reserve. We'll start off with the current year activity. This is what you would call your p and l. We take our this is a very simplified version. You take your revenues minus your expenses, and you come up with your current year profit and loss. So this shows that we have a a positive revenue balance for this year. To get our year end fund balance, and these, again, are these are projections. These are based on our May projections. We take our beginning fund balance as of 07/01/2025 and the current year profit or loss, which is the $3.46 $0.28 to get your projected ending fund balance. So that's what we're looking at. That also includes some of the changes that we'll be approving tonight.
Denise, just to make clear, that 25,000,000 plus is not the unappropriated fund balance. It is all reserves and fund balances that we will be talking about.
Thank you, Neal. Okay. So this is basically a visual representation of fund balance. We have the big and I'm gonna go back to this. So just stay with me here. I do not take any responsibility for the names of these things because they are probably the most confusing names that you can. I tried to limit some of the confusing pieces. But that big black chunk, that eighteen five thirty eight three one seven, those are our restricted reserves. Those reserves are legally earmarked for a particular purpose. We cannot do anything other than that assigned purpose. And we'll talk more about that in the next slide. So that represents so our our restricted reserves represent 71% of our overall fund balance. The lightish gray $84,000,000 represents our assigned reserves. So these are planned obligations. The largest portion of this has been assigned to balance the budget for next year. So it offsets any shortfalls in revenues and assigns them to next year's budget.
Orange is the 4%. That's the unassigned reserve. That's our statutory percussion for enrollment variations, revenue shortages, inflationary spikes in expenditures, etcetera. So look at that. You have the big black piece. Those are our restricted reserves. Then we have the assigned reserves, which are basically our appropriated fund balance and encumbrances, and then we have the unassigned reserve. All of that is our fund balance. Don't get overwhelmed here. We're not gonna get too deep into the weeds with this. The first column are all of our reserves. We're not gonna get too deep into that. You can look at them. Second column represents our beginning year balance. This was a beginning year balance, $18.03 $32.02 67. Second column rep and I'm not going too deep into these because 99% of these have already been voted through the board, etcetera. So then we have our usage because we have reserves, and our goal is to utilize those reserves when we can. So you see, we utilize 630 in our transportation capital reserve, our repair reserve, 250,000, and then our TRS reserve. So we we utilize about one point almost 1,200,000 in reserves. The next column, the third column, appropriated budget. Those are allocations made from our reserves to balance the budget. It's a portion of it. 1,200,000 for next year, 2627. Next column represents the reserve increases that the board is being asked to allocate this evening. Allocating approximately 2,200,000. I will tell you that this is like a moving target. Our our fund balance is we start our fund balances in probably September. And, of course, the earlier you start them, the less
accurate they are. As you move through the fiscal year, they become more accurate because you have more data and and so forth. So, however, that 4%, which is a very minimal amount that we're allowed you know, we met the audit meeting audit committee met today, and we were talking with our auditors. Municipalities have no cap. They can have double their their budget in reserves. We get 4%. So I'll go back to that. The reserve increases. What we do is we do a not to exceed amount. By doing that, it gives us flexibility once our final year fund balance is is determined once we go through audit that we have enough money to shelter the 4% without exceeding the 4%. So I will tell you, like, we have capital 1,600,000 allocated. We're never gonna use that 1.6. That's our cap, but we're not going to utilize it. But we wanted to have that protection there so that we don't exceed the 4% cap. Then we have interest to date. This is all passive interest generated from these funds. I will tell you that Barry Gamzon watches these accounts. He's always moving money to get the highest interest that we can. So we made over $600,000 in these reserve funds that will go back right to our to our needs when they're determined. So so that is fantastic. Then we have our projected fund balance at the end of the year. So that's saying that's taking into account what we've used, what we've appropriated, and the increases that we're proposing tonight. Then the last column, net change, it's it's these these changes were inadvertently planned. Okay? So, for example, tax or reserve, that was was predetermined when we were looking at our tax liability that we needed to reduce that fund. It was it was higher than our projections. So the end result of these changes is showing that we have a net change of almost 700,000 for our tax servicer, and the same applied to unemployment and workers' comp. So if you look overall, the net change is increasing the fund balance by about $206,000.
We'll be having a public hearing to to extend to approve a 120,000 for the steam boiler number two at the Millstone.
Is that reflected in the usage for the repair reserve in the third column from the left?
What this then leads to is projected 319. But then to understand, we are if you go to the five seventh column, second column from the right says projected $6.30 $26,319,006 97 for the repair reserve.
So what I understand then is sometime during the next year, right, that 120,000 utilized. So will that will be decreased, obviously, by 120,000. And, of course, the other thing to point out, which is Which is why we increased this. So that was done through the budget process. We increased that reserve. And but the other thing just to note is with the restricted reserves, we obviously have statutory limits on what we Can. Put in there. You can't just
Correct. You can't just keep putting for yeah. So so most of these reserves have statutory requirements as to how much we can reserve. Some of them, like, for example, TRS is in relation to our TRS costs. ERS, the same, EVLAR, which is listed as employee benefit liability. So most of them have terms in which there is an established maximum usage terms, voter approval in order to utilize those funds. Funds. So Yeah. Yeah.
I just wanna point out more for the public so that it's understood that it's not like we could just save oodles of money the way the village can Right. And stick it in some Right. Account. Right. We are limited in each of these as to what we Correct. We can do. So if we heard that TRS was based on the market going to be increasing the employer contribution rate by double digits, we could not put a million dollars in there because we're we have to stay within within the statutory limit.
And the and the flip side of that is as percent of that. We do the allocation not to exceed. If we find that we have saved more money after the audit, then what happens is when the tax line is decided at the August meeting, it may result as it has in this district, which one time in the past to a decrease in taxes because there's more money, both that we can have to Mhmm. Give back to the taxpayers.
Correct. And that would lessen the actual property tax increase by a certain amount.
Correct. Correct. I don't foresee that Yeah. This year. Right. And that, as I said, that's happened probably only a couple of times in the last four to six. Right. Is everybody good with this?
Something happened. It was moved. You okay? Yeah. No. Something happened, and the slide moved to the to the top of the the deck for whatever reason. Okay. So this is basically like a visual display of the composition of our reserves. Now about 71 it's probably closer to 74% are concentrated on capital and employee benefits. So two critical areas. One is protecting our liability as a district, our liability to the state, our liability to our staff, and the other larger percentage is focused on capital that can be used for capital upgrades. What we like to do is utilize capital reserve funds as we have in the past for particular projects that would not generate building aid. So site work doesn't generate building aid. Other you know, the last time we did a drainage project, district wide drainage project, we were to do paving, additional parking. Things like that are not aidable, so we wanna utilize reserve funds to cover that. It allows us to maintain and enhance our facilities, which is our largest asset without burdening the tax base, without having to go to the public for public vote and looking to increase taxes. Our buildings we were sharing are close to 300 years old combined, so that's a lot to maintain. So putting monies in capital reserves is a is a really safe and positive investment.
So on that, if we had something that we were doing that was aided We could still fund it through the reserves and receive aid. Through the Capital Reserves?
Yes. So this year, we we designated designated $2.02 $2,500,000 to the future facilities project from our reserve tons. It's collatable.
So then what just to make sure I understand. You said we try to use what's in the capital reserve for things that are not in a light paving parking Right. Etcetera. Right.
Because what happens is is that if we go to state a, it it will apply towards our maximum cost allowance. So that work, if going to state it's going to state ed, it will still reduce our maximum cost allowance for construction and incidentals. So that which would restrict future growth. Mhmm. Because the maximum cost allowance is on a five year rolling cycle depending upon the commissioner's approval date. So if we utilize those funds for that and go to receive aid for that, it's going to it's going to delay the process moving forward.
Any questions here? No. Okay. Next. So this is our assigned reserves. Remember, we had that big black piece that we just talked about that's that 71%, which was our restricted reserves. Mhmm. Then we have we had that gray piece Mhmm. Which was appropriated reserves. So also known as the signed reserves. So that includes projected encumbrances of 856,000. That's the sheer guesstimate based on our last five year averages and our current outstanding encompasses. So that number may change. And then you have the appropriated fund balance for balancing the 2627 budget.
Which is, again, combination of from restricted reserves Yes. And from whatever one point
We have 1.2 in restricted reserves allocated and then another 2.7 in fund assigned reserves.
Yeah. Okay. So, again, these funds bridge the gap between our revenues and our expenditures and allow us to maintain and enhance our instructional programs without the burden on the taxpayer. Next slide. K. So I'm going with this one. So this is so we need to maintain statutory compliance, 4% of our existing budget. It's a statutory cushion that is there in an emergency if needed. It it's less of that and more of a cash flow issue. So at the beginning and end of year when our revenues are high and and our revenues are low and our expenses are high and vice versa, these funds allow us to maintain and ensure liquidity. I I will also say that, you know, that this 4%, god forbid, if there was a crisis or our aid was delayed for whatever reason, this 4% would cover us for a whopping 2 weeks. Mhmm. Two weeks of expenditures eats up that entire fund balance. So kinda keep that in the back of your mind.
We also know that the other thing you can do is to float you can borrow borrow. Can do rands and tams.
Rans and tams. Yep. Which no district wants to do. Correct. There's, like, revenue anticipation notes and tax anticipation notes. And that borrowing costs money. Mhmm. Costs a lot of money for that short term borrowing. So this also supports that. It also supports our high credit rating. We have an a a two credit rating because of our reserves and our financial stability. It's it's like a it's like an economic shock absorber Yeah. For, you know, inflationary.
Yeah. But even if you were to say, let's go for a rent or a 10, I I don't think we can pull it off in two weeks. Even if you said what? If you want to go for revenue or tax exemption, though, we wouldn't be able to get that money in a two week period.
No. Like, that underwriting process and Sure. I don't think it's Yeah. Significantly longer. Yeah. In one of my former districts, we had to do rands annually, and it becomes, a very bad fiscal problem. Because once Yeah. Once you're in that cycle, you need it. Yeah. So it's really an analogy to, like, a payday loan. Mhmm. If you think about payday loans, which are so costly that you can't get out of it, that's what ranting debts are. But sometimes districts need to do that Yep. For cash flow. Unless they wanna be like Mount Vernon who, Friday, didn't release their paychecks. Oh, I didn't hear that. Yeah. They said it was a bank mean talk about that. Yes. Banking issues are an issue. Okay. So let's go to the next slide. Thanks, Dave. I love this picture. So by strategically leveraging fund balance and reserve, we're able to, one, protect the taxpayers with this buffer, preventing any tax levy spikes or override, allowing us to use capital reserves to enhance and protect our buildings. The largest asset is kind of future proofing our schools. And, of course, just remember that any monies that are used to support the district that come out of reserves, feedback money into our instructional program. So it's not taking it out of our operational budget, but taking out of out of the reserves. And it protects the community's financial future through risk management while maintaining accountability and statutory requirements. The bottom line is that we are maximizing taxpayer value without increasing taxpayer burden. There's a little less than him on balance that he serves.
One last question. Do you get credit for this program? Brad? Greg. I think Greg did it with the drone. Greg did it the drone. Because I know Greg used to do things with. Yes. Yeah. I think this is Greg. Yes. Okay.
What what are the parameters for what we invest in? I was just looking at the numbers for interest. Yeah. Like, what
Very, very strict. If you had a couple of hours, I could probably tell you. But it was
Municipal bonds, specifically. What's that? Municipal bonds and money market funds, really, is what what you what a lot to do with both both. So we have a fund. It's a it's a reciprocal that is managed by many of the districts, and that fund itself is outperforming anything that we could get from other financial institutions. And it meets all of the requirements.
Oh, it's a bunch of business officials. And are you interested in in No. Finding out more about it?
I'm interested in finding more about it just because I'm curious about it, but didn't have other purpose.
Yeah. It's actually governed by a board of business officials and financial advisers, and it's it's just it's wonderful. It it eliminates a lot of the back and forth that we've had to do in the past with fund management and, you know, meets all of the state requirements. So Wonderful. Yes. It's called night class. Night class? Yeah. Leave your class.
Same Outlines it. Oh, that outlines our investment policy and Yeah. Instructions. Yes. What is it? 66240.
Explain it so clearly. You. Thank you. We will now move into item 3.1. Open the public hearing on proposed usage of the repair reserve. Recommended action be it resolved. The board of education hereby open the public hearing regarding the proposed usage of the district's repair reserve.
All in question? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? I'm sorry. Closing of the public hearing on the proposed usage of the repair reserve. Recommended action be it resolved that the Board of Education hereby closes the public hearing regarding the proposed usage of the district's repair reserve.
On the question? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Item 3.3, recommended action be it resolved that the Board of Education hereby approves the resolution of authorization of the proposed expenditure from the repair reserve fund as presented.
Sure. Okay. So we are allocating these funds to fix the boiler PVC boiler number two. I will just say that this this reserve fund has proven to be so valuable to the district. I like to commend Omar for his pressing me on this. So thus far, we have repaired the PVC elevator at a 108,000. PVC steam boiler number one at 65,000 Croton-Harmon High School elevator at a 185,000. And now lastly, the steam boiler estimated at a repair value of a 120,000. This is has been very bad. If this money were not used from the reserve, it would have to come out of the general fund. And as you know, these things are not planned. They they they just occur. We have a, you know, we have a a maintenance plan that looks at life cycles and estimates, you know, repair time, but these big items like elevators and boilers, it's really difficult to determine. And they don't make them like they used to, I will say that. So
We're, yeah, we're trying to we're trying to get it started right away because there's a lot of work that needs to be done beforehand, and then we're waiting on the equipment. We wanna make sure that it's in time for heating season. So it's a little bit of a tight schedule. Yeah.
Maybe 50? 50. 50. Yeah. Yeah. And then this year, through the budget cycle, we allocated another 300.
In favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstained? Motion carries. Moving into item 4.1. Item one. Item 4.1, instructional personnel. Croton-Harmon Administrators Association child memorandum of agreement. Recommended action, be it resolved. The board of education hereby approves the memorandum of agreement between the Croton-Harmon Union Tea School District and the Croton-Harmon Administrators Association presented.
On the question? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Item 4.2, the side letter of agreement between the Croton Teachers Association. Recommended action be it resolved that the Board of Education hereby approves a revision to the side letter of agreement between the Croton-Harmon, Union Free School District, the Croton Teachers Association previously approved on 05/07/2026, which extends the additional period of instruction from 05/21/2026 to 06/26/2026.
On the question, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Item 4.3, instructional personnel recommendation. Recommended action be it resolved. The Board of Education hereby approves the instructional personnel recommendation of Dana Prem as a 1.0 FTE mathematics teacher, mathematics tenure area at the Croton-Harmon High School at a salary of $118,987. Doctor, step 10, doctor Prem is appointed to a three year probationary term as a mathematics teacher commencing on 08/26/2026 and probationary term ending on 08/25/2029 in the ten year area of of mathematics. Doctor. Prem has professional certification in mathematics seven through 12 and professional certification in students with disabilities grades seven through 12 mathematics.
On the question. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Item 4.4, recommended action be it resolved by the Board of Education hereby approves the instructional personnel recommendation of Samantha Perlman as a one point o FTE mathematics teacher, mathematics tenure
teacher commencing on 08/26/2026 and probationary term ending on 08/25/2030 in the ten year area of mathematics. Ms. Perlman has initial certification in mathematics grade seven through 12.
On the question, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Item 4.5, recommended action be it resolved that the Board of Education hereby approves the instructional personnel recommendation of Robert Simels as a 1.0 FTE science teacher, science tenure area at the Croton-Harmon High School, a salary of $73,889, MA step two. Mister Simels is appointed to a four year probationary term as a science teacher commencing on 08/26/2026 and probationary term ending on 08/25/2030 in the ten year area of science. Mister Simels has an initial certification in biology grades seven through 12.
On question? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carried. Item 4.6, recommended action, be it resolved. The Board of Education hereby approves the instructional personnel recommendation of Jeffrey Barile. Barile as a one point o FTE elementary teacher, elementary tenure area at the Gary E. Tompkins Elementary School at a salary of $63,275. VA step one. Mister Barile is appointed to a four year probationary term as an elementary teacher commencing on 08/26/2026 and probationary term ending on 08/25/2030 in the tenure area of elementary. Going I'm
board of education hereby approves the appointment of Caroline Browne as a one point o FTE social studies teacher, Croton Morgan High School. Leave replacement for John Bohuniek MA plus 45, step fifteen, $125,006.61 dollars effective 08/26/2026 through 06/30/2027.
On the question, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstained? Motion carries. Item 4.8, recommended action be it resolved. The Board of Education hereby approves the appointment of Kaydi McInerney as a one point o FTE, visual arts teacher, Pierre Van Cortlandt Middle School, leave replacement for Ashley Lupfer, BA Step one, $63,275, effective August 26 2026 through 06/30/2027.
On the question? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstain? Motion carries. Moving into the consent agenda. Item four I'm sorry. Item 5.1, approval of the consent agenda. Recommended action be it resolved that the Board of Education hereby approves all the items under the consent agenda.
Could you talk briefly about the benefit agreements? I don't know if I missed that. Something just in in general. What
Sure. So these are folks who are not part of any of the collective bargaining units within the district. And so we then try to look at how we can maintain consistency across our various bargaining units continue to incentivize folks to do work that's outside of the bargaining unit. These reflect approximately 2.5% increase in compensation year over year, which we've checked with the region and is pretty much the median of of the region. And so these are annual actions by the court.
So with regard to one of the individuals, miss Kerri Tracy, assuming she is listed In her role as athletic director.
In her role as athletic director, but really Trainer. I'm sorry. Yeah. But that's really there's nothing in benefits that's been provided to her that's really about beyond what she has to teach her. No.
Think that's what I'm worried is separating apart from anything she gets as a CTA.
Okay. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Abstained? Motion carries. We're now moving into our closing of the meeting. Item 6.1 is a motion to enter into executive executive session. We will enter into executive session, presumably, exit executive session at which point our meeting will immediately adjourn. Our next meeting will be a reorganization meeting, which will be held on July 16 at 05:00 here at the district office. Item 6.1 executive session, recommended action be resolved from the board of education hereby enters into executive session to discuss the employment of a particular person or person and an exact subject involving a confidential student matter regarding a particular student or students.