At the Dec. 15 meeting of the Windsor Unified School District Board of Trustees, the board prepared to move into 2021.
The meeting kicked off with the swearing in of trustees Bill Adams and Malinalli Lopez. They were the only two to submit paperwork for the seats, so there was no election, they were simply appointed. Adams is a returning trustee, while Lopez is taking over the seat formerly occupied by George Valenzuela who said his goodbyes at the last meeting.
Then it was time to reorganize, with Stephanie Ahmad receiving a unanimous vote for president and Rich Carnation also getting unanimous support as vice president.
“We’re not moving seats or handing over the gavel and switching the dais,” said outgoing president Eric Heitz. “It’s been a very interesting year having to do this, and I feel like a game show host with all the faces in front of me (on Zoom.) It’s satisfying to have been president this year, but I’m happy to pass the torch to trustee Ahmad.”
“It’s an honor to serve in the district where I completed my K-12 education. I think it’s wonderful and I owe a lot to this district, as the first in my family to attend college, and the first and only lawyer in my family. But more importantly, this district creates good human beings,” said Ahmad. “Trustee Heitz, as president, you’ve done an amazing job transitioning from in-person to Zoom meetings in a completely unprecedented year and keeping things steady and steadfast. You truly bring that statesman quality to the board.”
With Valenzuela’s retirement, Heitz now becomes the longest serving trustee “You’re the old dog, that’s fun,” teased fellow trustee Adams.
Adams and Carnation will continue to serve on the facilities subcommittee, while Heitz and Ahmad will serve on the police subcommittee.
For community liaison position, Carnation will remain the liaison with the town council, and will be stepping up to work with Mattie Washburn. He will also be serving on the North of Arata ad hoc committee.
Heitz will become the liaison for the Windsor Wellness partnership, the Cali Leadership Council and Windsor Oaks and North Bay Met Academies, as well as Windsor Arts Now.
Adams will be the liaison for the WE Foundation, the Booster Club, Windsor Middle School and Cali Calmecac, while Ahmad will work with Brooks Elementary (the president historically serves on fewer committees).
New trustee Lopez will be working with Windsor High School, where one of her children will be starting in the fall, the Cali PTA, the LCAP committee and DELAC.
Budget picture looking rosier
Earlier this year the budget picture for Windsor schools, and all public schools, looked grim with a proposal for a 10% cut in funding across the board. While that proposal was eventually dropped, there was still a lot of uncertainty regarding COVID-related costs and falling enrollment numbers.
However, when Chief Business Officer Lois Standring presented the first interim numbers to the board, things were looking much rosier.
“The original budget was very doom and gloom,” Standring said. “There was a 10% cut across the board, but when the budget came in the news was much better. Those two revenues reflect that difference.”
Other changes since the adoption of the budget include carryover budgets being added for all federal programs, California Partnership Academies, site discretionary accounts and site donation accounts; the annual charge from Cali increased by $655,278; COVID relief funding has been included, including removing $500,000 in expenses from General Fund for COVID costs due to special funding received from state; along with the removal of a planned transfer from a Lytton Tribe fund donation to the General Fund.
These changes lead to a first interim report which shows an upward change in revenue from $33,262,941 to $36,282,091 and a downward change in expenditures from $32,130,165 to $30,959,790. The ending fund balance improved from $4,279,744 to $9,649,457.
While the increase in the Cali’s payment to the district helped the district, Standring raised an alarm that “It’s a huge impact for Cali. The multi-year projection for Cali is not good right now, so we will need to address that.”
Standring plans on taking the current calculations to the Sonoma County Office of Education to determine if they make sense.
When calculating projections as required for first interim (showing solvency for three years) several assumptions must be made, and for this budget, the assumptions included a savings of $250,000 for hourly pay and substitute costs in the current year, a reduction of five certificated FTE in each year based on declining enrollment (which should be taken care of by retirements and resignations rather than layoffs); costs for the so-called Golden Handshake retirement incentive coming to an end in 2020-21 and removing it for future years; a 5% increase in health benefits; and removing COVID relief funding in subsequent years.
The multi-year projections look good, with an ending fund balance of $6,550,660, allowing the district to file a positive certification. However, there are still two specters at the feast — continued declining enrollment, which causes a nearly $3.2 million loss in revenue by the 2022-23 school year, and the ever increasing costs of special education, which draws nearly $6 million from the general fund in this year alone.
“That is an area we have to look at and decide if that is the level of effort were going to have because it’s a huge nut out of our unrestricted funds,” said Adams. “Thirty-four percent (of our budget) this year and 47% next year, that a lot.”
“We’ve been looking at our options and we’ve been thinking that a special ed audit by an outside party to really help us drill down on those expenses,” said Superintendent Jeremy Decker. “That will hopefully come to board in a next few months.”
Other items
- An annual care and maintenance contract for the solar panels installed on all the campuses with Terra Verde was approved.
- The board accepted the annual accounting of the development fees the school receives from local construction projects. The beginning balance as of July 1, 2019 was $954,659.47 and the balance at the end of the year was $1,071564.64. Revenues of $382,928 were collected while $266,023 was expended, primarily on the lease and maintenance of portables.
- Slightly amended board goals were approved for the coming year.
- The Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) Budget Overview for Parents for Cali Calmecac Language Academy and Windsor Unified School District was also approved.
Editor’s note: There will be separate articles forthcoming from this meeting regards the School Plans for Student Achievement (SPSA) plans for several schools in the district, as well as the current status of school reopening and COVID. Please keep checking our website.
