Good evening. I will now call the April 22nd, 2025 meeting of the Board of Supervisors to order. This meeting will be conducted for starting to the bylaws of the Cormorant County Virginia Board of Supervisors to ensure a fair, orderly and safe meeting. Exers from the bylaws pertaining to the public conduct during the meeting has been posted outside of York and you Miss rants, please call the roll Mr. Hamlet. Here. Mr. Newman. Mr. Tyree. Here. Mr. Simpson. Here. Mr. Stocks. That's great. Gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day. We thank you for this time. We thank you for those who are gathered in this place. I just pray that you will grant us your wisdom as we discuss the business and the budget for coming and counting for the people there're in and I pray for your guidance thank you for your mercy your grace and your love and Christ, I'm afraid to ask the mayor to do a report on which of the straight answers. My name is Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. I'm Eric. Hi. Annouement. Hi. Mr. Terry. Hi. Mr. Simpson. Hi. Mr. Handler, the newman, Mr. Terry, I'm Mr. Simpson, I'm Mr. Connors. At this time we will have public hearings recommended 2025 tax increase. Our next item on the agenda is a public hearing for polls 2025 tax increase. Mr. Stamie, please provide your vote. Yes, Madam Chair, members of the Board, Derek Stamie County Administrator here in Cumberland. And our first public hearing is the County Administrator's recommended 2025 tax raise. I'm just to give you a summary of information for all three of the public hearings that we had this evening. Throughout the spring, everyone's board has held multiple workshops with school or county staff, constitutional officers regarding the county budget. School or budget requests, requests from individual departments, as well as the county's cap on a pretty good program. Part of the county administration proposed budget to be able to state tax rate will remain as advertised at $0.60 for $100. At the April 29, 2025 meeting the board will vote for a proposed or potentially closed public hearing vote on the proposed budget and has the ability and flexibility to adopt tax rates at or below the advertised rate. The proposed document, including the proposed 2025 tax rate, will be available on the county's website. And of course, we are requesting the board to hold three public hearings for the steaming as advertised. For the first public hearing, the board is requested to hold a public hearing and consider the tax rates for 2025 and see based upon the levies that were adopted in 2024. We are proposing no new tax increases as it relates to any of the tax rates for component counties. You can see the real estate, you manufacture homes, remains the same in 60 cents, personal property for 50, airplanes in 50, machinery and tools at 375, heavy construction machinery at 375 and public service corporations at 60 cents. And again, this is a public hearing only, county staff will prepare draft motions after we receive feedback from the board as far as adopting the 2026 county budget and setting the 25 tax rates at the April 29 meeting, which would be part of your supervisor's agenda back at that time. Just to give you some background on our tax rate here in government county, this is I'm sharing with you the most recent data related to the proposed tax rate for 2025 by our neighboring localities in the region. some localities, this is updated down. Some localities are proposing to equalize their tax rates, which are shifting some of the tax rates lower, some are increasing their tax rates, which you can see. We're kind of in the middle of the pack there. Right next to Buckingham, we're currently at the same rate. Charlotte County checks into 62 cents. Howhatan are our meeting neighbors to the east of 69 and a good one at 53. You can see the remaining counties. Noone in the North Carolina way. Amelia are are lower in the mid 40s 50 Cent per inch. That's what I have for you for this public hearing. That I can take any questions. That's this time we will open the public here. If there are any citizens sign up to speak. Call the beach by then to speak. Once all speakers have finished. I'm sorry. Okay. All right. All right. Next is the recommended FY 2025-2026 budget. Mr. Stainman. Okay, the next public hearing we have for you is the County Administrators Recommended budget for the We are 25-26. Again, we are requesting the older public hearing and keep that public hearing open until the 29th of April. The fiscal year 25-26 budget process began in the fall of 2024. And through November and on to March, we did work with departments, school and constitutional officers, and the planning the Capitol and program in the County Administrator's recommended budget. We went through a series of reviewing forecasts and revenues, identifying funding constraints and impacts operations. We considered all of these as part of the current budget recommendation. The four budget workshops were held throughout the winter and screen, including a joint workshop between the school board and the board of supervisors. So again, just for everybody's information, public hearings are open tonight, April 22, 2025, and we will remain open until Tuesday, April 29, 2025. We are going to leave those open for additional public feedback and comment. If anyone that is watching online or is going to listen to the later time or anybody in the audience would like to follow up with questions, comments or feedback. My email address is the stayinvnetcommonccowney.orginea.gov. This time will also allow for additional board member feedback and discussion, but will also be posting this presentation on the county web as well. County Administrators recommended FY26 budget does the following. It does not increase any county tax rates. We do see an impact as it relates to our cost of insurance, as it relates to our county employees over the past five years. The county has absorbed all of the increases related to insurance costs. And we're seeing about a 12 to 13% increase this year. And this budget does propose that staff shares in the 50% and 50% of the cost increase of that 12% for the coming fiscal year. The budget does assume a 97% collection rate in real estate taxes. It utilizes rollover funds, including the previous year turnback to balance the budget, and we'll go over that in more detail as we walk through the revenue side of the budget. It does continue to fund contributions to community service agencies such as Cross Road, Public Library, and Cumberland Youth Athletic Association. The budget has recommended Does Flat Fund School's public transfer in the amount of $5,594,459 versus the request at $6,018. It does fund the CIP projects through grants and donation related funding. Match funding would require board approval and appropriation. We'll go through that later as we talk through the CIP as well. Anticipated revenues from future projects were excluded from consideration so we are not banking on anything that does not exist today in terms of our revenues. We want to make sure that we're as conservative as possible when it comes to our revenue generation. The recommended budget does include a 3% across the board raise and a 1.5% bonus to align with the compensation board and the county administrator would be exempt from this. But I'm going to get more into that in a little bit as it relates to the compensation board and why we are recommending this. This is part of the numbers related to what was included in public advertising advertising for the budget. The General Fund Revenue is a total revenue from local sources. It's approximately $19 million revenue from the Commonwealth is shade over two. And then the revenue from federal governments, $169,000, has changed. The total General Fund revenue, totaling out of $21,159,680. Again, revenues assume a 97% collection rate on real estate and a 90% collection rate on personal property. Revenue is included all new home construction has been captured and in a previous year and again, other projections include unrealized resources. Revenue is included in previous year's turnback so we will be tapping into that turnback which is currently in our fund balance from the school to $895,000. To the right is the summary of all of those funds and then to the left is a percentage break-a-all on recommended general fund revenues. You can see that the county is very much at one level at its stole when it comes to revenue. Almost 60% of our revenue comes from general property taxes. Heavenly dependent on real estate. You can see the breakdown there. Missilane's revenue comes in at 18% state revenue approximately nine. Other local taxes have increased at 7% everything else is in the 1 to 2% range. So we are heavily dependent on real estate. Just to break down a lot of our general fund revenues, our conceitables include back tax collection efforts. All revenue categories were evaluated against previous years actuals, previously approved revenues and projected revenues. You can see the differences there between what the original department will request and what's being recommended. Mrs. Cruz went back to this budget several times looking at the revenues to make sure that we were properly capturing anything that we could to help us project the revenue because of the difference between what was being requested and what we were previously projecting under the departmental request for FY26. The next slide, I just wanted to highlight a couple of the highlighted areas where we saw some jumps and some of our projected revenues. I used the money as a hot interest earnings of existing county funds. We had been very conservative on previous budgeted lines from previous fiscal years, and we did shift this up about $125,000, which is still below, we collected the previous year, but it's based upon money that we have in the bank and money that we're earning interest on. EMS revenue is projected to increase due to improve tracking and reimbursement initiatives. Our University Services Coordinator has been working very closely with finance to retool how we build our EMS services and make sure that we're capturing all the information that we can on every specific call so that we can properly seek reimbursal from the insurance companies. Planning and zoning fees didn't increase last year and it is projected to remain high based upon the amount of applications and permits that are coming through the planning and zoning and building officials office. So we are seeing an uptick in those revenues as well. And again, just to highlight miscellaneous revenues, that's a large number. That includes the cops, Creek, annual payments of the county, $131,000, as well as a school turnback for the brief is here. And that gives you your total general fund revenues of just that 17 million eight fifty eight two fifty three. I'd recommend in general fund expenditures this was again what was included in the public hearing advertisement and paper I'm going to go through this uh... a process section I just give you an idea of general government administration that includes everything from the Board of Supervisors budget to county administration, to some of our constitutional officers such as Commissioner Revenue and our Treasury's office. Judicial Administration is related to administration of the court system, circuit court clerk, Commonwealth Attorney. Public safety is related to fire and AMS and the sheriff's office as well as animal control. Public works is related to our refuse services and general properties. Health is not only our contribution to the health department but also some other health related contributions. Community Colleges includes CSA as well as our contribution to the local community college. Parks, recreational and cultural includes our contribution to the library as well as the funding of our parks and park department. Community services is related to a lot of the local nonprofit contributions that we see for steps and PMON Senior Resources, I'll go into that and some great detail later and then some dot on department related expenditures of $20,500. What you see on the screen now is a pie chart recommending a percentage breakdown or recommended general upon expenditures and your budget is a reflection of your priorities and education and public safety. Clearly stand out as priority for the county. So look at the school transfer of their 26% public safety at 25. 51% of all general fund expenditures are related to schools and public safety. No, noting positions are recommended with the exception of an assistant comments attorney position, which is contingent upon the Sheriff's Office to initiating the Body Kimber program, which is great funded and operates with additional information on that later. The budget has been reviewed line by line and projections are either flat or reduced or possible. All budgets are impacted by a 3% ATB increase, cross the board, and 1.5% bonus is recommended for per Virginia compensation board. And this is something that the board can have discussion on because they have a new forward with it. We haven't really been given a whole lot of guidance on how to implement the 1.5%, but it's something that we can certainly discuss and ensure that it's equitable. Just so you know, the Com forward does determine a reasonable budget for the participation of the Com well towards the total cost of operation for our constitutional officer. So positions such as the Sheriff's Office, the Com well's attorney, the circuit court clerk, commissioner revenue, intrasher, all do have Com forward funded positions. All of their positions are Com word funded, and then some of the common word positions partially fund some of those funded positions. So our budget, a lot of what we do with our budget recommendations aligns with the common word to ensure that all county employees are treated equally across the board. Failure to fund 3%, and the 1.5% bonus have will be land on that bonus piece with leads to certain positions performing the same duties receiving a raise and others not potentially. So we just one of those things we have to keep in mind. Breaking down the recommended general fund expenditures. General government administration and 2 million 1 0 6 7 7 4. You can see from the department of work less to the recommended budget from the county administrator a lot of those do increase. Couple of them they all have the most increase and that's primarily related to that 3% across the board and the 1.5% bonus. You're going to see that throughout this budget recommendation when you look at these individual lines. So literally we went line by line and looked at previous three year projections and tried to come up with the most conservative estimates as relates to expenditure. So this has been combed over multiple times. Judicial administration, again that includes the nuances of the Commonwealth terming position, contingent on body cameras. You see that uptick and their budget there from 401 to 415. Safety, Sheriff's Office, School Resource Officer, E-911, Fire NEMS. You can see that there was a decrease in the Fire NEMS that was after going through the budget and looking at the requests from the volunteer fire departments and making that a flat funding request that will approve this fiscal year. Correction and detention did go down. It worked very hard on the correction and detention budget at Peamon. And we've been able to lower the county's cost and share of providing that service well paying for that service, I'd rather say. And I'm controlled to go down as well as primarily driven by a position that was requested but not ultimately filled. Same with revenues and general properties, it's a lot that the requests and the recommendations came down, but it's such a similar thing. The health contributions that includes the supplements of the local health department, the pae mons and the resources, crossroads, and frequent amount of palatin, as well as the heart of Virginia frequent. Those were all funded and recommended as funded as a best request. Parks and Recreation and Cultural, we did recommend a sliding cruise that again related to the cross the board. CYAA requested $10,000 and we landed at 8. We just finished making about $80,000 with improvements to the ball fields and some improvements to the gymnasium there. And they're doing pretty well from the financial standpoint. Its, my understanding right now the recommendation is 8,000. Local library remains the same as well as CSA was a slide-up tick and then community college contribution remained the same as well. Community services includes the planning commission or planning zoning department, economic development, We, or Zoning Appeals, the CRC, Virginia Heartland, Regional Economic Development Authority, or Piedmont Veterans Council, on the very change of commerce, along with Small Business Development Center, or Piedmont Habitat for Humanity, and base that program, which is Virginia, I don't know, I'll say the action program for Southside Virginia, Peter Francisco, so water district in our extension office. Now the majority of those were funded as requested. One of the largest ones you'll see up there is the reduction in the planning and zoning department that did have an additional full time position that was not ultimately recommended as part of the budget. Recommended General Fund Transverse, that's the breakdown. You can see the transfer to the schools on the 5.5 million transfer to social services to supplement that operation in addition to the safe funding that we received. The CSA fund, I don't want to go for these in a little bit little bit more detail as well. You can see that the total transfer of solid funds is $710 million, not $8 million. It's just another layout of those transfers. You can see that the department over at Quest for Social Services, this is what was being recommended and be funded as requested as far as the water and sewer fund. It does include a subsidy of around $374,000 from the county's general fund to subsidize that operation. The EDA recommended revenues include $120,000 subsidy from the county's general fund. do oversee revenue for rental properties and as well as some other funding opportunities to the community as far as the CSA. You can see that the total CSA expenditures are around 670,000. Magnificent was a budget transfer approximately $220,000 subsidy for the county. Our debt service is approximately $2,935,000 annually. The majority of county debts slated to roll off in 2031. It involves debt service related to public school systems infrastructure as well as our communications equipment line that we received a couple of years ago. So you can see how all of those different layers of debt add up to that $2.9 million annual debt service. The slide in front of you summarizes all of the information related to general fund expenditure estimates. Our grant fund, our grant total, General Fund expenditures and the total budget of 42 million, $969,399. And again, just wanted to break down visually through the pie chart, the commitment to public schools and public safety. Budget's again, our reflexive accounting priorities with 53% of our all funds budget going to fund education. 13% of all funds in the budget going towards public safety. Again you can see the debt service there about 70% of all funds and the remainder of very small percentages related to the all funds budget for the county. We're going to continue to look at our fees. Modern sewer fees throughout the year, looking at operational efficiencies that we can continue to realize. We're going to continue our efforts with the new business task force to bring the new business with the county, and we're going to review existing policies and service levels and attempt to recognize savings. And we're going to continue to actively pursue and aggressively pursue great funding opportunities to help with our current situation. So I can tell you that the budget was a bear this year. We started out with about $3 million dollars delta between requests and revenues. And I'm at a point where I can bring to you a recommended budget. And with that, I'm glad to take any questions. So, I can help notice a couple of things. It's only just a comment that the fees for the transfers, services, the pre-fee services, now over a million dollars. And just a comment to more members, they were gonna have to do something about that. I was gonna be crazy for probably the last decade. Well, we couldn't my house now, and I always like to compare it to other counties. It may not be fair, but compared to Buckingham's published rating, the bill, the reviews about the same rate, a little $1 million. The difference is to have 8,000 more presidents than we did. So that's almost up. And they have seven transfer stations, it's a 3, so one expenditure I think that we're going to have to focus on what can we do to get that some relief. Second one is, water and silver. Last year, the figure wasn't on the slides, Mr. Stamie just went through the operational expenditure for 544-470, 480-8, and now you're going to be 16. That's correct. There are 8, 16, 3, 22, 50 percent increase. And one year, that's going to take, again, some additional detail that that increased the amount. The county is going that to the tune of 374,000. So it's the expensive running of water and sewer systems, or if there's approximately one approximately 170 more connections. And I had a comparative, I think that's all my accesses in the water. The water services, well, 704. It's time to get through network automation, get in ways you can't reduce cost these calls for. Okay. And we can reach in with a board board, which I can't have so many people. We are on the map. We have challenges. That's a bit of a board board, quite a while. So it can be as long as the decade. Hey, everyone. We need do more to the new most areas. Okay. You got it. Mr. Stain, so I just wanted to know, for those on attendance, for those who may be washing up, people live, if you could just explain what the the turn back is the figure from the school, the explain what the term back is, what that back is. Absolutely. So at the end of the year, let me back. So each year, the school system gets a budget transfer from the county. It's typically in the past, at least since I've been here, it's been matched with what they requested. It allows them to dive in and acquire additional state funding, grant funding. And what we've asked them to do, at least for the past two years, is to monitor their budget throughout the year and then work to identify and hold on to funds that they don't need to expend and then if they're able to turn that back to the county. So when I say I used to turn back, there are funds that aren't used and the schools were able to say at the end of the year, they turn those funds back to the county. So given that figure, what was, do you have the figure for the schools for last year, for last year, in current fiscal year, for the group? It was, the general fund transfer was $5,594. So what I'm recommending is the same amount of sales as last year. Same amount. And they ended up not using how much votes in the term back figure. $894. I'm 4,000 of that that we approved for last year. I just wanted to make sure that everyone knew that that term was and where this is going to be coming from. And then mind me, one of my biggest concerns. And by the way, I know this was a huge tax, a huge undertaking. I know we started off with a request from all the departments, the tune of $3 million above our revenues will be ending. So great job tuning it in and trying to do this with the revenues that we were projecting without having to touch tax rates. Because for me, that was a not-star touch of tax rates. Um, big concern that I have in here you put for the body cam. I know that was a grant that was applied for, I was sure, is part of that belief that grants expire. We did check on that and it's not. The funding is available through 2026. Okay, so that's new information. Yes, okay, that goes to increase. I guess my biggest concern is, when we take a look at county administration and the workload that we're looking on staff, there's one department in particular that stands out that we've got one person running that department in the planning zone where typically you would have for the workload that that department has currently I would say probably three people and so we've got one person who in the workload of three people To no fault of their own getting bogged down and getting behind Because it's just hugely impossible to keep up with that work So I think that we're gonna look at adding positions It would be good for us to look where we needed the most and not necessarily where we may or may not be getting funding for body cams and needing a new full town assistant college. In turn, I just think that that's something that we should look at because we're talking about a real need versus a kind of pay meal note that's going to happen now. So that's kind of one thing to set up for me, but I want to say great job with staff, great job to you. If you're putting together this, this, get a snap. I got a point to my left. Yeah, it's an interesting job to snap for putting together this budget because I know it was a huge undertaking. It's a small or open fabric here. First person we have to speak is Liz James. The evening, Liz Jameson, 396, budget value road, a couple of days in. I'd like to speak on the School of War budget tonight. Now, come on down the call to exclusive to the budget proposal for the 2025-26 school year. And we were asking only for the minimum necessary to meet the required local bench. But it appears that the county plans to develop on the school for next year, which means that we will also lose state dollars because the locality didn't provide enough money for us to make the bench. Now every month you hear of all the amazing things at the school division and its schools are doing, it is unreasonable to expect that the division can continue to provide the same opportunities and services with reduced funding. And because you are all reasonable people, you understand that. Now the school division is already operating on a tight budget in order to be accredited. There are very few programs that can be eliminated, but obviously something will have to go. Will it be 3K, garter school, code RDA, CTE offerings, athletics, art, music? Somebody is going to be heard no matter what we come. as we speak our bus gate is getting older and more unreliable and a single bus will cost you over $130,000. Class sizes will probably go up and you've noted that you plan to give the county employees a 3% raise. We have hope to be the same. We've already had some teacher resignations five. And some of them in hard to feel areas. And when teachers realize that the raise, we're now hoping that we can give a 1.5% raise. But as soon as people find out that, I expect how we're getting more resignations. In addition, the county naturalities school for maintenance, this last year that went into approximately $400,000 that we returned. We also have to do our own snow removal now, and that was another 35,000 dollars. All year long, we do say money for emergencies so that we do have money at the end of the year. If we're lucky and have no major emergencies, we like to use that money for replacing buses and doing routine maintenance repairs and things like that. But now, we're asked to give that money back. We've only been able to survive for the last couple of years because we had grant funding. Well, grant funding is dry. And inflation is taking over everything costs more. And so right now, I feel a little bit like the orphan Oliver Twist comes to you with my empty bowl, saying, please serve and madam, we need some more. Our kids deserve the very best we can give them. So please look at your budget and see if this is the very best. Thank you. Next, we'll have Mr. Roger Kaccher. I am Roger Kaccher. I am a citizen of the Commonwealth County. I am the come air. I've been a associate with the county for a longer than I've a county. I am a county. I have been associated with the county for a longer than I have owned property in the county. Specifically, I have, what's quite, have all the public exposure have all the public exposure in the early 2000s when I, as a consultant for all percentage of the company, who wanted to rezone property for a business in Combo a Catholic Catholic and it was a dog-knocked process. It was a lot of public reaction. And it's very similar to the proposal of Blanville that there was a meeting held last night in front of of the planet division. And as I understand it, they loaded the project down, which was exactly my experience in 2000 and two. We went ahead after the press of my client and received the project hoping that the Board of Supervisors would approve it and ultimately we did obtain approval from the board. Now, I respect those people and opposition. I... from the board. Now, I respect those people and opposition. I wish that the board take in consideration that a real long technical question is to answer it, ask it for a question of last life, that people are really at no knowledge of. My whole origin experience has been an environmental industrial body, voice management business since 1974. I went by on company for 17 years. We had 50 employees, Sprite over Over, put in the rich, the Virginia Lexington building, and we worked on super fun sites, all types of landfills. And my own education is as a microbiologist, and I've been educated for, which is a technical microbiology biochemistry. That sort of led me into the environmental field in 1974, when it became a new business, following the Clean Air Act in 1971-72. So I'm here because maybe I don't remember any of you being involved with the month of project that I represented in 20 years ago. But I have been through this process and I'm extremely knowledgeable about the complexities of groundwater movement, the reaction of soy and glucose. Mr. Hatcher. And so on. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. It's out of your time. I'm on my bail. Okay. We'll appreciate it. Thank you. Mr. Schoen. Good evening. Thank you for allowing me to address the board of Supervisors and Seabing and the County Administrator. I'm here to request support for fully funding our Commonwealth County Public Schools budget. Full funding will allow us to retain our focus on our staff and keeping those people who are most important in our educational setting at the school. As you know the most critical resource any school has is its people. The teachers and staff who work closely with our students on a daily basis. We cannot provide competitive compensation. We risk using those professionals to do divisions that are offering more. Some of our nearby school divisions are offered up to a 7% raise for the upcoming school year. And that's going to be very hard for public county to continue to be with that and maintain our staffing and keep those employees in our schools. Our current superintendent, Dr. Jones, has already taken a physically responsible approach by presenting a lean budget piece, cut out a lot of fluff or a legend fluff. And what he's requesting is another 127,000 over what the county is currently proposing. That will allow us to meet that 1.5% rate, not even a 3% rate for our school staff. And as I said before, that's going to make it very tough to compete with those divisions that are offering up to a 7% rate. And the reality of it is our staff is not just a line item. There's a lot of people on the forefront working with our kids on a daily basis. Without adequate funding, they're going faced with larger class sizes, reduced resources, and it's gonna be really hard to maintain a stable, quality workforce in our schools. I urge you to support the proposed budget as a person who had children come through the school system 25 years ago, when I moved here, the current state of Carmel County Public Schools at that time, I did not want to put my child in the school. Through the hard work of that administration and those teachers at that time, I made the decision to put him in the school system and he flourished. And the school has thrived under the guise of many superintendents since then, but a lot of staff who stayed on really hard with our children to keep it going. So any consideration you can give to them, I greatly appreciate it. Thank you. Miss Wendy Taylor? This one being jealous. When you tell a three you have cyber road, the strict people work. Good evening. I'm also the principal at R&L Elementary School. Good evening. Thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening. I want to begin by acknowledging the difficult task you face, and building a budget that balances so many and PD needs. I understand that every department has priorities and limited resources to go around. As a tax pain citizen, I sincerely appreciate the work that we've done to be this, this belief least responsible and protect our community from the tax increases. Having said that, I'm here to respectfully ask the fully-fund school divisions revised local legislature request. This amount is already a reduction from our original request, out to the fair minimum by Patrick Dunes in our leadership team to accommodate what the vision needs. Despite our efforts, we've learned and proposed on the table as to provide just over $5.5 to $9 million, leaving us with a short call of a little over $127,000. That may not seem like much of a context to a full budget, but for us, it's positions, it's programs, and students. But we ask for additional funding, It's not because we're asking for more, because we're asking for the required local match to unlock the whole amount of state money. Without... and students. But we ask for additional funding, it's not because we're asking for more, it's because we're asking for the required local match to unlock a full amount of state funding, without it, we're leaving critical dollars on the table. Because the proposed local contribution called short, we've already had to cut nearly half a million dollars from our original budget. The current 120 and little, around 27,000 shortfall isn't just about that number. That's on top of the 400,000 more than 400,000 we've already sacrificed. That's a devastating loss for a small division trying to do right by every child. We've already had to reduce the proposed staff raise as you've heard. When we factor inflation, our teachers are making less today than they did in 2009, and yet they're doing more than ever. Managing increased responsibilities, rising student needs, and doing it all with compassion and grit. The emotional toll is real, they are exhausted, but they keep showing up because they care. Our teachers are spending their own money on supplies and materials, and they do that every year. What's frustrating is this conversation seems to happen every year. Since I started here, we've been part of the Illumina Tamstrom School System, even as our resources have steadily defined. But the success has come at a cost. Staff are regularly taking on multiple roles in their personal time, especially if the family is often the first thing that they're faced. There was a time that educators could fit on the job they were hired to do and still have a healthy work like balance. Now it feels like we're being penalized to find the ways to make it work with less. That's simply not sustainable. We're going to have this real, and we risk losing great people and struggling to reverse them because the demands have become too high. Our staff members are writing grants and their spare time just to keep and help cover basic needs. Our central office operates with fewer employees than any neighboring division. Everyone is doing more than one job, all the evidence there that capacity isn't. Things fall through the cracks, not from my children, but in my effort to support. It's not just about instruction, We're also paying for the almost never-movable of the maintenance fees, the outflows, the families are being into this county because of school system. That will only last if you keep investing in it. Don't make a sacrifice anymore. Totally find our school division. Don't ask our teachers and our children to get up one more. Thank you. Mrs. Virginia Gills. Jenny to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm, but I do plan two. I retired from CCPS after starting as principal for 10 years. It was an honor and it was a privilege, some of the best years of my 34 years of public education. And because of this, I do know firsthand the staff are vices that our school staff continue making every single day just to meet those basic needs. I saw at first hand how our teachers, administrators, and central office staff work to stretch every dollar, often doing more with less. In addition to the extra grant writing that's done at central office, our teachers work tirelessly to secure other grants, even creating and sharing Amazon wishlist with our friends and family to fill where school funds fall short. What we accomplish in Carmelon is nothing short of extraordinary, especially when compared to neighboring school divisions that have significantly more resources, personnel and support. I had the opportunity to serve on a board of principals from across our state and recently to work with a company whose focus is family and community engagement. And I've been seeing how underfunded we are, for example, in other counties, neighboring counties, they have a paraprofessional in every kind of art class, where at least one for every two classes. This is something that I have requested each year in our budget, but it never made it to your budget. So I know you probably wonder why, but I think that's a need I invite you as I had stood here before, and I invite you to the elementary school and spend a day in kindergarten. And I'm sure you will see why that is a need. I'm certain that the leaders behind me will expand that invite to you at any time. Many of the leaders that I work with also share that they have tools that some of us agree about. Like a self-made or working self-made. I use my self-made and it calls substitute every single day and more. And that really shouldn't happen. My niece who's a Carmel and High School graduate, she's a mental health counselor in the neighboring division. And even she has an issue of self-hood. Now, a self-hood is really not what I'm talking about. It's really just a point that I'm trying to make. Let's talk about the big money. So neighboring schools have special ask support staff for family engagement, for curriculum teams to design, curriculum assessments to segregate their data. Our teachers do every bit of that. Other schools have deans that support any discipline needs, our administrators do all of that. They have school social workers, ground speakers. You may have driven by the elementary school, the middle school, the high school and seeing the administrator pulling leaves, spreading mullets, doing other tasks to beautify our school grounds. It's not an necessity, but it's just a point that we're trying to make. Meanwhile, our staff continues to wear multiple hats, manage massive workloads, and still find a way to show up for kids. It's just not sustainable and it really shouldn't be expected just because we welcome kids because we do and just because we love teaching because we do. So when I'm called the supervisor's earlier, I shared that Dr. Jen is not only serves as superintendent, but he also serves as a finance officer like the only finance officer, the chief. And to now the piece of the meeting, we are really tasked to have to build two positions as I shared earlier. We know that we're the largest employer in this county. We are at the heart of the community. And while our staff doesn't complain, I promise you they do feel the strain. We shouldn't have the beg every year to receive which required by this day. Dr. Dunes has already cut the raise for our staff from 3% to 1.5%. He's reduced the budget down to the bare minimum. He's moved variances to lower our required lower maximum variances. The people in the other county who know our school the better schooling, wonder if it's to come to our school. But we're going to tell them no now. So the weekend, not have that required level of match amount to save us a little bit of money, maybe. But we do. Yes. It is okay. But I'm going to be very consistent across the board. I stop Mr. Hatcher, please. So I have to stop. Thank you. Thank you. You're making this tough decision. Next, we'll have is definitely older. I tell you the truth, I really can have anything to say. But I want to thank you all for what you're trying to do. I know it's a monumental task. And just to remind you to ask the Lord's wisdom how he made these decisions, because every department, if you give everybody everything they ask for, next year they'll go out more anyway. So there's a big difference between wants and needs, and so I just want to encourage you to try to work together and do a thing as best for the county. Thank you. If no other citizens sign up this week, we will now open the floor for more of our decision. Discussion, I'm sorry. Part of the comments will remain open on Saturday, 23rd, 2024, or interest citizens. What has the opportunity to give rent or or comment until then by contacting our deadly clerk, Tiananmen and the county We'll show you the straight-up office at 804, 492, 3625. I just want to ask a question based on the skills talk about, because that is a concern. I think I addressed that with a few drones process here. Did we get a revised request? We did. We did. I think it's going to the fact that Dr. Jones is leaving, he was still on the training of two roles. That's correct. So Dr. Jones did send along an updated budget request that was about 100, you the figure earlier, 127,000 and it was 127,000 above the the flat fund and he had outlined a lot of different areas where they tighten the screws and made some cuts and the 1.5 percent salarine grease was baked into that as well. I can certainly send that to the board, and we can include that as part of our discussions. Did that have a request or a financial director position? I don't recall off the top of my head. That was it. That's pretty annoying. More couple days ago? Yes, sir. Okay. So sometimes having time to adjust, it's like there's a court. There's, you could never have put a dollar value or one dollar, or something that's done for our community. Second and not. And, personally, I would like to go back and revisit some of the funding options because I do know that in order to get an accident, we have to get minimal in order to get grants of oil. And they've made now without a hold of it so we need to. But again one of my concerns is with the again timing of the information from Dr. Gunn to again yesterday morning about not mistaken but we sent out people. It's within the last week of the year. Yes exactly. And again, those are concerns. I wish had not fallen to late process. So sorry. But I do believe that I think we need to look at the old care to at least care what we can. Because like I said, there are large support.. Probably without a dollar of rent is asked. Along the public say, I mean those are two things that make this county shine. Get that into the tax dollar. So I really don't really like that deal. Sort of discussion. Yeah, I just want to thank the personal thank you for coming. Thank you for your passion. Thank you for your professional. I do think it's worth more than $1 or $1. I'll keep saying end. And I think all of us on the board will help. And see what one can be done. I think that's a reasonable one for us. And you know, no problem, it says, but it doesn't hurt to work one more time. So that. I'm going to say one more time. It's really great.'s a really long time. At this time, I'd recommend the CFP FY 2026 to 2031. Is this a statement? Madam Chair, members of the board, I just wanted to provide this year's FY 26, I'm sorry, The current presentation related to the FW26, FW30, capital and perg program. Virginia State Code does allow for the development of the CIP program. CIP program typically is done in five year increments. We do utilize a 25 year CIP program down into those five year increments. actually with primary focus on the five year cycle and the immediate one year impacts. And the 25 year, I'm not going to share that with you because it's such a big document, it would be able to read it. Nobody would be able to see it. So I didn't want to waste your time with that. But a processing cost identified with the CIP are typically rounded up when their early stages do account for unforeseen costs. cost and unexpected cost fluctuations a lot of times when we approve these by the time we get a round actually implementing a project costs that increase or potentially decrease. So we do try to update the put in estimate the costs as it pertains to my recommendation. Really I focus on three areas for funding sources and that's cash out of general a general fund borrowing opportunities, and then I agree for grants and donations together. And I've highlighted that as for a reason because when we go through this document, I'm gonna share with you what the recommended projects are and also how this would potentially be funded. So I've got some updates on some of these projects. Some great solutions. I would partner where possible. For example, we've included our radio system project and these vehicles, anchor donations. And we look to implement best practices. For example, that I mentioned earlier with Payment Regional Jail. They are actually following a very similar program that we are related to their CIP program. And it's an upstabulous point of bit of money because it's adopted as part of the regular operating budget. We did share this with the board of the previous workshop and many commissioners engaged as well and did try to synthesize all the feedback that I received. So in looking at the FY26 recommended budget, we are am recommending and this is all contingent upon grant funding because we don't have we have money in the general fund when I'm recommending that we approve this contingent upon grant funding. And right now recommending two new shares vehicles at 123,334 dollars. There are original requests for three new vehicles when we think that we can get to that would be great. Paving at the Randolph Transfer Station. Transfer stations for your up and over one at the Hamilton needs it as well. We're going to look at ways that we can creatively get that accomplished and then renovations to animal shelter. Again, all three of these projects are contingent upon great funding for donations. Public utilities includes a recommendation for a palm station generator and again that would be contingent upon grant funding as well. We have opportunities through the Virginia Department of Emergency Management that I feel that these will qualify for and I do want to pursue that. And as far as judicial administration I am recommending a potential funding that will be basically on borrowing in the amount of 1.5 million related to seed money from the courthouse architectural design. We are considering the use of a PPEA process recommended by staff. There's more to come on this. I mean, providing up to that process to improve and lower the design and construction costs related to any previous shared designs. This is a placeholder because we do not have a front estimate until we actively receive proposals from qualified firms. I didn't want to admit this from the presentation tonight because we're going to go into much more detail the later time as we're linked to this project. Far and rescue, we did fine-tune the estimate on an ambulance replacement and that estimate has come back at $406,296. It would be great if you current requests as it's 70%. So the 30% match would be approximately $121,888, which would ultimately have to come from the general fund. Parks and Recreation, there are two projects located in that, CIP, currently grant funded, County Administrator recommends roof repairs at the LPJ complex, and the Barricor Connector Trail, we've had 50% matching funding on that for years. It's not a huge priority, but if an opportunity comes along to match that, it's really on the backboard. It's just out there for an awareness standpoint. We are looking at multiple items related to the gymnasium roof. Ultimately, we're going to have to do something with my goal right now is to tend to fix it with grant funding. We've got about four options that I think we're reviewing now with cost estimates ranging from $250,000 to $1.3 million. We just got to work through that and see what makes the most sense. Public schools, all requested items, Dr. Johnson indicated to me that these were content potentially on grants and donations. I am recommending that the board, instead of setting a $450,000 as seed money for the Combo and County Elementary School roof replacement. And this can be done in next two days, meaning that figure is not baked into the budget as presented, but it's up here for discussion purposes. So with the idea being that we've recognized this as a need, we've got to cost us some of the approximately 1.1 million, and we want to go ahead and start setting aside money for that replacement because we don't want to get caught when we don't have any funding for it. And just looking at the CIP revenues, you can see based upon general fund and potential grant funding, I probably should have picked a different color than a darker green than a lighter green than I used, so it would be easier to see. But you can see the general fund, if you move forward with the roof and if the ambulance gets the grant funding, you need about $57888. The branch of a total approximately 1.5 million and then potential borrowing scenario that we will discuss in a later time. It's not being requested to be funding at this time. It's more or less for awareness purposes. And just from a brand's perspective, if you take out some of the fishing wildlife funds that we've discussed previously with you, right now I believe we will fly for over 2.5 to $2.6 million with the grant funding, and we've received approximately 850-wish thousand. And there's more in the hopper. So we're doing everything we can as a staff to team up and seek opportunities to help with some of these projects and some of our needs. And we offset operating expenditures where we can, but a lot of it's one time funding, and you don't want to make yourself be on the current fiscal year. So with that, we'd like to take any questions. There's one quick question on revenues. Stay funded consistently. Don't have it. So we're other potential representatives. I believe so, and what that's carved out for is sometimes when the state and sometimes even the federal government, I should probably change that to other government funding. Sometimes they have spending bills where they're looking to ear mark and project in a locality. And we get contacted and then you have to submit an application for that and then it goes through a little group of process through your local legislator. And there are opportunities where we can receive funding for existing projects. It's typically more competitive if you've already got some funding established for it. So if we got some some grant funding and we don't have a match We can we can seek that through our local legislators and we've been actually doing that as part of the Fish and Wildlife Fund I talked to that office probably every five to ten days. Okay. But, yes sir. We'll go off now, come in here. I La, no minutes of time to speak. I'm working on the Ministry of Health and Health. FY 1626-2330. Contact out the County Administrative Office. of course, you, it's open to the service until April 23, 2020. 4.5. All of the number of comments that you've been standing on. I would like to thank everybody for coming in. and I'm you're concerned with the budget and everything and I hope that you can make a better resolution in that. Again, especially schools. You all got a hard and great thing to begin and you all are just absolutely not. I couldn't say anymore. Thank you very much for your shows to the community. As always, thank you for showing up tonight. Thank you for those who chose to speak. We wish your concerns. Make your voice heard. It's not an easy process and I think most of you will realize that. And from where I sit, I've always said, I don't like taxes, I don't like spending. That's my kind of human government. But the two areas that I don't like, any pension, are public safety and our schools. You know a lot of times you hear about localities, their solutions are just throwing money. Throw money at it and then that will solve the problem. You know that doesn't work. But one thing that I recognize with Franklin County Public Schools is you are operating on-terrain budget. You do a lot with a loop, and I don't think you should be penalized for that. You should be recognized for that, and if there is a way to make sure that it's hold, then we need to look at it. Especially given the state of Dr. Jones's' moving on because of the fact that he did serve two roles. And I think that that's something that wasn't accounted for when doing this lecture on stuff. But thank you for coming. Thank you for taking the partners process. And it's not set in stone yet. Thank you. Thank you for coming. You're a good letter player. So we will look through the budget. Figures are $127,000. And see you can get it. Well, so you got one comments for the end. First of all, thank you all for coming. School system, you all know what you mean to me. I have been on both sides. I'm a part of a common county public schools. So it's not easy setting up here and to tell you all that we cannot find you. To our county, the ministry of the system, you do a wonderful job, you're a Jennifer and an entire state. But you know we will give you more work to do when coming back at you more more time because we heard the school system loud and clear. I thank them for coming to us tonight and the professional, but respectful manner and addressing their concerns to us. Not yelling at us, not screaming at us, not delivering us, but just expressing facts and concern. That means a lot. If we had the money, we would give everyone what they're standing in need of, but it has to be a need and not just a need. It is hard. Even though we lower the taxes, trying to take some of the burdens off of the citizens come 70 cents down to 60 cents, trying to take some of the burdens off of the citizens, comes 70 cents down to 60 cents, trying to find the school. People don't want the land filled. What do we do? We're stuck. And we have some major decisions to make as a board, which is only five of us. with the help of the county staff and this board will put our hands together we're going to seek God for direction and guidance and let him lead us the rest of the way but we ask that everybody patient with us and be willing to work with us or we work together we accomplish so much so much more. They're working, they're working, pulling up fire. So, when that note wants to give, thank you all for coming out this evening and be patient with us. Have a good night. And I have a motion to adjourn. Absolutely. Second. Mr. Hamlin. Aye. Mr. Newman. Sorry. Mr. Simpson. Aye. Sorry's the handling. All right. It's going to be a necessary extension. All right. It's done. Thank you.