Monadnock Regional School District

School Board Finance Committee Meeting Minutes

April 1, 2008

Troy Elementary School

Approved

 

Committee members present:  Tim Aho, Jane Fortson, Gene White, Sue Oerman, Jim Carnie, and Phyllis Peterson.  Administrators Present: Katie Chambers, Business Manager.

 

K. Chambers called the meeting to order at 6:01 pm.

 

0.  Election of chair:  Motion to postpone until all members of the finance committee could be present by T. Aho, seconded by J. Carnie.  Motion Passes:  4 yes (G. White, J. Carnie, P. Peterson, T. Aho) 2 no (J. Fortson, S. Oerman) Motion for secretary opened: no takers, J. Fortson stated she would take them for tonight.

 

1.  Approval of Minutes: Motion to approve the February 19th minutes by S. Oerman, seconded by P. Peterson.   Motion passes:  five yes, 1 abstention (T. Aho).

 

2. Public Comments:  None.

 

3.  New Business:

a.      Finance committee goal setting:  G. White stated that the finance committee needs to take on a bigger role, and more responsibility than in the past.   Katie’s leaving will have an impact on the committee and with two people with financial backgrounds their expertise needs to be called on.  A suggestion was made to meet on alternate weeks and not before the school board meetings, so that the committee can spend the time necessary on the topics, and get the rationale to the board ahead of time so that the items can be presented to the board for discussion.  T. Aho stated that he didn’t feel that other members did not have expertise in finance.  He spoke about the combining of two classes in Sullivan (topic not until 3e of the agenda) and that he spoke to Ron LeClerc of the Department of Ed, he stated that the rate of $14,000 was going to be coming to SAU #38.  K. Chambers asked if we should set up another meeting to get to all the items on the agenda.  J. Carnie agreed that getting things at the last minute has been an issue.  He stated that the finance committee was never intended to be a budget committee.  It is supposed to review finances and how the district is being run.  He doesn’t appreciate the comments made by the facilities committee; he stated the facilities committee needs to get recommendations to the finance committee.  Further stating the finance committee is not to be a rubber stamp group.  P. Peterson stated that she feels we need to be looking more closely at the operation budget.  J. Fortson stated that she sees one of the roles of the finance committee to be on the front end of the budget process before the whole board receives the budget.  S. Oerman would like the committee to be proactive not reactive regarding what’s left for funds.  K. Chambers asked when the committee would like to meet next?  J. Carnie stated that the school board never made cuts in the budget, and that cuts need to be made up front, with a priority list of cuts as was done in the past.  G. White stated that we need to make cuts, as we may have a large surplus two years in a row, then it would lead one to think there were things in the budget that we don’t need.

The next meeting will be scheduled at 5:00-6:45pm on Tuesday April 8th.

 

S. Oerman made the nomination of J. Fortson for chair, stating that Doug had informed her that he could not make it, if it was scheduled for a day other than prior to the board meetings.  Motion fails for lack of a second.  T.  Aho challenged Doug’s availability. 

 

S. Oerman leaves meeting at 6:39pm citing disappointment with the progress and tone of the meeting.

 

d.      Budget Transfer request:  (in board packet) Request to transfer $42081.00 for the renovations necessary for preparing the Wilcox building for MC2’s move there.  Motion to recommend approval to the full board by ????? , seconded by ?????.  Motion Passes: 

 

b.      MS22:  T. Aho wanted to make sure the $500,000 in the warrant article for the Surry building repurchase doesn’t “vaporize”…that the excess over the amount of the repurchase doesn’t get spent ant that it goes back to the taxpayer.  Motion to accept the MS22 as presented by P. Peterson, seconded by J. Fortson.  No discussion.  Motion passes:  4 yes (G. White, J. Fortson, T. Aho, P. Peterson) and 1 abstention.  (J. Carnie)

 

 

c.       Draft of 2009-2010 budget schedule:  Handed out to look over, not covered due to lack of time.

 

g.  Legal Bills – No handout for this meeting.

 

e.  Default Budget:  (Handout):  K. Chambers asked the committee to review this for the next meeting, not covered at this meeting due to lack of time. 

 

f.  Financial reports:  (handout) not covered due to lack of time.

 

h.      Other:  J. Carnie mentioned the Surry Transition committee discussions that will be impacting the finance committee such as the tuition for the Surry students and the MC2 students.  He further asked:  “Why didn’t they just cut and run?,  We’re not obligated to take the kids from Surry, we’ve been nice enough to say we would, but trying to say the SAU has to pay for services for no kids in SAU 38 maybe we should reconsider.

 

4.  Old Business:  Not done, due to lack of time.

 

5. Second Public Comments:  No time.

 

6. Next Meeting:  as stated earlier the next meeting will be in the conference room of the HS at 5:00pm on April 8th.

 

7.  Adjourn:  Motion to adjourn by J. Fortson, at 7:02pm, seconded by J. Carnie.  Motion passes:  Unanimous for all present.

 

 

 

Respectfully submitted by Jane Fortson