Tonight (2018-01-09) was a meeting of the Honeoye Falls-Lima Board of Education (BoE), and before that the Program Budget Advisory Council (PBAC).
Full disclosure: I sit on the PBAC, so some of these Observations aren’t exactly from the Audience.
Much like at last nights Town Board meeting, there were boy scouts in attendance. I counted 6 this time, plus a few parents. Again, always good to see more people paying attention to what government is doing. Even if it is motivated by a badge.
Conan’s (HFL graduate) dad spoke during comment time to thank the district for all the help they gave his son. Conan made the dean’s list at college. Having crossed paths with Conan at various times in the past few years, I’m glad to hear his college experience is going well so far. Fitting this came up at a school board meeting, because it really is all about the children.
Gene (Superintendent) talked about last Friday’s snow day, and how handling logistics interfered with his sleep that weekend. A number of events (including the Solver movie) were occurring on campus over the weekend. So despite being closed Friday, there was plenty going on at the school on Saturday.
Bruce (Business and Operations) gave a presentation to open up budget season. At the core, it was the same as the last few years. While the details change, every year there is a budget. As to those details:
He expects a tax cap at 3.26%, which makes yet another year that 2% is not 2%. A 3.26% levy increase will gain the district ~$1 million, of which ~$200,000 goes to paying off debt. ~60% of the districts revenue comes from the local residents through property tax. There is an expected enrollment drop of ~150 students over the next five years. This will create challenges at the high school with the over 400 electives offered. Worth noting, all numbers mentioned above are best guesstimates at this time. They will almost certainly change by the time the budget vote rolls around in May.
After the presentation, the only other item of note was a discussion on allowing a home schooled student that resides in Rush-Henrietta to be part of the FIRST Robotics program. Explanation, if such is needed:
Rush-Henrietta and Honeoye Falls-Lima have a joint FIRST Robotics program. RH (and HFL) have a policy prohibiting home schooled students from participating in school-sponsored extracurricular activities. RH basically said they are ok with making an exception if we are, but that it’s on us if we do. So HFL opted to stand with the existing policy (ie, no home school students on robotics team).
Although, there was discussion about reviewing the policy and considering changing it, that is for a future time. I think the review is a good idea, because at first glance the policy doesn’t make sense. Assuming the students parents live in the district, they should be paying property taxes to the school. In which case, they should also receive the benefits of those taxes, namely their children being allowed to participate in school programs. If they opt out of some programs, that shouldn’t force them out of all programs. Unless in opting out of program, they can also opt out of taxes.
Again, that’s at first glance. There may well be a good reason for this restriction, which is why I am looking forward to hearing the future discussion on this topic.
While not a part of this meeting, I wanted to point out the Sentinel’s article about the last BoE meeting. In particular, I thought Donna (Author) did a good job capturing the comment I made. When I make comments I often wonder if the words I think I am saying match up with the words that are being heard. In this case at least, they did. Doesn’t mean I’m being any less of a fool when making comments, but it is encouraging to know at least the words get across.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the January 9, 2018 meeting of the Honeoye Falls-Lima Board of Education.
As has become the norm for this group, Agenda’s and similar information can be found at HFL’s BoardDocs page.