The evening of 2022-02-15 was a meeting of the Honeoye Falls-Lima Board of Education (BoE), and Program Budget Advisory Council (PBAC).
Short agenda, yet long meeting. Such is budget season. Big topics were essentially the same as last meeting: Pair of budget presentations (High School and Interscholastic this time) and the first responder property tax. Other things were discussed, as always, but those three were the bulk of the meeting.
Bruce (Business) and then the firemen gave presentations on the cost and benefits to giving the first responders a degree of property tax exemption. While I’m sure the numbers will change, ballpark sounds like ~$600 decrease for those benefiting, while ~$6 increase to everyone else. In the end, the topic was tabled for future consideration. Which in effect means no change for this years taxes, due to deadlines.
The Board asked a variety of questions which I think did a good job of highlighting the complications of this proposal. No one was against supporting emergency services, I believe all who spoke started by stating their support. But my sense of the discussion was that they felt this was too convoluted of a method to rely on.
I almost think the ‘better’ solution would be for the departments to offer direct payment. Not full time employment (although they could do that too), but some sort of stipend. Not sure what all that would entail, but feels like it would be a cleaner method then having municipalities decide to tax some people differently then others.
The high school presentation started off talking about the mental health of the students, along with their ‘Social Emotional Learning’ (SEL). From that, a need for a second Assistant Principal. Would effectively replace the existing Teacher on Special Assignment (TOSA), so doesn’t appear to be a net change in staffing here.
A chunk of the talk seemed to encourage a greater focus on the group, not the individual. They then moved onto the ‘Learning Academy’ and it’s more unique approach. I was getting mixed messages. On the one hand, collectivism is the stated goal? But for those that can’t fit into that mold, more individualized groups exist? I understand certain data lends itself to being aggregated and monitored in that way. But we forget that each student is an individual at our own peril.
Graduation rates are down, but still high for the county and state. As an aside, IMHO the past two graduations on the football field have gone quiet well. Absenteeism is up (~20% vs ~9% pre-panic), as are referrals. As Gene (Superintendent) pointed out later, we’ve spent the last two years teaching people (especially kids) to be afraid. Negative outcomes from that should be expected.
Going to gloss over the interscholastic presentation. I see value to having such a program, and am glad it is there. But if I’m not playing the game, or personally know those that are, sports hold little interest to me. If your opinion differs, great, you may enjoy hearing Brian (Athletics) speak. Having said that, I was glad to see the proposed budget increase was ~2%. I believe that has been the lowest department request this year.
Unfortunately, the student board representative had to go before his time to speak came up. But he left notes with Renee (Curriculum & Instruction), who shared them. What stood out to me was the mention of students protesting masks, and a gathering that had occurred in front of the school 2/14. Combined with some students apparently refusing to wear masks, I think this ties back to the issues brought up in the High School presentation. Just like the rest of us, the students appear to be getting ‘weary’ (as Gene put it).
I’ve already mentioned some of Gene’s words of wisdom above, but he had a few more. He predicted an end to the mask mandate in school on March 7th. For those keeping track, that was not a guarantee, just his best guess at this time. While I think today would be better, the optimist in me hopes he is right. The cynic still remembers ‘two weeks to flatten the curve‘.
More importantly, he repeated a call from the last meeting to accept people’s differences. We don’t all need to agree, and we shouldn’t taunt people for choosing different things. While he was speaking in regards to wearing (or not) masks, this is good advice in general. Exceptions exist (always an exception), but conformity for conformities sake carries risk as well. Especially when brought about through force.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the February 15, 2022 meeting of the Honeoye Falls-Lima Board of Education.
Agenda’s and similar information can be found at HFL’s BoardDocs page. While a recording is also available.