4.6.2026 Fall River School Committee - Facilities and Operations

Order the facilities and operations subcommittee meeting of April 6th, 2026.

Please call the role.

Mr. A.

Yes.

Here.

Mr. D.

Here.

Mr. Modus.

Here.

Can we all rise to the flag, please? I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you so much. Pursuant to the open meeting law, any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any meeting. Attendees are therefore advised as such recordings or transmissions are being made whether perceived or unpersceived by those present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible. Citizen input time. I think we have one person Jeff CH and madam

secretary. Can you please read it?

Hi I am a resident who lives in near the stone school and on weekends there are many lights always left on. I know it would be save some money for the schools if they were shut off on the weekends.

Same situation at Dery. When you drive by, there are always a lot of classroom lights left on. I know there is a remote way way to shut them off, but the position is currently vacant. Who is in charge of the lights? I have attached a picture of Stone School. I don't have a picture of Jury, but could get one if needed. Best regards.

Thank you, M. You want to just answer that just so for the edification of the public?

Sure. So, uh, most of the buildings, um, for instance, in that particular picture, uh, the hallway stairwells, they're always lit. Um, most of that is public safety reasons. If they need to enter the building at night, um, there are not many lights that would stay on.

Uh, classrooms, if there's a classroom light on, that should have been off, but um, not necessarily anything other than that. So main hallways, atriums, um def definitely uh stairwells should always be there uh for public safety reasons. So we everything else should shut should go on and off. Um almost all of our buildings have daylight harvesting, but they also have um a uh uh occupancy uh sensors, so they should

be off in the classroom. If they're on, that's a mechanical issue that we need to take care of. Somebody I'm sure must check that to let you know if there's We do periodically. If a bunch of classrooms are on, we'll get to it.

We do. Yes.

Great. Thank you so much. Sure.

Mr. D, um just very quickly um and I know um I brought up the director situation before and um I don't know if there's um there's like a code or just um this best practice to leave the lights on if um if someone comes in. I don't know if we're turning them off like after like if there's like night shift for custodian security if they're right. So second shift second shift custodian. So someone's coming by the

building especially in the winter time after 5:00 it's already dark outside the the rooms would be dark unless a custodian is in and out doing their particular uh duty uh in those classrooms. We also at Dery High School have a third shift uh custodians. So again, those individual classrooms if they're picking up uh maybe for an absence of a second shift person going in to cover an area that may be on um

and then areas like the gym would normally be done on second shift unless there's sporting events which could go into a third shift and then those those areas would be lit. In this particular picture, I see that one classroom that may it may be a classroom space. I would have to look closer at the building that may have been left on inadvertently because that building does not have it

has automatics as far as occupancies, but if someone overro overrode that with a switch, then we would have to check on that and that one I can take a look at.

But those hallways, those corners are hallway lights on that building.

Thank you. On the last um point and again not we can get an update on this just to keep the meeting going but um I know we have the facilities manager position in the budget. It only doesn't I know that position specifically for Dery.

Yes. Um maybe there could be a conversation of um and I know it's unfilled currently but maybe expanding those duties in the future so it covers um if we keep that position it can cover um situations such as this and other couples.

Mr. D on that point um that in that facility managers um it does say that at the at the request of of myself um and now Josh if they need that person to go out and look at a you know another facility um to have a se second separate set of you know second set of eyes um that that would be okay. So it's in the job description already to do things

that you just mentioned. we just announced. Is there any applicants that we we have about a dozen applicants and um we would like to fill that before the end of this school year. Um Josh has been filling in for quite some time at Dery since it became vacant and um we've been fortunate that it's it's worked um but it is a lot of extra work. Dery the plan itself is a big building to keep

you know running. Um the plan is not not to fill it. No, no.

I mean, since it was vacated, we Yes.

just been taking a long time based on whatever trying to find the right fit um you know, having having the skill set um and and there's a variety of applicants um that have one or two pieces of that skill set. So, um we're just being a little picky right now.

All right, sounds good. Please let us know. Uh 2.01 is an update on the school resource officer. So, we have carried this forward uh from prior meetings. So, we do have a the oldou, we have a newou, but I'd like to just get into the um before we start with those two just about the finances of the current uh SRO and the sergeant. We're pleased to welcome Jore, deputy chief. Welcome.

Thank you.

Um if you wanted to just uh maybe just run down how that works, maybe the timing on our budgets run from July 1 to June 30th.

Yep. So when we know how much everybody's going to get, what is the information and then we have some questions on the hours and that type of thing.

So as far as budgets concerned, obviously we run the same with the municipal schedule as we do with you guys. So uh as far as the numbers are concerned, um we did have uh one of the SRO's just got promoted to sergeant, so he was transferred out of the unit. He was then quickly replaced with another officer. Um, but if you're asking for the basically the lines of each salary that they're getting. So, right now it

looks like there's four officers at approximately 88,684.

Uh, there's one officer at 82,853.

There's one officer at 71260.

There's one officer at $93,98.

and the sergeant is at 104754 I believe that's all in the fiscal 26 budget that's posted on the website. So that would be the salaries start on July 1.

Correct. That's the amount we would know how much we're going to that's the annual salary. Correct.

Including everything.

So after the we had just discussed some things about traffic actually and it came out to wonder how much are we paying uh the sergeant that was something we added a couple years ago because the sergeant does pretty much pay the sergeant for that for those seven people.

Correct.

So made sense for us to pay that.

Absolutely. Mhm.

But uh it came to our attention that there was overtime, automatic overtime since the start of the year. So I'm trying to figure out where how does that fit into the um so the overtime is not factored into the figures I just kind of roughly gave you there. Um but based on theou that we've been working with, there's basically 10-hour days that every SRO is working and that's been going on since I was

before I was the SRO sergeant back in 2017. Um, so that practice, I don't know when it started, but it's a 10-hour day.

So there's a built-in two hours of overtime each day for those officers. So each officer gets 10 hours of perpetual overtime based on those extended days.

And what exactly do they do? I'm in favor of the SRO. I don't want to make consider filtered but at the end of the day the overtime that I understand from the thing would be that the superintendent has to approve the overtime okay which would be on the our sheets and talk about it but when it's built in it it starts to be like what why are we

doing that and when I just look at a 7-h hour day just you know 7 hour school day 8 hour workday 10 hours like we had mentioned this to the private superintendent and she said they work 6:30 to 4:30 or something they do thing so what what exactly is happening.

Take us through like the day of So they have an initial roll call. So all of the SRO's uh get together for roll call at the station. They're obviously doing any type of information sharing or any directors or safety bulletins that come out. So there could be things that have happened overnight that they should be concerned with in proximity to the schools or maybe involving potential school students so

that they're aware. Um and then they they deploy to their schools. They complete their day. They stay until after the school is done uh making sure all the students are off of the premises and if anything is being disclosed or what have you that they basically are there for the security and um communication piece they return to the station they have a debrief and then they're done. Um that's the that's

basically where it's at. I think when I was the SRO sergeant there were things with extended days and it was just easy to put everybody on the same schedule so that they would start and finish all together and keep everyone on the same page. Um, if you're wanting to adjust that, I understand your concern. I mean, we're willing to to adjust that. I think the schools would just have to

understand that there's going to be less coverage based on the hours that we can spell out in the MLOU. I mean, we're flexible.

So, 6:30 is a roll call. Is that the correct?

And then it just begs the question of if 6:30 is a roll call, they get in at quarter 7.

We have school to start all different times. We have some traffic issues. So, I I think there might be some room for um some overtime when it's targeted towards certain things, but quite honestly, I just think that's an additional expense that we don't necessarily um because if we pay the expense for that and then we need something extra to pay.

One of the past practices that was there is that anything that goes beyond as it relates to investigative or if there's an arrest at the end of the day, one step 10-hour period is exhausted. we would assume it in our budget. So if there's a continued investigation, let's say there was a crime committed and we needed to do interviews or what have you and the SRO was wrapped up in that, the

overtime would come out of our budget.

So there is a stop gap there where it isn't an unlimited amount of overtime that you would have, you know, uptick there. So that's something that is not enumerated in theou, but that's something that I know uh over the last seven plus years that we've we've done that where they would take the overtime from our budget.

Any questions, Mr. guys.

Thank you. The STRO supervisor position.

So, I went through the um bothus the proposed and um the the one we're working with now the SRO's are supposed to report to the building principal. The SRO sergeant. Who would they who would be their point of contact? the superintendent design with the police chief or so you talk about span of control in any organization and the former police is tall. So the reason why we have an SRO

supervisor is they're the coordinator.

So those officers do answer to the principal but they're always looping in that sergeant and sometimes the principal is calling the sergeant because there might be something that requires resources to be moved from schools. you know, we've had incidents happen, you know, during to bulk up the manpower there for the presence, for the security of the students or if there's a special event of what have you. So, a

lot of that gets relayed through the sergeant. Uh, I know Mr. Bacho is in direct contact with that SRO sergeant.

If there's ever a concern district-wide, so he's the coordinator. Um, I understand how theou works and that is correct in the sense of dayto-day, they're going to answer to the principal, but that sergeant is always looped in on any decision- making.

Okay. Um, and I asked this um through the administration if we can just get just a copy of all the job descriptions.

And I understand it falls under the police department as it should, but since we're just paying for it, just seeing if um just get a copy, not just for the supervisor, but just for all um the um actual SRO position as well. you want their job description as we have it laid out in policy as far as police officers expected tasks or do you want because essentially when we take thisou

we adopt that as kind of the policy as it relates to SRO's because this is additional responsibilities above and beyond a normal patrol officer so I can give you the patrol officer duties and responsibilities job description and then this would just be enumerate on top of that oh so there isn't a like um I guess the way And I know it's different from education to police. Like for all our

position, we have an actual job description for what your for what your duties and responsibilities are.

Mhm.

Um so that doesn't exist like in terms of No, that's not what I said. There's a there's a foundational um job description for every police officer in the building. Thisou gets adopted as the school resource policy which then outlines additional duties and responsibilities. So, if you take those two slices of bread as the sandwich for what an SRO is.

Okay.

I think when you see it visually, it'll make sense.

Yeah. I know what you're saying. It's a generic uh like a teacher has a duty. If you're a chemistry teacher, you might have some specific things or there's some similarities to what you're saying, but I think when I send you the duties and responsibilities of an actual police officer and then you put this because there's some I wouldn't say restrictions, but there's some guard rails in thisou language that kind of uh

points more towards diversion and you know lower impact stuff than you know a regular police officer responding on the street would act differently based on their duties and responsibilities.

Okay. And um I the SRO that we have currently has it been like pretty steady or like do they get like switched out from time to time?

No, it's been it's been steady. We do have one right now that's out on leave that should be returning at the end of the month, but it's been the same cadre of people for the last uh three years I believe.

Thank you. Um, in terms of I know we talked about briefly if um the start times are being staggered and that goes from school to school if there is a um so they're going to roll call at 6:30 and we're paying for how how many hours of overtime in the morning? Is it 1 or two?

It's 1 hours in the one in the morning, one in the afternoon. So, it's 2 hours a day to 8:30 if the start time for a school and I don't have that in front of me, but if it's before at 8:30, so have most of that time is overtime until 8:30.

Well, I think one of the things that complicates the coverage is obviously within the collective bargaining agreement with the police department, there are set hours. So, I think that's one of the things that's kind of a moving target. So, I I kind of see where you're going as the guiding light. Like if I'm an officer assigned to a school that is only open 8 to 3, then I should be responding to that school at 8 if

we're trying to reduce overtime. The problem is is that the hours that are spelled out in the collective bargaining agreement are different in the sense of what they're expected to work. So to try to have every SRO on a different schedule creates a lot of inconsistency with at least I would ask that at least in the morning that they're all on the same schedule and then they deploy to

their schools because I think it's very important that they start the day all on the same page as far as debriefing at the end of the day. We can find a way to kind of accommodate that.

Right. I think the issue is um and I think this something we should address in the future. the school department doesn't have a seat at the table when we're um negotiating like between like the police union and the city. Hopefully that's something we can change we can recommend to the administration to the city changing in the future just because whoever I don't know who's negotiating

on the other side for the city but they don't have like the understanding of what happens in the schools. So that's something I would definitely recommend to the city just to have a voice from the school department at the table. Um, so same things like when if we're if they're going till 4:30, for example, Dery High School, I believe, closes.

What time is Dery closed?

250. 250. Um, so we're paying for 2 hours in the beginning. So what would they And it's going until 4:30. Are they staying for events after school or they either staying for events or they're helping out with either traffic or they're hap h with dery. We've got instances where the the students have been luckily and knock on wood nothing's really happened this year but they're going over to CVS and and all those

areas over there. So these those SRO's have been deployed over there to help with just pushing those students out to the the proper transport or moving along.

Um, and I don't know if that's and just speaking from personal experience, um, just two days ago, um, or it was Thursday. It was, um, it was th last Thursday or Wednesday. I went through Dury and I drove down Ellisbury Street and um I didn't see any crossing guards. I didn't see any um, I don't know if the SRO's would go in if um, there's like a lack of crossing guards, if they would

help with managing traffic. I don't know. It just didn't look good the traffic issue there. But I don't know if that's within their scope or within their purview to help out, but well, I couldn't tell you on that day if there was something else more priority.

So, um just going through the um I don't know if we have the data on this going through this. We're not doing the we're still on the um dollars. Dollars cent. Then we're going to go over the Okay. So, I can ask question.

Yes. um question as far as your your training and stuff like that for these uh offices. Now um do we pay for any additional training as far as for you guys to know the buildings or let's say something did happen at uh Dery knowing the building um are these guys the ones that you would go to if there was a problem in the building? So if you had like a lockdown and there was

an area that was breached or So I think the best examples of that is that a lot of those officers are part of our emergency services unit too. So there's a lot of shared information there as it relates to not only our emergency services unit being prepared for that type of situation but getting that out to the other officers. So we do we're an accredited police agency so we do tabletop exercises all the time and

we do a lot of debriefs. But you got but you guys do not go into the building and practice at all to to build them the buildings or be familiarized with the building.

We do we do do it at Dery. We've done it at Diamond. Obviously, I know it's not part of this meeting, but we we do do that. Um we just started a new training program for our new officers which is called FRP FRPD University. They do spend two days with our emergency services unit going over floor plans, going over walkthroughs, room clearing, uh different things as it relates to active shooter response and

understanding that. As far as the cost to the district, uh I think the only thing we've ever asked from the district uh is potentially funding sometimes for the uh trainings for like train the trainer type stuff, but also just the leave of absence from duty for the officers to be able to attend the training. It's not an additional overtime cost for the uh for the district.

The uh the only request I'd make of the administration is to uh try to get some history on what uh deputy chief mentioned about the overtime being 10 hours for multiple years or I don't can't remember what you said about I know when I was a sergeant in 2017 that was the that was the standard. It was five hour sorry it was two hours a day for 10 hours a week.

Yep. So I think at some point and I think the MOU might call for some of this but I'm just looking strictly to at the dollars and sense of what does it count towards net school spending and how whether um it was always 10 hours then if that's the case then those numbers and well I think it's because the MOU speaks to the the school the hours of work being 6:30 to 4:30. So that's a 10-hour

day. So the only way to get the 10 hours is when you have the meshing of what's expected from thisou and the collective bargaining agreement with the the uh former police association. That's where the two extra hours because they work eight hours a day.

So I think there might be some language we can look at in theou when we get to that portion to maybe segment that out.

I'm just trying to figure out the history of course. How did we get here now? Because at that point it shouldn't look at when I look at the overtime sheet. So we budget 800,000 salaries are 710,000. That 90,000 in overtime to me is not what's the what you just explained is the normal stuff. Overtime to me is we need you uh there's some traffic issues or whatever. So we're

going to have to add a couple of hours overtime, right?

That comes out of overtime, right?

I think all overtime is supposed to be signed up by the superintendent, but at the end of just looking back history, look to see where it's at.

Okay. Mr. Chair has one follow on money.

Mr. D, sir. Um my colleague um brought up the training and um you basically you answered the question um where it comes out of for train the trainer. Um I guess this is actually not more for you or for if whoever in the administration find out if um for the trainer trainer is this are they leaving the district?

Sometimes I know when I was in the SRO they sent me for Alice training to get the trainer certification for that so that we could be able to do that type of training. Um have we done that recently?

No. But yeah, sometimes they do leave the district. A lot of the training is sponsored by the Mass Police training uh committee. So it's free to the agency.

Um so it's just a matter of a leave of absence for them to attend it.

Um I guess it's more of like an internal policy question. We currently have a policy where um if um I know for just non-SRO like typical employees, they would um if they're leaving the district, they would get put on the agenda and we would approve that. School committee would approve that. Um not sure. I don't recall in my year and a half of being on on the committee almost two years of seeing that ever come

before an I think that's because they technically still work. employees of the former police department.

So they're here as part of the MOA. So I think that's sort of a they have to worry about it which they would also in my opinion backfill maybe if you're the worker and you had to leave the SRO sergeants duties I believe is to come in and make sure you back fill.

We actually did that last year. Um Mr.

Aar we had mandated training that post has now put in place where you have to do uh a training two two training days or 16 hours. So, we had to have all the SRO's go and we actually brought in people to backfill the SRO positions so that they wouldn't be completely vacated cuz they have every SRO out of the district during a regular school day is not it's not good.

Would that come out of um overtime budget or would that No, that's just a change of duty status.

So, those guys were already scheduled for those days. They would change status to training. They go to the training. We ended up having officers that we came out of our budget and hired over time and they were they were all former SRO's actually. I remember I remember those two days correct cuz they were all guys that had either got promoted out so they were s they were mostly sergeants and

lieutenants actually that came back to to back fill those positions those days.

The the last question I have on the train just because it's in I know we don't want to get into the new um but it's a financial question. um if we have um so I don't know if it's the proposal was highlighted 12 hours of SRO training not sure where that would come out of we or maybe find out well let's uh pause that for a second so any other questions on the finances I

think we can get some info when I appreciate that so next up is the UU it used to be called something else too I used to be two documents is this now combined into one yeah so this the language in thisou is the um actual model language that has been uh mitigated to this because it was presented from Desi kind of worked with the commission to produce this. So this document was born from that and it's

been seen before.

So for those that have seen it, it reads very familiar. Yes.

But they used to have a a standard operating procedure.

Correct. Which was adopted.

We had a different type. So we had two things going on at the same time. So what we're looking at is the one that looks like this is the recommendation.

and I mentioned it in the previous segment is that if if executed this would be adopted into our SOP so that this would be spelled out.

The only thing I would ask is if we go through uh we don't have to go through the whole thing but any recommended changes that are highlighted in yellow I would assume and if there's things that we either Mr. Chief or Mr. Venturo would like to have or is this total agreement what was yours?

Well, I I think that everything in here so we did have a couple of sessions um deputy with um with I think um besides the SRO's, we did have Lieutenant Lady captain here uh going over. So those those highlights um along with the superintendent um were the ones that we were looking to change um and um and work on. might have been a little language added and it might have been

something that we wanted to remove. Um, but it is it is that that particular those particular items in yellow.

Yes.

That we were interested in.

Are any of those uh deputy chief uh problematic? Are there things that you think we need to change uh more? I mean we this is the subcommittee. We're going to forward this to the full committee.

Sure. So there'll be some additional time.

The first section that I reviewed is the uh I think the bulleted points were around the low-level offenses. Um I read the section. I think the important thing in that section is just to understand the spirit of that language is that we do understand that there's some low-level offenses that can be handled by regular school discipline and that the solution is not always placing uh a

child into the criminal justice system.

But I think we do a very good job in our relationships that we have in the district. So that language I have no issue with. Um obviously it talks about misdemeanor misdemeanor allegations, threats, assault and battery, lararseny, receiving stolen property, willful for malicious or wanted destruction or injury to personal property. So that would be like vandalism. Um those are usually things that are either regular

school discipline or diverted to youth court. And then youth court does a great job with those kids. Um, so I have no issue in that language.

My only question on that one would be u whether it's an absolute or not because functionally in a school, you know, somebody might have uh an allegation or threat that you guys might think it's a misdemeanor or whatever, but we know either a backstory. So I think there has to be some flexibility.

I don't think the rigidity of this I think would be a problem as far as being a school administrator. destruction of property, wanting destruction of property, lossy, you know, like some of those things I think should be um part of it, but I understand the idea is not to put everyone into it.

Um I see how you're reading that because it puts the full control in the administrator in determining if it's going to be something that can be handled by the police. I think that the the spirit of the language is different than how you it can be interpreted, right? So, I think it could be cleaned up a little to maybe make it more of like a a meeting that happens with the

SRO and the administrator. I mean, some of these things are past things that have happened that are being brought up days later. But, you know, if there's an act if somebody brought if a child brought something to school like a spray paint can with spray painting lockers, then that's something that's going to take immediate intervention would probably result in some type of summons.

Um, but that's going to get diverted at the juvenile court level more than likely to be kicked back out for Yep. Oh, I I totally get it. I think I think cleaning that up might help us.

Like the last of mine says, "School staff shall not ask an SRO to serve as a school disciplinary disciplinary or enforcer of school regulations." I understand that. But what's above is not school regulations.

So I think somehow we have to and there is something also to be said for no, you're going to get charged and if they divert it, they divert it. But you have to uh lay the law down sometime. So I I would only say that the very first line the parties acknowledged that it may be appropriate for school administrators.

The the meetings that the deputy is talking about happen 10 times a day in all the schools. The the I I see it at Dery and RPA the most because I'm at those places the most. Um but they're they're forever meeting with the principles, the vice principles, um the sachs after these incidents happen or after they're brought to light. So that actually is happening and they have a discussion, you know, do you do you

think, you know, the SRO might ask the administration or the administration might say, you know, do you think this does warrant, you know, being charged?

And I think some of that has to do with, I think, the child's background in the school and also their background with law enforcement. Um, so I I think a lot all of that is taken into consideration.

I think Yeah. Yeah, I would just say though if that's happening already, why are we adding it? That's where my mind's on.

So, if it's already happening in a the proper way with proper communication, it's added here for a reason. So, we got time to clean it up before the full committee.

You have any thoughts on that, Mr. B?

No, I we are not the agent of the police department. They're not our agents. We know that we want to make sure that we offer students, you know, the opportunity to get themselves, you know, turned around and and get back into the daily. These guys I I have had uh excellent relationships with my police departments who I've worked with in all my SRO. So, I can only imagine that we're going to have a great

relationship here. I look forward to it.

Um I certainly agree with you. we we don't we don't want you to do our job and we certainly don't want to do your job and that there are sometimes that we have to come together talk about it and then decide how the students going to go forward but I think to your point just just tying that up I think it's good and I and I will certainly continue to work with the principles and and the

administrators to support you know resolution and and just that well the collaboration is key absolutely absolutely Mr. Dice, thank you. And just some on that point specifically, I think some of these and I think this comes down more as a policy decision. I mean, assault and battery that should be zero tolerance in my opinion. I'm sure you would agree.

Well, I mean, assault and battery sounds bad, but it can be just an unwanted touching and in fear of being harmed.

So, that's assaults in fear of being harmed. unwanted touching is a battery.

So, there's different levels of assault and battery. Um, you know, people get into a shoving match. Is that appropriate to put a child into the criminal justice system? We've put that through youth court before and had a youth court and at the end the two kids end up becoming friends and they're serving on the youth court uh, you know, staff, if you will. Um, I don't I write policy in the police department. I don't

like shall m and all those because it gives you no latitude. So to the point you made Mr. Aguare, when you start putting things in words, you have to be careful how you do it because then it it narrowly pushes it down that road. I think that one of the the spirit of the language should just be a collaborative discussion with the law enforcement party and the school administrator to

come to a collective conclusion. But I think the police are going to make the decision based on uh what he had said around if there's a history with this child. the child's already in youth court and there's already diversion going on that's information we're privy to that we'll be able to use that in leveraging the conversation thank you okay move on chuckle you said the truency court right

they would come in and on the way down as I was a middle school principal on the way down to the court I would walk with magistrate and as we walk down she would say uh the dockets right it's Listen, take this one back. Take this one back.

Take this one back. Let him go back to class. I want to see him someplace else.

Right.

So, I I appreciate that. And I think the more support that we have on both ends and having like that kid in need program, you know, you saw him last night. What do we have prepared for that kid waiting?

How how can we help and support that family? I I'm a big proponent of having the school resource officer. Sound good.

Deputy going down the other um sorry.

So the next section is uh the highlight is reporting directly to the forever public schools principal or principal's designate. Uh I think that happens in every school. I think every SRO does report to the um principal. I think as you already stated, they're still employees of the police department. So they answer to a sergeant that's always looped into that conversation and sometimes it's not only the principal

but um you know others that might contact that sergeant. The next so I have no issue with that. The salary question and and what's covered um Mr.

Das had brought up around training required by the agreement and what's paid for by the district. Uh it would be something directly related to the duties and responsibilities of the SRO position. I think the only time in the history that we've ever come to the district for some funding is something that would be specialty training just for the SRO's or additional resources to that. I don't think we've done that for

a couple of years now. Um, a lot of the training is coming through uh our own professional development track within the the department.

The only reason I even um brought that up is um not sure it was on the previous page, but it was highlighted in yellow that there will be 12 hours of training.

Not sure what the um what the prior training was, if it was less or if it was more. Um but if there's going to be like a designation thing, it was on page 15. So I'm not sure what it was beforehand, but I would argue that that be strikes from theou because the the training is dictated by the police officer standards and training. They have to do the mandated inservice and that's something

that's on our responsibility to make sure that they maintain their certification. So, as far as the 12 hours of training, if you guys want to keep it in there, then we need to spell it out to what we're going to do above and beyond what they're requiring.

Scratch on page 15, the SR shall attend a minimum of 12 hours of train because it's mandated anyway. They doing more than the actual inservice for a regular police officer.

Thank you. And I and I'm glad you made that point cuz it made it sound like the 12 hours we would then need to and if we're paying for all training for that 12 hours, then that would need to be spelled out and we need to have a specific budget for that. So thank you.

But back to that section of stagyard, this is where we're talking about the hours. So thisou speaks to the during the hours of 6:30 to 4:30. So that spells out a 10-hour day there.

So on that um I'm looking at the one we have in yellow with the strike through like the word from is so I'm assuming that everything else that's in here is was in the old one.

Correct.

So I don't I'm not reading it as you are. Um what I'm reading here is that the um they would work a 40-hour work week. Their schedule shall be in accordance with the academic calendar for the for schools.

So I'm looking at 40 hours the academic calendar of the schools, not necessarily this the next line where it says the standard workday shall be during the hours of 6:30 to 4:30 meaning all-incclusive. I'm taking that as 40 hours within that time based on the calendar. That's just how I I've always assumed it and um I don't know how anybody else sees that.

But to me that is the issue we were talking about before it whatever it is. And then there's one in red that says start times maybe stagger. Is that new? Is that recommended new? Is that what the red is?

That's what she going page 13 second paragraph in red. Is that new?

I don't believe that's new. I think it's addressing what's above because the start times before we had the conversation I think deputy the 6:30 wasn't the start.

So I think that may be referring to the standard 6:30 start because I think it was staged. I think originally we wanted staged on both ends and that became to be a that was a problem. But ultimately you guys can get together to work with the superintendents and say what did it look like before because I have one here but it's in very small print we can't read it.

So if we had one that just just for the edification of us all I missed it and it said we've been paying 10 hours it is what it is. If people took the position thinking I'm getting 10 hours then we shouldn't cut to 10 hours. But ultimately I this kind of spells out what was in my head all along. So, if we can just uh before it gets to the full committee. Um

Mr. Muller, you got anything?

No.

Guys, um on this. Yes. Um might be outlined in here somewhere. Maybe I missed it, but when school's not in session, are they going back? Where are they going? The are they going back to help out with police department for the summer or Right. So, there's different things that are they're either using their accumulated vacation time because they're not taking vacation during the year like they normally would. Um, but

that's something right now I believe that the patrol union is in negotiations trying to come up with because there are other police agencies that have spelled out SRO benefits as it relates to that position. But with us, they typically take their vacations in the summer in line with the school schedule.

um what they do come back for is like the teen police academy and they come back for some of the events that happen after school is done. So, it's kind of like a trade-off there. Thank you. And um just to reiterate my point, I think we should have someone either at the table or just um informing the city side as to what will be best for the school department. I don't think we have anyone

that's negotiating on the school department side when it comes to that even though that would affect the fall public schools.

I would say that we do because Mr. Chico or the superintendent's designate actually would weigh in on that.

They go to the negotiation.

No, but they would inform the negotiation. So they would say, you know, what the deputy mentioned for salary, for instance, if $85,000, that's an $85,000 salary. The way I'm, correct me if I'm wrong, is for the whole year.

During that whole year, they're working 5 days a week in the schools, whereas the other shifts are four and two, four and two. So, they're picking up an extra day that they work for the whole year.

So, ultimately at the in the summer, they're getting all of those. If there's 40 weeks in the school year, you got 40.

We call them group seven days.

So, those days are 40. Like just for round numbers, if you added 40 separate from the regular vacations to the end of the year, we only have x amount of days in the summer. So it's sort of a wash.

The way I see it, it's it's kind of kind of they're working more in a shorter period of time to have the time paid back later during and then at that time it's up to them what they do in the summer. They can take overtime, right, or whatever. But I think Mr. Das's point is something that we the more clear we can get with what it's costing us so

that we know that we're not and I'm not accusing anybody doing something wrong.

I get it.

Very transparent. This is what it is.

These are the hours. But it says in here, if you work at a nighttime event, you're going to get paid the detail rate if higher detail. And it goes to uh I'm assuming that it's a detail, correct?

So it spells it right out here. So that's what I'm trying to get to is a point where where there's no longer this wondering, no surprises, you know, any other guys.

Um just some things that we're going to go back and look at this. I know there's a section about training for SRO's. I don't think they're changing anything here, but it just outlies um a lot of different trainings that need to Well, that's just adopting the language from the police reform act. So, the training is mandated to be formulated by the NPTC. This year's training will be online. Um it hasn't been rolled out

yet, but essentially what'll have to happen is you talk about the scheduling of SRO. So when there is a break, when you have like the February vacation, that's usually when our SRO will do some of their inservice training. So they're not using their vacation time when the school's out because they're actually change of duty status for inservice completion. Uh we have our um we have to

do qualifications for firearms twice a year. That's getting filtered in. So they'll be doing that during April vacation. So there's there's different things that we do to try to be creative.

Um but as far as the training, that's dictated by the post. Now, as far as what you need to page 15, he decided to strike that because it's the 12 hours. I think we can strike because piece of in here.

The only thing I would say is if the MPTC says next year they need 60 hours of training, then that's something that we're going to have to communicate with you guys and say, "Hey, they're going to we're going to have to figure out how to do You have that in the beginning, too, right? Some have is listed about um the 12 hours. It's twice in here, I believe right?"

Yeah, I think it is. Sorry. At the beginning, I would just probably in line with MPTC requirements.

Correct. Because now it's like nobody's going to wonder. It's not just training.

It's for you have to.

Correct.

My my last question on this the entire document is around um data collection and um so we have to collect data on um arrest, citations, court referrals. Um, we don't go further or anything less.

Um, trying to think of something that would come to mind. um just either just like conversations or if um I think I know what you're getting at is so what I see at the end here is the documents of what the police actually filed on the part that we have uh the statistics count of event types what I think Mr. guys. Correct me if I'm wrong. You're talking about the interactions that the gentleman talked

about where we mediated one. That's very difficult working in a school to figure out because you could do 10 of those a day and there's really not a mechanism because it flies in the face of the idea is that we're working something through in our in our own uh management system.

It would say Kevin and John got into a thing and we mediated it, whatever. So, it would sort of be on our side, not the police side. So, you would you would have probably mediations We could ask for how many mediations do we have in each school? It it should show and be documented in the conduct or whatever, but I don't think the police would know.

It wouldn't be appropriate to do field interview reports every time a police officer is interacting with the child in that and I I think in that matter like after after an altercation like and I'm going by During RPA again, the officers are there. They're like in the VP's office. they they respond and then so they're there while this mediation is going on, but they're not reporting out on that because it's it

doesn't become a police matter per se because there's no arrest because there's no charges. They're not they're not forwarding it to juvenile court, right? No, I appreciate that. I think m that pretty much answered my point. I guess it's more of an internal if it's something that's not a police matter, what are we doing on this side? So uh the principal the assistant principal who is usually head of discipline we

must report to DESIE. So all infractions are we have there's a SIMS report those types of reports there's a a report that we do for discipline reporting to DESIE the assistant principles do that on a daily and a weekly basis and that just and then at the end of the year what we do is we go over that with the sim reporter um for the data report of the district

and we go through each month with the assistant principles. So whatever the police department and their um whatever they uh whatever their incident reports look like, they stay with them. Our incident reports are from our our district. They do not coincide.

They're they're totally parallel.

Okay.

The only thing I would ask is to make sure that um the incidents are all being reported, which we know, you know, like she just mentioned that you have to report them. We just want to make sure that we're all reporting in a high school in a uniform fashion so that we don't have like one school has a whole bunch and then you're like I know there was some issues here

and then we put stuff in the journal instead like it has to be the same rules for everybody otherwise the data means nothing. So along the way to the principles I'm sure you're going to reiterate that that they have to report what's going on. Um any other questions on the SRO's motion can I get a motion to refer to motion refer with the changes that we talked about? Made by Mr. D seconded by Mr.

Monis. Roll call.

Mr.

Yes.

Mr. D.

Yes.

Mr. Mon.

Yes.

Deputy Chief. Thank you for coming.

Uh we're going to just move around. So we added security on here. So Mr. Dur will be here for this discussion here.

Anybody have any questions generally on security?

My intention was just to have him here as a resource for this.

Any other questions on security yet?

Okay. So you can stay, you can leave, whatever you're going to do. want to go home and have supper. Feel free uh maintenance uh capital plan. I want to hold that for a second because the next item 3.04 is the discussion and vote to refer the job description for refrigeration appliance repair service technician job description. So we ask for maintenance to be here for that discussion as well, not necessarily for

the capital plan. And if we run out of time, we can postpone that. So on the appliance repair service technician job description, it's been before us a few times, Mr. Chief, do you want to uh say anything or do you want to I'm good. Questions, Josh. Um I mean, we we see a we see a need to have my my big concern today is and and the industy the industry trend, Josh

just went through it with um with another piece of equipment, but the industry trend seems to be that nobody wants to come and give you a price on anything, not getting paid. and and back in the day, we always used to say free estimates and all of this stuff as as trades people, but but it's starting to to make this complete turnaround like I'm not going to make the trip down um for free. So,

if you need to check this piece of equipment, it's going to cost you X amount of dollars to have them come down and triage it. Now, mind you, you may only do that once if you agree with the triage and have one price in your head.

But what I think our problem is with some of these companies who do service for us is is just that like it's difficult to get a second person in without paying a second person.

Sometimes even if one of our vendors that are accustomed to coming down here want to get paid for a visit to tell us what they need to do and never is there anything on particular vehicle to fix the issue. So you end up with a two visit on each one item. The hope for this here is that that like some of the other trades is that maybe we may not be able to have the the

um the manpower to do the work, but we will be able to at least triage it. And if if we have the ability to do it in-house, we'll do it inhouse. I think this fills that kind of gap. Like there is some of those calls and you see we handed all of those slips to you. some of those slips are stuff we could have done in house with the triage and I think that that

this is where it might fill a gap.

I also think too the um all the duties that you guys brought up I think um plays a big part in this, right? Cuz I can use them when they're not busy doing this particular job. I can get them to do other other jobs and there's plenty of work in the district.

Plenty of work. What is this person's certification to be working on this equation, especially with high volumes of gas and everything else if they're talking about turfy?

So, I mean, I I think that we're going to have to look at the certifications deeper. Um, but I do think that there's a need for this. Um, so I mean these people that are coming in, they don't have the gas fire license like you and I do, but they're working on the equipment because like anything after the show off, you can work on it, right? They're trained.

Correct.

They're going to cover the warranty after that item is done and done.

Well, so I I'm using Dery. I would say most of that stuff is out of warranty at this point, right? So, I mean, I can do a data collection and see what kind of equipment is there, but a lot of it's out of warranty at this point.

But the problem is to even purchase the equipment. They're not going to just sell sell you a gas valve, let's just say, because I know certain um vendors and certain companies, you have to go through their And sometimes you can buy the licensing for it as well. You would know that even with controllers, right? Controls, computers right?

You might not necessarily have the license, but you can obtain it and then start working on it.

No different than like a flow guard, right?

No different. But it's like everything else. Even some of them, they're not just handing them out.

For sure.

And that's why I subcontract with somebody else and say, "Hey, give me these parts." And I think to your point, man, I think that's where all other duties come into play because if we have I'm just using this 100 appliances and they can only work on 70 at Derby. But in the meantime, I can get them to do something else. I think that's where um I think it's advantageous for us to one

keep that in there and also um utilize that mechanism in this job.

As long as we got uh proper certifications and everything else, Mr.

Chair, so if you guys can put that in writing of what is needed to apply for a job like that, that way we know what we're getting for our money. If if I could um hold on a second yield.

Yes, she is.

And then Mr.

actually just it was to Mr. Monus. So would we consider So let's just say we lay out three or four different licenses. Would we consider taking three instead of four? Would we consider taking two instead? I'm not saying taking none, right? But there there could be a level of depending on which one they hold.

You know what I'm saying? So, like if if they may hold one that's that we feel is important. Um, and they may not have one that we may not have as much use for, but would still like them to have. So, I I don't know if we can lay it out that way. Wants and, you know, nice to have and and must have.

Well, I'm just saying like equipment, you got to have your universals. So, at that point, your just regular 608 is not going to just cover it. So, that's what I mean. How far are we going to have it?

I understand if you said, "Hey, this is all we got that came up to to the list and let's just say um he's an apprentice." Okay, we at least know we got somebody that can go down, check it out, say, "Hey, um Josh, we need to call somebody else and this is above me or whatever." I just want to make sure it's safe. I just want to make sure we got a

safe person that's looking at equipment and knowing when they are able to work on it, when they're not able to work on it. I just want to keep the district safe. Uh like I said, we have a lot of gas. We have a lot of um freon. We have a lot of different things that can cause a district harm.

For sure.

Right. Decision.

I think we could to that point before I call Mr. Tus. I definitely think that we can change the qualifications and requirements to do something like you're saying before back to the full committee because the questions that we've had and I think they're legitimate questions from you guys and about let's get this thing to the right place to make sure that it's feasible. when we got the bills, the

bills didn't necessarily spell out exactly what we were looking for, but it spelled out some things. So, I think going from here, let's morph it into before it gets to the full committee.

Here's what that we need. Like, like a license to do freon or I think a couple of a lot of them were the guy came in had to uh the thing froze up, you know, the pipes froze up or whatever. A lot of those were very similar. I don't know exactly what you have to have in order to do that, but if that's one of the major pieces as you analyze it, I think

it'll be more palatable to the committee to say we're going to ask for this and then the salary has to sort of be um lined up with what we can't pay, you know, $35,000 and say we want you to have an HR license, right?

You know, so that has to line up with um also what you're paying other people in the unions and and all that. So, Mr.

Dice, thank you. you that that's exactly the point I was just going to make before we refer this um through the chair, Mr.

Moon, is we can um and going off of your experience and expertise, we can amend these qualifications. So, there's certain licenses that you believe um that should be in the qualifications, we can add those. And just quickly to the point of um the need because I know we go to outside vendors and I I understand it was provided before. It wasn't in the backup for this specific meeting. I

think this was something that was about a month ago. It was in the backup for there. I think just for um we get a lot of information every single day. So just keeping it um thorough. if um there's something that's tabled from a previous meeting is brought here the backup should my opinion just be within induligent for that. Um, and I think just also to the point if we're in if

we're spending the same amount or it's not really we're not getting a big turnaround for having this position, we're not seeing a big turnaround in the outside vendors just like we did in this budget and this position we don't believe we need. We have the ability to cut that position. So, we can approach that at another date. Um, but I through the chair and Mr. Moers, what would you

like to see in the qualification? Can I weigh in on that first because I think it would be this has been a productive discussion but I think it would be even more productive if we allow Miss Lal to work with Mr. Pico to come back with this so they have to analyze the uh bills before he answers because we don't necessarily know those pieces so they can communicate with Mr. Pico uh Mr. is

after like before the next meeting because once the bills I think that's going to be what's the telltale sign of what is the license that's most needed or three or four of them. So I wouldn't want to put Mr. Monus on the spot because he doesn't hadn't seen the backup on the bill. So I'd like to ask Miss Lal to work with them come back to the committee with that recommendation if that makes the most sense

but that way we have it as safe as possible.

Yep. And then the other piece is the um 80 I wrote here 8020 just looking at the facility nutrition versus regular.

Y so in order to benefit which we put on that last item for uh Mr. Pado to be able to have them do other things we have to look at what does that look like. So if it's 80% nutrition, 20% district truth and advertising, we should put it here, too, so that the position's funded, you know, and it might be I might be up on 200.

And it could do the licensing, too, because if if it's a refrigeration license, then that obviously changes a lot on both sides. You know what I'm saying? like the refrigeration license is not strictly for for the kitchen area where we could use that person working on heat pumps and different situations for us. So that split may be changed. I think you're pretty close with that number of the 8020 because a lot

more appliances.

It says we're not 100% like we know we're acknowledging it. Exactly. And then we can try to uh see how it's progressing. The person might come on and maybe want to work full-time on the other side. But I do think giving you some flexibility to work to work it out, come back to us with something, it would make a lot of sense to full committee.

Um to would we be coming back to facilities or would we go straight to I would say we should bring this right to the full meeting. Okay. Uh May whatever May 6th May 6th. So um productivity wise I think that makes the most sense. Mr. D.

Thank you. Um just a question on the um reporting. So it would um position itself would report directly to you Mr.

Yes.

Um are we just based off the conversation from the last meeting that we had the last pole meeting if there's going to be some of this coming out of nutrition there's no there wouldn't be any issue with that legally.

Well we had just talked about having it listed so that it would be 8020. So if the position was going to be funded it was originally projected as 100% out of nutrition but based on utilizing the position we just threw out an 8020 number. So 20% would come out of the budget, the regular operating budget.

80% would come out of nutrition. That allows for the flexibility for Mr.

Potato to do uh those type of things.

I I'll make a motion to refer to the full committee with um no recommendation with the um changes proposed.

Motion made, seconded by Mr. Monus. Roll call please.

Mr. A.

Yes.

Mr. D.

Yes.

Mr. Monus.

Yes.

Um, I think that we've been here for an hour and I like to keep the meetings to right about an hour. Very productive.

The maintenance and capital plan, as I said before, with things that we can add to future ones. Um, the only question I had and I think it would get answered earlier was we received the paperwork from Mr. Patado that he was doing the Dury job, but we could clarify that it's that's not a long-term No, it he's been he's been doing more than than I thought it would originally be. Um,

but we we definitely need to hire.

The idea is to hire. I didn't know if it was as I saw that we're trying to like combine them, right?

But we're not trying to do that. So, so I think that was fine. Uh the only thing right on that same point is um due to the fact that I believe the getting the getting the ideal person is going to be very difficult because the the building is was set up and the person we had was part of the construction. So that skill set can't be duplicated. Right. So, I I

do believe that we may be able to modify the um the salary range and bring it down a touch uh in that conversation for another time. But, um I think that that might be the the answer on that piece.

Yep. I I I couldn't agree more. I mean, I think we have positions if they don't work on whatever, we go back to the superintendent, deputy superintendent.

Let's work them so that it gets to the point where we can actually hire somebody. But we have a lot of positions here that they go vacant for way too long and we have the money budget and the needs are there like I would say let's try to move on it even though that's not our purview but we have a position I say let's fill it. Any other new business?

Mr. Chair, Mr. um just two things. One um just if I can ask for um an update because it's going to come with the capital plan.

Bishop Connley is probably one of the most biggest um items that are in that capital plan um for the future of the district. I asked um at a previous during the budget hearing that we get an update on Bishop Connley where that's at um they get an update. So, and this so for planning purposes, not only for strategic plan, but for this capital plan if we can get an update on that at some point. Um, and

just on new business quickly, I did bring it up in an email over the weekend. It's um different employee I know we have a uniform system of um requesting mileage reimbursements. We have a form. Do some employees use um like a different like a mile IQ or something different for their mileage allowance or We've never specified how to report it as a district. Um the old method was basically point A to point B and they

kept track of it that way. Um we do have those who use an app um to report. So it does it does give you different results with an app as it does point to point.

Does all like cuz I know um the person in question wasn't isn't the only individual in that department that uses um that gets the mileage reimbursement.

They all use the Mile IQ or just I don't believe they all use the uh the same system. In fact, I don't believe that either. I think that only one uses that particular app and others do it in a manual method.

Does the app track automatically? Is it like an automat does someone does he have to go in and I I don't know because I don't have an app that does my mileage. Um but I I'm I've seen the document. Looks like it is automatic.

Okay. Um we can just get maybe a confirmation on that. If it is an automatic, that would explain a lot more of the um the address to me. And so I think she let me look into how we've done reimbursements in the past on travel. Um there should be a travel request form.

These guys probably go daily for maintenance. They're probably going to the hardware store or something.

This is this is particular school to school.

School to school. school um or or school to school, school to to warehouse, school to Yeah, I'll I'll leave it up to you.

forth to buildings if they're going from Dery to Conley and back to you know going back and forth if we share people going back and forth to those two buildings which I don't know but um it's a complicated issue.

Yeah. I look there's a lot of uh Ken and I will talk about it and there's a lot of people in different departments. It's not only this department. There's a lot of uh travel reimbursements here and there. We should have a uniform. I thought we did have a uniform.

If we don't, we should uh make it that.

Yeah, on the bishop Connelly. I know at the meeting the other day when Mr. proposal indicated there was a meeting or some presentation coming up. I asked that within 7 days we get an update sort of um putting the pressure on for that because we we're looking into purchasing uh Bishop Connelly to double the enrollment of the prek classrooms.

And I what I mentioned at the time is that if you're going to lease a property and then you have to make portable walls and things which is what Mr. Chico had to do because we only leased it in the past. Now we thought we were going to purchase it. If that's no longer the case because there's a little thing going on between the city council who has to approve it and the mayor. If

that's the case, we need to know that sooner than later so we can figure out, right?

Oh, absolutely. I mean, I the the hope the hope is um that we have a real answer and assigned PNS um before we enter our next school year. That that to me is the ideal situation because um there's an awful lot of pressure to get the next round of classrooms ready.

That's my point. So, we're opening up the classrooms as part of our plan in September.

Yeah. and a whole bunch of work has to happen over the next several months in order to get that done. And when we toured the building, which was early in January, we were shown what does it look like for a portable classroom versus a not because if we didn't, we have to take it out. If we're going to own it, then we're going to have to do major repairs. You know, millions of dollars

of roofs and boiler, like everything.

And we were down this road thinking we were going to purchase. And I there's some issues going on right now with the city council and the mayor and we need to get an answer. If it's not going to be, then we have to know what's the least. Then we got to figure out what do you have to do. But I don't think it's fair to you and your department to try

to figure out this. If they're going to keep kicking this can down the road till July and then we're going to be on you saying when's the place ready for September.

I don't think that's fair personally. So that's where I was. I know I threw seven days out. I just made that up. But Mr. Guys, just to close on that point and just to be frank, I don't know if the city has the relations right now to get the deal through. Um I think we need um I would even say just yourself, Mr. Chair. I think we need a liazison. Like the

administration that we have is all new, so they don't know the council yet. I think we need someone down there that's that could sell the deal that has um the relationships in my opinion. I help with that.

So on April 14th is a joint meeting between the city council, the mayor, and the school committee.

So stay tuned. What I would say, um I I mean that's it's going to have to get to that point.

I I hope I'm my I'm very hopeful that between now um and maybe it's maybe it's the 13th and maybe it's um this coming Friday. Um but there has to be some pre meeting.

Um we do have a lot of material that we didn't have in our hands um as of the last time we spoke. A lot more a lot more work has been done. Um with the help of the dascese but also um on our side we did do a flyover. U so we've identified a lot of the the power positions in that particular property and the and the points of interest um

that is the the deal maker I I believe um and um the dascese is very eager for a whole bunch of reasons but but to move on this so I we have a very willing I'm totally confident that between now and then yourself l you know anybody else that needs to we just have one way or another get it done and um if it's not going to be it's not going to be we have to just

make our plans. I just want to say thank you to the deputy superintendent for joining your first committee meeting on your first day and it went an hour a little over an hour and that was so make motion to adjourn by Mr. D. Second by Mr. Monus roll call Mr. Yes Mr. Das Mr. Yes.

Thank you all. Have a great day. Thank you.