The Fall River School Committee Policy Subcommittee convened on March 28th to deliberate on and refer several policy updates to the full committee. A significant portion of the meeting focused on revisions to the fiscal management policy, where Kevin Almeida detailed changes aimed at enhancing budget transparency, streamlining annual budget processes, and clarifying audit requirements. A key proposed change was the adoption of a cost center approach for budget oversight and reporting, with a plan to implement detailed quarterly reports for fiscal year 2023. The committee voted 3-0 to refer this policy, with Mr. Aguiar requesting the superintendent to recommend essential MASC policies and to ensure cost center reporting begins by July 1. Further discussions included an updated face covering policy, outlining requirements for students returning from positive COVID-19 tests, in school health offices, and on buses. Mr. Aguiar successfully proposed an amendment to automatically lift mask requirements if federal or state mandates are rescinded, which was approved 3-0. The subcommittee also reviewed the use of school facilities policy, with Ken (likely Kevin Almeida) presenting proposed fees and permit requirements, particularly for artificial turf fields to cover replacement costs. Mr. Aguiar suggested separate tracking of turf field revenue and clearer rules for porta-john rentals based on usage frequency. This policy was referred to the full committee with a 3-0 vote. Dr. Taylor introduced three policies concerning educational sustainability: homeless students, military families, and children in foster care, all stemming from DESE and MASC recommendations. A notable discussion ensued regarding the state's incomplete reimbursement for McKinney-Vento transportation costs, prompting Mr. Aguiar to request a letter from the superintendent to the legislative delegation advocating for full reimbursement. These policies were referred 3-0. Lastly, Tom presented updates to Title IX, harassment, and retaliation policies, which now differentiate between sexual harassment (ACAB) and general harassment/retaliation (ACRB). Mr. Aguiar voiced concerns about the clarity of adult-on-adult harassment policies, requesting a more explicit and easily searchable policy for "harassment of anyone." This item was also referred 3-0, and the meeting concluded without new business.
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okay the uh policy subcommittee is meeting on march 28th uh roll call please mr again here mr bailey yeah mr harp here a salute to the flag to the flag of the united states of america to the republic which stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice pursuant to the open meeting law any person may make a audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any media
0:39attendees are therefore advised that such recordings or transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible okay so there's no citizen's input so we'll go right to this discussion for number three 3.01 discussion and vote to refer to review the fiscal management policy and kevin almeida sure so what you have in front of you is the
1:06updated fiscal management policy policies um what we've done is highlighted in yellow the changes to the the policies uh in particular um what things that have been updated are things in reference to soa and making the budget more transparent and that kind of thing and in particular in the policy db the annual budget policy it gives a bigger description on the annual budget and the process
1:41it describes the foundation budget which items are reflective in the foundation budget and which items you have to exclude in addition um the budget deadlines and schedules filed uh policy bbc uh it shortens the policy but it just essentially says it's a backwards map of when the budget is finally adopted in june dating back to uh when we actually start the process so you know as as you all know we start
2:15the process typically in the october november time frame and work on our schedule as we usually do just a quick point of clarification here on policy dbc it references selectmen that should say city council um and then in the one two three the fourth paragraph the references selectmen again i should say city council as well so absolutely are these just the policies from msc that's yes we're not these aren't your own
2:46recommendations so we'll talk about it later because i i just think for me personally we're fall river public schools masc doesn't dictate to us what we do we should be doing what we think is appropriate for us not just following what they do so that's just an aside but as i was saying it i was just in that language made me kind of think true that this is template language from them right thanks so
3:16just kind of going on the big the big policy change here that's being recommended is uh the adoption of the budget by the school committee at the cost center level so file dbg our policy dbg cost centers should be to represent appropriate levels of transparency for the committee to oversee goal implementation while allowing for administrative day-to-day work cost centers will be agreed upon by the
3:42committee and the administration so that's the big the big policy change here now file policy dbj it recommends having quarterly reports being given to you currently we're doing uh we do monthly reports but using the approach of the cost center approach uh what i i think what we'll do in the future and next year for next year's budget and for fiscal year 23 going forward is um provide you with the same quarter same
4:18report that we provide you on a monthly basis but give you the detailed quarterly report that's being discussed here on a quarterly basis to have a further further financial discussion so policy d d uh just it goes on to talk about uh grants and gifts and the fact that you know when we apply for a grant and again the accept acceptance by the school committee policy dec that's a new policy
4:48and it's the federal funds supplement to not supplant policy so essentially it just says that you can't you can't stop uh supplant your budget so you got it when you get federal funds you got to supplement what you're currently doing in your budget so it's anything above and beyond so that's essentially what that policy discusses and then i believe the next update is policy die the audits policy policy
5:17so it goes to the it describes to you um what we were required to do on a yearly basis with the audits from so we get every year we have the end of the year financial audit we have the gatsby 34 audit which is done through the city that we're a part of we get the federal grants audit which is the single the single audit it's part of the single audit act that we get done
5:39have to have done every year it's an audit of all i thought federal grants and the student activity account audit it gets done as part of the gathering 34 audit it's all gets worked out so now this policy now just states everything whereas the olds policy did not describe all the audits that we do it just gave like a very very general description policy dj for the purchasing it essentially just goes on to talk
6:07about the fact that um we're going out for the lowest possible price on everything we purchase it provides the superintendent uh that she designates who the purchasing agent is for the district which in this case is me i always see all the purchases and talks about purchase orders and stuff and then i believe those are the updates to financial policies
6:43um for dbg kevin right yep you said that one has the most uh that's the biggest that's the big change yes well so what's like an example of that so we've you know i know we've talked about the line but the fact that we vote on the total bottom line uh bottom line dollar amount so that will change in the future so it'll change when we develop next year's budget
7:07when we report out to you next year so what we'll do is we'll provide you at that point at that point that level quarterly will provide you with updates on a cost center basis so you'll be able to see all the line items every single every department every school and for every department and each one of them will be possible you'll be able to see each cost center broken out with totals
7:28with what's been spent to date so on as well
7:38so just speaking of that i appreciate the theory here behind the car centers i think we need to i've said that very much over and over what i would like to as we proceed for the current budget we already approved the but the draft budget so i would anticipate that we approve the regular budget but i think for july 1 we have time to implement this for the current not so much for the budget approving the
8:05budget process but how it gets reported starting in july i think it would be a good sign of like working together to say this is what we have so can i ask you a question so as i like laid it as i laid it out so could i continue to do so you guys get a monthly update could i give you that update that we do monthly and then on a quarterly basis provide you with
8:26a call center approach you know report for you guys so that you have is that sufficient enough i would i would say if we have this committee be more involved in the call centers uh ftes like i think we had to tease out before it gets to the full committee what is the call center what like defining a call center because some people don't know exactly what that means or whatever
8:48so for instance i would envision a school being a call center correct so in given school we would have 40 teachers 10 counselors 20 whatever so when i envision the call center if we approve a budget as such the committee is doing their financial fiduciary responsibility and saying here's the budget for this school with x amount of employees the superintendent can therefore if one person leaves one person gets
9:15replaced within that which is what your practice is anyway and i've been saying practice and policy should be the same so i would be of the belief that we don't need monthly reports we would need if we do on the front end everybody on the same page here's what we have here's what we have the number of employees and the like i don't think we have a need for that monthly report i think that's a little
9:37overkill if we did on the front end this stuff so i would say at quarterly we have the report along with the transfers i think that would be sufficient as far as this member is concerned okay but on the front end if we say this is what we have i think it's fair to say three months from now at a monthly meeting if the superintendent says oh i need to add another
9:58position x y and z that can happen on a monthly basis but i think sometimes when you report out the monthly report it's almost like it's really not an eye-opener for anybody to be honest and other than that it makes it look like as if we're just either not addressing it so when we accept a monthly report there's no question there's no nobody it makes it look like as if we're not doing our piece
10:22whereas we would review it quarterly maybe in a more depth you know you're going to tell us where the projected transfers are going to come from on a quarterly basis so i think that to me would um would make sense but i think you've got time to tweak this between now and the and the full committee i just wanted to make what you said kevin or maybe mr again said the monthly reporting is overkill
10:50i said that oh you said that okay all right it's it's a bigger so just to a clear it's a much bigger report that would have to be done
11:05but if what i'm hearing is we're going to break it down by cost center and then when the changes are reported we'll report it by cost centers too okay
11:18so you would identify the cross centers like you know it used to be uh the schools were a call center a department was of course so they would have to define for the full committee what so our budget will have 27 call centers 22 courses 20 whatever they come up with recommendation so now we would know here's where each department is somebody came to you from the public and said mr bailey how many
11:43uh ftes do you have in a certain car center right now you can't really say as clearly as what we would in the future yeah to say no we look at it we approved 18 costs 18 employees we still have 18.
11:54we have two vacancies we it helps us to manage to know where the the money is uh going but i think quarterly uh more in-depth quarterly makes more sense than having to prepare a monthly um you know and when we when we look at like kevin the budget uh and those cost centers like we um like we discussed they will have you will have the the school and then the lot the bottom line
12:20item but numbered for that particular school that particular department and so on exactly yeah and you'll have more you like there'll be more detail you'll have all the lines too that fall within that category within the cost centered is there any more uh so some of the policies as i mentioned earlier are from the masa yes what i would personally like to see before we get to the full committee is to have
12:45your recommendation of superintendent so some of these things are what the state asks us for some of them don't really need to be in policy the one about the federal law whatever that doesn't necessarily that's the law we have to follow it so i think looking through this and saying here's what i think is the policies that are needed and and not adding to it because sometimes i think the school committee
13:11folks um send us all these things oh you should have this you should have that but i'd rather have it be you to say talking to your departments and say this makes sense that this doesn't make sense because we don't need a policy book this thick if it can be defined and i think adding the piece of the cross centers makes it much more controlled you know so some of this stuff might not be needed
13:36but i'd rather if it came from you to say you reviewed all of these things and this is what i recommend keeping or not keeping rather than go through the whole thing i think with would make sense the purchasing is did we not have one i see the whole thing was highlighted we did but it was very very small it was small and not very specific the way this was okay so we
14:01some of these have like non-highlighted and highlighted yeah and then some are just totally highlighted is that does that mean we're getting rid of the little language in another yeah so maybe before the committee purchasing was only the correct short one so but where did that oh it's underneath so we get rid of dga is that dga is the one that one page this is what we had it before right and we're changing it to
14:34this more comprehensive the if you notice a lot of the correction a lot of the recommendations are uh more detailed than what we had in place yeah so i guess my only comment on that would be to for the full committee when they review it just have it the old one the old one and say old you know and this is what we're recommending new so we can chase trace it back if it ever
15:00i've had a hard time trying to figure out old policies that are no longer in existence where they came from but i think other than that the um i do appreciate the uh the time the schedules and all that uh stuff makes sense and my last point is just to try to however we can implement it for july i think that would be important with that are you uh okay there's a motion by mr again to
15:31approve is there a second roll call again yes mr bailey yes mr parker yes uh discussion 3.02 go through a referral update based covering policies i'm sorry it was we need that to report the full committee yep i'm okay i'm sorry uh you know just yeah we just uh when i say motion to accept what's to say except the referring recommendation so we can take another vote if you want to
16:04make it you it's up to you i think yeah yes the so what you have before you is the mass the face covering policy as you know we had a policy that we put in place last year um and uh what uh masc given that we're all back um has uh recommended policy which uh when we had talked about uh going back and removing masks we said that there were three conditions that were being
16:37recommended and that's students returning from a positive test they would need to still mask up for five additional days as they finish up their quarantine also masks are required in all school health offices so every school nurse's office has a box of masks because students are or adults if they're going there usually they're not feeling well so as a precaution they will mask up until
17:02they're seen until they're deemed safe to return to class or whether they're going to be dismissed to go home and also until april 18th so far masks on buses are being required that's a federal well there i think they're going to review on the 18th so we don't know um but it may be removed so those are the only changes and this is the the recommended uh face covering policy adjusted policy are there any questions
17:40so on that last piece of the uh the school buses yes i think if we added something along the lines of if it's in the effect so that we don't have to once we put in the policy that this is yes i think we should put like a caveat to say once it's eliminated it automatically gets eliminated from our policy so that we don't have to come back and meet to still be in compliance so while
18:05under federal mandate oh federal regulations yeah something because as i'm reading it says by federal health order all students are required to wear a mask that's subject to a timeline of when they say it so if we put some sort of language to say once the federal law is out then you know what i mean we wouldn't have to come back if we didn't do that we'd have to technically
18:26come back to okay so we'll put subject to um lifting a federal mandate or is that does that make sense but um also too though what how is this being enforced yeah unfair on on sort of buses the kids have to wear their masks it's not school buses anymore just federal yeah that's federal they they follow the tsa guidelines so until they lift that if if it's lifted on the 18th then it
18:56will be okay but it's until then um they're required yeah whatever language i think you even the five days piece i think you should put some caveat in here to say because that's a regulation as well from the state yeah it's well it's recommended by dph and the odessa so i think you need to give an out to uh once once either of those is eliminated these policies will no longer be in
19:27existence or something because otherwise we wouldn't be in compliance okay motion approved referrer has amended second most motion has been made by mr again to approve and vote to refer second invite mr bailey roll call mr again yes mr bailey yes yes item number 3.03 discussion about to refer to review the use of school facilities policy ken sure so on the policy um a couple of highlights um
20:07probably not highlighted on yours because that's the original policy i highlighted them just because i think that they're um sometimes we we don't look at these particular pieces so the e on use of uh use of facilities for a charge um number one e orville public schools should not be at a cost associated with the use of schools by any outside group whether it's profit or non-profit
20:34um so for instance if a school is using um a facility on a saturday we have a cost no matter what so if a private group non-profit uses a building there are going to be costs we have a custodian to bring in we have security to bring in so to say that we will not charge non-profits is against that policy um that's num that's the first one i'd like to add an f to that particular piece
21:09and that would be all artificial turf fields will have a minimum cost with any usage not directly associated with foreign public schools so if if there's a rental that is an outside group and whether they're profit or non-profit there is a minimum cost to use that field um just because of the nature of the field and the fact that the requirement to replace those fields would need to be covered so a grass
21:39field is a different situation because we can let people use the grass fields at no cost um as long as they they uh comply with one of the regulations we have and that is they have to um rent port jobs for whatever so if we have a little league group that wants to use the feel that the fonsica school as the columbus little league always did they would need to rent porta jones
22:08and then there's no cost to us whatsoever other than we're going to cut that grass anyway they would have to groom the field themselves as far as game days and things like that but um we wouldn't have a cost uh to bear kenny what's the minimum cost for them so we would come up with a minimum a minimum charge as to what it would for instance if you look at well i it's not included but um
22:33most of this refers to a schedule and the schedule is the uh one item that we had brought to full committee and that is the charge is the hourly charges for the field so there may not be charges for custodial there may not be charges for groundskeepers to use let's say the stadium for instance however there would be a minimum charge to use the field broken up non-profit and profit right so when you say minimum cost
23:04um that's you're gonna come up with that minimum it's already it's already in the oh it's in the charts it's in the chart oh i'm sorry so all those all those charges are already there yeah it does break it up in four categories non-profit profit within the community and non-profit profit out of the community and um the use of facilities piece again i i highlighted the ones at no charge which again i think
23:39we have to um distinguish what the no charge would be so if someone wanted to use spencer borden from monday through friday after up until 9 9 30 then there would be no charge because we have everyone here so there is no extra charge to particularly do that so we're not always we're not necessarily charging them if you wanted to do a community-based for lack of a better word of freebie no
24:06charge if you're coming into the building now we do have a charge for um for community profit that we would charge an hourly rate for and we have the same thing for a out of community both charged non-profit and profit so the only the only no charge completely would necessarily be uh would end up being a community group that you wanted to use the building within our operating hours
24:36so that we're not incurring any extra personnel costs
24:45and um with that the superintendent may authorize the use of facilities at a reduced charge or without charge except for any charges associated with the supervised supervision or cleanup so that basically addresses that that piece so there's nothing to change um in any of this and then the fees all of that schedule and once the school committee approves the the fees that that we proposed
25:15then um that would be what we would be using for our day-to-day operations and then um the only other thing that we've probably not enforced is that any organization using the school are responsible to get the proper commits if they're selling anything you know food bringing food in or or anything like that so they would need some permits from if they're handing out food food handlers things like that
25:53open for questions mr argue so when the um where you added the um on one e says uh shall not bear the cost which i agree with it's not costing us anything right i think that ties into the second one having the superintendent be this whole authority of if somebody wants to get it reduced they have to notify her right so that it can be um i do agree with that as well the
26:24the fee structure that you talked about i think that i i'm not sure i think that might have gone to facilities a year ago or something like that they went to facilities but also what the full culture yeah i think that's where the some of the further questions are going to come in i think this takes care of the piece of whether a non-profit gets to use it but the real issue is going to be
26:45the whole piece you know that schedule so i'm not sure how to talk about the fee schedule yeah so the fee schedule i know it was in the facility but it did go to the full body it went to full body in the table i think it went with the full body of february right and referred back here full body structure yes so i think that's where this i mean this would be good to
27:15take care of the non-profit pieces that we were trying to address but i still think that there's some issues with the schedule so that we can at the full committee you want both done at the same time i would assume so i think that's where uh we'd have to look at it that'll be the turf minimum cost or right you know the only other thing i would say is when we use the use of schools account
27:40i don't know if there's a turf fee you know like if how that's broken up but i think at some point we should look at targeting so we're making money on the fields that that gets broken up somehow so we as a committee know here's how much money we make on the fields as a separate as a separate product like a division of the thing because we could keep on saying we're making money on the
28:03fields and it's chunk change for like a better way to say it sometimes then what it is or what are we going to do with that money do we is it profitable it'll help us to understand what what does it really take to replace that carpet up there you gotta rent a lot of times in order to get a million dollars you know so but i think going along with that
28:26and and why i say there needs to be that minimum charge is what what will happen is if the non-profits if the fee is so low the non-profits are going to tie up all of the time that's possible for those rentals and therefore there'll be no purpose in having that separate item because there'll be no money in it but that was that was the concern right so right if we really want to build that that plan
28:53that the carpets can be replaced on a when they should be replaced then i think that there has to be a certain amount of time that we a lot whether it i don't know i don't know how you would do that if it's uh you know 15 hours a month 20 hours a month or something like that that would be set aside for the non-profits and then the remaining time would be up for rent
29:18and what's the warranty on those that the 10-year 10 to 12 years it's not as much a warranty as it is a you know what like life cycle right so um as far as the facilities themselves um we talked about personnel being into about like nine o'clock um if let's say the pop warner team was using it and the lights and it got dark at a certain time how does that factor in like how do we
29:50so there would be a fee for the lights so like the parks they paid they actually pay for their own meter at henry lord that is that meter is in pop warner's name over here it wouldn't be so we would have a fee for the lighting so if they were if they were playing on saturday and sunday and they didn't need to go into the into the evening then there would be no fee for lighting
30:12if they're using it during the week then there would be a feed you know and we would probably hope and again it could be one more item is we would adopt the city's regulations on hours so that lights out 10 o'clock yeah you know no starting a new inning or something like that so that you wouldn't disrupt the neighborhood with the lighting when did that get switched over at him a lot kenny
30:37it's been switched for a while five musicals yeah since they since the lights went up that was switched how how often do you have so if you want to render one time you got to get a border john so like that well that would that's the issue do we do we the only other choices we can't let somebody use the facility knowing full well that the building's going to be locked
31:03because we're not going to let people into the building to use the bathrooms so and the only place that that well the only two places is cuss and um and soon to be talbot also should be three that we would have outside facilities available to the public so pop warner has it but they do have the season it's a good point as to what you would do but knowing full well that
31:26if we don't have a portage if we don't have them use the portage on and the bathrooms are not closed we know that all of those people are using so i'm thinking of in the park like if you had baseball practice at kennedy park and there's nobody around you know those bathrooms aren't open right they still get to practice without it so i'm just wondering if there needs to be a if you have it on a
31:46regular basis like if i'm going to run a league and i'm having it every tuesday and thursday for the season right i should have a portage on there but if i happen to be somebody that wants to have just a practice like what is the cutoff for when you need it so i have a tuesday thursday i get a portage on this gentleman uses it the other day does he use my porter john like
32:08on our facilities i'm just thinking sometimes it can get a little if you're not giving exclusive use of the if you're not having exclusive use right you know so it might not apply to a lot of places but the ones that are long term it totally makes more you should say that if you're going to use it more than once in a week you you'd have to have a
32:26quarter job i mean we could come up with something yeah it's simple exactly what i'm saying something anything that kind of gets it'll allow for somebody to say he wants to take a bunch of kids and say we're going to go play at the at the place of behind fonsica with a bunch of hanzo kids that wouldn't necessarily that one shot deal right means they need a portage on unless we put maybe
32:46more than once in a week or something like that right yep i make a motion to refer motion is made to refer seconded by mr bailey roll call was dragon yes mr bailey yes mr harper yes either items oh that's so this is going to go facility so we can finish this before it goes to full yeah well i was thinking this part is good policy okay the money piece of the thing
33:19will go to facilities i think it's already in there anyway yeah yeah i would think this could go directly okay uh 3.04 discussion and vote to refer to review the following policies listed and that's uh dr taylor sure so you have three policies in front of you we were asked to adopt these policies after we received a court report in december from deci around the policies that we have that support
33:48educational sustainability so there are three categories of policies in front of you one is from homeless students we had this policy in our frps manual already but there wasn't a designation that it had been approved by school committee so in distance which is a technical glitch that we'd like to fix the sec the other two policies one is around how we support military families and the other one is around children in
34:15foster care so in 2019 masc well dusty urged that we break out how we support homeless students separate that from how we support foster care students and they strongly recommend that we have policies around military-connected families so these policies are taken from the ms masc database and we'd like to move some votes for them to refer those to the full committee
34:45they're already you know the uh the first policy the homeless students yeah you just saw i was trying to read it while you were talking about the it talks about the school of origin and then the different levels can you explain that is that uh um is that a hug like once you go to elementary to middle you go to your home school now or how am i mixing up two things or not feel
35:12free to let me know no i know you're referring to so if a student is designated as homeless or mckinney-vento they always have the right to attend the school of origin so it could be from kindergarten through sixth grade like sixth grade they move into a middle school but at that point we have been told by dusty that once a student's about to graduate we can have a conversation with whatever district
35:35they're in where the temporary housing exists and try to collaborate and encourage the family to attend school in that district that they're currently in so we've had a number of cases this year where we have families living in shelters in brockton or attleboro and some families are multi-year we've been advised by that at the end of each year to review those families those families placements and to make you know
36:00talk with the family and collaborating about what really is the best sort of like an informal best determination meeting um so we would ask to do that with our family so we get clear on who our mckinney mental families are and who work so if the student is here from k to five at six they go to the home school automatically no they should stay and follow her public schools and that's uh
36:25because i think that's what i was reading it was it sort of looked wishy-washy a little whereas it's not um it's it's a bit vague technically they can stay if they choose to do k through 12 in travel public schools as long as they're designated homeless and that's whether they're doubling up or living in a shelter or living in a hotel or living temporary with relatives they have a spot in our district and there's no
36:52is there a desi person who does appeals on that like is there how does it work if there's a dispute i mean it's all well and good when we all say let's talk about what's best for the child you know but at some point some of these cases can get a little costly to the districts and then not in we could feel like it's not in the best interest of the child
37:13to be driving 45 minutes every day and then the parents could say something else when did is there an arbiter of that to say there isn't so we have contacted support what we've been told as a district we could file a report with desi to say that we have a family that's from multi-year been designated mckinney-vento but there isn't necessarily a arbiter or you know a dusty official who says
37:40you can know like this is the final decision so in theory two districts can duke it out for multiple years we we can't force them to go to yeah like we we have students for instance we had a family who lived in brockton but they were commuting to fall river we can't force them we can certainly have a conversation with that parent but where there laid their head when they had their home
38:03is where they have a right to attend yeah no i i totally i hear that i i think sometimes it's like the third rail we don't want to discuss it as far as laws regulations and stuff but it's a reality that i think we need to address because we say that and then we can event those the homeless and then the money comes to transportation it's not 100 it's a mandate for us but it's not 100
38:27reimbursed right so the state's telling us that we have to transport this child but they're not giving us the money to replace 100 of our transportation that's in every district that's just not right that's not fair so i think we need to i have no problem with this is kind of the way it's got to be but i would ask the superintendent to write a letter to the local legislative delegation
38:52asking for them to meet to discuss this issue both the laws regulations around it as well as a hundred percent of uh mckinney-vento reimbursement i find it totally illogical that we have twenty million dollars more from the state but we're not hundred percent funded on a mandate like kenny vento and that little districts like the one i work in at westport at the same that money costs a lot more in westport than
39:18here just not right so why i would last to to me i'm happy to to join in a meeting if i can but if we just keep letting these things go on and on they're never going to fix it so i do want to support the kids no matter where they're at but at some point enough like we have to say you move on to the next thing otherwise we're just going to continue it down
39:40you know that path so but then i make a motion to approve the three or four of the three referendum the motion is made to refer seconded by mr bailey uh roll call yes next is uh 3.05 discussion vote to refer to review the following policies listed uh dr taylor as well no that's uh that's actually oh that's you i'm sorry i'm sorry sorry so um there were some major changes in
40:20the title ix law in 2020 and as a result we consulted with the attorneys on how we should revise our policy as well as masc sending down this policy in 2021 uh for adoption so previously there was a policy called acab and it covered harassment of students and that was um both types of harassment general harassment and as well as sexual harassment and they both live within that same policy as a result of the
40:50changes in title ix and the requirements involved in that they split the policy so there's a new policy acab if it would help the committee i've made copies of the policies here that might shed some light on this so the new acab policy focuses solely on the sexual harassment the title nine complaints and as a result there's also a uh procedural piece to that which when you look at a forward policy and it
41:19has a letter and it's followed by an r that means it's reference material for that policy it's like a guide for the policy so the new policy would be for the title nine piece it would be the a c d a r i'm sorry ra which is this document here and that is really the step-by-step manual on on following one of those policies and uh the reason this is so complicated
41:46this binder right here is is all the forms that go with the title ix investigation so if there is a a complaint or grievance on the basis of sexual discrimination whether it be for gender sexual preference some type of sexual harassment whether it be physical or verbal um you have to file a title nine investigation and begin that process and so this policy would would split the the old policy into one that
42:13just deals solely with the sexual harassment piece of it and that that policy would be a c a b and a c a b r a which is the manual for it and it also designates specific roles for the people who take part in the investigation it can't just be one person doing the investigation that's to be a facilitator a coordinator that has to be an investigator that has to be a
42:34decision maker and then there's an appeals officer if somebody disagrees with the decision so it's a very involved process and that's all to do with the title ix changes it came down to the end of 2020.
42:46by taking the sexual policy the sexual harassment policy and making it a separate thing there's also now a separate policy for harassment and retaliation and that policy has its own manual which is based on the civil rights piece and as the committee is aware we had some problems with uh some allegations of discrimination so this would be the how-to manual for that and that is this document here which
43:12will be a civil rights grievance and that policy would become a c r b which is the reference material for dealing with a civil rights complaint not tied to sexual harassment or title ix in any way this would be the manual for that uh and again it's a as a procedure defined roles and and that policy goes through is that in our package here yep excuse me do they have the procedure
43:38it is it is in there it's just not identified by the letter it's died it says civil rights grievance procedure it should be in your pocket yep it's in the top right hand corner okay in addition it breaks out harassment of students student on student or adult on student that's the policy jick so that's conflict between students and recently um we have we already have the policy in place which is our bullying and and
44:12bullying investigation policy which is jicfb that's already posted on the website and that was updated in october of 21.
44:26okay tom you just said student on student yeah that would be j-i-c-k j-a-c-k
44:40and that's for harassment but if it's bullying it's the jicfb policy and i apologize that this is so complicated but that's the way that the policies are now broken and have you you brought up yet adult and adult that would follow under the harassment the civil rights policy acrb acrb yep acra which is just prohibiting harassment and the investigation piece is acrb and that is that policy that's the one
45:03that says civil rights grievance procedure
45:29my concern is that we don't have a policy we haven't had a policy of you know adult bullying in that school so the language that says student in the reports that we got that said but for us not having a policy to say you're not supposed to harass adults we don't have anything to go on which i thought was ridiculous but i'm not so sure just by reading this as you were going that it's as
45:53explicit as it needs to be on what to do when a person is harassing another employee and i know you said it's part of this but as you were reading them like it doesn't necessarily say in an explicit way so i'm wondering if these policies were verbatim what masc recommended are these our records these are our policies where we took policies that were already given to us by masc sent them to the attorney and got their
46:23advice on how to proceed with that and these contain those modifications okay so what i would recommend is before this goes to the full committee that we get a highlight that and some more like uh language just very clear language that we can't have an employee treating people like whether it's civil rights when you look at the harassment of students policy i think it should be a harassment policy
46:49and in within that it also should say somewhere that a staff member can't harass another staff member so so the the policy that begins with the letter j that's really in a bunch of policies that that relate to student affairs the policies that hey that begin with a apply to everybody and i'll pull out the language that shows the ac harassment policy the harassment's prohibited and
47:12then the sort of the flow chart of how it goes through whether it's related to sexual harassment or just regular harassment whether it be gestures slurs comments discrimination any of those things and i'll make that because yeah it's not clear like right it's not like i said it's there's probably ten policies in front of me right right here right now and and sorting through them to try to make them
47:34digestible for the committee because i'll highlight those pieces similar to what mr ragyat mr almeida did and i'll send those out to the committee before the next meeting like i'm reading the harassment of students policy the first line says harassment students by other students employees vendors other third parties will not be tolerated in the public schools you mustn't go well conduct all that other
47:54stuff but it doesn't necessarily say within here that it can be an adult i know this is meant for the students that because that's the statement harassment of students by other students employees something as explicit as that for adults as well correct right that's basically so maybe it's like even though it might be buried within the civil rights grievance procedure i think having something that says harassment of
48:22anyone is unacceptable yeah something along those lines ac is non-discrimination that's another policy that's in there non-discrimination on the basis of several different fields ace is specific to descript to uh disabilities so there's a number of policies i'll highlight the pieces that i i think the committee needs to see and i'll send those two what i'm saying is we should create another policy so those are going
48:43to be buried under ac acac whatever those things are what i'm suggesting is that we have a policy that says if i'm a person in the community or worker whoever and i go to our policy manual online and write harassment i shouldn't only see the harassment of students one i want to get one that says harassment of anyone whether it be harassment of adults or anything so that we can see it even though it's probably just
49:08going to be copy and pasted from some of the stuff that's in here i think explicitly stating i don't want to ever get a report from any agency or person that says but for us not having a school committee policy that it's unfair to discriminate against adults and harass adults we can't find that they i don't ever have that happen again forever so that's where i'm coming that from it's not to i just think it's an
49:31addition not necessarily what you do with that i make a motion to refer a motion is made by mr aguiar to refer is there a second sentence by mr bailey a roll call yes is there any uh new business no new business secondly by mr bailey roll call dragon yes yes yes thank you everyone thank you