The meeting began with the normal Call to Order, Agenda Review, and Flag Salute. 

A statement from the superintendent and the board chair were made in reference to the passing of Town Manager Don Turner. 

The first Community Comments portion of the meeting included a statement from a community member in reference to the complaints and subsequent 3rd party investigation that found the allegations unsubstantiated against a board member. 

The Consent Agenda included an approval of a warrant, contracts, and approval of committee and regular meeting minutes. 

The Reports to the Board portion of the meeting included:

– Operations Report: Over Thanksgiving the remaining 11 Herrick Classroom A/C mini-splits were installed to assist with mold issues in classrooms that did not have air conditioning. Additional electrical work remains to be operational before the spring and will occur over school vacations. This work was grant funded. Additionally, the MHS stairwells have been resurfaced with non-slip ADA-compliant material per insurance recommendation paid for by the Capital Reserve Fund.  

– Committee Reports: Finance committee met Wednesday and will be discussed as part the budget discussion of the meeting. Other future committee meetings have been rearranged for the month. If you are signed up to receive the newsletters (link above) you will receive notifications of these changes. 

– MHS Principal Report from the new principal, Scott Sivo, (see agenda packet and/or watch LCATV for more information): Like all principal presentations they are formatted to discuss work completed towards the goals of:

1) Student Achievement and Success – To foster curious and passionate learners through opportunities that further their academic knowledge and skills and meet the challenges of a changing world.

2) Social-Emotional Health and Well-being – To prioritize the health and well-being of all members of the learning organization through programming that promotes care for the heart, mind, and body. 

3) Family & Student Engagement – To cultivate engaged citizens inspired to meet the demands of a changing society through an awareness of self, others, and the world around them in the local and global context. 

– Student Representative Report: Discussed Wellness Week coming up and completing community projects that promote wellness and the community. Discussed other activities for students to engage with each other. Mentioned the play, Little Shop of Horrors, currently showing this weekend with doors at 6:30pm. Winter Concert on December 11th at 7pm at the HS Auditorium. Rock Project concert on December 18th at 6:30 with teachers and students. Admission by donation. Highlights include 28 students who applied early to college. Milton’s National Honor Society donated 37 bags of food to the Milton Food Shelf and inducted 35 new students. In October, students and staff had an ultimate frisbee game. There was a Power Puff Football Game the first week of November. Twelve students attended a student athlete leadership conference in November. Milton HS Rotary Interact Cluge visited MES and read to the younger kids.   

There were no Presentations. 

The Discussion portion of the meeting included:

– Herrick Facilities – Review Itemized Bond List: Need to clarify the items needing correction. Need to determine who will manage the construction projects (internal or external). Due to cost-estimating time it may be too tight to go to bond for March according to Truex Cullins. Items include complete roof, replace windows in entire school, exterior doors, electrical code issues, water heater replacement, sprinkler inspection, and egress lighting.  

– FY26 Budget including the December 1st Tax Letter discussion: See https://www.mtsd-vt.org/apps/pages/fy26 for the latest information from MTSD on the Fy26 budget. A presentation was given and can be watched on LCATV. See the Tax Letter here and note that this is just a projection and is not based on any final decisions by all of the final passed school budgets: https://tax.vermont.gov/press-release/commissioner-taxes-releases-fy2026-education-tax-rate-letter. The state is late in providing MTSD with their weighted daily average students for which MTSD converses the state and eventually is a consideration in the overall education tax assessed to Milton. There is now a new “CLA” formula that uses a state average “CLA” to make the “CLA” swings less drastic, but may have other unintended consequences. New ballot language has also been made required on the town ballot. Matt walked through applying the new formulas, but MTSD is missing a lot of the numbers still from the state. Basically, it sounds like the board is flying blind on what the state is doing and this makes it difficult to discuss budget decisions. Currently discussed plans for Level Service FY26 Budget and what percentage increase over that last year’s budget that is.

– Website Vendor Change Proposal: A proposal was made to use a single vendor IT tool to replace numerous IT tools that don’t integrate well with each other and currently will cost less to use overall. Information was in the packet. 

– Milton Independent Submission for January 2025: Looking to get a submission regarding the budget or the bond vote. Scott suggested the bond vote due to likely having better numbers for that than the budget by then. Luckily, Scott was on deck to write this submission for the board which is due to the Milton Independent by January 3rd.

The second Community Comments portion of the meeting included no comments.

The Action Items portion of the meeting included approval of International Field Trip Requests – MHS International Club for three trips to Canada in 2025. 

The Board Comments portion of the meeting included a comment from a board member planning to attend the MHS play tomorrow night and a congratulations to the girls soccer team. 

An Executive Session concluded the night.