Morgan Hill school board trustees will tackle a number of key issues at Tuesday night’s meeting, with the district’s proposal to restructure the facility use pay scale for local sports leagues at the forefront. Other key business on the agenda includes a push for more state funding toward public education, a district-wide demographic study and the School Accountability Report Cards.
Closed session will begin at 4pm Jan. 23 inside the Morgan Hill Unified School District headquarters, located at 16500 Concord Circle. The public session will begin immediately following at 6pm.
Listed as the sixth item to be discussed publicly, the “Facility Use Fee schedule effective July 1, 2018,” has caused quite the stir among members of the different sports leagues that utilize school district fields. The new pay plan, which was devised by district-hired Facilitron, changes the pay structure from a daily to an hourly rate.
“Based on analysis of the District’s costs to maintain facilities, Staff recommended that the Board consider adopting a new facility rate schedule to ensure that the District recovers appropriate facility rental fees so as not to create an unfunded impact on the school district. which would have to utilize General Fund revenues to cover the shortfall for operational costs and capital facilities funds to provide for the maintenance, restoration and replacement of facilities,” according to the agenda item.
Facilitron cofounder Jeff Benjamin, who contacted the Times this week, disagrees with certain league representatives’ take that they will be forced to considerably raise their membership fees to cover the additional costs for facility use under the district’s proposal.
“We are not out to upset any group,” said Benjamin, whose Faciliton company provides an online reservation platform for sports leagues to view the availability and cost of renting a school field. “We were founded based on our need as parents to find practice facilities for our own children.”
Facilitron is already contracted by many other school districts, including Gilroy Unified, San Jose Unified, Eastside Union, Alum Rock, Oak Grove, Vacaville and Fairfield, according to Benjamin.
After introducing their plan to the school board at a previous meeting, district staff, along with a Facilitron employee, met with representatives of the sports leagues Jan. 3 to fill them in on the new facility use rates and gather their feedback prior to seeking board approval. The seven-member school board will hear the modified proposal Jan. 23 and is expected to vote on the item that night.
Other general business items also on tap Tuesday include:
• Accept the 2016-17 Personnel Commision Annual Report, which “provides evidence of work completed by the Personnel Commission staff, summarizes the hiring activities for classified personnel, and recognizes those who have retired from the school district,” the agenda states.
• Approve the 2016-17 Annual Financial Report, which verifies “the District’s financial records and conformance with required accounting practices,” according to the agenda.
• An analysis of Gov. Jerry Brown’s State 2018-19 budget and its local impact. The presentation will also include multi-year financial projections, which are a “tool used by the district to ensure that it will be able to meet its financial obligations in the current and two subsequent fiscal years,” the agenda states.
• Adopt California School Boards Association-generated resolution calling for “Full and Fair Funding of California’s Public Schools,” according to the agenda item. “The resolution highlights the threat that under-investment in schools poses to our communities and calls on the State to meet its responsibilities to today’s students and to California’s future.”
• Update on the implementation of the Next Generation Science Standards and “the pending curriculum council recommendation for course design and graduation requirements,” according to the Jan. 23 agenda.
• Review of the district’s five-year demographic study, which was contracted to SchoolWorks, Inc. “The district-wide and school-specific enrollment projections are meant to serve as a planning tool to help with both long and short-term planning,” the agenda states. “They are also used as a tool to identify certain facility planning requirements such as capacity, utilization of existing facilities, planning for modernization or new construction, and attendance boundary redistricting.”
• Approve publication of 2016-2017 School Accountability Report Cards, known as SARCs, for each of the district schools.
Consent items
Items listed under consent are considered routine and are grouped into one single vote by the school board unless otherwise requested.
The Jan. 23 consent calendar includes:
• $15,000 contract (One-Time Discretionary Funds) with Gene Bregman & Associates to conduction another parcel tax polling survey. “With the recent publicity of the District’s Right Sizing the Budget effort, there is a possibility that a $75 parcel tax measure may now have more potential support to warrant a June 2018 ballot measure,” according to district staff.
• $35,300 contract (Restricted Routine Maintenance fund) with HazMat Doc Environmental Consulting and Management Services “to perform the required triennial inspections and five follow-up six-month observations,” according to the agenda.
• Submit Measure Q grant application for the El Toro Health Science Academy crossfit nature trail with potential for $100,000 funds.
• Approve Gavilan College High Step Dual Enrollment Program at Ann Sobrato High School, which offers college-level classes on the high school campus.
• Approve appointment of Superintendent Steve Betando as the District representative on the Charter School of Morgan Hill Board of Directors.
