Board of Mayor and Aldermen - workshop

tax bids 932. so it is so it's really going to be under 2000 if you want Well, let's make sure A&R knows what they're doing. I didn't know. I'm going to go ahead and call them.

Oh, you?

I didn't know if we had our first or second.

Okay. Is it time?

So it's 5.30. We'll go ahead and get the work session started tonight. I've got an agenda somewhere, don't I? I knew you'd come around. I knew you'd come around.

Where's that?

Is it in my book? Okay, so it's 530. We'll go ahead and get started. We'll call the meeting to order. I guess we need to approve the agenda. So I guess we'll do it by voice. I mean, we have a couple people absent. Alderman French is not here and Alderman Anderson, but we have a quorum.

Here. Here.

Here. You guys care to approve the agenda for us? I'll make a motion to approve.

I'll second.

Now, just everybody say aye. Everybody agree? Any changes? Aye. Agenda approved. Any comments from the citizens? A lot of folks here tonight. Nobody wants to talk to us? Glad to see you here, Mr. Hillis. So with no comments, we'll get right into it. Number four is the tourism director. A little information about how this was handled. We had probably, I don't know, 28 applicants, I think, for the tourism director's job. We narrowed the field down to seven. We did quite a few interviews with those seven, and then we put a little panel together that has the current chairman of tourism, Alderman French, Miranda Edwards from athletics, Tina Warren in HR, myself. We did the last two interviews as a panel. and we want to let you have some discussions with Ms. Kim. The panel decided from the two that we want to let everybody talk to Ms. Kim, and hopefully that's who we hire. So I guess at this time, Kim, if you'll come on up. We have a letter that she wrote us, and also her resume is in the book. I guess we'll start with her telling us a little bit about herself, and then we'll open it up to any questions. How about that?

Thank you, Mayor and Alderman. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you for taking time to meet with me and do a speed dating, get to know me. I have a very extensive background in tourism and economic development through tourism, as well as downtown development. This position seems to be just the perfect fit for me. I'm so excited and honored to be considered. I have maybe a few more than a dozen years in experience in tourism. I build CBBs. I have rebuilt CBBs. I have worked completely for tourism authorities and for cities. and it is my proudest honor to do that. It is so nice to see people coming together to create kind of funding in their community from people that just stop in. One of my best conversations I've had, I've had so many conversations with residents through my years, and a lot of times they don't understand. I find education is really, really a big deal because they're like, you know, you're bringing people in, they're using our roads, and I'm like, yeah, but they're leaving you money. to pay for your schools and those roads, so those tax dollars. And so that's kind of been the most exciting thing for me in tourism, that it really does generate revenue in the community. There is so many opportunities for marketing. I love the marketing side of it. I love the sales side of it. I started my career in the marketing and then moved into sales. And then I moved into being the executive director. And so I have had very, how do you say, multi-million dollar healthy budgets and I have had very below a half a million dollars and get it done. And the beauty of that is the grassroots marketing as well as the opportunity you have to finance stuff and to promote a city. I was very honored to come in and literally, I like to research, I like to know the community before the, you know, I have long conversations and discussions. I came in and I have to tell you, there is a secret sauce here. I've said that before and I'm gonna say it again. Your frontline people, your businesses, the people behind the counters, the business, the types of businesses are, I mean, you have a couple of, I believe, great models for economic development, business, and communities. And when I say your frontline people, I say your residents. People here are excited. They're happy about living here. They're happy about being here. I came in tonight, I gotta share this. When I came in this evening, I walked in and it was a little early. I was just making sure I was in the right time frame, because this is not my time, and I could hear a man singing. Do you know how rare that is for people to love what they do and to enjoy where they are and to kind of share that? And visitors feel that. And I would love to be a part of the growth of tourism and economic development here because there is just so much opportunity. And I just think you guys are sitting on the edge of being the best place that's known, not just by your residents, but by the region and extended out that. Why aren't we going to Manchester? Why aren't we spending the night there? Why aren't we having spoken out to do different events, attractions, and different things? So I've been doing this for, okay, well over a decade. And I will tell you there is something special. I'm not just saying that. I love going in and building. Rebuilding is very, very difficult, but if you get to know the community and you invest yourself in the community, it is easily done, and it is exciting to do that. But you guys are sitting on the edge of just really greatness as far as economic development through tourism. There's no retraining most of your businesses. They get it. I had the fortune in Chattanooga this week to meet a couple from Manchester. They had no idea who I was, they had no idea that I had interest in being here and looking to start a career here, or restart a new career here, I guess. And I just asked them, I said, y'all are from Manchester, I'm just curious, you love it, you don't love it, and how long you been there? Been here 20 years, they live out in the country, And they love it. And I said, well, it's great to say that, but what do you love about it? And it's laid back. And I think the beauty of this opportunity is to keep that special laid back lifestyle, but yet offer the opportunity for others to enjoy that and to meet your residents. If you walk into a restaurant, and I've had this, I've retrained restaurant teams, I've retrained hotel teams, but I have not felt that that's necessary here. Walking into one of your hotels this afternoon to check in, I was pleased that you have a local business that has their menu out there and you can scan the QR code and you can pre-order. So the foundation is not only clean here, it's very solid and strong. And so that is something I believe is where I need to be and working with the people I want to work with. So I appreciate you guys considering me.

Yes, ma'am. Does anybody have any questions?

Yeah, I do. My name is Thomas Crawson. Yes, sir. In Manchester. Okay. three, five, 10 more years, what does winning look like to you?

Winning is, it's an interesting, I think you have to have a vision, and I do believe that the tourism board, as well as this board, have to know what they think they want, and there has to be planning. So for me, winning is getting the hotels, not just, transient business, but businesses more than one night. And that would be for me, I don't know if I, winning is gonna be booking meetings and conventions. When I came in, it was the porcelain artist convention. It was, they were so, they were like a finely tuned machine. And so to see that working in the center was great for me. So to see that booked more often, that would be a big one. To be the hub and spoke for, I can't even imagine why this destination wouldn't be the number one place that bus tours would choose when they're going to Knox, I mean going to Nashville and going to Chattanooga and points in between when they're going to Jack Daniels or even if they're heading north. So for me it would be booking more of those. getting them to understand that this is their stopping point. And then I do believe the people need to know who Manchester is. I think that that is gonna be a huge win and it's gonna not be as hard, it's just gonna need to be consistent messaging. And to me, that's gonna be a huge deal, consistent messaging for the brand, for the city, moving throughout the next 10 years. And I think you said, so if we're saying 10 years, for me, it's also leaving or preparing someone to step in, the next leader, right? So for me, that's the, I guess, 30,000 feet winning.

Oh, excellent answer. Thank you. Thank you.

Gentlemen? Ms. Hughes, what would be your first week of the job? What would be your two years? to promote Manchester.

To promote. So for me, I think just literally pushing forward what's out there. I'm very impressed. When I got on the website, I was stunned the way it was worded and the following, like literally putting into place, this is the footprint of our campus. They call it a campus. You've got free hotels and event center. Nobody does that. That was brilliant, right? So for me, it's continuing and growing that messaging and following. One of the things, and usually when I come into a community, for me, it's getting to know the businesses, the residents, the staff, the team, and that is citywide. What I have learned over the years, if I find out who Manchester is to this board, who Manchester is to the tourism board. It's different to everybody. And for me, that's kind of been my recipe for success, is that when you understand who people think they are, then you can better share that. Like, I can come in at 30,000 feet, and I told you guys, the coffee, the young lady that I met at the coffee place, she, I'm like, maybe 30 years her senior, but it didn't matter to her. She talked to me for 30 minutes, and she shared with me, she just was sharing, I said, oh, do a lot of people come through? Yeah, and the tourists love us. You know, that's pretty awesome. So for me, it would be getting to know the business owners, the communities, especially the hotels. I'll tell you, From a marketing standpoint, I do think there needs to be a conversation with the hotels. Let's just say booking this week was very interesting, and so I believe it looks to me at 30,000 feet like they have a lot of military and government business, which is fine, but that's not what is gonna continue to grow, you know this, the HMR financials, right? And so I think to add to that, to fill those rooms. So for me, it's to understand, to get a better idea of how full they are, what the occupancy is. I don't know if you guys get the ADR report, the Smith travel report, I don't know if y'all get that. But I think taking a hard look at that, taking a hard look at the hotels, and having the conversations. I think literally exercising kind of a little push forward with what's already going on, and then looking at the ways to, to expand that without throwing spaghetti at the wall. If you have $10 million, it's easy to throw spaghetti at the wall. But at this point, I believe a good investment is gonna be so fruitful just because of the solid foundation that Manchester already has. It's pretty stinking exciting. Thank you.

Okay, well, Ms. Kim, thank you so much.

I appreciate you. Thank you all very much.

The next item is Manchester City School Projects. Dr. Vaughn, not sure how you're going to go about this, but we'll get through it. He has his board here with us for discussions tonight. I guess I didn't do a good job in that, but let me get some copies. Oh, you got copies? Yes, sir.

Oh, okay.

Yes, we've got some copies to hand out, sorry. I thought I was going to have to make them. Dr. Vaughn's finishing up handing those out I mean a lot of this right we've been discussing where we need to go with middle school high school and can we build a school right those are I guess probably the three categories that we've all been discussing I believe that the board give me a pretty good directive that they want something in their hands before the next election so that we can make some decisions so that the school board can make some long-term planning. So, Dr. Vaughn, I'll turn it over to you with what you hand out.

Yes, sir, thank you. Appreciate you working with us, the conversations we've had. We've been working with KBJM Architect. You've met Jason Morris, he was here at our meeting. Estimates project, cost estimates for middle school. 620 students, as you can see, I'm not gonna read to you, but it's $52 million. Basically, you add a high school to that for a 912 campus, that is including sports fields and the middle school campus there as well. But a high school would add basically 35 million to it for a total of about $87 million. One thing that we've also included is the cost to run as far as electricity, water. Insurance is there. You also have estimates of what staffing would cost. So there are a lot of other costs that would go into opening a new school, curriculum, things that you would have to have. So those are the costs, the estimate, of course, that we would put out to bid if we're able to do this. I will tell you, we've looked. I'm going through things on the East 4th Street office and We've been looking at a new school for about 25 to 30 years at this point. We have. I know that it's a big undertaking for the community, but I love your words. She talked about this place, somebody coming in, it's a good place. And it's gonna continue to grow. So we believe, and the numbers that we have in our district warrant that we look at a new school, and that's where we are.

I'm gonna ask a couple questions to start, if that's okay with everybody. First couple questions I have is, okay, you take the cost of the school out of the equation, and then you provided us some more ancillary numbers of what it's gonna cost to run it. All those things you're comfortable with. I mean, we get the school built, you're comfortable that Everything will be covered with insight of what you currently can do budget-wise. I mean, new personnel, new whatever it's gonna take to do this, right?

So we're in an interesting situation in Tennessee, basically, that we're funded a year behind. So the first year, Manchester City Schools would have to have the funding and reserves to cover our operating costs. At this point, we do feel confident that we could make that happen, especially at a middle school. When you're looking at the cost of a middle school, you're looking at, support staff, administration, because we would keep the other three schools open. So opening a high school would be a larger undertaking. So to fully answer your question, middle school, yes. High school, that would be a stretch.

And with that, I mean, Can you kind of tell us what you plan would be for the current middle school? Just, I mean, lay out what we would look like as a school system if we build a new one.

So the board would have to make that decision. We looked at two different options. That's definitely a facility that would need to remain in place. There were two different options we could look at. Westwood Middle School could become a primary school which would house pre-K, K and one. The problem with that is that's a very old school and the primary grades truly need restrooms in classrooms or at least more than are there now. So that would be a pretty major undertaking as far as a remodel of the current Westwood Middle School. Another option would be for it to be a fourth and fifth grade school, an intermediate. We would pull fourth and fifth grade from both College Street and Westwood, and that facility is handling six, seven, and eight right now. It would easily handle four and five. It would need administrative staff with some support staff as well, but it would handle it. The only hesitation that I have really with that is the community aspect of Westwood and College Street. We would have to be creative, and we've been creative in the past, but to be sure that There's some strong sense of identity with those students, but we would work closely. One thing, every elementary school in this area is proud of their basketball team, just something simple as that. So we would have to come up with a way to make that work, but we would use that facility.

And along those lines there, and I know this is near and dear to to Vice Mayor Messick's heart here right um buses you know we could end up in a situation to where a parent is going to a couple different schools right I mean has there been any planning or consideration on how we would handle those type of things I mean like I said I mean look if you have three kids you either plan, you could be at three different places that morning. So, I mean, just curiosity, right? I don't have kids that are gonna be in school, so I'm not worried about me, but I just, I know busing has been something we've talked about for a couple years, and I just kinda wanna hear how we look out in the future and say this is how we'll handle it when we're there.

As I mentioned the last time we met, I've been in contact, there would be two different options that we could undertake. One would be for Manchester City Schools, the City of Manchester to purchase buses. about 150,000 a bus. If you have a bus, you're gonna also need mechanics. You're gonna also need a garage, a place to park. There are lots of things that'll come with that. I've also worked with two different companies to price outsourcing. Warren County currently outsources their transportation program and I've talked with both of them and we will get with them in August. We've talked in August to try to figure out a way to make that happen as well. As small as we are, We would probably look, we've talked between six and eight buses. So for an outsource, that would probably be housed in McMinnville. And so the cost is something that they are figuring and we have worked with them. But we would not run a route through every neighborhood, every street in the city of Manchester. There would be bus stops just as we have now. There would also be the opportunity for parents who have students at one of our elementary or a primary center, whichever one it winds up being, but those students, they could drop their siblings off at one of our elementary schools and they could catch a bus to ride to the new middle school. So we are looking at that. And that would be an additional cost.

yeah and and i think you know as as we do all these things right i mean i think we just have to keep piling those numbers in there to where everybody feels comfortable that uh we don't get too far out right anybody got any questions or any comments um well i know this might be a silly question but how are we going to pay for it what's the plans i know how i think

I mean, we can pay for it, but I just wanna hear how we're gonna do it.

So, school board had a meeting last night. I went to their work session, and I kinda lobbed it across the table, right, that they're gonna have to have some skin in the game to help the city. The conversation has been, you know, our general fund is about 20 million bucks a year. Right now, we're paying four to the school system, 26, or 2.6 million in cash, And then we pay a bond note that's not going away anytime soon. And Anthony, you may have to help me here, but when we were talking with Scott, our financial guy, we believe that payment's going to be between $3 million and $3.3. Is that about what he said on $50-something million, or?

Yeah, you're talking at the current point,

So, yeah, it'd be around three point something million dollars, right? That's, yeah. So, I mean, in our conversations last night, I just kind of lobbed it over to them and said, hey guys, we're going to have to help, you know, get some skin in the game. Otherwise, we're going to be looking at the city working off about 13 million dollars versus 16 that we get to work off now. You know, As we've all kind of discussed here, by the time the school gets built, which would be two to three years, there's a lot of things that will change with inside of revenues that I think we'll be able to pay it. But I told the school board last night that the city, I wouldn't be willing to get the city in a situation to where we don't have money to continue the work we're doing. So we asked them to kind of be thinking about how they could help us with that payment.

So the school board didn't say, sure, we're happy to have some skin in the game?

I left before the meeting, so I don't know.

The school would have to have a meeting to vote on that once there's more conversation. There are a lot of things that we have to consider in this. When you're looking at, for example, the number one million dollars was thrown out. When you're looking at long term, in a system our size, right now Manchester is thriving. Revenue's good, coming in from taxes, sales tax, revenue's good. We hit a recession. then those numbers look different. So right now, it would be an easy, not an easy, but it would be a fix. We also don't know what the soft cost of opening a building would be. So it's a big ask, and this is a big ask of y'all to build. I'm not saying that. But for my board to say that we can hit a million dollars for 30 years at the size that we are right now is a pretty big ask for them to hit. I'm not saying that. I can't speak for my board, but I'm not saying that we shouldn't be able to help and have skin in the game, but I'm not sure that at that level it would be physically responsible for the future of Manchester City Schools to be at that level. One thing that Mayor talked about last night, and I appreciated that, we talked about, right now I think that you make out of your budget a payment basically for I don't remember exactly what that was. How much a year are y'all paying on capital projects for Manchester City Schools?

$1.3 million.

So 1.3? Mm-hmm. Do you know, and I didn't ask last night, this is thinking through today, and I know Anthony may know, as far as how much time is left on that, on those bonds?

so hang on anthony because it's two right and i who has my sheets okay so one one of the the bonds that's still left out there's three million dollars i think the payment on it is 8.55 and it goes till And then the other one, it's $500,000, but I think it goes to 2040. But when the other one's paid off, it goes to 1.3. So we're going to have that $1.3 million payment until 2040, if I looked at that correctly. Correct. Correct, so the 500,000, if you add it to the other bill, is 1.3, and then when the other bill pays off, it went to 1.3. So you're... No, it is schools. Yes, we have our own debt line. We have another $27 million in debt that's not on that sheet. That's just school board debt. There was two things that was done, one in 2010 and then one in 2018. But that excludes the city debt on those sheets that I give you. Yes, ma'am. That's just purely school debt. 2044. So, Dr. Vaughn, 2044, it all pays off.

All right.

So that payment will be on us until then. Like I said, we're paying two to now. When one pays off, it jumped the other one up. and that's why it's to 2044. Now.

The reason I ask is I'm looking at ways to help get out of that debt. For example, the 215 East Fort Street property, it sells. The 800 Park Street property, it sells. Those are properties that are funds that could possibly go in to help alleviate some of that debt to get that number down a little bit.

Well, I think when the time comes to pull the trigger right, if you guys have some cash you want to put toward the build, and we do too, to lower our payment as a team, we definitely will do that when we go to do the final note. But I agree, which will lower everybody's payment.

Yeah. I've checked with several districts around. Most districts, well, everybody that I've talked to around operates like we've been operating. In the past seven years, we've worked on all three schools. We've put roofs on the buildings. We've put HVAC in the buildings. We partnered with BOMA to build onto College Street and to buy property. We've been fortunate to not have to asked for additional money to do that, but as far as committing to a large sum payment of a million dollars a year, school districts are not able to do that. That would be up to my board.

I think that that's going to be part of the conversation that this board's going to want to understand. I can't speak for everybody on here, but I think everybody understands that we need some kind of skin in the game to make this work.

Because. Skin in the game? Yeah. It's just that a million skins, it would possibly close Manchester City Schools. So if. Man, I don't know if I believe that or not. In 20 years, we don't know.

Honestly, because you guys have a bigger budget than I do.

Mayor Dr. Vaughn, can I ask a question?

Yeah.

You know, I've sat here for the last four years, and every time that there is anything that's brought into the city, you know, in the last four years, we've turned it down. I mean, we haven't turned it down. What I'm saying is the additional people, as far as people size, we get money from the state, X number of dollars per city. Am I correct? Yes, sir. But I'm reading here on just the one that's on tonight's right here, you know, that we are full capacity at Westwood Elementary School, you know, with 500 children right now at this point.

Right, almost 600.

Okay. You know, but that would overextend anything that any new homes or anything coming in now. We'd have no place to put these children. in either place, nowhere in our city system. But we're talking about, now correct me if I'm wrong, but we're talking about two years at least to build.

Three.

Three years. Okay, we did discuss that.

You saw us finish.

Right. How many additional children do you project in three years? to come into our Manchester City system. I know there's no way you ain't got no crystal ball to look, but I had heard the average at some point about 70 students a year is what's been coming in. Am I correct about that?

That's between 50 and 70 a year in increase.

Okay.

So we're looking at about 200, let's just say 200 kids in three years.

Okay, let's just use that number right there. How much money would that generate from the state?

Basically $8,000 a kid.

Okay. So we're looking at what? $1.6 million. Am I correct on that right there? That would generate that.

That's some good skin, ain't it?

Yeah.

but you also have to remember that when you get, when you bring in those 200 kids, that's the equivalent of 10 teachers. A teacher's one.

But I was going over your thing right here, and we're not, it's not, you know, of course, without the high school, it's completely different, you know, because you're only having to add so many

Remember, the high school is something that this board asked us to bring. We did not come with that.

Oh, I know. I know. I know. But when you look at the number, the 866,000 versus the 5.1 million, there's a big, incredible amount of difference right there. Right.

Yeah.

So. I just want us to try to work together to where we can come together so that we can do this because we can't keep going. When I say my previous four years are the last time I served on this board, but this has been going on for years and years and years. We've got to do something. We've got to come up with some solution.

I think Dr. Vaughn brings up a good point. I think for both entities here, to do this, it's going to put a strain on us both. It ain't going to get no cheaper than it ever is going to get now. We either make it a go and do it, or we add on somewhere and spend half the money adding on.

I add on to Westwood Middle School would be $22 million. Yeah.

And that's half the cost of what we're talking about that would increase our numbers for our students.

Again, I can't speak for my board. They would have to have a meeting. We're here.

What are y'all doing? Y'all yeses back there? I mean, y'all want to school or not? Yes. Okay. There's one of them. I gave you more. Say yes. I mean. Dr. Powell, you back there. Mark your oxen here. Sell it off right here.

I can do it.

Mr. Mayor, if I may, I was talking to a couple of teachers who were city school employees, and I was asking them about this and what they thought, and they said to me, I don't believe you. I don't believe you're going to do it. We've heard it before, and I don't believe you. And that bothered me so much because, one, you guys who know me know that Don't tell me I'm not going to do something. I'll figure out how to do it. But two, it's the right thing to do. It's the right thing to do. I believe that. And there's a lot of, your board is full of smart people. And most of us up here are pretty smart too. I think we can figure it out. I fully believe we can figure it out and it'd be the right thing for our town. The only thing I'm looking for, because we're not going to answer questions sitting here tonight about a million dollars, or the only thing I'm looking forward is let's commit to do as much as we can together. And then we'll win. And maybe, like I said, you've got smart people. Y'all might figure out how to give us $2 million a year. That's what I'm counting on. I tell you. But the commitment is what matters to me. If we commit, we'll make it work. We'll figure it out.

It's not. I've been on this board for eight years. When I started, we had a $3 million surplus. And we wondered how we were going to get through the next year. Next year, we had a $4 million surplus. And we wondered how we were going to get through the next year.

We had a $6 million surplus.

And it has grown from $3 million to $16 million. And every year, we wonder how we're going to do this, how we're going to pay for this. I remember well, two, three years ago, I wanted to give everybody a 10% raise, and all y'all raised all manner. It came about that. You did. You did, because you said you can't do it. It'll bankrupt us. It was $1.3 and $1.4 million, but we did it. And our fund balance has gone up ever since. So there's a little bit. I know you can't eat faith. You can't live on faith. But you've got to have a little faith in the people that run the school board and the people that are on the BOMA and in the citizens of Manchester. Those people and those kids out there deserve the best that we can do. And if we don't build a school, we're letting them down. We can do it. We may not know exactly how right now, but we can do it. And we need to commit. to do it.

But we'll keep letting these small obstacles.

Well, let's forget about it.

We'll handle it.

Right. Get in our way.

And I appreciate that, Mr. Messick. And I appreciate, Mr. Crawson, your comment. I can assure you that my board and me, we are committed to finding a way to make it work. I really appreciate the fact that Mayor Hobbs came on board, and he was from day one, let's build a school. Lisa Gregory's probably gonna get me for this, but I think Lisa's been on the board for 30 years. No, 20, 20, 20, 25 years.

I think Lisa's gonna get me for that. You're right, she's gonna get you.

But Lisa has been on the board for 25 years, and you know, sorry about that. But, and I know that And all of that time, that's been a dream of the board. And it's not about a dream. My board, my job is to take care of faces. It's to take care of faces, and that's what we have to, that's our focus, the faces that are in those buildings. We're committed to helping you find the brick and mortar, but we've gotta do it together. But I can't do it at the expense of the faces. Mr. Hillis, you have anything?

Come on up. Come on up. I get in trouble all the time about people not speaking into these microphones, so come on up here.

I think if we could come to some sort of an agreement to where, because we're not a funding body. We can't make money. We can't sell oatmeal cream pies to raise $100.1 million to pay a payment. So we don't generate revenue. We get revenue from the city, we get revenue from taxes, and when those taxes go up, everything that we're getting at this point in the game is just because the economy, some might say it's not so good, some might say it is, but obviously it is because we're getting more tax revenues. That's the basis for where we're able to do extra things, and we've spent that money in our schools, and given bonuses to our teachers, when we've given them increases and so has this Board of Mayor and Alderman. And I'll tell you I'm a little gun shy because I've been before the Board of Mayor and Alderman before when they wanted to close the system and now I've got a Board of Mayor and Alderman that wants to build a new school. So if you can see why my reluctancy is like I don't know quite what to tell you other than this. In order for us to have skin in the game, my opinion is we have to see where we're at at the end of the year And whatever we have that's extra, whatever we need for capital projects, we have a conversation about that yearly. That's what I'm thinking.

I mean, listen, on down years.

If it turns out it's a more constant thing, then it's a more constant thing. But we are willing to talk with you guys and work with you all. I mean, when I came on the school board, we had $100,000 or $200,000 in the fund balance. That's it. I feel you. And luckily, we've been able to put some money in there and do some projects and do some other things with it. Salaries are one of the highest in the area for our teachers and our support staff. We've just done an increase for that. So we've got to sit down as a board, put this on the agenda, and sort of see what we can come up with. But unfortunately, I know where you stand, where you all stand, You know, you're on the hook for a $3.3 million payment. And the school system, I don't think can be on the hook for that much money. We just don't know what's gonna happen to us. I mean, God forbid we had a bad thing that occurs. I know insurance pays for things, but insurance might not pay to upgrade a building to ADA standards. And then we have to pull our money out to do that. It's just all kinds of things, same thing could happen to you. But your fund balance is bigger than ours. So congratulations.

Thank you. We've worked hard.

Again, that's what I'm thinking. I'm not, again, I can't speak for the board because we have to do the right thing and have a meeting about that. I'm just telling you my opinion on it.

And I mean, I wish when you guys meet, you'd consider a couple things. I'm sure your budget is built basically just like ours. You have things that you want to do this year that you've set money aside for, but in a downturn year, you don't spend that money on those things. You pay your bills, just like we would have to do, right?

Correct.

I mean, and this just has to be our first commitment as a togetherness that this is what we're gonna do. I mean, look, at the end of the day, I don't think from everything you've been told or hear Manchester is going to see a downturn in sales tax or property tax. I really don't see that coming, okay? Now, the economy could crash. There's always things that can happen. But the long and the short is... I hear you, and I could see how that would worry you when you have one moment that wants you to close and one who wants you to build. Well, we're in the one who wants you to build, so let's build, right? I mean, and...

Listen, we are all very happy that we've got a board of mayor and aldermen, a funding body that actually wants to see us grow and wants to see us do things for the community. It's wonderful because we know that could change with... August the 6th.

I do want to point out, just for informational knowledge, Jessica, what percentage of our budget is in salaries and benefits? It's about 90%. It's about 90%. So it's not...

It's about $9 million, I think. Yeah.

Listen, I mean, that's the biggest expense for both of us, right? I mean, you take the police department, give them $4 million, and they really only have $500,000 to buy things with. The rest of it's in salaries and everything else that's tied up into those numbers. But I think... I think we're at a place where we're all talking the same language to each other, which is great. And I think that as long as there's a commitment, we don't have to have a dollar figure to work it out. I think everybody wants to move forward. and it sounds like your board wants us to move forward, and you want to move forward, and I think that we can find exactly a common ground to make this happen.

Yeah, we're not going to, I mean, our school board, you know, our director, Joey, he's been great to work with, but we have no intentions of abandoning our funding body and not doing what we can.

At the end of the day, Travis, you know, any... Any bad downturn, any bad situation is not gonna hit the school system in a vacuum. It's gonna hit everybody. And we're all gonna have to work through that together. To me, the important thing, this is a big commitment. It's a big commitment for everybody. But the important thing is the commitment. It's the right thing to do. And if we believe it's the right thing to do, then we'll figure the rest of it out. I believe that completely.

And I will tell y'all, and this is my opinion, We have several kids in both of our elementary schools and then when it gets to the middle school, it's just like some of them flutter away. We've done some internal things and Dr. Vaughn has worked with the principals over there and the teacher and the teaching staff, but I've gotten some feedback. It's just the facilities in general. And I think if we do have our brand new middle school, we're gonna draw in more revenue because there's more people gonna go to it. I'm just telling you. Everybody likes new, right?

Well, and we're a sports town, right? I mean, it's gonna be about our facilities. It's gonna be about where they want to put their kids for sports. And I think that puts us in the right advantage compared to what we've been dealing with, right?

I beg your pardon, but in that, I don't have it in front of me, but is the sports fields and all those things in that? Yeah. Okay.

Yeah, everything's in there. I mean, you know, if we find a spot and we had to, Look, I don't like piecemealing stuff. That's why we've never had that kind of conversation, right? Do you build the school and then everything after? I think you do it all at one time because there again, you don't know what the next BOMA looks like.

Any other board members want to speak? About anything? Okay. Any more questions, guys?

I think, go ahead. Yes, sir.

How many children are homeschooled in Manchester?

Hey, Alderman Threat, please move to the microphone.

Did you hear the question?

I did.

I'm gonna repeat it for them so everybody at home can hear it. Right, you gotta remember, we got another audience that sits at home. Question was, is how many people are homeschooled?

There are, the numbers I have are more county-wide, and I wanted to, I'm afraid to give you the number that's in my head because I'm not positive what it is, but it's hundreds.

I have seen the Facebook page, I had a client that just kind of inadvertently saw that, and there were, the county, Coffey County Home School Facebook page has 900 members. How many of those live in the city? I don't know. I would dare say there's a couple of hundred, 100, 200. DAVID BURRAGE.

Depends on how you homeschool, whether or not you have to report. So we don't necessarily know because of the way the state has that set up. I will tell you, we're looking at ways, and we've been very active in ways to bring the homeschool community back. Have you talked to those parents? How we talk is Manchester City Schools actually opened a virtual school last year. It's statewide. And that gives an opportunity for some kids, homeschool is a really good option. Just like for some kids, virtual is a very good option. One goal that we have is for the homeschool families to have the option to come to our virtual school. and still work with home. So I can get you an exact number, but I do not know that right now.

Anything else?

Yeah, I have one question, and I know y'all probably were not able to answer it, but the last time we built a school in the city of Manchester was what, year 1967? And I mean, I would be curious to know what that elementary school cost. And I know that there's no way of comparing, but we're probably looking at five million back then versus what we're 10 times the amount today in the 60 years.

In talking with the architect, I think that you could go back as little as five to seven years and see considerable difference, you could go back 20 years to coffee middle and probably cut it almost in half.

Well, you know, well, that's, you know, that's the point that I'm trying to make. It's not going to get no cheaper.

No.

It's not going to get any cheaper.

Well, thank you guys. We appreciate you very coming.

Thank y'all.

Any old business? Any new business?