The Power of the Purse

December 13, 2024

Welcome back!

Things were busy in Sudbury this week. So let’s just get right to it. Here’s what we have for you:

Energy and Sustainability Committee Seeks to Clarify Control of Solar Revolving Fund
SPS Budget Transfers: Still Anyone’s Guess
Town Forum Recording Available
Health Survey Reveals Growing Health Concerns for Lincoln-Sudbury Students
SPS Addresses 14 Classes Over Class Size Guidelines
SudburyWeekly.com News Roundup

Let’s get into it!

Energy and Sustainability Committee Seeks to Clarify Control of Solar Revolving Fund

By Kevin LaHaise

The Tuesday, December 10 meeting of the Sudbury Energy and Sustainability Committee previewed a potential tug-of-war for control of the Solar Revolving Fund.

Historically, any use of the money in the fund has been decided by a vote of the Energy and Sustainability Committee. Chair Rami Alwan raised concerns that the Town of Sudbury has, according to his report, transferred $330,000 out of the Solar Revolving Fund and into the Facilities Department budget to pay for electricity bills. Alwan alleged that this money would free up an equivalent amount of money for other purposes unrelated to sustainability initiatives.

Alwan stated that the Town believes it has the authority to tap the Solar Revolving Fund to pay such bills without approval from the committee, but questioned the legality of that action. “I’m not sure it’s legal.”

However, Alwan also cited a lack of clarity in the language of the original article passed at a prior Town Meeting.

“It doesn’t say on the article specifically that the money expended out of that has to be by vote of the Energy and Sustainability Committee. It said that in the description, and I can show you the wording, but it has been standing practice for the past 8 years and that has been supported by legal precedent to-date. So I am very concerned about this sudden move.” (46:44)

Discussion expanded beyond electricity bills to include criticism of other requests Town staff have made of the committee to fund components of various projects. One recent example is the Sudbury Public Schools HVAC project, which the committee declined to fund.

After Alwan commented about a private discussion about a $170,000 request to use the Solar Revolving Fund for pool repairs at the Atkinson Pool, Combined Facility Director Sandra Duran joined the discussion briefly and asserted that Alwan misunderstood the facts and implored him to accurately represent them.

“Actually Rami, that was to go towards the solar-ready roof. That was not for pool repairs. Just so we’re clear. It was to offset the roof, which was $300,000 worth of roof. But we can talk about that separately. I would like you to stick to the actual facts, and if you need clarification, I am available.” (55:43)

Alwan suggested that a Town Meeting article could be developed to clarify that the committee has control over any expenditure of the money in the Solar Revolving Fund. He also noted that he was communicating with the Town’s legal counsel to get further guidance.

In recent discussions, the Energy and Sustainability Committee has taken umbrage with funding requests that they don’t feel align with their mission - going so far as to suggest that some are seeking to use the fund to fill funding shortfalls on Town projects.

That theme loomed large in this discussion, for which a local nonprofit, Sustainable Sudbury, was present. Alwan voiced a desire to get Sustainable Sudbury’s support “to preserve the Solar Revolving Fund so that it can be used to continue energy projects that we’ve been working on.” Member Olga Faktorovich added: “Instead of closing budget shortfalls over and over again.” (1:01:40)

SPS Budget Transfers: Still Anyone’s Guess

By Kevin LaHaise

What’s Going On:

The Sudbury Public Schools (SPS) leadership met with the Sudbury Finance Committee on Monday, December 9 to talk about budget pressures in the current fiscal year.
After about an hour of discussion, SPS leadership concluded their time with the Finance Committee and moved on to their own meeting later that night. But the Finance Committee continued discussion about SPS transfers and how the district manages Circuit Breaker special education reimbursement funds from the State.
The Finance Committee is trying to get a grasp of where the money is moving within the SPS budget and across fiscal years, but after multiple discussions and correspondence with SPS, members lamented that it was still unclear.
Member John Baranowsky said “If I went and looked at all the transfers that have been made would I be able then, if I spent that time and effort, would I be able to know which line item they came from? Were they coming from the Circuit Breaker or were they coming from somewhere else? So it still leaves it, to me, it’s still an open issue. Or I agree that its not clear. It’s still not transparent. We’re getting there, but it’s death by a thousand paper cuts, it usually seems with this.” (1:19:30)
Co-chair Mike Ferrari highlighted that there’s still a lack of clarity around the sources of additional funding for a recent SPS HVAC project. (1:22:50)
Members did feel that they were getting closer to clarity after the latest discussion, but there was more to discuss and look into in future conversations.

Why It’s Important:

Public schools tend to require flexibility in their budgets as student needs are constantly changing. The Finance Committee was careful not to suggest that SPS was doing anything wrong with their budget, while also working to improve clarity and transparency.
A recent Finance Committee meeting featured a conversation with a Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education representative who told the committee that school districts manage Circuit Breaker funding differently, and that most approaches were acceptable so long as the district is transparent in what they are doing. (More here.)

Town Forum Recording Available

If you missed the 2024 Annual Town Forum this week, you’re in luck. They recorded it, and they published their presentation. Full materials here.

But - civic treasure that it is, SudburyTV already has a video up, complete with an index and links to all the materials from the presentation. You can access all of it HERE. Skip to the topics you want to learn more about, or jump to the Q&A to see what other residents were curious about!

Health Survey Reveals Growing Health Concerns for Lincoln-Sudbury Students

By Kevin LaHaise

The results of the 2023 MetroWest Adolescent Health Survey were presented to the Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School Committee on Tuesday, December 10.

In a bit of good news, use of vaping devices has taken a hit since the last survey. In 2023, 21% of students reported having used a vape product in their lifetime. That was down from 42% in 2018.

In addition, several mental health indicators improved over prior survey results:

However, lifetime usage of alcohol and marijuana were significantly higher at Lincoln-Sudbury than all students that participated in the survey. Lincoln-Sudbury students reported higher levels of alcohol and marijuana use, and reported binge drinking in the last month (at the time of the survey) was up to 22% from 17% in 2012.

Reported race or ethnicity-based bullying in the last year increased to 15% in 2023, up from 10% in 2021.

There was an alarming increase in reported attempted suicides in the last year - 4% reported attempting suicide in the last year compared to 3% in 2018. The presenter noted that this equated to 55 students. (1:37:45)

Ensuing discussion among the committee members was somber. The presentation included a massive list of initiatives the high school has launched in recent years to respond to issues unearthed by the survey, but the trend lines in several areas continue to be cause for concern.

Chair Ravi Simon summed up the overall sentiment in the meeting towards the end of the discussion:

“I think after this I feel less optimistic about, sort of, the trajectory of the student body’s mental health. Which I think is in spite of the great work you guys are doing, not because of anything that you guys are doing. But some of the statistics, especially around the suicide statistic, is extremely sobering.”

1:57:55

SPS Addresses 14 Classes Over Class Size Guidelines

By Kevin LaHaise

During the December 9 meeting of the Sudbury Public Schools (SPS) School Committee, Superintendent Brad Crozier provided an update on class sizes as part of a broader budget discussion. SPS currently has 14 sections (or classes) that exceed the districts class size guidelines. All 14 sections over guidance are in elementary school. (Guidelines here, enrollment updates here) For quick reference, the basic guidelines are:

Kindergarten = 20 students per class
Grades 1 & 2 = 22 students per class
Grade 3-8 = 24 students per class

Superintendent Crozier explained that the district does not automatically add an adult to a classroom when the class size exceeds guidelines. That’s one option available, but not always necessary based on a variety of factors the district considers regarding student needs in a given classroom.

“When and if a class is over guidance, it does not automatically trigger a full-time TA that gets hired for that class. That could be one of the mitigations. One of the things that we look at when considering sort of what to do when a class might be over the school committee guidance, we also look at how many staff are assigned to those particular classes. How many adults are assigned there. We also look at other supports, because there are some schools, based on need, that have higher staff ratios in particular job assignments. Like, a couple of our schools have school support specialists and they really work with increasing academic skills, whereas some of the schools don’t have those school support specialists."

1:09:00

Crozier when on to say that most of the time there’s already more than one adult assigned to a classroom when it is above guidelines, but told the committee that it would be difficult to provide any data about how SPS is staffing classrooms over guidelines that night.

“Most of the time when we have classes that are over guidance, there’s more than one adult assigned to those spaces for one reason or another. Sometimes that assigned adult is for part of the day, other times its for the whole day. Umm, and so having a breakdown of each class currently and what the number of adults assigned, it is difficult for me to provide that tonight.”

Next school year, the district is forecasting 5 sections over class size guidelines. Three of those would be in first grade, and the other two in fifth grade, according to Superintendent Crozier.

Vice-Chair Meredith Gerson added that the classes exceeding guidelines are typically only exceeding by one or two students. “And as you mentioned last meeting, they’re one or two over guidelines.” She later added “There are no classes projected to be 30 students [inaudible] that much over our guidelines?” Superintendent confirmed that no classes were projected to have 30 students.

Member Mary Stephens voiced concern about the class sizes, particularly at the younger grade levels. She asked if the district knew ahead of time that it was going to have 14 classes over guidelines going into the current school year, as neither Stephens nor Member Karyn Jones were members of the committee when the current fiscal year’s budget was built. Crozier responded:

“I think we knew that, we had a discussion with the school committee about class sizes and it was certainly the school committee’s purview when they were making the choices for FY25 to have some of those classes run a little higher than the guidelines given the tradeoffs they would have had to make last year. But yes, I would say we have had some move-ins. And once the school year starts it’s not always in the best interest to take a class that’s already, you know, had a few months together and split them apart into other classes. So, you know the guidelines are really for budgeting purposes, and they’re not a trigger for something to happen. And, you know, we want to meet the needs of the students and you know, the principals are in constant contact with me when they’re worried about a particular group of students.”

(1:13:50)

Pirates Of The Caribbean Code GIF by Brian Benns

Jones had confirmed with Superintendent Crozier that the 14 sections that were over guidelines were all in elementary school grade levels, and Superintendent Crozier added further commentary with regard to middle school:

“Middle school is slightly different because, based on student choice for UA’s, based on the teams, the range varies. And although, what we really try to look at is the home room size, you know we try to keep the home room size at the school committee guidance, which is 24. But, you know, sometimes certain classes go above guidance. We try not to have classes of 27 or 30, those are much higher than what we want, but they certainly go over that number. But I don’t have those class numbers for you tonight.” (1:16:25)

The committee had differing perspectives on class sizes and their impact on student outcomes. Vice-Chair Meredith Gerson deferred to the expertise of the administration, and questioned how much class size mattered so long as the administration wasn’t citing it as a problem: “In all the presentations that we’ve had, not once was it said ‘okay, like this is our path and solution to fix the problem is class size.’ So to take up administration’s time and school committee’s time when the Superintendent and his curriculum experts in-district, and administrators, aren’t saying that that is the problem…” (1:22:50)

Member Karyn Jones added:

“There’s the data, right, but then there’s also this qualitative data that I think teachers themselves could provide, and again maybe nothing changes, but it could just be helpful just to understand how they feel it has impacted them or not, just in how they’re able to teach and connect with the students. Because for a student, this is their only time they’re going to do first grade. You move them through and we kind of have them for their most important years. Once they get to L-S it’s four years, that’s it, and then they’re adults.” (1:27:30)

Member Mandy Sim added that reducing from 14 classes over guidelines this year to a forecasted five classes over guidelines next year was a reduction of 9 classes over guidelines. She felt that demonstrated the dedication of the administration to the needs of the students. (1:31:00)

Chair Burnard, who earlier voiced openness to a future review of class size guidelines, put the class size conversation to bed and moved the committee on to another topic with a closing comment: “I agree with both Meredith and Mandy that, you know, the students’ needs are being met.” (1:31:44)

Much of the discussion pertained to budget decisions that are being made over the course of December. In order to bring all class sizes within guidelines in the next fiscal year, cuts would need to be made elsewhere in the budget. The committee was weighing class sizes alongside other priorities. It does appear that level-service is possible within the guidance that SPS has been provided by the Town, at least based on the latest discussions, but SPS appears to be pessimistic about fitting in new initiatives.

The committee will meet again on Monday for their annual budget hearing, during which the public can provide comment on the budget decisions being made. Take note - it appears residents will have to attend in-person to do so.