Subject: HUUSD Board Meeting Recap 1/15

Dear members of our six town community,

At our last meeting on January 15, 2020, of the Harwood Unified Union School District (HUUSD) Board: 

• Michelle Baker, Director of Finance & Operations, gave a presentation and answered board member questions on the FY21 Budget. Her report, and all FY21 budget documents, can be found at https://huusd.org/business-office under “FY21 Budget Development.”

• Board members broke into small groups to discuss how they view equity in regards to HUUSD schools, using the HUUSD vision statement and guiding questions to frame their conversations.

Please note that our full administrative team has now started to work on transition plans and we will be sharing out more details following our January 22nd meeting.

The Board took action on the three (3) items below:

1. Approved the following items as part of the consent agenda: Approve: Minutes of 1/8/2020; Accept: Vouchers 1151 and 1165 equaling $358,456.18

1. Approv...

Dear members of our six town community,

As you may have been hearing from headlines and news stories, this is a tough school budget year around the state. We want to make sure our voters are aware of the financial challenges school districts are facing and the work we are doing to address them. 

The HUUSD has been making good progress in its long-term preK-12 planning effort -- identifying major changes that will reduce operational costs across the system while also improving opportunities for our students. But even as we plan ahead to re-configure our district in the coming years, we face huge challenges right now to balance affordability and excellence in next year’s budget. The combination of reduced merger tax incentives, dramatic increases in health care costs, lower pupil counts, and property value fluctuations (among other things) mean that actual tax rates in our towns could increase by 4.0% to 8.7%.  

In response to this high number, the Board has asked for several additional bud...

Subject: HUUSD Board Meeting Recap 12/18

Dear members of our six town community,

At our last meeting on December 18, 2019, of the Harwood Unified Union School District (HUUSD) Board: 

• David Epstein of Truex Cullins and Bert Delabruere of ReArch gave a presentation on the District Bond including the scope of work, priority levels, projected costs, and  schedule. This presentation addressed all elements of our district PreK-12 plan, but was primarily focused on the work at Harwood Union High School where the bulk of the work will occur both to address deferred maintenance and facilities upgrades and enhancements. A June 2020, bond vote is planned.

• Michelle Baker, Director of Finance & Operations, gave a presentation and answered board member questions on updates on the FY21 Budget. She presented a preliminary projected equalized homestead tax rate of $1.70. Her report, and all FY21 budget documents, can be found at https://huusd.org/business-office under “FY21 Budget Development.”

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