The Board of Education finished the district development presentation series, and discussed finances and policies during its Tuesday, November 19 meeting.

Superintendent of Schools Anne Uberti personally delivered two separate presentations to the Board: one on the district’s operational goals for 2024-25, and the other on her own goals for the district as superintendent.

These are the final presentations in a presentation series designed to highlight the work being done throughout the schools in support of the district’s Strategic Plan. The series started at the Board’s September 17 meeting and covered measures of progress used across the district, as well as each principal’s strategic plan for their respective school.

Uberti first delivered the operational goals presentation, which highlighted goals regarding facilities, finance, human resources, security, pupil services, teaching and learning, and technology from the district’s central office departments. There were desired outcomes, actions, and deliverables outlined for each topic.

Some desired outcomes include: starting development on a comprehensive 10-year Facilities Master Plan that ensures the district’s buildings and infrastructure meet the community’s needs, creating a summary guide to include with the 2025-26 budget manual to give the BOE an overview of the budget and its “major movers,” and expanding the Newtown Community Partnership into a consortium with New Fairfield where students can access a larger community of jobs and more.

Uberti then moved onto the second presentation, which highlighted goals that will guide her work in the district in her first year as superintendent. Some of her goals included establishing trust and cultivating strong relationships with stakeholders, enhancing and improving instructional practices to elevate student learning outcomes, and building a long-term facilities strategy.

Reports

BOE Chair Alison Plante outlined the time line for the budget presentations and discussions in January during her chair report. Uberti will present the budget to the BOE on January 14, which Plante said will guide their review of the budget.

The Board will receive budget books that same day, and from there will have two weeks to review the budget book in detail. Plante added that she hopes this solves a problem they have all experienced in the past, where they get the book and then have to “dive right in and start engaging on presentations.” The BOE will have a Google document to capture their questions, and then meet as a group on January 28 and January 30 to tackle whatever questions they logged.

For the January 28 and January 30 meetings, Plante said all administrators and department heads will be present to address any questions the BOE may have. She added the BOE will have their public hearing and any final discussion and adoption of the budget on February 4.

“We hope this is overall more efficient, and gives people more time to really dig into the details,” Plante said.

BOE member Shannon Tomai spoke on behalf of the Board’s CIP/Facilities/Finance (CFF) Subcommittee to provide an update on issues with Newtown High School’s roof. She shared that Facilities Director John Barlow recently went up to the roof since it often has issues when it is warm during the day and colder at night. While he was up there, Barlow reportedly discovered a “really horrible” 180-foot longer spidery rip in the roof over the auditorium.

Tomai said that he got a bunch of vendors, including the roof manufacturer to investigate, and they all said that the roof “will not make it through the winter.” She added that Barlow had patchwork repairs done immediately to ensure that area would be alright since they expected rain on November 21.

According to Tomai, Barlow and Uberti then went to the town and asked for an emergency appropriation. A total roof replacement for the high school was planned for in next year’s CFF plan. However, the emergency appropriation will let the damaged portion above the auditorium be repaired during winter break this year. Tomai said that money would be spent this year, and will be taken out of what they requested for the total roof replacement next year.

The application for the emergency appropriation is still pending, according to Plante. She said that it will require Legislative Council action, so they are working closely with Newtown’s first selectman, finance director, and relevant chairs to assure it gets passed through appropriately and in line with the town’s Charter.

BOE members voted to unanimously approve the reallocation of previously approved HVAC funds for Newtown Middle School in the CIP. These funds totaled $450,000, and were set to be used for electrical load inspections for the possible installation of temporary air conditioning in classrooms.

In light of the facilities study and acknowledging the work ahead for the middle school, Uberti shared the building has had continuous issues with heat. She said that, “when it’s hot, it’s hot at the middle school,” and that it causes them to have students dismissed.

“What we’re looking to do is repurpose that and use a portion of it to do an electrical study to see if we could put in window units at the middle school, which would be a lot more affordable,” Uberti said.

She continued by saying that they do not know what it would require, and that they would use the money to determine what they need. Once they have that information, Uberti said that they would “build out a plan from there” of how that would happen.

“The way that we would like to use the money is to do the electrical study, and then the balance of that funding of the $450,000 to do the installation of the electrical required to hook the air conditioning up,” Barlow said. “Whatever’s left of that is to start purchasing AC systems and to get them installed in the building.”

Tomai also shared that Newtown Public Schools have not had any issues with All-Star Transportation’s bus services since November 6. The district previously had several busing issues with the company’s transportation services since the start of the 2024-25 school year, such as bus driver shortages and non-running routes. As to what has changed, Uberti said that All-Star has gotten more drivers, which has been the main issue.

However, Uberti added that All-Star still does not have enough drivers for them to be fully compliant with their contract, particularly regarding athletics transportation. The district has sent a letter to All-Star, which they will need to respond to by the end of November for them to determine how they will manage Newtown’s transportation services going forward.

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Reporter Jenna Visca can be reached at jenna@thebee.com.