Board approves hearing, resolution

   Two budget-related items were approved by the Monticello School Board at its regular meeting Feb. 27 in the administrative board room at Monticello High School.

   The first of those was approving the date and time for a public hearing on the 2023-24 school district budget. The board set Monday, March 27 at 6 p.m. for the hearing, which will be followed by the regular board meeting.

   The other was approving the 2023-24 Budget Guarantee Resolution. Under the process, districts that make lower than 101 percent of the previous year’s regular program district cost can use property taxes to reach the 101 percent mark.

   District business manager Marcy Gillmore said the district approves the resolution every year in case the district needs it.

   “Sometimes by this time we don’t know if we’re going to need it or not,” she said.

   Board member John Schlarmann added, “It’s a thing you fall back on for declining enrollment or things like that.”

In other board business:

   • As part of the consent agenda, the board approved several personnel items, as follows:

   Resignations – Max Stoltz as high school math teacher and freshman boys basketball coach (effective at the end of the school year), and Ryanna Devaney as Panther Academy associate.

   Appointments – Bret McDonald as varsity softball coach, and Jordan Williams and Holly Wells, as high school volunteer track coaches.

   Transfers – Kaylee Stephen, involuntary transfer from first grade teacher to sixth-grade science and social studies teacher; Chance Manternach, involuntary transfer from sixth-grade science and social studies teacher to high school special education teacher; and Stacie Breitbach, from junior high softball coach to assistant freshman-sophomore softball coach.

   • Also as part of the consent agenda, the board approved five sharing agreements with other districts for the 2023-24 school year.

   None of these are new; the district shares its food service director, Pat Kelly, with North Linn; its Transision Alliance Program (TAP) specialist, Angie Kurt-Sconsa, with Midland; and three positions with Anamosa: human resources director (Brooke Scott), K-12 school counselor (Sarah Melsha), and school social worker (Mikel Millsap).

   There was only one change among these; whereas in the past human resources director Scott has spent four days in Monticello and one in Anamosa per week, starting next school year it will be three in Monticello, two in Anamosa.

   • During the principal reports, elementary school principal Denny Folken shared that FFA students from the high school will be speaking to fourth-graders at Carpenter School March 2, about where their food comes from. The event was supposed to be last week, but the ice storm and subsequent closing of school caused it to be postponed.