Just weeks into the new school year, the Kingsland School Board met on September 15 to hear updates on projects and review the preliminary levy.
“This summer we are almost done,” Superintendent Scott Klavetter said of the ongoing construction. “The actual roofing piece has been done for a couple of weeks already, as far as opening up and replacing roofs. What they have been working on the last week and a half or so is the steel work. They did do a little bit of a deduct, which I appreciate, for the issues that happened with the rain. They took $5,000 for the time and cost it cost our district staff.”
The goal was to have the work completed by September 19, but with rain in the forecast work may be slowed.
“As for next summer we are still on track,” Klavetter said. “The plan is to be able to go out to bid in November for the work that needs to be done next year.”
After engineers determined the original site for the solar panel project was too close to a drainage ditch last month, they have been searching the school’s property for a new site.
Klavetter told the board the engineers have taken a new look and decided the area behind the center field fence at the baseball field seems to be the best option.
According to Klavetter, there is only one little hangup that they need to discuss with Spring Valley Public Utilities and MiEnergy.
“Apparently the outside of the baseball field has not always been school property. The school actually bought a little bit more property to push everything to the east,” Klavetter shared.
Because the plot map still shows the property as two separate parcels the engineers are hesitant to put solar panels one property that feeds a different property even thought it is all owned by the same owner.
“Theoretically, if you were ever to sell that parcel now you have solar panels on one parcel that feed another parcel,” Klavetter explained.
Preliminary Levy
“Right now the news is not great but could be worse, I guess. When you look at where we are tracking right now it is showing on the general fund side a reduction of about $50,000,” Klavetter shared. “The total projection right now is that we’ll see a decrease of about 1.5% in local revenue.”
One thing that could potentially change this is when the school receives their October 1 enrollment data.
“This almost always changes a few times between now and December when you certify the official levy,” Klavetter said of the the total for the final levy.
The MDE (Minnesota Department of Education) always encourages certifying the maximum even on the final levy because a lot of local taxes have equalization or matching aid from the state.
“You don’t want to put a number in right now, because you lock yourself in. You can always bring it down in December, but you can’t go higher,” Klavetter explained.
The board approved the proposed levy.
FFA update
Cody Howard gave the board an update on the Spring Valley-Wykoff Future Farmers of America (FFA) activities over the summer months.
The group spent time with the School Age Child Care (SACC) group making pizza and butter. They also took in a Twins game and brought baby animals to the Olmsted County Fair’s Miracle of Birth Center.
“We had Fillmore Little Farm Hands where we set up a bunch of games and they had a lot of fun with that. At Ag Days we had our barnyard, which was a pretty big success, and our float,” Howard shared. “We exhibited projects at the Mower County Fair where we won quite a few ribbons. Last week we had the fall barbecue.”
Other Business
The board thanked Corey Marzolf, Juanita Gilbert, Sharon Jahn, Lori Jones and Sharon Schmidt for their donations of clothing for the Kingsland Drama Club’s costumes. They also thanked Scheels for their donation of $500 to the Kingsland Trap Team and Becky Bicknese for her donation of $50 to the Preschool Furniture Fund.
Similar to last year, the senior class proposed to have their last academic day be May 15 with the last official school day be May 23. The senior class trip will be May 17 through the 20 and the Academic and Arts Awards and senior checkout will be May 23. Klavetter noted the arrangement worked well last year. The board approved the proposal.
Leave a Reply