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4-24-2025 Special Board Meeting

Added Apr 25, 2025 •

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then uh St John the Baptist Parish School Board will meet in special session in the board meeting room got your grammar cafeteria 1,600 Highway 44 Reserve Louisiana on Thursday April 24th 2025 at 6:00 p.m. at this time I'm going to that Mr Miller would come up and lead us in prayer and before we do that would just like to uh remember 2 of our former employees long time Educators Mr Valerie Billy Houston and Miss Grace cook who passed away a few weeks to go please continue to keep that family in your thoughts and prayers let's pray God we thank you for this opportunity to gather for this time this evening to do the business of this District we pray for you your wisdom and your guidance we pray for um healthy conversation and understanding but God we also lift up the families who are mourning losses the Houston family and the Cook family we pray that you would give them comfort and God we pray that everything that we do according to your will but it would also be things that will be done to help to advance the education here in St John Baptist Parish in Jesus name we pray amen amen would everyone please stand for the pledge share the franchise on the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands 1 nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all roll call Miss Holden Mr Burrell Miss Trish here Mr Morris Mr francese here miss freezo here Mr Mamou here Mr Wallace here miss Mitchell Williams here to speak their here miss I have 8 present and 3 ABS a present true absent we do have a quorum item 3 public comment Miss Attorney John Blanchett request to enter an executive session pursuant to Louisiana revised Statute of 421782 to discuss strategy and our take action that's necessary regarding ongoing litigation in the case of Kathy Duhon edar versus St John the Baptist Parish School Board DOC number 901669 eastern district Louis of Louisiana judge Janie requires action yes Mr Wallace we'd ask for a motion to go into executive session we have a motion by Mr car is a second by Miss Trish roll call Church yes Mr Morris yes Mr branches yes Mr Brazil yes Mr Mamou yes Miss Mitchell Williams yes Miss vickner yes Mr Wallace yes 8 years 3 ABS 8 years 3 ABS now going executive session so I'm not going to they're not mine but yeah my number is 225 270 070 and that's myself all right got it can we get a motion to go back into regular session motion by Miss Trish second environments for sale roll call did anybody come no um Mr yes Mr Morris yes Mr francese yes Miss Rosso yes Mr Mamou yes Richard Williams Miss Victor yes Mr Wallace yes 8 years 3 ABS 8 years and we are now back in regular session thank you Mr Wallace and we're going to uh we're going to be asking for 2 motions and the first motion would be for the board to approve a uh a corrected map of the board's uh proposed attendant zone changes um and with that if I may just a brief explanation for for everybody in the room yes sir um what this is that you're seeing on the screen is where Emily C Watkins is kind of right there in the middle the magenta line is the current attendant zones what this does is it would shift the mlac Watkins a tenant Zone to the end of West 5th Street along a drainage Canal know students are impacted by this at all this is all industrial area or um wooded or or type area um we don't anticipate that um there's going to be any development in there um G given just the types of land we're not we are not aware of any permitting or anything like that this is purely um to have the boards proposal um that's pending before the federal court just match it physical boundary that drainage ditch um that that goes kind of north south uh at the end of West 5th Street so so move a motion to approve the effect we have a motion by Miss Trish do we have a second second by the franchise any board members roll call Mr yes Mr Morris yes Mr branches yes Miss Brazil yes Mr Mamou yes Miss Mitchell Williams Miss vickner yes Mr Wallace yes 8 years 3 ABS 8 years absent at motion carries thank you Mr Wallace and the second motion that we're asking for is for the school board to retain the Attorney General's office as co-consul in the board's pending desegregation case the Duhon matter for sale and we have a second by Miss Trish and board members it would be a motion to retain the attorney roll call Mr yes Mr Morris Mr francese yes Miss friselle yes Mr Mamou yes Mr Wallace yes Miss Mitchell Williams and Miss Vick now yes 8 years 3 ABS 8 years 3 absentee and Carries thank you Mr Blancher Wallace and I'll thank you for all your hard work we really appreciate everything that you do for us thank you Mr Trish and uh y'all have a good rest of the meeting and uh I'll be in touch with Dr Perry okay item 4 uh we have no card for any public comments uh St John the Baptist Parish School Board appoints a superintendent to represent the school board on the local itep committee requires action we have a motion by Miss Mitchell Williams second second by Mr Mamou any board members roll call Miss Trish yes Mr Morris yes Mr francese yes Mr Brazil yes Mr Mamou yes Miss Mitchell Williams Miss vickner yes Mr Wallace yes 8 years 3 absentee absent at motion carries item 5 public we have no uh public comment cards Mr Ryan Smith with vulkar except apparent low bidder from Blanchard mechanical contractors for each vac work at Esa General Preparatory in the amount of 1,160,000 requires action so this is was part of the um uh packages that went out previously uh but we didn't get the 10-day documents when we opened up the bid for the last board meeting so we're just trying to get it uh approved for this 1 it's HVAC at um the alternative we have a motion by Miss Trish do we have a second second second second by Miss vigna any board members Miss Mitchell Williams you said this is not in the main building this is in the um and that other aluminum building we're calling because I was like that's a brand new school that was my concern okay thank you exactly how you doing uh that's uh consists of I want to say um the vrf replacement on that 1 this planet to us this um state your name for the record please Frank Thompson Thompson Lucas Associates MEP uh engineer for this project uh this project replaced the entire HVAC uh system in the alternative school that's we had old uh Hotel style um AC units building there were leaky didn't need fresh air requirements they had reached uh their usable life so we put in we've already purchased under Esser all the equipment this is to install and implement it new ceilings everything to with it so at the end of the day new AC throughout the whole building new ceilings new lights it's going to look uh really nice and they're going to have nice uh control of each space okay thank you so we have okay uh the lights that he will be installing is going to be compatible with the lighting system that we're putting out through the other building LED lights okay yeah I I apologize I need to clarify the the lights are new we're just putting them back in we're putting back in I I made a mistake when I said that so the new lights new lights okay and then yeah I understand that that we changing the piping so to answer the second question okay we're not double working yeah yes sir we're not putting the lights up and then he's coming yes sir we're going to just suspend them change out the ceiling and then put them back in the ceiling grid so I misspoke I apologize on the first part miss miss vickner and then this is a Mr Miller question too um sorry for my ignorance but what is apparent low bidder I mean why the word apparent we just haven't had that on any of our previous probably just mine okay right I know what apparently means I'm like why why do they have that label okay okay perfect 1 other question thank you that's all 1 other question will this work be completed by the time of school year next year potentially will be um they're going to start whenever we get their contract get them underway um it will start replacement in all the classrooms because none of the kids are there and doing the hallway so it it should be if it's not completed be very close they'll still be able to move back in um and there may be some things they need to finish up on the weekends and but uh the the having the the beauty having the Pax units the style units in there those are going to run the entire time until the systems were ready to run and the kids will have AC until we're finished okay real quick um I'm just making sure I know that that building to be used for kindergarten for Fifth Ward not Fifth Ward yeah Fifth Ward correct we don't know not sure yet not sure okay that's the opinion right now okay all right okay any other question roll call yes Mr Morris Mr francese yes Miss friselle yes Mr Mamou yes Miss Mitchell Williams yes Miss V yes Mr Wallace yes 8 yay and 3 apps 8 y 3 apps and that that motion carries thank you guys item 6 public know we have no public comment card Mr Chaz Lynch Walker update and discussion on John Lurie Mr chair hey uh just to remind you all at the facilities meeting um last month on April 8th there was some discussion about John Lurie that was discussion about the asbestos that was probable in the building um the timeline there a lot of question questions asked about the timeline for what's that what's that project going to look like how we're going to get it done with with or without moving kids um what uh what we did since the last meeting was try to confirm a lot of the questions that we heard asked in the meeting um and uh we we engaged your um environmental engineer Ritter and Associates to go look at this uh facility um they tested some things and brought them back we're going to report the test results to you um Mr Thompson that was just up here he also did some investigating and so the slides I'm going to run through quick will get you to a point where you understand the project better and that you understand your options for that campus on how we can play that out some strategies on construction that will help us accomplish this with the least disruption to students um let me see so we discussed 3 options and you've heard you know 1 or 2 of them before 1 of them was moved the kids to another school and let the construction go on at this campus while the kids are somewhere else um we understood that that didn't set well with everybody at the meeting so what we did is look at a a couple other options how could we keep the kids on that site if you know if you're to uh want to do this construction project but keep the kids on the site how can you pull that off um 1 of the options is the use of temporary facilities just something that in the industry we've done before you could use um note this that um well first off I'll just break the news to you guys as best as testing that they did found that the materials in the ceiling that were suspected to be asbestos we were told this morning by your uh engineer your environmental engineer that they were tested clear they were not asbestos which makes this whole problem a lot less it becomes more of a kind of a construction scheduling uh process with the mechanical guy but it's not a clear the building of asbestos and that that's huge but leading up to today we assume that it was going to test positive as as and we came up with some plans that were in that line um but at this point it's not as best as so that makes this conversation a lot easier and but uh when you think about it we said okay well um which buildings have the potential as bestest it was the front building the back did not so we thought what if we pushed as many kids as we can into the buildings that didn't have it and then that leaves the front building free to be abated and all that that's 1 of the options is if you wanted to spend some money on temporary buildings get the kids totally out of the front building um you could probably do that on the site it's just expensive expensive and it would be for 1 year so we wouldn't recommend it but um the the third option is the 1 that really works best it's to keep the kids on the site and do something that's uh the best way to explain it it's like musical chairs um you have some classrooms that are free because your your student enrollment at the school is less than the capacity of the school so you put the kids in these classrooms today while you renovate these classrooms and do the mechanical work when it's done and it's put back together then you move the kids into that completed portion and you do another portion and you just do that 3 or 4 times uh working it out with the instructional folks trying to you know to make sure they're in line with the moves uh that the moves work for them and then you know you move your way through the building that way by moving groups of kids into this Wing or that wing and letting the contractor have a wing to himself to do the work it's very commonly John Mr Frank could attest to that um myself and Dr Williams have done that in another District before together um and but that third option is probably the option where you're at um where where you could we think you could pull that off um if you wanted to do it and I'll just run through the slides real quick and then get to a point where y'all can ask questions right now the scope and the cost that these are these are the bond projects that we had and and the money that we had available uh for the bond um and just just trying to show you that now this is does not include all the other things that were brought up at that last meeting that are not in vulgar scope there were some other other discussion I don't have those items in here I think y'all were talking about other projects Mr Miller you may recall what the projects were but I I just put we put on here what we're manage them with vulgar right now at the school um and uh just so that you would have more of a picture of the money now this is the hard capacity worksheet looking at how many classrooms does the building have what you see there is the the picture on the left is all ground floor uh spaces and the picture on the right is the second floor of the front building and you can see that it's really 3 major parts it's the up and upstairs and downstairs of the front building and then you have that metal building in the back and you also have a t-building at your advantage so if we can work together with the staff to do the um the um the the scheduled moving the kids around 1 phase at a time then we can work through this project and get the mechanical work done uh we don't have to worry about going to doing as best abatement clearing the building and then coming back again um we we can get right this summer into doing some of the mechanical Replacements and then uh during the school year um do some more do more of the renovation and mechanical work in those areas that are clear you know when that happens um what we do is we'll totally isolate the construction area they'll put up temporary walls where the kids can't get in that area while we're working in that area and the kids are in their area having school we're in the other area and if you know the contractor knows what he can do without disrupting class in terms of noise anything noise it would be done after hours that's typically how these things are pulled off and you know our group here where we're very confident that we could do this that we could um you know stay in place what we have left to work out is um there's a couple of options on piping to work out and there's also sitting with the principal and maybe Dr Williams or whoever they choose um to help us um make sure that we know what spaces do you want to be empty and worked on first where are you going to position the kids so that we can do that and then what phase do you want second and third it could be in done in 3 to 4 phases is what we think something like that depending on how many classrooms you're able to free up uh at a time for us to work on um let me think the other no note that some of the the air conditioning units are on the chiller and I have that statistic on the right um 18 rooms are on the chiller 10 of the classrooms are not on the chiller what I did here is just a quick model to its kind of just an initial assessment of feasibility to do this plan that I'm uh in explaining to you um all I do is take the number of large classroom spaces and multiply it by 25 as just a round number I know they don't actually staff that way some classes will have 25 some will have 10 but there's a whole lot of tricks we can pull to um a little solutions to make room available for the construction work like if you if you would needed 2 more classrooms to put 10 in you can take 1 classroom and temporarily split it and make 2 classes out of it through the project and and just do what you need to do to be able to accommodate the instructional folks um but we would be able to work that out with them I believe and what's the time frame if if y'all were to clear the building and get out of it totally we think it'd take 4 or 5 months to do this work but because we're going to try to cater to the schedule you know the students and the principal and and move when they want to move for instance if testing comes up and we don't want to move right then you know we might have to stop work we want to stop work and then start again when it's over um that stretches it out and I could see this being 6 months um ballpark um but it it totally would be dependent on what the the teacher the principals tell us that we can do without disrupting class how much are the work can be done in the summertime when the kids we actually have in the slideshow um Thompson Lucas here and they're able to describe I probably should have let them describe the 3 phases they they broke it up into a group of work that could be done in the summer keep this in mind you already bought a lot of the equipment and it's it we have it the new units they knew Air Handlers and so we think that during the summer a lot of the handle units could get put in you could also put in a lot of the piping during the summer but um and there's a couple options that we'll go over with Mr Miller that are really just y'all's choice preference for piping locations but um we would what we would try to do Dr Perry is do um I would say the public areas and I'll probably let um yeah I'll uh and I'm gonna ask them to come up and explain it this this actually where we're at in the slideshow Scott or um Frank yeah they came up with an option that would get a lot of work done during the summer and minimize what's left to do uh during the year correct so what we're thinking is if we could get it early in the summer and this is us getting it out to bid uh being able to award a contract quickly uh still have a large portion of Summer left we would do the air handlers in the kitchen cafeteria take care of all the public areas the hallways everything except for the 2-story classroom part that that area is going to be more extensive we would do that during the school year the idea is take care of all the public areas get those out of the way that the 2 story classroom Wing will do during the school year potentially if you could give us a floor we build a uh a partition so the kids cannot get in there and also the uh workers can't get to the kids so we build a a barrier hard barrier give uh they take care of the first floor get that done get it back in operation ceilings everything it's totally done then we moved to the second floor once we moved the kids to the first floor we do that 1 and then we're we're finished with the school and the back building we can do that 1 since they have have the uh units that are Pax in there we can put in the that 1's getting a vrf system we can work with 1 classroom at a time and use it as a swing space and you LeapFrog your way through it we've done that numerous times probably 15 times in schools now it just takes a lot of coordination with the principal that's kind of the the model we were looking at if you guys want to keep the school going keep the kids there that's how we work through it Mr Miller I have a question use your drawings to further explain that so the the drawings kind of show the areas we would take care of during the summer take care of the kitchen cafeteria Air Handlers we would clean the duct work have it sanitized sealed it'd be like new duct work we would take care of the library and those classroom areas because those are kind of public uh large corridors a lot of traffic there we would take care of cleaning the duct work and changing the unit out in the auditorium and then like I said we would keep the the 2 story classroom Wing to the right for the school year question Rick I got a question real quick um Mr Miller what's the capacity at or right now I see the enrollment the capacity 700 700 okay it's not based on an instructional Staffing but more said okay that's what I was you know when they start Staffing it they're going to have some classes that's 25 and they're going to have some a team in the woman right now is 415 that's what I that's what I and a question because it was a whole lot so yeah if that's the case then you will rotate kind of model that I'm talking about is is where you get you know yeah that's what based on we were buildings as well and it's because if you had to get so uncomfortable that you don't want to do it cost more money got you and this is the back building and you can see we're pretty much touching every area changing the classrooms doing work in the corridors putting the fresh air units in so these we can LeapFrog our way through the classrooms but then the corridors we need a break to do those or a summertime to to finish those corridors but come back after school and and when we say moving generally we have we create 1 swing space or 2 whatever uh we could work out with the principal with with y'all and uh and then we we try and get those done move the classroom back in and we try and put them back in their classroom as quickly as possible yeah I'm not certain yet we could definitely have that as a goal it all depends on how quickly we get it out contracted all that goes well and fast um like and in the first phase is the cafeteria so that's not moving anybody so then you only have 2 more phases and this has been done like you said you know we had had this 1 Leone gotcha had to move back to East St John high school it's uh it's in phases but it's up to the principal and administration to work together to get it done but it's not impossible miss miss I had a question I'm not saying it's not possible but I want to highlight the fact that we are adding more traffic and more people and more Vehicles onto a facility that is already exuberantly aggravated from a traffic perspective and a zoning perspective as far as like being able to come and go and have parking spaces so we are aggravating the current problem that already exists that we've already known there is no solution to right now so by doing this system I understand it's possible like no offense I see it I just was like you're able magnet in a couple weeks ago I see it being done but you also have lots of open space where there's lots of places for the trucks and the construction things to be that is not the case that Janna Lori so I would be very concerned about trying to do the LeapFrog model with a what a crew of 50 more people and and and trucks and all of that I added on to the problem if we and and that's where Option 1 if we move them somewhere else we could knock this out and but I know that's not always always a possibility so we the the thing we have going for us is do have all the equipment in hand we're not waiting on any air handlers any cassettes any of that we have it in hand so if we have equipment not the piping not the piping that's yeah piping is uh 1 to 2 weeks to get it but it the quick we can get this out to bid and we can award a contract it saves us some of the summer this Summer that means a whole lot to us getting it done by Christmas if we're at the end of the summer we miss a summer it'll be later than that Mr Mars well I I can access a lot of questions and I want here and stuff and so we can stay here for our and some of the thing is how many spot did you test you know because some of the oh God uh insulation that on the AC piping have been changed because we had roof damage so that you check that part or did you check the part that existed and so yeah your environmental engineer is is not here right now but Ryan was with him and uh I asked Ryan the same question just to make sure you got in every wing and every single Ryan would you um well I all night asking these questions back and forth and what if you run to a spot that wasn't tested they have investors then we as school board or if we have those kids that because everybody know wants as best as mess with in this Airborne then we have a problem and we hadn't prepared for it so I understand what you're saying and like that but keeping the schools in a in a keeping the students in the schools we could or could not be in nobody can't guarantee what's going to happen you're 100% correct and that that possibility is there on all of our projects and then like Miss Jennifer say we adding on to it so I think we have to you know you can't come and give us something like this and if we going to spend 8 million close to 9 million dollars in it and it's still some work I think we need to evaluate the building totally and if we going to spend it in if we got to spend another 2 million 10 million dollars to make it completely right because the must say this again I know the windows are bad in it because if you look at all the window sills there's water so if we going to spend that much money on a project we need to have a top rated project not a partial rate of project that's just my opinion and stuff like that and like I said we can't answer and ask all the question tonight so you know because you just put it on us and we have to go and you know to lengthy discussion and act which environmental engineer what if you know and like we have the school board always have to take the side of caution especially when they come to our kids and stuff like that and I'm sorry I didn't mean to cut you off Mr Mars oh I'm sorry and and and that's my only thing and as for as an experienced teacher we got experienced teacher here that's easy for you to say shuffling and stuff like that but when you have small kids and you shuffle them around and stuff and curious mind and stuff we you looking at a lot of stuff so I think if we going to go ahead with this project I like to see that we use a 100% get them out the building whether it be temporary or we send them to Leon gotcha and stuff for a year and stuff I think we then we won't have none of these questions you have the free rein because you always have unforeseen items in a construction project that's why you have change orders because there's something the engineer missed something Mr military this happened this you you didn't you didn't catch it so from our brother side on the side of being cautious and I would say that recommend to this board that we look at either housing them temporary 100% or moving them somewhere and because project of this magnitude and stuff like that you know we talking about some smaller kids that we would be and I've just you know 1 board member opinion I have Miss Tristan Mr Miller I think that we've moved with a lot of prudence we cannot micromanage everything that's why we paid Mr Miller and its birth to his birth date today and so uh sticking with the agenda at hand I think that Administration has several options for you to look at and along with the principal to make a plan and I appreciate how well prepared you were for this meeting and we don't have to move on it and I think that y'all did a wonderful job and thank you for the options thank you very much Mr Miller then Miss Mitchell Williams Elevate in already tight space the possibility of looking at temporary for school it's Mitchell Williams so my question is hypothetically let's be clear this decision has not been made it's on hypothetically if we were to relocate the students to another building would that expedite the process and they could be back in their building by January versus them being out of school year I think so definitely it it would cut off 2 3 months off the process just not having to move people around work around them we could we wouldn't have to wait for certain things for summer go about the whole so maybe even sooner than mid year if we started in the summer we maybe even to be in by Thanksgiving so because we're not if you we would have done this project and we're waiting for for equipment we might be you know 12 16 weeks waiting for stuff but we we have it here in the school district it's ready to go so big plus there and just like like punch train when it was closed you know you might you might just you might need 2 2 uh sites to move the school but it is possible to do that um my question is um to the administrator uh you think that y'all can come back to us that's probably the May 8th meeting and have a uh timeline on well what options y'all want to go with to the board so I want to say I think um Mr middle and I had already talked about uh visiting uh Leon gotcha this week to um assessment of the building to see what work needs to be done um we should be able to give you some um recommendations by May and um y'all went to the school site um the bathroom on a um in code for the smaller kids it should be yeah or even if we move the key 100% cost going to go down because you're not putting up temporary wall and you're not hindering your contractor so you know it's it's it's a it's a no it's a win situation but it should be ready because the last school that was there was Emily C Watkins so yeah so if we move them to gotoh provided that it's in the shape too yeah it was already in elementary school so they already have the toilets and everything Elementary and that's what my question was yes if there is any other discussion it it doesn't need be for tonight but Dr I would like to see and I can put it on the finance committee um agenda too but I'm I'm I'm not I'm wondering where the 2.3 million dollars that was allocated for the solution for the traffic in the original bond proposal I see we're up to almost over 8 million at this project which I'm on board with the entire 8 million but I'm trying to figure out where the 2.3 million for solving the traffic problem even though as there was came back with no recommendation other than put some better signage up because the community knows that they need a solution to the traffic problem so if there's still the 2.3 million is still available then I would like to see us considering purchasing 1 of the plots of land adjacent to the school if we're going to keep Janna Lori there it's going to be school we need to take the money and use it while we have it for what the voters intended the purpose of solving the traffic problem so it was 2.3% I'd like to see the breakdown see where that got reallocated to because it was 6 million initially probably got absorbed into that but we have to the voters voted on it to solve the traffic problem so we have to try to solve the traffic problem so that's something that's not on the agenda but maybe Mr Perry Dr Perry can look at that and and come back on at the main meeting I'm going to put in I'll put it on the finance meeting I don't know I had a study showed no improvement would result in a better function but we initially only allocated 6 million so I'm guessing that 2.3 is probably in those additional costs well the playground repairs and things like that yeah the playground repair wasn't needed I don't think the Performing Arts Theater well maybe but the finance department yeah that's what I was going to say maybe um that discussion could be bought at the finance yeah just giving Dr Perry a heads up so that I can put it on the finance committee meeting 1 of the problem we have to consider is inflation if if it's Construction Construction cost now this number may go out the window the longer we prolong it so it may you know that's you know the 8 up there represents you had 6 million but Ryan has put on there that when we bid it we typically it can come in with it it can come in it can come in any situation 6% for a year you you lose as you wait you you cost more I I think the best solution would recommend and get my supporters to move to schools 100% and let the contractor have it and when they finish timeline when you finish they're going to back to the school period y'all have any more slots uh no sir we've told y'all what we had to tell you yesterday all right just has any more discussion we will adjourn

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4-24-2025 Special Board Meeting

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