Local News – Monday, June 27th, 2022

At the Salem R-80 Board of Education meeting Thursday night at the district administrative offices, Dr. Heman Blau, Principal of William Lynch Elementary, was proud to announce the school received the Mary Miller-Richter Award from the University of Missouri Center for Positive Behavior Support and Missouri Schoolwide Positive Behavior Support. Only one school and one district each year is honored with this award. Wiliam Lynch Elementary provided a positive learning environment and achieved positive social, emotional and behavioral outcomes for students through the exemplary implementation of Schoolwide Positive Behavior Support. Congratulations to Dr. Blau, teachers, staff, administrators and students of William Lynch on this fantastic accomplishment!

The Salem R-80 Board of Education met Thursday evening at the district administrative offices. Superintendent Dr. Lynne Reed introduced Dr. Nathan Wills who will be replacing John Smith as the Assistant Superintendent July 1st. Dr. Reed discussed with the board the school district should not be sending e-mails to personal e-mail account as any request for information could expose their personal e-mail account to the public. She said the district could provide them with a district e-mail if they would like one. She said she spoke with Energy Solutions Professionals and after some discussion, it was determined work would be done on the Tim Gym first around October 1st, then on the locker rooms after football season. After the principal’s reports, the new Technology Director Mark McElvy explained to the board how the school is complying with the security standards required by MSIP 6. He said he was also working with Homeland Security for no charge on testing and finding red flags. McElvy also said the current phone system owned by the school has not been supported since 1998 and he is looking into new phone systems with a number of vendors. The board approved amending the 2021-2022 budget to reflect actual expenses and revenues, then the board discussed the 2022-2023 budget that includes funding from the state grant for the teacher $38,000 salary base. Reed said that when the benefits are added that the state does not reimburse, the 70% reimbursement drops to 54% of the salary increase. The budget also included $1,000 increases for all teachers making over $38,000; and a 3.5% increase to the base of all classified staff. The budget also includes revenues of 1.9 million dollars of ESRA funds and the $1.8 million cost for the Tim Gym and Locker Room renovation. The board then adopted the 2022-23 budget. Corky Stack from Stack & Associates talked with the board about the construction trades building project. He said the estimated cost of the proposed building in August of 2019 came in at about $860,000 or about $1.31 a square foot. Stack said he was contacted by the MRPC in June of 2021 about the project and with the inflated cost of materials, the project jumped to about 1.3 million dollars or 2.02 a square foot. Stack said some of the costs have stabilized, but the new cost could be as high as 1.807 million dollars. Stack said the cost to create a design that could be submitted to CDBG for their approval and one that could be used to generate bids would be $68,500. The agreement went on to say there would be a charge of $3,500 to solicit and hold a pre-bid presentation, and then $18,000 would be charged for the general contracting administration. The board approved the district curriculum that is now available on the Salem R-80 website. Five board policies were discussed and the board approved the technology usage updated policy, asked for more information after the discussion to change the student cell phone policy, asked for more information about the sick leave pool and how many people are using it if it were to be phased out, asked for more information on how many days currently are being used as sick days or personal days, and approved the change on the staff fringe benefits that does not provide dental insurance, but offers it as an employee option. A few handbook changes were made that were approved by the board, one where insurance will terminate at the end of the month of the last day of work for an employee who is leaving the district. Superintendent Reed asked the board if they could use Stifel for bond underwriting for the new elementary school project and the board approved her request. The board then went into closed session where they hired high school counselor Susan Jadwin under the critical shortage provision, employed Mark Howard as assistant track coach, hired Brenda Hanning as a part-time special education secretary and adopted the administration salary schedule as presented. The board accepted the resignation of Alaena Tyler as an upper elementary special education instructor and heard a retirement letter from Rolland Todd. The meeting was then adjourned.

Airport Board President Tyler Naramore called a meeting of the City of Salem Airport Board for this evening at 6:30 in the City Hall Council Chambers. The board will hear the fuel pump update, go over other business, then have an election of offices before adjourning.

The Dent County Commission met Thursday for their regular meeting. Dent County Treasurer Denita Williams reported the county received $64,770.43 in CART funds in June and year to date, the fund is up 6.74% over last year. Williams said the county received $172,159.00 in PILT funds and those funds were up from last year. After the road report, the commissioners approved the Notice of Decision of ARPA funds for the $75,000 requested for the SMDH Transformer. Two bids were opened on selling the Road and Bridge Department’s tractor with the winning bid going to Gary Kolthoff for $9,300.00 The meeting was then adjourned.