Board approves consent calendar, minutes with one abstention and authorizes disposal of unused musical instruments

At its Jan. 30 meeting, the Santa Fe Public Schools Board of Education approved multiple routine items on the consent calendar, voted to approve a prior meeting's minutes with one abstention, and passed a resolution to retire and dispose of musical instruments the district identified as having no value.

Consent calendar: A motion to approve consent items 1 through 5 (with the Jan. 16 minutes removed for separate consideration) passed by voice vote. The board president called the vote; the motion carried with all members recorded as voting in favor.

Minutes: The board then considered the Jan. 16 regular-meeting minutes separately. A board member moved to approve the Jan. 16 minutes and another seconded. When the board called for votes, one member announced an abstention; otherwise the motion carried.

Musical-instrument disposal: The board approved Resolution "20 20 four-twenty 20 five-ten" as read to retire and dispose of musical instruments the district determined had no value. A board member noted the action supports clearing items stored at CAPTCHA as part of planned demolition and reuse of storage space.

Contracts and fiscal notes discussed on consent: Board members asked staff clarifying questions before the consent vote. Staff said the district decreased the contract amount for occupational-therapy professional employer organization services as the district has increased hiring of OTs. District staff said substitute-staff contract totals rose compared with last year due to higher placements and a new practice of placing permanent long-term substitutes at hard-to-fill schools; the prior-year contract total was stated as about $1.7–$1.8 million. The crossing-guard contract and related MOU with the City of Santa Fe were discussed: staff described a shared funding arrangement and said the city contributes approximately $195,000; total scope-of-service costs for the fiscal year were described as approximately $445,000, with the district budgeting around $243,000 in anticipation of the city contribution. Staff said the current crossing-guard contractor has been the only respondent to recent RFPs and that the district will request the city recover owed funds during future MOU negotiations.

What happened: all consent items were approved; Jan. 16 minutes were approved with one abstention; the instrument-disposal resolution was approved.

Why it matters: routine contract adjustments and disposal of unused district property affect operations and asset management; crossing-guard funding and MOU timing affect school safety expenditures and intergovernmental cost-sharing.