Board approves charter application, publishes tentative budget notice and adopts policy amendments; audit committee charter revised

The School Board of Manatee County took multiple formal actions during its July 22 meeting, including approval of a charter school application, publication of a tentative millage/budget notice and adoption of several policy and bylaw changes.

Parish Classical Preparatory Academy charter approved: On a 4–1 roll call the board approved the application for Parish Classical Preparatory Academy sponsored by Charter Schools USA for the 2027–28 school year. The motion to recommend approval came from district review staff; the board voted 4–1 with Mr. Kennedy recorded as the lone dissent. Jensen explained the committee review process precedes contract negotiations and noted that, if approved, the school would not open until 2027–28.

Publication of tentative millage rates and tentative budget: The board voted 5–0 to publish the required notice of public hearing to adopt tentative millage rates and the tentative budget for fiscal year 2025–26. Business services staff explained the tax collector’s certification and that the advertisement includes the required capital outlay information; trustees were shown a draft budget summary with total proposed revenues around $1.72 billion.

Adopted policy and bylaw amendments: The board voted 5–0 to adopt a set of bylaw and policy amendments that had been discussed at a prior workshop. The items listed in the motion included multiple bylaw numbers (0131, 0164, 0165, 0165.2, 0165.3, 0166) and policies (3430.07, 4430.07, 8305, 8431). The board chair noted the items had been reviewed previously and there was no public comment at the hearing.

May 2025 budget amendments: Trustees approved the May budget amendments 5–0. Finance staff described the amendments as 732 chart strings affecting multiple funds (general, capital, food service, health insurance), including moving some projects from FY24–25 into FY25–26 and shifts tied to final counts and higher food costs.

Audit committee charter revision: The board approved a revision to the audit committee charter to change the committee size language from a fixed seven members to a range of three to seven members, bringing the charter into alignment with current practice; the motion passed 5–0.

Ending: Several of the approved items will require follow‑up steps: charter contract negotiations with the applicant, publication of the advertised millage/budget notices, and staff implementation of adopted policy changes. The board’s roll calls and vote tallies were recorded in the meeting minutes.