Committee Hearing, March 25, 2003

COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA CONTINUED PUBLIC HEARING COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE - - - Room 696, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Tuesday, March 25, 2003 10:15 a.m. - - - BILL NUMBER 03009, an Ordinance amending Chapter 10 19-1800 of The Philadelphia Code, entitled "School Tax Authorization," by amending Section 19-180, entitled "Authorization of Net Income Tax," to further authorize the Board of Education of the School District of Philadelphia to impose a tax on net income from real property and tangible and intangible personal property of residents of the School District of Philadelphia; all under certain terms and conditions. BILL NUMBER 030012, an Ordinance amending Chapter 19-1800 of The Philadelphia Code, entitled "School Tax Authorization," by amending Section 19-1806 to further authorize the Board of Education of the School District of Philadelphia to impose a tax on the use or occupancy of real estate within the School District of Philadelphia. BILL NUMBER 030013, an Ordinance amending Section 19-1801 of The Philadelphia Code, entitled "Authorization of Tax," to further authorize the Board of Education of the School District of Philadelphia to impose a tax on real estate within the City of Philadelphia; and to restate the rates of taxation in tabular form; all under certain terms and conditions. - - - 304 PRESENT: COUNCIL PRESIDENT ANNA C. VERNA COUNCILWOMAN BLONDELL REYNOLDS BROWN COUNCILMAN W. WILSON GOODE, JR. COUNCILMAN JAMES F. KENNEY COUNCILMAN ANGEL L. ORTIZ COUNCILMAN FRANK RIZZO COUNCILMAN FRANK J. DiCICCO COUNCILWOMAN JANNIE L. BLACKWELL COUNCILMAN MICHAEL A. NUTTER COUNCILMAN DARRELL L. CLARKE COUNCILMAN RICHARD T. MARIANO COUNCILWOMAN DONNA REED MILLER COUNCILWOMAN MARIAN B. TASCO COUNCILMAN DAVID COHEN - - - 305

Good morning, everyone. This is the continued public hearing of the Committee of the Whole regarding Bill 5 Nos. 030009, 030012 and 030013. Our first witness this morning will be will David Glancey. (Mr. Glancey came forward.)

Good morning, Mr. Glancey, and welcome.

Good morning, Council President.

Mr. Glancey, as you undoubtedly are aware, the school district has cut from its budget the BRT, I am told, with a savings of approximately four million dollars. Mr. Vallas has indicated the workers are not essential to the district. Can you tell us, for the record, if you will, what the employees do and what it would mean if in fact they were not funded?

Thank you, Madame President. Again, David Glancey, Chairman of the Board of Revision of Taxes. I'm sure everybody here has the best intentions no matter what may be reported or what 306 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE may be said. So let me just be very frank and factual about the work examples of the real property assistants. I've submitted for your edification this morning a sheet that shows typical examples of work, and it's also really a job spec that the real property assistants must follow in order to be an employee at the BRT. Instead of just going over this spec -- the spec can be read -- if I can just give you a couple of examples of how we consider these folks an integral part of what we do at the BRT. Most of you Council people, many of you have been over to our shop for appeals this year.

Yes, we have.

Richard Haas, who is the appeals, abate and exemption administrator, on his time sheet, Mr. Haas has five out of six of his employees are school district employees. If we didn't have those five employees, we would not have what I consider a very even flow of how the appeals have been processed, how taxpayers have been treated, how the appeals themselves have been heard. Then taking us away from the appeals process, we also run, which I consider and I think 307 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE you agree, a very efficient tax abatement and tax exemption unit, all of which, all of the detailed paper work, all of the paper flow, all of the filing, all of the deed research is done by school board employees. That's really what you see in these typical examples of work. But what I wanted to bring out is that they are fully integrated in what we do. We have, so that everybody knows and we're talking about the right numbers, we have 75 employees currently at the BRT. There are some in the pipeline. I believe there might be two that are currently in the pipeline. We have allocated 85 employees from the school district. The number that I testified to on March 10th I believe is the correct number. It is roughly 3.2 million dollars for the 85 employees that we have. The other example, as I said, that I would like to use about what the school district employees do is that the entire day, when a citizen comes in for an appeal, is basically run by our school board employees. From the time somebody checks in in the morning in our courtroom, they deal with school board employees who do that check-in 308 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE process. During the course of the appeals, they are court officers for us during that process. And when all of the hearings have been heard and all of the folks have left, the school board employees actually are the scribes that make sure that the decisions of the Board of Revision of Taxes are correctly recorded and then passed on to the appeals administrator so that the taxpayers can get notified properly within ten days, which is the shortest period of time I believe in the Commonwealth for any tax agency to notify in writing any of its homeowners of what the results are. So I can't say enough about how integral our school board employees are. And if you don't mind, Madame President, what I would also like to say is that I think the old value of if you share in the benefit, you should share in the cost is something that we should all respect. And it's a very viable value. In this instance, as you well know, 58 percent of whatever is collected by real property taxes -- and I will reiterate we are not the tax person. But what we do, real property taxes are based upon what we do. 58 percent of that goes to 309 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE the school district, as you know. And of that -- when I look at my own budget in comparison, it would take about six million dollars from the school district to equate that 58 percent. Another way of looking at it is, again, as I said on March 10th, if every tax dollar were collected today that was owed in real property taxes -- forget appeals, forget delinquencies -- it would be roughly about 500 million dollars. So if we take the school district budget currently, roughly 3.2 million dollars, as a percentage of that 500 million dollars, it's about six-tenths of 1 percent. So I don't believe that we are asking a great deal to have the support of the school district in order to continue it funding these folks. Just let me correct one thing before I finish. It is not something that has taken place for only ten years. This particular cost-sharing and benefit-sharing has taken place for well over 30 years, well over 30 years. At one point actually members of the Board of Revision of Taxes had part of their salary paid by the school district. So I might ask Superintendent Vallas if he could 310 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE supplement my salary today. (Laughter.)

But be that as it may, I would simply like to conclude that they are hopefully in the process of doing what we will do in the year 2004 by way of real property valuations. I will tell you if we lose 75 employees all in one fell swoop, we will not be able to continue with that program nor would anybody who loses 75 employees from their department be able to continue with that. The 2.4 percent that the five-year plan suggests -- and we agree with that, if everything was equal -- that 2.4 percent in real estate growth that is suggested by the five-year plan won't be realized. So with that, if you have any questions, I'd like to thank you.

Mr. Glancey, you didn't touch on the U & O.

I'm sorry?

You did not touch on the U & O.

Well, the U & O is roughly half of what the real estate taxes would bring as 311 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE well. So whatever you might lose. If we don't realize any gain or, in fact, if we realize negative growth, that very same situation will take place with the U & O tax.

Thank you. You spoke about your employees and the appeal system. I just want to publicly thank you. I think today is my last day for appeals.

Yes, I believe it is. But we might have continuances.

But I just want to say that my constituents had nothing but complimentary remarks on the way they were treated when they went to their appeals hearing, and your employees were very courteous, very helpful. And I want to publicly thank you for that.

Thank you, Madame President.

At this time the Chair does recognize Councilman Nutter.

Thank you, Madame President. Madame President, I could certainly make the same level of comment and compliment to 312 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Mr. Glancey, Mr. Davies, and a whole host of other people over at the BRT, including the staff. I think many of us, especially in the past year, have experienced a tremendous level of support and assistance in accommodation as this Council has both struggled with trying to deal with the larger property tax issue, the assessment system, as well as now the appeals process. And in my time here, I think the past year I've spent more time and phone activity with the BRT than any other year in my experience. In addition, I understand that because of numerous, at times onerous, data requests, there may be a need to upgrade the research and analysis unit at the BRT. I think the concern before us today is or should be framed in the context of important essential work is being done. Decisions were made some time ago about where certain individuals should be placed from a payroll standpoint. I believe, at least for myself, there's no question that we're talking about an essential and important function for the city, for the school district, for the taxpayers and for the homeowners 313 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE and property owners in Philadelphia. I believe that the BRT does provide the level of supervision and management of the staff. There's no department or entity in this government, including the one that I sit in, that cannot benefit from changes, upgrades, improvements. And so we don't need to debate those fine points. Both of these governments who are wed to each other in many ways, the city and the school district, need each other from a variety of standpoints. We need the revenues that are generated and the work that is done. Both governments, though, are facing severe financial pressures. It is quite interesting that the BRT was one of the agencies that came in this year and actually asked for additional funding support, and so far is actually, I understand, engaged in a discussion that may actually lead to that, which is unlike many other departments. But I think all of us have learned some big lessons in the course of this year. I think what I'd like to suggest is -- I'd like say one thing and suggest another. One, I 314 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE strongly support the staff and the workers, and specifically, the individuals that we're talking about with regard to this budgetary item. I support their work. I support their need to do what they do, and the city and the school district are the beneficiaries of that work. My suggestion is that the two heads of the organizations, Chairman Glancey and his board, CEO Vallas and his management staff, take the opportunity in a slightly smaller, somewhat less public forum and let's have a serious financial discussion and a management operation discuss about who does what for whom, how does it get done and who pays for it, and whether that's a proportional cost based on who's getting what out of property tax assessment and the ultimate receipt of those revenues. All of those kinds of discussions I think should be on the table. But the answers will not necessarily be derived in this room. We may hear about the solution in this room. We will not get the answer and the development of a game plan in this particular room. But I think your presence and the statement for the record as to what goes on over 315 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE there and standing up for the staff and the employees is important. So anything that we can do to assist in that process, that leads to what I think is critically important. You can call it a memorandum of understanding. You can call it a cooperation agreement between the two entities.

Something that gives both the school district a comfort level about what goes on and how it goes on and why should there be any cost-sharing at all, while at the same time allowing the BRT to know that it has a stable, secure staff providing an essential function that leads to funding for both the school district and the City of Philadelphia. So I don't think there's a big debate about is there a need. I don't even really want to have that discussion. What I want to talk about is who pays for it, how does it get done, and does the school district know that people who are not in school buildings, who are not teaching children, which is their essential mission, but who are doing another job. And I said to the CEO yesterday that if it came to pass and if we played this out to its 316 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE illogical conclusion that somehow the people were not there, I don't necessarily know that that helps the school district generate 447 million dollars or the city to get over 300 million dollars in real estate tax. So we know that that's not an answer. We know that not performing assessment functions next year or this year, this summer is not an answer. So we already know what we're not going to do. What we do need to do -- and if I can assist with an introduction, Mr. Glancey, Mr. Vallas, you're here ten feet away from each other. Please acquaint or reacquaint yourselves with each other and let's work on a cooperation agreement between the two governmental entities and then let us know what that result is or how we can assist in moving things forward. I don't think we need to have a big fight about this. But both the CEO and Mr. Glancey I know are serious about their concerns here and about the need to get something done. And I support your efforts in trying to make a partnership out of this current situation. Thank you, Madame Chair. 317 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Thank you. And if need be, Mr. McPherson will be available to be of assistance.

Thank you, Madame President.

The Chair recognizes Councilman Kenney.

Thank you, Madame President. Yesterday's testimony from Mr. Vallas, I did not read or understand him to say that the employees there weren't necessary. I think there's an issue of ambiguity as to what the roles and duties are. And maybe it's a function of the newness of the management group at the school district. And I also fully accept your explanation and position that these employees are absolutely needed because of their ability, experience, the ability to work with the taxpayer, to soften the blow, so to speak, of the things that we get complained about from our constituents. They are people who are good public service oriented people, who do a good job, and also perform a function that 318 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE is critical to raising money, as Michael said, for the school district and for the city. In the past the city has done kind of unique things to help the school district reduce its costs, unique types of legislation that we've done for deficit financing, issues relative to trash collection and things that the city used to bill the school district for that they either don't bill them anymore for or bill them less. I think there may be a way to find a creative solution to this funding problem or this expense problem in that kind of environment. And I do believe that both individuals, yesterday Mr. Vallas and you today, are speaking truthfully and from the heart as to what their missions are. I think that one of the odd parts about this whole process is that we really don't approve the budget. We had this kind of discussion yesterday with Councilman Nutter that we really do listen to the budget, we hear about what the initiatives are, what the funding issues are, but our only ability is to reauthorize the tax collection again. So we're kind of in an awkward situation 319 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE here. We really can't change it. We can assist in helping everybody get where they want to be. But I think both positions are valid. He's looking for ways to save money for the kids, and you're looking to continue your operation which is critical to the needs of the city. So I agree with Councilman Nutter. I think there's a way we can solve this in a creative way. Thanks.

Thank you, Councilman. And I would just say to both you and to Councilman Nutter I clearly am someone who does like to sit down and talk and see how we can resolve these things by consensus. And Mr. Vallas and I spoke this morning really for the first time. But having spoken with Mr. Vallas, I understand what his mission is. I mean, he clearly has a very tough job.

So do you, Dave. (Laughter.)

I do. And I think that Mr. Vallas and I can easily sit down with the help of Mr. McPherson, and I think we can work this situation out. We've kind of started already this 320 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE morning in some preliminary things.

Good luck. Thanks.

Thank you. Are there any other questions or comments from members of the Committee? (No response.)

Seeing none, thank you, Mr. Glancey.

Back to the appeals, Madame President.

Please do. Hurry back. They're mine. May I suggest that Mr. Vallas and Mr. Harris -- I don't see that Mr. Nevels is here -- please take the witness table. (Mr. Vallas and Mr. Harris came forward.)

Mr. Harris, can you tell us how do you expect the Access medicaid reimbursements increasing by eight million dollars? Can you tell us how comfortable you are that you will be receiving that money?

Before Mike gets into the details, Madame President, if I could just make some 321 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE general comments. Last year we generated about four million in medicaid reimbursements. In Chicago, a district twice as large, I generated one year 54 million dollars in medicaid reimbursements, even with the tightening of the medicaid reimbursement rules, because there's been a reluctance by Health and Human Services to view school districts as social service agencies. So there's certainly been some competition. Our reimbursements before I left dropped to about 30, 32 million dollars. So just proportionally there is considerably more money in medicaid reimbursements to be had simply if we bill for all the things that we feel is eligible to be secured. So the district has not been very aggressive about billing for all the things that we can secure reimbursements for when it comes to providing checkups and vision testing and eyeglass examinations. School districts of comparable size generally secure at least two to three times as much in medicaid reimbursements. The number that we're using next year I believe is five million dollars. Is that right, 322 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Mike?

Yes.

So we've incrementally increased that. But I believe that the potential out there is for us to secure as much as ten million. We hope to get there, but we don't anticipate being there next year. We think it's going to be a couple years to get to that ten million dollar mark. But the consultants that we have brought in, who incidently are from Boston and actually did the same type of assessment of our medicaid system in Chicago that generated one year in excess of 50 million dollars, they have estimated that the potential in reimbursements could be as high as anywhere from 14 to 17 million dollars if we simply follow the appropriate procedures.

Council President, there are a number of steps that we're taking. By bringing in the consulting firm that CEO Vallas referred to, they're national experts in accessing Access funds. They have worked well in Chicago and many other large districts around the country. We have full confidence in them, and we have tightened 323 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE up the relationship between the finance department and the special education department. We are communicating to health care providers the importance of participating in Access payments. We are having Access training sessions. We have improved parental notification of medicare Access eligibility. We're going into another phase that will probably be a little bit longer to implement, which will be dealing with hand-held reporting devices in the school district. It's something we're exploring with to allow the employees at the school base level to be able to report faster and better. We have made it in such a way that on a number of different fronts we are pushing the envelope to make sure that we're getting as much as we can back through Access. And we are making sure that documentation and billing procedures are up to industry standards. With the help of PCG, the firm that we've engaged to manage and help us do this, we do believe that we'll be able to achieve the numbers, and eventually in excess of the numbers that we've projected. 324 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Point of information.

Yes. The Chair recognizes Councilman Rizzo.

To the school district, could I suggest that after hearing today the fact that there's information maybe out there that the various city agencies need to get together on, could I suggest that maybe you and the health department, the health commissioner get together and possibly join hands? There may be some savings utilizing some of the established processes that they have already, especially with the district health centers that are scattered throughout the city, and going after some of the potential reimbursements that they take advantage of. You know, you could join hands here and maybe not reinvent the wheel.

I agree, Councilman. And we believe, especially with our special education division, are working as close with the health department as it can. What we're focused right now on are the Special Ed employees and the nurses in the schools that are basically our employees at the moment. 325 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE But we do want to get into -- we're working close to have a tighter relationship with the health department. And I appreciate that suggestion.

I think it's a splendid idea. Let me point out, though, that the health department has been terrific. Our coordination of the STD testing and treatment has just been phenomenal. It's been very well received. And that obviously is a very controversial issue. So I have nothing but the greatest praise for the health commissioner on so many fronts. But I think working together to maximize our medicaid reimbursements is something that we should pool resources for. I'm also looking for a greater opportunity to work with the state agencies too because in the past the state itself has not accessed all the medicaid reimbursements that they're eligible for. And there is a state role to play. But obviously with the new leadership team the new governor has brought in, we feel very optimistic that we're going to be able to far exceed these numbers. 326 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Thank you very much.

Madame President, we provided the information -- if I could just take a minute to respond to your request yesterday.

Which request was that?

You had made three or four basic information requests. We have them in the folder. If I can just take a minute and explain what we've provided you all with.

Yes. Fine.

Included is the letter that you requested regarding the Thomas School.

Oh, I have that. Thank you very much. I appreciate that.

In the packet is the information that various members requested. First, a more detailed breakdown by council district of CIP projects or capital projects. And of course, this is not a complete list because we really only focused on --

Excuse me, Mr. Vallas. Is that presently being circulated to the Council members? 327 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Yes. It will be in the packet that will be circulated.

Do you mind if we receive it while you're talking about it so that we can look at it?

Absolutely.

All right, Mr. Vallas. I think everyone has received a copy.

Well, in the packet is proposed CIP projects by council district. Now, let me point out that it doesn't include all the allocated dollars because we have not finalized even our preliminary plan on how we're going to allocate the money over a five-year period. But I know in individual briefings with Council members we've gone through many of these projects. And of course, this plan is a plan that will be adjusted every single year. But at least it lays out some preliminary projects. In addition, in the packet itself, on the right-hand side, we have a detailed, a more detailed breakdown that Councilman Nutter requested of the proposed budget adjustments. And this lays out those proposed budget adjustments in detail. 328 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE It is then followed by something that Councilwoman Reynolds Brown requested. And that was a breakout of our Office of Procurement Services, our MBE/WBE recruitment efforts. This is going to be our strategy for making sure that when we set targets and goals for MBE/WBE, those targets and goals are complied with. Then in the left-hand packet, third, is a summary of our compliance with the No Child Left Behind legislation. It shows what we're doing to comply with the four phases of No Child Left Behind, something, Madame President, that you had requested. Then fourth, something that the President had also requested was an updated organizational chart of the school district. I see what's missing here is the phone numbers. I'll make sure I get you the phone numbers. But this gives you the organizational chart. Then in the right-hand packet is something that was requested by a number of individuals, Councilman Rizzo specifically. And that is a copy of the Code of Conduct. And attached to that copy of the Code of Conduct is a more detailed breakdown of our discipline policy, a chart 329 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE talking about expulsions and transfers outside the district, followed by the procedures for disciplinary transfer requests and an explanation of Act 26. So I believe this was the information that was specifically requested. Let me also make a point that the size of the central office administration this year, as of today, over last year is percent smaller. And 10 after this budget is approved, it will probably be 11 about 20 percent smaller. So the central office 12 reorganization has actually resulted in a downsizing 13 of the central office, and that downsizing is going 14 to continue. As of today, there are over a thousand fewer employees in the school district than there were a year ago at this date. And that is before this budget is introduced. So when I lay out that organizational chart, I just want to put that organizational chart into perspective. But obviously as more information is requested, we will provide more detailed information.

The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Brown.

Thank you, Madame 330 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Chair. Good morning, gentlemen.

Good morning.

Good morning.

I first would like to comment on an issue and concern raised by my colleague, Councilman Jim Kenney, yesterday, an issue that I too care very much about, and that is this notion of vocational education and what that means. I need to say thank you for your acknowledgment of the fact that, just as we get young people on track for higher education, we need a plan as well to get them on track for vocational education, and more importantly, for the opportunities that come after that; and also your understanding that the time is ripe to put young people on track for all of the issues raised by Councilman Ortiz around the building of new schools and what that means for our city. So unfortunately yesterday I had to take care of my own daughter at a public school and couldn't get that on the record. To that end, with regards to students in high schools, I'd like to 331 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE talk a little bit about your counselors and the like. On of your testimony, you mentioned that you'll be doubling the amount of counselors in high schools. My initial concern rests with a couple of calls I received from the office of counselors who are also asked to teach for obvious reasons because the teachers aren't in the school. So with the new counselors that you have on line, what will be the expectation of counselors currently in place?

The expectations -- and I've been joined by Creg Williams. If there are additional questions obviously related to high schools, Creg is our director of high school programs. But the problem with counselors are twofold. There's one counselor for every 1,000 students, if you can believe it. I mean, it's unbelievable. I think we have what? 126 counselors or something?

113.

113 counselors in this 332 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE entire school system. And of course, then most of the counselors end up not being able to do any counseling because they have related functions. Our goal here is to get the counselors back to counseling. First of all, to at least double the size of the counselor corps, and then to basically have those counselors be used exclusively on providing counseling services. We're going to supplement that by creating that we call student support centers. These will be centers that will overseen by counselors or adults. But they will be centers that have individuals from the community, partnerships with our interfaith, mentors, role models and seniors, all working in the student support centers providing information about like SAT prep, college entrance exams, college preparatory, college choices, because the goal here is -- you know, even two counselors, even one counselor for every 500 is just -- we need many more resources than that. So while we're going to double the number of counselors and free up their responsibilities so they're focusing exclusively on counseling duties, our game plan through our student 333 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE support centers and through such programs as City Ear, as well as through some programs like I cited yesterday, College Summit, is to create student support centers that access other resources in the schools and in the communities that can participate and support the counselors and the counsel functions.

The student support centers, that sounds like a new phenomenon for the Philadelphia public school system. Is that a tried, proven practice?

Yes. You know, a lot of times students will not readily go to adults to communicate problems but they may go to other students. And normally -- and we weren't the only city previous to have done it. Other cities have student support centers. But they're a place where the students can go to access information about colleges, about SAT prep. They can access tutoring help, because our game plan is part of our student jobs program is to, in effect, hire students and pay students a stipend to tutor younger students. So you can go to the student support center to access all sorts of 334 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE help. But occasionally, there are going to be more serious concerns and there are going to be more serious requests. And that's where that individual will be referred to the professional counselor. But a lot of what is requested is information that can be provided sometimes by seniors and sometimes by people in the community, parents who may be working in the schools. We have 70 or 80 City Ear employees through the City Ear program. That's part of the national -- the kind of domestic Peace Corps program. So they're going to be all employed in kind of a counseling support function. So just doubling the number of counselors is not going to be all that we're going to do. But our goal next year is to have student support centers in all the schools as centers that are staffed all through the school day and that have the resources to respond to a student's concern.

The value of counselors is a segue to the issue of school safety. When you cited your priority areas yesterday, your first one was school safety. 335 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE In addition to school crossing guards around the school, and blinking lights, is there anything else in regard to student safety around the schools that we should be aware of that is used to promote school safety?

We're really trying to push what we call the parent truant officer program or Safe Corridors program. Our goal next year is to have parent truant officers or Safe Corridors -- different school districts call it different things -- in all of the schools. So in addition to having crossing guards, there are parent patrols. There are parent patrols who are walking the routes to and from school. It's also been known as the Walking School Bus. While we have some parent patrols, our goal here is to expand the number of parents and community volunteers who are on the street. And the goal here is to bring them in. Obviously, we can't pay -- I mean, there is such a thing as volunteerism. But to provide them with distinguishing jackets and with communication devices like walkie-talkies and to, in effect, make 336 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE sure that every single school has a parent/community patrol who can walk the routes to and from school, can stand on the street corners, can cover the corners that perhaps crossing guards do not cover. So I would characterize that as probably one of our biggest new initiatives next year. But also let me point out that in this past year we've expanded the number of partnerships with community-based organizations in the formation of regional crisis teams, working with PAAN, working with ASPIRA, working with a number of community-based organizations. All of our nine regions are linked up and hooked up with community-based organizations and with, in some cases, religious institutions. So that when there is a school that is a hot spot, when there is a problem in a school or in the community, we can saturate that school or saturate that community with crisis intervention officers. We've done it at Audenried. We've done it at Overbrook. We've done it at Gillespie. We've done it at many elementary schools and middle schools where there have been problems not only in the schools, but in the community themselves. 337 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE So the goal here is to have crisis resources that can be accessed at a moment's notice and dispatched to areas where we're having significant problems.

One final question around safety. I know that due diligence is given to crimes that happen inside the school walls. Do you keep track of crimes or incidents that occur involving our students outside the school or nearby the school?

Yes.

And do you have some designated perimeter?

No. Our policy is 16 hours, 24-hour-a-day zero tolerance policy. And the 17 way that works is if you are arrested for assault 18 and battery on Sunday, we'll be processing you for 19 expulsion the following week. 20 In fact, that policy is being challenged 21 in the courts. And I think we just won the first 22 preliminary challenge to that where we basically 23 expelled a student from a specific school or 24 transferred a student from a specific school for fighting, for being involved in a fight at a party 338 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE that weekend because it basically was a violation of the 24-hour-a-day zero tolerance policy. Also, let me point out that any time a child is a victim of violence in the school system or any time a child's parent is the victim of some tragedy, we will send crisis teams out to the schools. It doesn't matter whether it happened on school grounds or not. Any time there's an accident, any time there's a tragedy, we dispatch crisis teams not only to the schools, even if it didn't happen in the schools. But we dispatch crisis teams to the homes. In some cases we provide counseling, psychological support. Sometimes there may be a tragedy where an individual cannot pay for funeral expenses. In those cases, through our solicitation of donations, we've been able to finance funerals. So we've really taken it a step further. Not only do we have a 24-hour zero tolerance policy, but we also have a 24-hour crisis intervention policy. Any time it impacts our kids or the family of our kids, we're going to dispatch personnel to the home and the following school day to the school.

The matters that 339 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE come to our attention where young people are involved in school skirmishes, of course we refer them to Dexter Green. I actually have a situation right now where the neighbors are concerned. So just forward that to Mr. Green?

Yes. And Dexter Green works very closely with Vern Trent in our special education department, who dispatches the counselors and counseling support. And he also works very closely with Gwen Morris, who you met yesterday, who manages student discipline and alternative schools. In addition, Nilsa Gonzalez, who oversees our schools and regions, she is the direct point of contact with our nine regional superintendents. She is also engaged. We actually have a public safety committee that meets regularly and includes representatives from the city and other agencies. But she is there to make sure that the regional superintendents are dispatching their crisis intervention people. So it's really kind of a three-prong, four-prong intervention and support plan. And it's something that we've done before. It's something that I've personally done before. 340 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE In my previous job, we actually created a crisis intervention fund. We raised about two hundred, three hundred thousand dollars a year through private donations. We paid for intervention, support. We paid for over a hundred funerals over a period of six years, children or family members who have been the victims of tragedy. And the bottom line is those are things that we plan on replicating here and we've begun the process of doing that. It doesn't mean that we're going to be able to respond to every event. It does not mean -- as Councilman Rizzo pointed out yesterday, sometimes things are going to fall through the cracks on the disciplinary side. But the bottom line is the mechanism is there for not only disciplining students, but also for intervening in tragedies and crisis situations. And as the months go on, those instruments and those institutions will grow sharper as they get used to the new setup.

Madame President, I presume takes care of my five minutes.

Thank you. Mr. Vallas, we did receive a copy of the 341 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE proposed CIP projects by council districts. However, I don't see anything in here for Districts 8, 9, and 10.

We'll correct that. We'll see if we just deleted a page or we omitted a page. We'll get the original copy out and we'll replace the copies that are out there.

That would be fine, because I'm sure the Council members in those districts would like to see it during the hearings.

Also, let me point out just as a point of record, we have met with individual Council members when we laid out our capital plan individually. And in cases where the Council members had conflicting schedules, they sent their staff aides. And in those meetings, we provided them with detailed information on all of their capital plans. But we'll make sure that the document we put out is updated in case anything is missing, Madame President.

Thank you. I noticed that in my district there are a number of schools that are not mentioned at all. 342 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Does that mean there will not be any improvements, whether it be site improvements? And maybe you can tell us what the difference is between a site improvement and renovations.

What we've listed here are what we consider to be the major capital improvements. There's 200 million dollars plus in additional work that's going to be done. And those are what we call the maintenance and the minor improvement nature. When we talk about these projects like major renovations and site improvements and new construction, we've really tried to list some of the bigger ticket items. Now, this doesn't mean nothing is going to be done in the schools. For example, I mentioned the other day the Minutemen programs.

Excuse me. Did you say the Minutemen?

Yes. We've organized our operations people into repair teams of about 20, 22 people. We called them Minutemen. Obviously, we 23 were looking for something patriotic here and 24 relevant to the Philadelphia experience. 25 We deployed -- we sent teams out to 343 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE individual schools, and they literally spent two to three weeks at that given school and they repair everything. They repaint. They replace tiles. They varnish the floors. They renovate anything, any interior work that needs to be done. They catch up on the job orders. So those projects are not listed because we consider those to be -- many of those basic renovation and repair projects to be things that we should normally be doing and they are not projects of an extraordinary nature. I think we're going to be doing upwards of 40 schools a year. So this does not include that basic interior facelift that we're going to be doing, that we're going to be giving to individual schools. So those are not laid out. On the cover sheet of the proposed projects, we've also listed 226 million dollars in specific money that has yet to be allocated for even some of the larger projects. So we're far from finished.

All right. Because I didn't see schools like Barratt, Cramp, Girard. Many of them are not on my list. I think I 344 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE have four schools that you mentioned here. I want to make sure that everybody's treated equally and fairly.

Yes, absolutely.

At this time the Chair recognizes Councilwoman Tasco.

Thank you. Good morning.

Good morning.

Sorry I had to leave yesterday. I didn't get a chance to ask some of the questions. I hope that these questions have not been asked. I have a couple in reference to your testimony. You talked about providing daycare and in-service child care. I wanted to ask you, what are you doing, what is the district doing to work with males and females regarding the prevention of pregnancy?

We are revamping the school district's what we call family health curriculum with an eye towards not only updating that curriculum and doing what we're required by law to do in that curriculum, but to also stress very 345 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE importantly the importance of students not engaging in that type of activity. Some people have asked us to characterize our health care curriculum or our teen pregnancy curriculum, and I would say that it's an abstinence first, not abstinence only. I mean, we have an obligation to teach preventive measures. And we feel doing that and expanding our relationship and partnerships -- for example, the development of our values and character education curriculum and the additional counseling that we'll provide in the schools, we think that that will help us be more aggressive on this whole issue of teen pregnancy and students engaging in those types of activities. Also, let me point out that as part of our partnership with the health department, as you know, about six months ago the health department conducted a voluntary examination of 1200 students in two high schools to test for sexually transmitted diseases. And the number of students who tested positive for chlamydia was startling, to say the least. And obviously, that was well publicized. Since then we have been partnering with 346 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE the health department in a campaign to not only go into every school and provide voluntary testing, but also to provide voluntary treatment. And so far we're doing about two high schools I think every two to three weeks. When we go into high schools, we send letters out to all the parents, although obviously we have to provide testing and we are not required -- in fact, I think we're prevented by law from doing parental notification if we're going to do testing. It's something that a student can voluntarily do if they're over the age of 15. But the response has been extraordinarily positive. We've been going through high schools. The response from the parents and from the community have been positive because of our education campaign. But as part of this campaign, we have not only been going in and doing the testing and doing the treatment, but it's also been an education campaign. It's also been an wake-up call. So we see it as much a detection and treatment -- as much an education program as a detection and treatment program because now children 347 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE and their parents are finally waking up to the fact that, hey, I better pay attention or be more attentive about what my child is doing and the type of activities that my child might be engaged in. In addition to this, as part of our early childhood program expansion, we're going to be establishing a program which I refer to as the Cradle to the Classroom program. And this is a program by which in all the neighborhood high schools we'll be identifying pregnant teens. We'll be providing the pregnant teens with a parent counselor, parent trainer. The game plan will be to make sure the babies are born healthy, put in daycare and preschool, and that the pregnant teen remains in high school. And we feel that this will also be an aggressive campaign, an aggressive effort at reducing the number of repeat pregnancies. About 90 percent of the young ladies who become pregnant and drop out of high school within the next five years get pregnant a second time. So obviously there's a crisis. Now, we ran a previous program in my previous superintendentship. We had about 2500 348 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE students participate through the program. The graduation rate exceeded 90 percent, and only four pregnant teens got pregnant a second time during the two years, on average, that they were in that program. So, again, those are some of the things that we're going to do, revamping and upgrading the health care curriculum, number one, and providing more counseling support.

Number two, our sexually transmitted disease education plan, the education plan, the approach that we're taking when we go into schools and we're providing the voluntary testing, the additional educational approach that accompanies it. Then, number three, the Cradle to the Classroom program to deal with teens who, in fact, have become pregnant, to make sure that they stay in high school and that there is not a repeat pregnancy and that the babies are born healthy, put in daycare and put in preschool so that they're ready for kindergarten when they come of age.

Are you limited to education to just those students who participate in the voluntary testing plan? How do you reach every 349 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE student in the high school about sexually transmitted diseases, about pregnancy prevention? Is it solely voluntary?

No. Beyond the curriculum, beyond the incorporating of --

Is there curriculum provided to everyone? Are they exposed to it?

Yes.

Or is it a selective basis?

Oh, no, no. The curriculum applies to everyone, and the curriculum is incorporated into our general curriculum. In fact, as I talked yesterday, as we move towards developing our new curriculum instructional models, we're doing reading and math first. And we hope within the next two years to have our science and social studies models. We've talked about integrating more of our health curriculum into our general science curriculum so that we can, in effect, just not say, well, now we're going to take the health classes as much as we integrated into our general science classes. But this curriculum is dispensed, is 350 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE communicated, is a part of the instructional requirements for all students. But when we do the sexually transmitted disease testing in the schools, we come in with a campaign to alert all the students in the schools as to the dangers of engaging in that type of behavior. And the testing is certainly an indication of what the repercussions are for that type of behavior. So that type of educational impact is felt through the entire school. It's just the testing is voluntary and treatment is voluntary.

Okay. Thank you. Let me talk to you a little about your diversity curriculum. You talked about your curriculum models yesterday, and you said you're going to incorporate a diversity curriculum. Will that be in all of the schools? Will it be a selective curriculum or is it integrated that everybody is exposed to the various ethnic groups that you talk about?

It will be in all of the schools. And let me summarize again. It will be in all of the schools because the Harcourt Trophies and the Great Books -- the Harcourt Trophies core 351 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE curriculum, reading curriculum that we will use is a multi-cultural curriculum. The Great Books and the Junior Great Books, the 100 Great Books and the Junior Great Books are going to have to meet the multi-cultural standards in order to be used as curriculum supplements. And once the social studies curriculum models have been developed -- and that's going to take a couple years to do -- both American history and world history will be basically an event-focused history and a history that examines the entire American experience, or for that matter, that the history of the world should not just be the history of western civilization. So those things obviously -- so in those areas, in those areas, both in terms of the reading curriculum and the social studies curriculum, as well as the literacy supplements, multi-culturalism will be embedded, will be infused in those curriculums and instructional models. But we will also be designing a number of courses that we will offer in the high schools that can be used for graduation credit. So students will have the option of taking African-American 352 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE history or African history or the History of Blacks in America or a History of Asian Countries. So the objective here is to offer multi-cultural courses that basically deal with the experiences that reflect the diversity of our student population. So in addition to being immersed in the reading curriculum and in the literacy support supplemental curriculum, like 100 Books and Great Books, and in addition to being part of the revamped social studies curriculum, we will also be designing specific courses that will be offered and that can be used and substituted for other courses at the high school level.

Another question I have, and I hope I can -- oh, what about -- give me the status of the Gear Up program. What's happening with that?

Can I provide you with that in writing? Or would you like me to talk to that now?

I would just like to know the status. Is it still ongoing?

Yes, it is.

I don't need to 353 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE know about the program. I know all about the program and what it does.

The status is Gear Up is still -- in fact, I'll let Creg just make some comments on Gear Up.

Briefly. Who is the new director?

High schools, Creg Williams.

Good morning. Currently we're still in the process of offering our Gear Up program. The Gear Up program is currently in both middle as well as high schools. We're going into the fourth year I believe of a five-year grant. And we anticipate rolling some extended monies over into extending the grant an additional year. We are in the process of looking at all of the programs and all of the opportunities that are offered to our young people. The major focus obviously of the Gear Up grant is to prepare young people to be exposed to and begin to prepare for college. We're going to look at that focus and make sure that that is, in fact, what's being done with the Gear Up funding as we close out the Gear Up 354 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE opportunity. One other thing I'd like to point out. One of the things that we have to do with Gear Up is to ensure that the activities can be sustained after the grant has indeed expired. So we're most certainly looking at that as well.

That's a federal grant?

Yes.

Do you see any opportunity for it to be extended by the federal government?

Chaka Fattah has actually been our lead person in terms of that grant. The federal government has not indicated at this point whether or not there will be a national expansion of that grant. However, we are closely monitoring and making sure that we're staying in tune and in touch with what the legislation is doing as it relates to that grant.

Now, I'm sorry I missed you. This is also political season too. That's why you see all this flurry up here. It's kind of hard to be focused. 355 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE (Laughter.)

Are you tracking the number of students who have participated in the Gear Up to see how many of them have gone to college? Is that something that you do ongoing or is that something that you plan to do?

Actually, with the Gear Up grant -- as I indicated a moment ago, we're in the fourth year of the Gear Up grant. The students who initially started in the Gear Up process began in 7th and 8th grades. So this would be the first senior year I think of a true senior class that we can literally track who have been a part of the Gear Up. However, there's been some small tracking of students in those schools who are not necessarily part of the funding from that. But this will be the first out year that we will actually be able to look and see if the students who participated as a result of funding are indeed going on to full secondary training.

Okay. Thank you very much. I read someplace that there is some concern about this program being folded into another 356 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE program. I can't remember exactly what it was. But another federal government program.

No, I'm not aware.

Okay. Thank you. One other question before my time is up. I have my notes down here, and since this was yesterday and I can't remember, maybe I can try and put it in context. We were talking about accountability. And I wanted to know what is the accountability of the private managed schools? What is their relationship to you and who holds them accountable? And you also talked I think something about the curriculum models and whether or not they would be incorporated. I know the charter schools are somewhat different. But the managed schools are still part of us, it seems to me, if I understand it correctly. What is their -- who are they accountable to and who holds them accountable?

Let me point out that both the privately managed schools and the charter schools and the public schools are subject to the same accountability requirements. And our 357 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE accountability standards are standards that we have developed so that they are, first of all, accountability standards that achieve our educational objectives, which is to set standards and then to give schools the means to meet those standards. But those accountability standards are also consistent with the accountability provisions under the No Child Left Behind Act. And those provisions, those standards -- and Joe Jacovino is here to discuss whatever details of standards you may need. But the objective here is to hold all schools accountable to the same standards, whether they're EMO schools, privately managed schools, charter schools, whatever. To hold them accountable and to take appropriate action if those schools are not complying to the standards. Now, we, of course, cannot dictate curriculum to either the charters or the privately managed schools. We can't dictate personnel decisions to the charters or the privately managed schools. But they are required to take the PSSA. They are required to take the TerraNova exam, which we require of the balance of the system. They are required to have after school, extended day and 358 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE summer school or some sort of intervention program or additional time on task for students that are academically struggling. So we have set certain objectives that they need to be adhering to. But at the end of the day we will evaluate them looking at test scores, graduation rates, attendance rates, overall management of their financial resources, the same criteria that we are using to evaluate our public schools. And let me point out that while we have obviously approved many charters, we've also taken steps to decertify charters that we don't feel have been living up to the standards. And while it's too early in the life of most of the EMO's to evaluate the quality of their educational programs, we will be making some suggestions relative to the EMO's in the coming weeks. And ultimately, all the EMO's will be judged using the same academic accountability standards as we're subjecting the public schools to. We've also created a unit to oversee both EMO's, privately managed schools and the construction of the new high schools. And that unit 359 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE is headed by Ellen Savitz. And the reason we picked Ellen for that job, and her team, is because we want all our new high schools to be like Kappa. And Ellen certainly has always had an appreciation for alternative management structures. I mean, the construction of Kappa in many respects was something that was done without a whole lot of support from the established system, the school system. So the bottom line is she's sensitive obviously to their needs and priorities. But at the same time she is obsessed with accountability and they're subjected to the same standards.

One last question for me, I believe. I have the list of the proposed projects, construction and/or renovation projects by district. And I do not see the 9th Council District. Does that mean that all our schools are top rate?

We may have left out a page. But as you know, Councilwoman, we had an opportunity to talk, a couple of occasions where we talked about the projects. I actually think -- we had a whole host of requests. And I think we slipped on the Xeroxing. But as you know, we spent 360 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE a lot of time going over your proposals, along with a number of other things. So we're circulating a new list now. And let me point out that that is not the complete list because we haven't earmarked all the money and every year we will adjust that list. And I know we're in discussions with many of the Council people, including you, Councilwoman, about some additional new school options, as we talked about Olney and we talked about Logan and some others. So that is kind of what we're locked into right now. But that list is going to be evolving and changing as we go along.

Thank you. I was really referring to -- you really had some specific concerns about Olney.

Well, we need a new Olney. There's no doubt about that. Right now, we're wrestling to see whether or not -- believe it or not, there was a little tug of war, fix only or build a new one. I think we're drifting into the -- we're leaning towards building a new one. But once again we're hopeful we're going 361 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE to be able to secure federal QZAB dollars, which is the federal school construction program dollars. But we need a new Olney. I mean, that building needs to be built. Someone asked me about Overbrook the other day. I mean, ultimately you need a new state-of-the-art high school. You can't have high schools where you've got to be worried about what's happening on the 4th and 5th floor. So there's a lot of needs that need to be done and we're working towards that. But again, let me lay out perspective. This addresses about half the capital needs in our system. We have at least three billion to three and a half billion in needs. And while people have been surprised at the size of the capital program, once you identify and earmark the money to many of the projects, you're left saying, well, what about this school and that school, because there's been decades of neglect. In fact, during a ten-year period in the late eighties and early nineties, there was literally not a dollar spent on school construction whatsoever. So we're playing catch-up. But we're 362 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE going to continue to try to secure additional funds so that we can expand our programs. And we will continue to be accessible to all of you individually, as we've endeavored to do, so that we can modify proposals or reconsider other proposals as we go along.

I do have one other question, and it's very important. Matter of fact, yesterday I know Councilman Ortiz talked a lot about the number of measures that you will use to increase minority participation in your capital plan. Our Commerce and Economic Development Committee is having ongoing hearings regarding minority contractors and other general contractors who don't make good faith efforts to meet minority participation goals. We brought in a gentleman I believe from Baltimore who said that they are able to stop the contract, take the contract away. They have found ways, with the support of the mayor, to enforce these contractors to meet their goals. What do you plan to do about that? How do you plan to handle it? And then another question, piece of 363 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE information that I will add on, as I have dealt with contractors through the years and working with the contractor community, we find that a number of the minority contractor are subcontractors but the majority contractor, general contractor who tends to be from the majority community, will not pay them on time, the subcontractors on time. And many of these subcontractors have funding issues. It's very difficult for a lot of them to get lines of credit. So they depend on the payment from the general contractor to meet their obligations. But we find that many of these general contractors will hold up their payments, will find excuses not to pay them. I'd like to know if you had any experience with that, what are the solutions you see that could be -- you would use to prevent that from happening.

Let me once again reiterate my commitment to doing things this district has never done. Again, we come from an experience where we allocated three billion dollars in school construction monies and over 50 percent -- I believe 56 percent went to minority and women-owned 364 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE businesses and well over 50 percent of the construction hours were performed by minority workers, and where over 50 percent of those working on the job sites were city residents, and where minority contractors were sometimes the generals and not simply the subs. And we did that by, first of all, establishing clear policies that basically set goals and then aggressively pursuing the goals. We did that by doing aggressive reach-out not only through representative business organizations, but also holding our own contractor fairs or professional service fairs or job fairs. We also did it by supporting fledgling companies that we felt had the means to deliver on a new school or on a major construction project but perhaps did not have the financial resources by, first of all, entering into contracts that would pay them in a timely manner; entering into contracts with general contractors that would require that when they get their money, they disburse money to subordinates, subordinate contractors within 30 days; doing things like wrap-around insurance so that companies that could not secure bonds or could 365 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE not get the insurance on a project from private insurers could come to the school district and get insured. And finally, we were able to do those types of things and accomplish those numbers by rigorous enforcement; working with a number of partnership organizations from the community to go in and to evaluate and assess and inspect and audit job sites not only to make sure that the MBE and WBE targets were being met, but also that the hiring targets were being met. So we would partner with assistant agencies to go in and to, in effect, police and monitor the functions. And then we were well prepared to jettison those contracts or to bar the companies from future contracts if they failed to comply with our guidelines. So those are the ingredients that are essential to an effective policy. And we will have an effective policy. It's not because we feel that the politics dictate that we have to do it. It's because we feel it's the right thing to do. And our experience was that once we opened up the process and once we brought many 366 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE additional general contractors and subcontractors to the table, we created competition, we were able to get better prices, and we were able to get better quality work. That is a fact. So when we did our aggressive MBE/WBE it actually created a better product, and we certainly stand by our record. Kim Sangster and my chief of staff, who was the director of the office of procurement in the City of Chicago, obviously these two individuals know how to run a successful program; Karen Burke, who managed the 76 school construction projects and the 500 school renovations and was mainly responsible on the operations end for his hitting those numbers. We've been there before. So we will be able to institute the type of program I believe that's going to be successful. And we'll be more than happy to participate with the subcommittee or the task force that you've put together and to give you continual updates on just how we're progressing towards reaching our goals. We will not embarrass ourselves by not reaching our goals or by not having a product that the Council is comfortable with.

Thank you very 367 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE much. We heard the young lady last week speak on behalf of the kind of programs that she envisions using at the school district, and we were real pleased. I would just like to say to you that I was very excited yesterday morning about your testimony. I support your thinking outside of the box, Mr. Vallas, and moving the school district forward. And we wish you all the success and certainly will offer our support to help in any way so that our children are exposed to a new environment and to new schools and we wish you well. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilwoman. Mr. Vallas, if I can get back to the proposed CIP projects for just a minute. In my district, I only have four schools mentioned here. One is HS1, New High School in South. Do I assume or can I assume that that is Audenried? That would be the 2nd District. It says new construction.

No, no. That's not Audenried. 368 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

What school is it?

If you remember, we identified of the six new high schools we were going to build, we were going to try to place those high schools regionally. So what we've done is we've earmarked and designated the resources for the construction of the new high school in South Philly. Now, that depends on securing of the site. That depends on the accesses to the land. But in constructing the new high schools, given the condition of Bok and given the size and the construction of the existing high school in South Philly, we felt that putting a new high school in South Philly would be something that we would want to do. But that would be in addition to the Audenried replacement because, once again, Audenried isn't a new high school. It's a replacement high school.

Well, I don't see that on the list.

Well, it's really not our project, which is why we didn't include it on the 369 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE list. Universal is funding that project solely. It's in the overall capital plan. But in putting this together, we identified projects that are coming from our funds. We didn't identify independent projects. For example, in the Northeast there's a charter school, a new charter school being constructed. And that's not on our list either. It's in the overall capital plan, but it's not on the list we prepared for the committee today because it's not one of our budget items.

Do you have any indication whether they're going to be building a new school?

Audenried?

For Audenried, where it will be located, when will construction commence. Do you have any knowledge at all?

Yes. I can give you an update. They have communicated to me that they plan on breaking ground within the next year. They are still debating the site. Of course, I recommended that the site not be located near Audenried and that there be another site selected. 370 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE They're trying to make a case that the way the school can be constructed and reconfigured, you can build it on the open land that surrounds Audenried. But they have not presented me with an update yet. I'll be more than happy to get that for you.

How would the new school be funded, the new construction?

It'll be funded through Universal's own means. They presented a proposal where they identified a number of sources, and they feel confident that they can secure the resources to construct the school. But I'll be more than happy to get an update on Audenried. I would be more than happy to do that.

I would appreciate it.

What I've attempted to do is to monitor the project to make sure that the project meets with our specifications. But I have been waiting for them to present us with kind of a final finished, updated plan. The same thing on site selection. 371 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE While I communicated to them my reservations about building it near the site that Audenried, the old school, is currently constructed on, I've been reluctant to dictate that to them and I've been waiting for them to come back. But I'll be more than happy to give you an update. Thank you, Ellen. She has an electric shock. She just plugs it in and she beeps me. Ellen pointed out that the holdup in them presenting their final plan is actually at our request. They're meeting with the eight, count them, eight community groups that have asked to be participants in this project. So that's probably the delay of their final plan. If you remember, early on there was some question on whether they had really involved all of the community organizations. And they are meeting with the eight, and Ellen is monitoring that. We will give you an update as soon as possible.

Thank you very much. At this time, the Chair recognizes Councilwoman Miller.

Thank you, Madame President. 372 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Good morning, everyone. I have some questions in the area of curriculum, academic and curriculum reforms. And certainly, this is all about the children. The State took over our schools for a reason. There were some problems a year ago. Well, there have been problems all along. We all agreed that reform was needed. I'd like to hear more about the standardized curriculum across the city. We had a problem that if a child moved from one section of the city to another section and of course had to attend a different school, curriculums were different. I guess I want more information about what the problem was in the past and how that's being dealt with presently. And I'd also like to hear a little bit about best practices, and if you're using a particular reading program, where does that fit into best practices, because for years we keep hearing about best practices but I've really never been clear on what best practices -- we were using it here in Philadelphia. For example, I thought Reading Recovery -- I know that some of the elementary 373 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE schools in my area was using it. I heard it was a good program. But just where are we? I'd like an update on that.

I'm going to ask Ed Williams to take you through the details of the curriculum plan. But just to put things into -- to lay things out comprehensively, not only is our plan to select best practice curriculums and to institute those best practice curriculums in the schools pre-K through 12, but the plan is also supported by a plan to increase time on task, extended day, extended year. It's also supported by a plan to have year-round professional development because no 16 matter how good the curriculum, if you don't have that professional development, forget it. And it's also supported by a plan to have curriculum coordinators and trainers available in the regions and in the schools so that we've got on-site people who are experts in the curriculum models. And finally, the curriculum is going to be supported by a plan to reduce class size and to have parental outreach. So while we've moved to select what we 374 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE feel to be superior curriculum models, we're not going to do what many districts have done and then say, Here's the best practice curriculum, okay, go do it. The classes are still too big. There's no 6 professional development. They have to share curriculum materials. There's no parental outreach. We're going to address all those issues because ultimately the success of the curriculum model depends on having those supports.

Good morning, Council. My name is Ed Williams. I'm the chief academic officer for the School District of Philadelphia. We have a folder of information coming around to you. And I'd like to walk you through the packet of information. It provides a kind of foundation and some of the things that we're attempting to do as it relates to the overall curriculum design in Philadelphia. I'd like to ask you to move to the right side of the folder. And on the right side you will see some documents starting with A Fresh Start to Excellence, where it speaks about a core curriculum. And at the bottom of that you will see Teaching to Proficiency. 375 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE This is something new for us because one of the things that we want to make sure we're doing is to say to teachers, In order for you to teach your youngsters, you must teach to state proficiency. So that's a part of the core curriculum, followed by what students are supposed to be doing in order to reach proficiency level at each one of the grade levels. You will also see information that relates to planning and scheduling time lines. As Mr. Vallas has said, we want to make sure that every teacher has a planning and time line schedule So that they will know what to do from the very first day that they enter into the classroom to the very last day. Then you will also see a year at a glance because we want to make sure that every teacher has a feeling for what they're expected to do throughout the entire year. The second document in your folder should be a Comprehensive Literacy Framework. So you can see what teachers are supposed to do in terms of reading and writing; and also, many of the core elements that are supposed to take place in 376 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE every school's reading program. That is representative of what's in the center of that sheet. Then following, this is something that is totally new for us. It is what we call the Curriculum Core Instructional Model that Mr. Vallas talks about. It is a new model that clearly identifies specifically what the expectations are supposed to be in terms of what the standard is supposed to be for that particular class. It talks about the performance level. It talks about what the expectations are supposed to be in terms of each student being proficient on the state examinations. It also provides the teachers with a step-by-step curriculum direction that they are supposed to follow. And if you look at the page, you will see that there are references to best practices and references to multi-cultural connections. That is totally new for us because heretofore multi-cultural connections were always put somewhere else, in another document. And what we're saying here is that we want to put in the hands of every teacher what the multi-cultural 377 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE connection should be for every grade level, for every student, and what some of the best practices are supposed to be as they move forward. The information that you see in this document, this document is for reading and literacy. This will be probably a document that will be in the form of maybe three or four hundred pages for every teacher to be able to follow. Then, as Mr. Vallas said, it is our responsibility to make sure that every teacher receives professional development so that they will know exactly what the expectations are from Day One that they walk into a program. And there will be ongoing professional development for every teacher as we move forward. The next sheet that you should have in your document is a diagram that kind of focuses on developing a conceptual understanding of mathematics and what are some of the core elements that we want to include in a mathematics program. Then following that there is another instructional document that deals with mathematics. In this particular document, it speaks to a 5th grade class.

It also references what the expectations 378 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE are supposed to be in mathematics and also what are some of the multi-cultural enhancement activities that we expect teachers to engage themselves in as they are teaching mathematics. The second page of the document, you will see that there are references in terms of mathematical resources. You will see there are references to the state examination. You will see there are references to the TerraNova examination. You will see what class-based assessments that are supposed to be taught in every classroom. You will also see on the right-hand side English language learners. There are pieces of information for every teacher to know what they should be doing with English language learners. You will also see reference to special needs youngsters so that teachers will know what are those youngsters supposed to receive if they're in the specials needs category. You will also see Home Connections. How do we get the home and the parents involved in this process? And there are recommendations for teachers in order to do that. And then lastly, you will see Community Connections. 379 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE As we go through the development of these documents, which will be in the hands of our teachers in September, these documents will be in the classrooms that we will be focusing on in reading and math. As Mr. Vallas said, as we move into science and social studies, this is the format that we will use. I think the difference for us this year is that we are saying to teachers that we want to provide you with a menu and a format to follow and that there's an expectation that if you follow these formats and menus that your youngsters will be able to do math and reading and science and meet state proficiency levels.

That's really good. Do you think that this type of document will help with teacher retention and the support of services and activities that you're going to provide?

I think it definitely will do that, Councilwoman, only because heretofore when teachers would come in the system, we would just put something in their hands or send 380 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE them to a classroom without providing them with the kind of support that they needed. Yesterday you heard Tomas Hanna talk about providing new teachers with coaches. Those coaches will be assigned to those teachers with the specific responsibility of helping those teachers know what to teach, how to teach, when to teach, to know how to manage their classrooms. So as we build support for our teachers in this process, we feel that that's definitely going to retain teachers moving forward because we don't want them to feel like they're isolated. It is our responsibility to provide as much support as we possibly can to make sure that they're going to remain with us.

That's right because certainly a more experienced teacher benefits the outcome for our students. Last year, you know, my daughter just graduated from public school in June of 2002. So I haven't attended any this year yet. But I was at a Home & School meeting, and there were a number of parents that were a little bit worried and upset about their children taking the PSSA because that 381 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE was something that they were not familiar with in the past. Since it's almost a year again and I would assume that those individuals -- that's less of a concern that parents are having, that children are having, because they were really nervous about those high school students not doing well on that test because it would impact graduation.

Madame, if I could just make a point. A lot of the anxiety was also over a proposal that had been pushed at the state level to, in effect, put something on the student's diploma. So if they graduated but they didn't pass the PSSA, it would be kind of like a negative mark that colleges would be able to view. It's my understanding that that legislation has been bottled up and it hasn't become a reality. So the student's PSSA score, while it impacts on the school, obviously it doesn't impact on the student directly. I think part of the reason isn't because we've revamped the curriculum. We haven't yet. We're revamping it this year. I think part of that anxiety may be due to the fact that that legislative initiative was not successful. 382 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

We here in Philadelphia did not support that piece of legislation anyway. Can you tell us, in your testimony you talk about utilizing a different standardized test. Can you just talk a little bit about the TerraNova versus whatever it was? I think we were using the SAT-9 or something like that.

We went with the TerraNova for a number of reasons. Reason No. 1 was we felt that the TerraNova was more in line with the state standards. Reason No. 2, we felt that the TerraNova was very similar in form to the PSSA. So if it's aligned with the state standards and it's similar to the state test, it's not like you're preparing students for two tests. If you're working on the PSSA prep or the TerraNova prep, you're, in fact, preparing them -- it's similar. Reason No. 3 is the TerraNova is a test the results of which we could get back much quicker and we could disseminate the information in ways to both teachers and parents so that you could really understand how your children were doing. It was a better diagnostic test. 383 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE And the teachers have really enjoyed the TerraNova because it really -- they get the results back in 30 days and you can break down that TerraNova in ways where you can identify both the strengths and weaknesses of the student. And likewise, the TerraNova also lent itself to information that we can communicate to parents. We actually did something unprecedented. We sent a very detailed breakdown of their children's performance on the TerraNova home to the parents. And finally, Reason No. 5 to go with the TerraNova is the fact that it's widely used nationally. It is I think 300 districts or something like that. I'm not sure of the number, Joe. Over 300 districts in Pennsylvania use it and the Archdiocese uses it. So we were certainly selecting a testing instrument that was well received, well respected, aligned with the state standards, and a testing instrument that could be used for diagnostic purposes. In the past, tests like the SAT-9 and others, if you can't analyze the results and then use those results to help maybe adjust the ways that 384 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE you're helping the student succeed, then that test really isn't that effective. There was also a related reason. Our individual teachers across the system, for all practical purposes, did not like the SAT-9 for many of those reasons that I identified. And we found the TerraNova obviously to be -- well, while it was our decision to make, we did not make it in a vacuum. We made it consulting educators from outside the district, and we made it with input from the teachers union leadership.

Somewhere in your testimony you mentioned parent training. And I'd like to know -- I know at some point when one of my daughters entered school each year parents were given a booklet that laid out the academic objectives for that particular grade. So as a parent, I could read that and go to a bookstore or somewhere and buy other little supports that we could -- that my daughter and I could work with at home to reinforce and enhance her knowledge. Then at some point it stopped. The school district no longer gave those out. So the parents are kind of walking around in a vacuum. You 385 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE don't know what your child is supposed to learn in what grade. Are we doing anything to educate and inform parents of expectations for grades, objectives for grades?

Let me point out that this year we did a big educational outreach on the TerraNova that we communicated to parents. But as I mentioned in my -- and it's in the packet -- in laying out our curriculum strategy, to support the curriculum, we're going to also have a major parental outreach component, and it's going to consist of the following features, because you're right. Those things used to exist in the school district. Then they disappeared. They probably disappeared when the truant officers were laid off. But the bottom line is those were good things in the district that should have been retained. The first thing we're going to do with parents is parents this coming year are going to get curriculum and instructional guides laying out the standards, explaining the new curriculum, explaining the expectations. But in addition to those materials that they will get at the beginning of the 386 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE year -- and those materials will also include the uniform discipline code, information about the school calendar, after school, extended day, health care information, because a lot of our children are eligible for the comprehensive health insurance program and are not registered. So it'll be comprehensive. But then what they will receive during the course of the year is homework guides. So our goal here is to have the curriculum models supplemented by homework guides that can be sent home to the parents so the parents can get information from the teachers that are already pre-prepared on how they can -- this is my child's homework. This is how I can help my child with his or her homework. In addition, parents this year, this coming school year are going to have a much more simplified report card. So the report card is going to be in a language that parents understand, because right now you need to be able to read hieroglyphics in order to get through one of our report cards. So those are some fundamental features that are going to characterize this new curriculum. 387 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE And I think the feedback that you will be getting -- because the biggest complaint I hear from parents is the report card. I think the feedback that you will be getting with the new outreach pro initiatives as part of this curriculum plan will be positive.

Some of the other activities that I thought was really good was that they would have maybe a special math night for parents and maybe it was a contest. The classroom that had the most parents show up, they got an award. I mean, that motivated the child to motivate the parent to become a part and get there. So there's lots of activities that I think -- and a parent, of course, we all agree is one of the most important partners in their child's education. And there's just so many things. I noticed that when one of my daughters was in elementary school there were a number of parents that weren't really proficient in terms of academically proficient but they had training programs where parents could come in and receive special classes in math and reading so they could actually assist their child a little better.

Well, we're going to be 388 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE starting what we refer to as our parent training programs and parent training academies. And the objective here is to not only communicate information to parents, but actually to make training programs available to train parents not only in their curriculum and instructional models, but also to give parents opportunities to be trained to do things in and around the schools, parent truant officers, parent patrollers, crossing guards, maybe even potential teacher aides or teacher assistant positions in schools. So the parent training academies and the parent training models that we're going to make available -- this curriculum is going to be all about reaching out to parents, communicating to parents and educating the parents. So I think you'll see a lot of activities that are school-based. The beauty of having a reading and math coordinator in every school is not only can they work with teachers to upgrade their skills, because we're going to have year-round professional development twice a month -- two hours twice a month we're going to have professional development 389 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE sessions throughout the year, not just before the year. But the beauty of having the curriculum experts is they can also facilitate math night or literacy night, programs where parents can come in and parents can basically get help and get familiar with the curriculums.

Who would be in charge of reading? Would that be Ed Williams for the school district?

I'll be in charge of reading, yes. I'm the academic officer. So anything involving academics, I will be the person in charge.

Because for a while we didn't have anybody in charge of reading or there was some confusion about that.

Well, I think we're being a little more specific now. Academics right now clearly indicates that there's a need for us to have reading specialized individuals as well as in math, as well as in science.

And I'm glad to hear that we're going to have a reading and a math coordinator in the schools. We need that. 390 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. MR EDWARD WILLIAMS: Thank you.

Councilwoman Blackwell.

Thank you. Thank you, Madame Chair. Let me first thank the school district. This is the first year that I haven't been nervous and upset and wondering what's happening with the school district and feeling that we can't really trust what we hear and wondering what the future will hold and all of those negative things because I know in all areas we have a plan. So I am extremely grateful. Let me ask a question because I got a call on a couple drug houses and a call about near a school -- I know we have drug-free zones -- and a call about problems that are expected in a school district yard. My question is, where does the police -- because I have an excellent relationship with my police districts as well as certainly with Mr. Green. Where does the responsibility of the police department start and stop and the school 391 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE district start and stop so that I separate it out and don't give each person the other one's work to do?

Very clearly, inside the school walls the school police officers and my office takes -- we take full responsibility for what occurs inside the schools. When you talk about the perimeters of the school and outside the schools and on weekends, the police department -- for example, if you have someone selling drugs, dealing drugs in one of our school yards, we will do everything we can to support and/or assist the Philadelphia police department in resolving those kind of issues, whether you're talking about installing lighting outside the building, if you're talking about actually putting -- in some cases we've actually even put cameras outside of buildings. Whatever we need to do to assist the police department doing their role in crime prevention, that's kind of what we do. And I have to say that we have, in my opinion, a very good working relationship with the Philadelphia police department in that regard. 392 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

How could you not? (Laughter.)

Thank you. Thank you all for all that you do. We applaud your efforts and we applaud your commitment and we applaud all the plans you have to improve life for our school children and all who work there and our city overall. Thanks, Mr. Green. Thank you, Madame Chair.

The Chair recognizes Councilman Ortiz.

Mr. Vallas, I've seen statements and I read your plan to establish some schools in the city that are more or less oriented towards the military. Could you give me what is the focus, the plan, the cost and why?

Let me respond by saying we're trying to expand school options for our children. The ROTC programs are options that we can expand because those options come with some subsidies, and those options are basically options that have proven to be very successful.

Successful in what 393 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE sense?

Well, academically. Our experience with ROTC programs have been -- and we had over 10,000 students in ROTC programs in Chicago. We had two high school military academies, and we had 42 high schools with ROTC programs. And the results of those programs --

Who runs the curriculum and what type of curriculum do those schools have? Is it a curriculum oriented towards the military?

No. It's really --

What does it do?

First of all, it's our curriculum, but it's supplemented by character building. There's a character education curriculum. There is a leadership curriculum. There's a management curriculum. There's a diversity curriculum. The thrust of the military curriculum or the military program supplements is really to build character and to build academic achievements. Also, the military academies, by their nature, usually have extended day, extended year into summer. There are summer academic camps as 394 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE well as there's a big emphasis on physical education. Let me explain what there isn't in the military academy. There's no recruitment. For example, at Brownsville recruiters were not allowed to visit Brownsville, the Brownsville Military Academy, which is the one that's gotten a lot of national acclaim.

But isn't it, by its very nature, a recruiting office?

No, not really. Generally, some students may elect to get into the Reserves or join the National Guard, things that I did incidentally, in part, because college tuition, the Montgomery GI bill. And if some students gravitate, they gravitate by choice. Also, let me point out the decision to participate in ROTC or go to a military academy program is a choice that you make. But generally we didn't have weapons training. We didn't teach military history. It really is more oriented toward character building, team work, developing relationships, building confidence not only academically, but also building confidence physically. We did not see it as a 395 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE recruitment ground for the military.

What are the costs involved?

Generally, when we built the Brownsville Military Academy, the cost would be the same costs you would have if you had a regular school. You have to pay for teachers.

Does the military fund the schools?

Well, the Department of Defense supplements the military component of that. So, in other words, whether you have ROTC or whether you have a military academy, you do receive additional funding for the -- they do subsidize some of that instruction.

Could you let us see those, what it is, how it's structured, how it's going to be oriented?

Sure.

I'd really like to take a look at this.

I'd be more than happy. In fact, if you'd like, I'd be more than happy to arrange an opportunity for you to visit both the 396 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Brownsville Military Academy in Chicago and also the school within the school military academy at Farragut.

After the primary I think we should do that.

All right. We'll do that. But we'll be more than happy to provide you with the information.

Thank you.

The chair recognizes Councilwoman Brown.

Thank you, Madame Chair. I will stay within my five minutes. Arts and grants, my questions fall in that area. With the capital program that you have underway, I'm concerned -- not concerned, but curious about grass at city schools. So as you move to build, are you factoring in grass space for young people to have places to play? Has there been any discussion given to creating green space at our schools as you move forward with the capital programs?

Yes, there has. And I'm going to ask Karen Burke, who is the director of our 397 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE capital program, to detail them.

I'm Karen Burke. I am chief operating officer. Greening is an amazing component of the capital program. I think in discussions with Council members we've indicated that. We are doing some campus projects out there, probably around ten per year, that will bring greening in to schools' current campuses. I think you've noticed out there that the building in the past has been curb to curb or sidewalk to sidewalk, which really precludes a lot of greening. What we intend to do on the exterior program out there is to get out, remove some of the asphalt in parking lots, green it up, and where possible, put in play lots so kids have something to do. That's absolutely in the plan. On the second part of the plan, if we build new or we put an addition in, we are looking at all our design specifications now. Quite frankly, in the past to save funds, people never put in green space such as trees or enough grass, by our estimation. So we're asking our architects, our managing architect there when they design on new 398 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE buildings that they must leave enough on the footprint for us to green it up with flowers and trees. That will go with all new construction.

Thank you for that. Arts, as you recall, at a School Reform Commission meeting back in December, a lot of discussion was given around the status of arts and music in our schools. And you did mention that that will continue to be two of the five core curriculum areas.

Yes.

So if you would, should we assume that there will be no cuts in the teaching of arts this year and/or are there any plans to increase the arts in the school district curriculum?

First of all, I'll guarantee that there's going to be no cut in the teaching of either art or music. And I will tell you that the amount of resources we put into arts and music will be increased. It is going to take us a few years to develop our arts curriculum. And again, while this is an ambitious budget, it's still a budget with some limitations. 399 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE But the bottom line is we are not only going to be investing more in the arts, but the bulk of our investment in the coming year is going to be in art and music equipment. For example, one of our goals is to begin purchasing musical instruments both for the elementary schools and the high schools, issuing an equipment note to do that. Part of the school district's equipment note will earmark money for musical equipment. We want to have bands in the high schools. I mean, how many of our high schools have marching bands? So we are going to be purchasing more musical instruments and musical equipment. In fact, probably one of the largest purchases this district has ever done. And we're going to be providing the schools with more art supplies. Now, the fundamental problem, though, that we're going to have beyond that is obviously when it comes to staffing. In the high schools, for example, as Creg Williams reviews the courses that we're going to eliminate, when we talk about replacing them with other courses like honors and advanced placement, exemplary courses, courses of 400 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE substance, the art and music courses are not going to be exempt from that because we have a lot of courses and lot of positions that are simply irrelevant. Just jettisoning them would free up money for us to bring in more relevant courses. So I'm very confident in our efforts at the high school to, in effect, clean up our curriculum and to do a lot of reallocating within the existing high school budgets. We are going to put more money in the high schools, but we're also going to do a lot of reallocating. At the elementary school level, it's going to be really hard for me to say I'm going to guarantee that we're going to have an art teacher and a music teacher in every school. But at the lower grades many times teachers can be provided with the art and curriculum supplements so that they can integrate arts into the general primary grade curriculum. What we're going to hope to do is to work with a number of the universities. For example, West Chester University in Chestnut Hill, they have one of the largest musical schools in the country. They have 600 student teachers or 600 401 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE teacher graduates a year. I think only a handful of them do their student teaching or work in the schools. We've had discussions with them about not only accessing more of their student teachers, but giving many of their musical teachers opportunities to intern in our school system so we can supplement the music teachers, because right now beyond the 60 or 70 so-called itinerant teachers who go from school to school, there are very few schools that have kind of a sitting art teacher and a sitting music teacher. So we're going to incrementally try to get back to where we are. Obviously, I will point out that if we're able to secure additional resources from the state and from the federal government -- again, you've read at least a preview of the headlines on the Rendell budget. Obviously, some of the areas that are going to be getting more resources but need even a greater investment will be areas that will not be ignored once we come back with our budget amendments.

I was actually going to reserve questions around the type of 402 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE partnerships the school district is doing with the Art Museum and the Philadelphia Orchestra and other higher end institutions. But I'll reserve that because I know that there's a lot on your plate and there are a number of priorities. But to know that that is at least on the agenda matters to me.

Yes.

My final question is around a lot of discussion and testimony was given to recruitment of teachers. Last I checked the number of African-American male teachers in the system was about -- and let me say teachers, not professionals -- teachers in the system was about 3 percent. So with this magnificent plan that you have underway, under the leadership of Sandra Dungee Glenn and her colleague -- help me out -- Rosemarie Greco, what strategy is in place to get more teachers of color, male teachers of color in the system, given the makeup of the student body.

Tomas Hanna, Office of Recruitment and Retention. H-A-N-N-A is the last name. Part of the work of the Campaign for 403 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Human Capital was to reach out to organizations such as Concerned Black Men. Scott Bass, who is the president of Concerned Black Men, is part of our steering committee. We know a number of years ago the district went into partnership with Concerned Black Men to attempt to bring in additional males of color. What we want to be sure happens as we do that is that the professional development that they receive prior to coming in is adequate, prepares them enough for that. That's one. The second issue we're looking at is taking a look at how we source. When we go out to colleges and universities, are we going to those colleges and universities that have in the past historically yielded high numbers of teachers? And it's an issue that we need to take a look at as we look at where we're going, have we been successful there and to continue going to those places. There are places we're going to -- Massachusetts, for example. We're going to a number of places where we found over time that travel has not yielded many teachers. And part of that also goes to looking at our historically black colleges and universities. 404 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Sure. It's a natural pool.

Absolutely. So we're looking at Cheyney. We're looking at Lincoln. For example, one of the successful strategies we know Lincoln has worked with is preparing our teachers to successfully navigate and pass The Praxis, which is one of our impediments. So we want to build on their best practices. It's also looking at the career changers. The economy is tough out there right now. What are we doing to reach out to career changers? We're in the process of finalizing an agreement with the Philadelphia Workforce Development Corporation for 50 slots that are going to attempt to bring in career changers. And we've made it very clear to them that we're looking at targeted recruitment. Are we bringing in teachers that look like our kids, that understand our kids, that are part of the community.

That understand the urban setting and the like.

Correct. Correct. Another sourcing area is also our 405 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE para-professionals. We have a number of NTA's, school police, secretaries who have gone back to school.

Who could be put in the pipeline.

We need to support them as they come in. They are committed and vested in our community. So it's a huge issue. Sandra Dungee Glenn has clearly made it one of the most important points in our work, in recruiting and retaining teachers. I mean, as we talked about the career switchers, as we look at our alternative certification areas, also Troops to Teachers is an organization that we want to work with to bring in our retired military. In fact, one of the original meetings that we had back in November of this year, most of the folks we attracted were men. Many of them were men of color and many of them from the Philadelphia area. So there's an area that we need to bring them in and be sure that we support as they come into our schools. 406 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

I'm extremely encouraged to hear that. And next year I would like to hear some results, as a result of the effort, some benchmarks you've met with regards to actual recruitment and retention of male teachers of color.

Absolutely. We were a bit at a disadvantage in that as I was putting the team together the bulk of the recruitment for this year had already been done. In fact, we kind of inherited a nightmare. It was amazing. By mid July when I had arrived, I was told that there were 600 vacancies that hadn't been committed or filled yet. I mean, the pattern had been to wait for people to show up rather than to go out and recruit people. But as Tomas pointed out, you've got to go to where the teacher candidates are. And if you want a diversified work force, you've got to go to the schools where you can access a diversified work force. And that's something that we have not been aggressive about doing, but we will be. I'll also point out the Troops to Teachers program is a fabulous program because the military remains one of the most integrated branches 407 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE of the federal government. And the quality of the men who emerge with their full pensions in their forties and the men of color is significant. So we hope to take that program up another level. It was great. The first time we had meetings with them, they were on time. So it was just perfect. So we feel very optimistic. And we will have benchmarks that we will set and that we will present and be judged by.

Thank you very much for your testimony. Thank you, Madame Chair.

Point of order, point of information from Councilman Rizzo.

Thank you. Mr. Vallas, let me first congratulate you and the school district on the ROTC program. God knows today we need leaders, young men and women. And I just want to remind everyone that our military academies, Annapolis, West Point, the Air Force Academy, those are great places to get an education. And if you can prepare any of our young men and women for entry to any of those great, great institutions, I think that this is -- I personally thank you for this because this gives an opportunity 408 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE for our young men and women from this region to enter what we can see when we watch television today, a very, very honorably professional, to defend the country, to defend the United States of America. So great job, as far as I'm concerned. Keep going. And I'd like to see a lot of Philly kids in Annapolis, West Point, the Air Force Academy, et cetera. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. The Committee will stand in recess until 1:45. Thank you. (Lunch recess.)

The Committee of the Whole is now back in session. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Miller.

Thank you, Madame Chair. Good afternoon. In your testimony you state that you're looking to consolidate the administrative offices and bring them to one place. And I believe you stated that you're spending a million dollars a year on one lease. 409 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Which lease is that? Which place is that?

That's our human resources office at 22nd and Arch. The law department and human resources are in that building. The other three buildings we have are obviously buildings that we own.

Can you tell us a little bit about the search? It's my understanding that one place that you're looking is in my district. I guess I'll just put it on the record. It would sure be a boost to North Philadelphia.

Well, I'm going to ask Karen Burke to get into the details of the search process. But if I can just explain the goals. Our goals here are to consolidate our operation, central office operations, which are in four facilities, not only the private facility, but also obviously the Parkway, the Kennedy Building and the Stevens Building, which is right off Broad Street, right kitty corner to Stanton and to the Benjamin Franklin High School. Our goal is to consolidate all of our operations into a single building. We feel if we do 410 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE that we will save about three million dollars a year in operating costs. We also feel that we should be able to raise about million dollars just from the 5 sales of those buildings themselves and through a 6 dropping of the lease. 7 Of course, any building that we lease, 8 access, rehab, move into is going to require some 9 investment in order to make that building adaptable. 10 But our goal here is to consolidate all of our 11 functions in a single building in an area that is 12 accessible, that is reasonably located in terms 13 of -- you know, it's not too far north or too far 14 south, but nevertheless is a facility that can house 15 our operations. 16 We're looking for -- right now, we have 17 about 900,000 square feet in all of our buildings 18 combined. We don't need any more than 500,000 19 thousand square feet -- thank you -- 350,000 square 20 feet. I keep on getting changing numbers. But the 21 bottom line is we have far too much space that we 22 currently have. 23

The building that 24 I know that you're looking at is not too far south 25 and not too far north. It also has off-street free 411 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE parking.

Karen Burke, chief operating officer. We have a firm that we've engaged through an RFP, Studley. And they are charged with looking out there, into the communities out there to see buildings that are available, whether to lease or to purchase. They're putting the scenarios together now. Each of the opportunities out there has different costs associated with it from build-out even versus lease versus buy. It's my understanding that the recommendations or at least a series of recommendations are being put together within the next couple of weeks and then it would go to the SRC for deliberation on that. So as far as I know, all buildings are still in the running and they are doing the pro formas on each of them now.

Great. Councilman Rizzo has a point of information.

Thank you, Madame Chair. Mr. Vallas, I would like you -- consolidation is great. But in the society that we 412 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE live in today, I hope in your part that there is -- part of that plan is an alternate location to run the school district. In the event of a catastrophic event, I would hope that you would have an alternative location that day-to-day operations of the school district could continue.

First of all, your point is very well taken. Our objective would be to identify other buildings, and in some cases, schools where we could simply shift our operations to. And the way that could be done is not to shift all of your operations to a single building. But you could shift police and high schools to the top floor of one high school. You could shift operations to another location. So the objective here would be to have backup sites.

The important thing is that in the plan that -- you know, just moving bodies from one location to another is fine. But technology has to be available, telephone communications. So if you do make a move, that the infrastructure is there to run efficiently, fax machines. In most corporations today, that is considered in the event of a disruption of the main 413 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE headquarters.

Your point is well taken, and we'll certainly focus on that. I will tell you at present, even though the system has multiple buildings, I would not be comfortable that we could actually move any of our operations to like one building or another because, first of all, the data systems aren't equipped, the technology isn't equipped. Any new building or existing building that we go in and we renovate, we will make sure that that district -- that those buildings are state of the art in terms of technology and information systems. But you're absolutely right. You need backup storage of data, backup storage of technology. Right now, this system, when it comes to personnel records, we don't have a database. Everything is on paper files. So when we put the new technology systems in, we'll be putting a lot of information on computers for the very first time, if you can believe it.

Mr. Vallas, don't feel bad. There's a lot of index cards still left 414 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE in this building. (Laughter.)

Councilman Ortiz, a point of information.

I have to leave because I have a parent/teacher conference.

You see I keep on doing that to you.

The report card better be good. (Laughter.)

Thank you. Speaking of the human resources department and information, we've always heard -- and I guess it's still not automated. I'll call it "automated." I'm not all that technical with the computers and all that. But is the data still in boxes and all around? Is it a shorter length of time now when people apply for teaching positions?

Yes. We are significantly streamlining the process. And I'll ask Tomas to articulate very quickly how that process is being streamlined. 415 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Hi, Thomas Hanna. What we're working on is we're trying to move into the age where we go from paper to more automated. What we expect to do is, through the relationship we've created with New Teacher Project, they have an applicant tracking system. It's something we're really looking forward to so that you would be able to apply on line. We would be able to get back to you. It has an applicant flow to it that would, within a matter of days, weeks, someone would get some type of response, whether it be E-mail, telephone call, letter, indicating that you applied, we hear you, here's what we're doing, here's what you can expect. That would be on the teacher side. One of our goals is to try to branch that out to positions beyond teachers. So we're trying to catch up. There are issues where we get numerous calls saying I applied, where is it, what happened. We definitely have to get better at that. But we think we're going to take a bite out of that through the new teacher applicant -- the applicant tracking system that we expect to have fully operational during this recruitment season. 416 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Because we have lost teachers in the past. We have lost applicants that just went to other districts because the application process was so cumbersome and lengthy.

Absolutely.

So it's really good if you're getting back went to people and letting them know where they are and whatnot.

Correct.

To go back to the -- well, not to go back. But in this day, with the war in Iraq, and here at City Council we had a session a few weeks ago. We were briefed by the police department and the city's emergency management team. One of my friends said that she heard -- and she may have gotten something from the school. I'm not really sure. But what is the plan? She said to me that if I guess an incident occurs while children are in school, that the doors are going to be locked and children will not be able -- she's not complaining. I guess I just want to have information about an evacuation plan or an emergency plan, 417 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE whatever it is that you're putting together. I know you've thought about it.

I'm going to ask Dexter to very quickly outline the provisions of that plan. And if this memo explaining what we've done has not been distributed to the committee. I know we've distributed this material to the city and we've been meeting with the various city departments to coordinate our efforts. But we'll certainly provide you the materials on what we've done to date along with a copy of a letter that we sent home to the parents. But let me let Dexter take you through a quick summary of what our plan is.

The city has not shared any of that with us. And when we had our briefing a few weeks ago, two weeks ago, I think, two Fridays ago, there was nothing in the materials regarding the school district.

Dexter Green, Madame Councilman. In the event that there's some kind of incident, there are two things that could happen. One is an evacuation. And since 9/11, the district 418 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE developed a standard safety and crisis plan for the entire district. All 264 schools have the same plan with their own evacuation process in that plan. But also in that plan is what we call sheltering in place. In the event there should be an incident, one of two things will happen. Either there will be an evacuation. And those sites are selected ahead of time. Either there will be an evacuation or there will be a sheltering in place. And basically what sheltering in place is, is that in the event something should happen, the school would go on lock-down, exactly what you just said. No one would be allowed in the building. No one would be allowed out of the building except for the first responders. And those responders are coming either from the police department or the fire department. We have been working through the last five months with the Philadelphia police department, the fire department, the Archdiocese, the schools in Center City, whether they're EMO schools, charter school, private schools -- it didn't matter -- developing a special plan for Center City. And 419 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE that's where we are today.

So you are going to give us copies of the letter you sent home and also safety crisis?

Safety and crisis plans. Every school has a copy of the safety and crisis plan, and we can provide that to you also, which includes the sheltering in place.

Councilman Rizzo, point of information.

Mr. Vallas, Dexter Green, could I suggest it would be real helpful to we, as members of Council, getting copies of these things simultaneously or even before you send them to our constituents so if we get calls we're not blind-sided by information that is being distributed throughout the city to the parent population. So if you could at least put me on the list -- I'm not speaking for my colleagues -- I would like to get this as a matter of routine so we're not surprised in hearing about this stuff at budget hearings.

We'll make sure you get that. 420 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

I think all members would probably routinely like to receive the information. The city briefed us. They gave us a copy of a tape called Shelter in Place. And that pretty much was talking about our homes, how to do shelter in place at home. Then they recommended that we look in the back of the White Pages for an evacuation plan that's on the last two pages. But it's not on the last -- and I have to talk to the city about this. It's not on the last two pages of the new White Pages.

We'll make sure that we send the material to you directly. In fact, any time we're going to be sending something to the city, we'll send it to the President and then we'll coordinate the distribution to the Council members because, as a matter of rule, we've been doing that when we have our press announcements and we put out our various educational initiatives. But we'll begin to do that when it comes to anything regarding public safety or emergency. Rather than go through a single channel, we'll make sure that all the Councilmen get copies of letters 421 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE that we're sending home to parents.

Could I appeal to the President? Madame President, your office is a very big place and I know that there are certain documents that you would like to go through you for distribution. But I think it would be more efficient, Mr. Vallas, if you could have this faxed to us directly. Things that are like press releases and information that's timely, rather than put a burden -- and I'm respectfully asking the President to allow you to communicate. You can send it to the President's office. But I would appreciate not knowing about something a week after.

Right. Okay. No problem. I see no problem. We'll make sure we give you copies of all the materials that are being sent.

And I appreciate your courtesy to the President. But again --

That's fine. We'll make sure you get a copy of it. Absolutely. From our office.

Are schools supposed to be used as I guess a shelter if there is 422 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE some bombing? We're in this time of war. So people have to start thinking about this in advance.

In this whole sheltering in place piece, our schools are equipped with enough snack foods, food for the kids and water for the kids assigned to that building. At this point in time we had not planned to use schools as a shelter for the entire community. But in the event that something happens while kids are in school, that would be -- now, can school buildings be used on a weekend or something like that when kids are not in school? The answer is absolutely they could be.

We've also been following the federal guidelines, and we've been stocking the schools not only with water and food to last a day, at least a day, but also duct tape and things of that nature because a lot of times the protocol being if there's a biological agent or some sort of a chemical strike or whatever, you want to secure the buildings. You want to basically secure -- you want to make sure that the buildings are not ventilated from the outside. So that's the reason why you have the shelter in place contingency. 423 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE But any decision that we would make, any decision that we would make, we would make only in concert with our public safety officers, like the police department, like the fire department. In other words, we would basically follow the city's lead and we would do what we were directed to do. But, of course, having the buildings equipped, because in some of the scenarios they talk about the need to be able to secure your building, keep people indoors for X amount of period of time while someone assesses the danger. And obviously we're only talking about the unlikely -- the most unlikely of eventualities. But the bottom line is we are taking those precautions. Better safe than sorry. And we are following federal guidelines. And let me point out that in doing this, we've really been able to get a lot of donations. For example, like Coca-Cola has donated the water. We've really had a lot of people stepping forth, and they've been stepping forth to assist us. Given the fact that there's not a grant that we don't pursue under any circumstances, we are going to certainly try to take advantage of 424 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Secretary Ridge's proposal that federal money be set aside to school districts to assist them in this type of public safety preparation.

Thank you.

Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilman Nutter.

Thank you, Madame Chair. Good afternoon, Mr. Vallas, Mr. Green and Mr. Harris. Mr. Harris, why don't we take care of a piece of information that we were working with yesterday. This was the matter of the moving columns from yesterday's five-year plan discussion, the August plan and the March plan. You have been kind enough to put together a new document. Madame Chair, if we could have the sergeant-at-arms distribute a document that I received this morning from Mr. Harris to the members. Mr. Harris, would you explain -- there are two sheets here.

Yes, Councilman.

One has three columns of different five-year plans, and then the 425 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE another has as a title Real Estate Taxes. Why don't we start with the five-year plan discussion and then we'll talk about the real estate tax issue from yesterday.

I'd be happy to. Again, I need to apologize for any confusion that we may have caused or I may have caused between Friday and yesterday. What I felt might rectify the issue and clarify what happened was to put -- these documents, the top two tables were contained in the package distributed yesterday. However, they were on separate pages. So what we did this last evening was put both plans on one page for you. The top plan represents the original five-year plan.

That would be August?

Yes, from '03 through '07.

Right.

The second plan is an update to that going from '04 to '08. And we will continue in the future to update the five-year plan. Next year you'll see '05 to '09. Given that there are adjustments, as any 426 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE plan is going to continue to be worked on and adjusted in crafting this year's budget and the realties of the state budget that we were working with, we adjusted the FY '04 and have a current FY '04 plan as opposed to the original plan. That was the point of confusion. And that was the point at which on the first -- where the wrong column was inserted in the wrong sheet. So at the bottom I wanted to take the other step of clarifying the differences that occurred between the adjustment to the '04 plan, and laid out there for you I believe what has changed and why it has changed.

So why don't you now tell us for the record -- first, early this year, late last year there was discussion about what your end of the year balance would be for FY '03. You sent to Council correspondence initially indicating that you anticipated ending this fiscal year with a 10.7 million dollar surplus. Subsequent correspondence either late last year or early this year indicated that you anticipated ending the fiscal year with a two million dollar surplus or slightly more than two 427 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE million dollar surplus. Can you tell us now, for the record, first, what do you anticipate the fiscal condition to be at the end of FY '03?

My current assessment and best information is that we will --

I don't know if you want to use the word "assessment."

Okay. I withdraw my choice of words. I don't do assessments.

Very good.

You may have to. (Laughter.)

We know some people who do. I can introduce you to about 85 of them. They do a very good job. As a matter of fact, they work for you. (Laughter.)

Well, my name is on the top of the page. I did notice that.

I figured you guys needed a little late afternoon respite from all the tough questioning from earlier. What does your analysis tell you? 428 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Our projection currently is that we will maintain what we believe to be a two million dollar surplus at the end of fiscal year for '03. I would note that this is in comparison to the adopted budget of '03 which had a 28 million dollar deficit as approved last May. So while the number did change from the initial estimate in August, we're confident that a two million dollar surplus -- which is, in my opinion, nominal within the whole budget. But it does represent a substantial progress I believe in achieving --

Mr. Harris, look, as hard a time as I can give you about things, I mean, don't be shy about recognizing the fact that you walked into a budget that had a 30 million dollar deficit projected for the end of the fiscal year and now you're projecting a 2.6 million dollar surplus. I mean, that's something to talk about. And it's something that should be recognized. You walked into a situation and you turned it around. Let's just call it for what it is, because I can assure you that if you walked in with a 2.6 million dollar surplus and you were sitting here today with 429 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE a 30 million dollar deficit, I'm not sure how long you'd last at the table. So we give acknowledgment where it is due. It is a spectacular job and you should be commended for it.

We're all working very hard on a difficult situation. So thank you, Councilman.

He would have been at the table alone, I might add.

I understand that. On his way over to the SRC and the pension system. (Laughter.)

Okay. So now let's talk about FY '04, the comparison between 8/23/02 and 3/23/03, the variance between the two. And lastly, before you do that, any of the materials that we have received to day, there was also a data request for a listing by category and dollar amount of the 48.5 million dollars in cuts. Do we have that?

I believe that was in the package that was distributed first thing this morning at the opening of the session. There was a page in there that had the cuts detailed. 430 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

We'll get to that. We'll get to that, because I don't think I have that. Let's talk about the variance in the '04 numbers.

Do you want me to walk down through the list?

No. Let's just kind of get right down to the bottom line.

I think the key components to the differences between the original projection of '04 in August and where we stand today, I would say that while we are trying to -- while we are launching a number of new program initiatives, they are costing somewhat less than we had originally anticipated in some of them. So our costs did not go as high and we originally thought. However, the revenues is probably the biggest issue. And that reflects the loss of 65 million dollars from the state under the current budget scenario. Again, I imagine that will change as of today. But at this time --

It's going on right now. 431 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Yes. But looking at it as of the information in hand, the loss of state and local funding, the vast majority of that being, the vast, vast majority of that being state funding. And then making up for that in cuts on down the line, an additional 50 million dollars in cuts that we will be pursuing.

Now, when you talk about -- did you say 65 million dollars in state funding?

Yes, Councilman.

Is that a part of the 73.7?

Yes, Councilman. Yes, the 73.7 is made up of 65 of state funding. And the way we addressed that 48 million dollars, roughly 48 million dollars were handled through previously where we discussed the budget reductions.

Hold on for a second. 65 out of the 73 is the state?

Yes.

The eight, is that local funding?

That is a combination of -- 432 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE yes, it is.

From us?

Well, it was dealing with some funding that we were going to pursue and were planning on pursuing and working with for the after school.

In a nutshell, in the original five-year plan, we assumed that we were going to be able to secure some after school, extended day money as part of the Safe and Sound program. We were unable to do that. So, in effect, we adjusted our budgets accordingly.

For this fiscal year.

For this fiscal year.

What do you mean by that?

In other words, when we laid out the five-year plan, we assumed that we were going to be able to apply for a number of after school, extended day programs that were funded obviously by other governmental agencies. And we were not able to secure that additional funding. So we took it out of the original five-year plan budget document. 433 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

But I thought Safe and Sound was working in conjunction with the school district on the whole after school program?

It is. We're coordinating our efforts. But we had come in under the assumption that we would be able to -- well, it was our hope that we would be able to be treated as a provider. But the city preferred not to, at least for this year's applications, because many of the applications were already out, the process was already beginning to basically put out the RFP and to continue to work with community-based organizations and neighborhood organization. So that doesn't mean that we weren't cooperating. Obviously, we provide a number of schools as Beacon sites, and obviously we work to try to coordinate our after school and extended day activities. But we had to adjust our revenue estimates to account for the fact that we were unable to secure money for after school, extended day programs from sources other than the federal sources and obviously our local indigenous sources.

So let me make sure 434 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE I'm understanding this, because I had not heard this before. Are you saying that the school district was trying to get money from the Safe and Sound organization?

Yes.

And they declined or refused or didn't approve any funding for the school district for after school programs? I thought they were in the after school program business.

They are. But they're providing the funding to community-based organizations and neighborhood-based organizations.

But aren't some of those organizations providing those after school programs in your schools, in our schools?

For the most part, they're not. For the most part, most of those organizations are -- there are some. Well, the Beacon programs are being provided in our schools. But many of the community-based organizations, not all of them, but many of them provide after school, extended day programs in their own facilities. So I think the decision was made to stay 435 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE with community-based organizations for this year's application, in part, because a lot of the determination relative to the after school, extended day programs, awarding grants to community-based organizations was made before we laid out our five-year financial plan. So the decision was --

I can understand that. But I think we help to fund the organization. I mean, my recollection I think off the top of my head is upwards of about 30 million dollars of city money went to Safe and Sound. And now we're hearing that the school district is not participating in that. There's something I'm not understanding here.

I'm going to ask Nilsa. Nilsa Gonzalez is the director of our Office of Schools and Regions. She, of course, has responsibility to oversee our nine regional superintendents. She runs the after school, extended day, summer school supplemental programs, and I'll let her articulate that.

Nilsa Gonzalez. We are in partnership with the city in Beacon schools and in 21st Century schools for this year. 21st Century schools is a grant that we 436 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE received, and what has happened is that we are using that monies to run the academic piece of the after school program in schools throughout the city. 5 Right now, we have 31,000 children in 6 our program. The city has slots for 60,000 7 students. 8

I'm sorry. Give me 9 those numbers again. 10

We have 31,000 students 11 in our extended day program in the Grades 3 to 11. 12 The city has 60,000 slots. 13

Additional? 14

Additional for after 15 school programs. What we are now doing with the 16 city is meeting in partnership to see how we can 17 support each other's programs for next year as the 18 providers have lost many of their students to our 19 program because it's an instructional program, 20 solely an instructional program. 21

We don't have to go 22 into all the details at the moment. But I have to 23 tell you, Ms. Gonzalez -- and you're just trying to 24 do your job. I guess hearing about our programs, their programs, so-and-so's programs. I mean, 437 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE they're all the same children from the city.

Absolutely.

I mean, it's almost a level of -- I mean, I believe in as much competition on many things as possible. This is possibly not one of them where we should be in this kind of competition. And I guess what I'd also like to know is for the eight million dollars that at the moment you believe you're not going to get, what would you have done with it? How many more sites either would be opened or how many more children would be served? I mean, did they run out of money? Is that why you didn't get any funding?

Let me explain where we are cooperating. Number one, the city provides the Beacon programs. The city pays for the Beacon programs. They house it in the schools. We, of course, do not charge the city, because the old board used to, believe it or not, charge the city for having after school programs, kind of an idiotic thing. But we don't charge the city for that. The second area that we cooperate directly on the funding is we have jointly applied 438 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE to the federal government for this 21st Century grant and the 21st Century learning center program. So this is a joint application between us, the city and community-based organizations. Now, the third area is the Safe and Sound program and our respective after school, extended day programs. We have not been allowed to access Safe and Sound money. Now, that doesn't mean that the city is not coordinating those programs with us. It just means that the city has preferred to work through community-based organizations and other organizations to provide the services. Some are provided off campus. Some are provided on campus. We are coordinating our efforts. And I will tell you this. We hope that next year we will be able to apply for Safe and Sound money and secure some Safe and Sound money to help supplement our after school, extended day programs. The main reason, the principal reason that I was given that they would prefer to do the coordination approach rather than just the direct funding approach was the fact that we were kind of entering the competition for grants business late in 439 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE the game and that while we should cooperate on Beacons and cooperate on 21st Century, the federal grant, and while we should coordinate our efforts, we should come back next year and apply for actual direct funding through the Safe and Sound program.

All right. Thank you. Mr. Harris, on this last chart, the comparison, let me make sure I'm understanding this correctly.

Yes, sir.

You're anticipating that we'll have 206 million dollars left over from the deficit financing?

That's correct.

Now, how did the number go up? Because the last correspondence I got from you was that it was at 187 million dollars.

That's correct, Councilman. And I'm glad I have a chance to clarify that. It is -- the balance at the time and before the closing of the 2002 books will end, assuming that we would have to draw down based on the 2002 budget, was that we would start this year 440 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE with a 187 million dollar deficit.

187 million dollar deficit financing balance?

Let me be very cautious. For the record, 187 million dollar --

You are going to be sitting at that table by yourself if you keep that up.

No, he won't be at the table. (Laughter.)

I'm just speaking fast. I apologize.

Take your time.

187 million dollar proceeds remaining out of the original 317 million dollar deficit bond. When the books closed for 2002, it actually was -- we did not have to draw down 15 million dollars that we anticipated we would have to draw down. So the balance actually shifted up to about 203 million. Then if you factor in what we anticipate being the salvage this year, in round numbers, we'll start next year with 206 million dollars remaining 441 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE out of the 317, which is a better position than we originally expected to be in. That allows us -- if you follow the five-year plan through, that does assist us, along with the other cuts, to stretch the deficit financing, in part, beyond '07 and actually carries it into '08.

So the two key numbers are you're going to start '04 with the 206 deficit financing bond remaining funds.

Yes, available proceeds fund.

Which you then anticipate in FY '04 a fund balance of 159.2 million dollars. Is that what I'm reading here?

That's correct. We'll have to draw down about 46 and a half million, leaving us with roughly 160 million starting '05.

Okay. Now, let's talk about taxes. We had a discussion yesterday about your estimates versus the city's estimates on real estate tax receipts. Your estimate, I believe, was a 2.8 percent growth. The city's estimate was a 2.4 442 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE percent growth. And you were going to tell us why the variance.

Correct.

Is that the explanation on the second sheet?

Yes, sir. That is the one page on real estate taxes. Primarily, it is the due to the transfer of millage, of the 2.71 millage from the city to the school district and it's reflected as a full year of this transfer. The transfer of the millage translates, as you see at the middle of the page, that for every dollar of real estate taxes collected by the city, the school district actually receives in excess of that. It receives 1.379.

Right.

To that end, when you multiply the current real estate taxes expected from the city by that 1.379, it gives you the 460.7 that we had listed in the book, creating that difference of the 2.4 to 2.8.

Let's talk a little bit about the 48 and a half million dollars. You've got a freeze. 443 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Now, what happens with these kindergarten -- and tell me that acronym, SSA. What's an SSA?

First of all, because we're going to be reducing class size and classes will have -- instead of 33 kids, they'll have students 8 per teacher, we feel that we don't need three people 9 in the classroom, that we can basically cut down the 10 SSA's and use -- 11

Mr. Vallas, what's 12 an SSA? 13

An SSA is a supportive 14 service assistant, a teacher assistant in the 15 classroom. They're three-hour teacher assistants. 16 So they spend three hours a day in the schools. 17

And that was 18 technically giving you three people in a classroom 19 of 30? 20

At the kindergarten level, 21 you'd have three people in the classroom. You'd 22 have a teacher, a teacher assistant and an SSA or a teacher and a literacy intern.

How many students are in our average kindergarten? 444 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Well, the class size ratio is 33 to 1. And sometimes if you're fortunate enough, you may have a parent volunteer. Let me also indicate that while there's SSA's in the schools, they're not always in the kindergarten. SSA's can be doing all sorts of things in the schools. They're not NTA's, which the NTA's are for security. There's like 1500 SSA's in the schools. There are also what we call literacy interns in the school. These are basically prospective teacher candidates who get paid close to a starting teacher salary who are also in the classrooms. The feeling here is after we move -- rather than just try to put more and more personnel in a single classroom, we said what we need to do is we need to reduce the size of that classroom. We need to get those classrooms down to students for 21 every one teacher. And that means you hire more 22 literacy interns -- you hire more teachers rather than literacy interns and SSA's. Let me just give you an example on the literacy interns. A lot of schools have -- most 445 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE schools have a literacy intern for 2nd grade. Well, if you have three 2nd grades in your elementary school with 33 kids in every classroom and you're assigned one literacy intern, then one 2nd grade teacher benefits from that literacy intern. Now, if you take that literacy intern's salary and an SSA's salary and you use that money to hire a full-blown teacher, you have class size reduction in all three of your 2nd grade classrooms. All the classes suddenly jump down from 33 to like or 24. So, in effect, all the 2nd grade teachers 13 benefit. 14 So any time you hire one teacher, you're 15 benefiting, in effect, three classrooms. You're, in 16 effect, reducing class size. Instead of having 17 three oversized classrooms, you have four small 18 classrooms. 19

Let me make sure 20 we're also being clear for the record. Are the 21 children, when you go from 33 to 23 or 22 -- 22

22, which will be our goal 23 at the primary grades.

Where are the 10 or 11 children going? Are all 33 kids still staying in 446 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE the room and you're just putting an extra teacher in the room?

If we don't have the space --

Because we're challenged by space in many of the schools.

-- we will stay with the literacy interns. We will stay with the present formula. If we do have the space, we'll hire the additional teacher. So what's going to drive this is space. And we feel fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your perspective, about 75 percent of our schools roughly have additional space because enrollment has been declining. There are about or percent of the schools that are 18 at or near capacity. So the availability of space 19 will dictate. 20 In those schools that don't have the 21 classroom space, we'll stay with literacy interns. 22 In those schools that do have the classroom space, 23 we'll hire teachers. So the actual number of SSA's 24 may fluctuate depending on what the final outcome 25 is. But again, the financial amount can be adjusted 447 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE because obviously it's not a budget-breaker.

The last item on this particular page, tell me what this means on the SEPTA tokens and transfers. Is the cost going up to the students? Is the cost going down to the students? Is the school district cutting back on what it's covering for students? What does this actually mean?

No, it's looking at the rates and talking to SEPTA and having negotiations with SEPTA regarding the rates because our transportation costs are increasing. However, we do not intend or plan at all to cut back on services or provision of services or access to students. So we will continue to work on rate issues.

Tell me about this. There was a proposal out of the Mayor's budget speech back in January for a million dollar 20 school-based facilities improvement fund. 21 Is this something that the city is 22 providing to the district or is this a district 23 initiative that we're helping to support or what is 24 this about? 25

It's my understanding that 448 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE the 25 million was to be used to support the infrastructure improvements in schools that help facilitate the Safe and Sound programs and the Beacon programs. And what we're doing -- and I wasn't sure how that was going to be funded, whether or not it was going to be through a bond or a through a direct appropriation. But what we're doing is as we look at our after school and extended day programs and as we lay out our plan to expand those programs, we're going to be identifying what we feel to be eligible expenditures that we could then access those proceeds for. But right now we haven't factored it into the budget because if these revenues are realized, they will probably be realized against the capital budget rather than the operating budget because it's not so much an operating fund expense as much as it's a capital expense, to go in and to make the physical improvements that need to be made to accommodate after school.

I assumed that it was a capital expense. I think what I'm trying to understand is whose capital. 449 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Your capital, the city's capital. But again, we have not finalized any -- we haven't decided what we're going to be seeking those capital subsidies for. So it's nowhere in either our operating budget or our capital budget. It's a proposal of the city, and we've got to wait to see how the city budget process takes its course.

Do you know if the million dollars has been identified in the city 12 capital budget? 13

I don't know. 14

We had capital 15 budget hearings, and I don't remember this item 16 being specifically identified. Okay. You can't 17 answer that one. 18 Yesterday I raised a couple items and 19 I'd like to follow up on them today. First, with 20 regard to -- I think one of the last items we 21 finished with before the break was ROTC. 22 I know my colleague, Councilman Ortiz, 23 who I believe has committed generally at least for 24 the next couple of months to try to restrict his 25 thoughts and concerns to the contiguous 48 states -- 450 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE he is not allowed to even talk about Alaska or Hawaii -- expressed some concern about our ROTC and he's been very active on issues related to the war. I bring a slightly different perspective. I'm certainly concerned about the war, and I'm also concerned about our military personnel and their safety. But with regard specifically to the ROTC, Councilwoman Tasco and I, within the past year, offered a resolution in support of the Roxborough High School ROTC program, which is a spectacular program at that particular school. And I'm sure that there are others throughout the city. We just may not be as aware of them. It would seem to me that any legitimate, appropriate program that works on character-building and leadership training, discipline and creating a sense of responsibility in our young people is more than appropriate and greatly needed for many of our young people. It's probably more than appropriate and greatly needed for some who are not so young, but we don't have any programs for them. So I certainly believe that having good ROTC programs or if there was or were a school that was created that had a, quote/unquote, military 451 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE focus, as long as we're careful I think about curriculum and the kinds of things that the young people are being taught -- let's not fool ourselves into thinking that some of our young people are not going to go into the military service. And on I think most days and nights some of us are rather appreciative that some young people actually go into military service because if they ever had to call on most of us here, you might as well learn another language. (Laughter.)

So there is a great deal to be learned in these kinds of programs. We obviously again have to be careful about how the programs are structured, who has access to the young people. They should not necessarily be recruiting pads for the different military services. Not because that's a bad thing, but they're young and impressionable and there will be enough time for that kind of activity if they decide to pursue it through college and become of an older age. But I would like to at least be on record as supporting these kinds of programs. I 452 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE think our young people benefit from them. And I would encourage you to continue to pursue that kind of option because one of the things that I think some of our young people have lacked and has not encouraged some to go to school in the first place is that maybe we're not offering the kind of things that are attracting their attention. There is no one size fits all. There is no one program that's going to keep everyone's attention. And if that's what encourages someone to go to school, then God bless them. I guess I probably shouldn't have said that since we're having public school hearings. I'm sorry.

No, that's fine. (Laughter.)

It wouldn't be the first time I got in trouble. You did talk about something earlier which I was slightly confused about. And Councilman Rizzo and I kind of looked up at the same time. And maybe I wasn't paying as close enough attention. You were talking about -- you were in the area of sexually transmitted diseases. You were talking about testing and treatment. And something you said 453 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE struck a bit of a nerve. It was something along the lines of if a student is tested and found to I guess have something, that treatment was subsequently optional. And again, maybe I missed a part of that. So could you at least clear that up? Because I didn't understand the process or procedure.

Well, I should probably have our health care expert here or someone from the Department of Health. But let me point out -- and please jump in and correct if I'm not -- are you familiar? Creg can answer that question.

What we did was made an opportunity available to all of our high schools on a scheduled basis to have any young man or young woman who wanted to be tested the opportunity to do so. If indeed their test results came back positive -- all of the students who were tested were actually given a secret pass code where they could call in to find out the results of their test. In indeed those tests were found to be positive, the young people were given the opportunity to go to neighborhood clinic health facilities based on recommendations to receive 454 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE treatment or indeed make arrangements at that local school site to receive treatment from trained personnel from the health department.

Let me ask a couple questions. One, all students were given the opportunity to be tested?

Yes. All schools, in the high schools.

Do you know of that population what percentage of students actually participated?

Actually, the testing is concurrent as we speak. So we haven't completed the opportunity for all of the schools.

And because you want to encourage them to be tested and then because you want to naturally encourage them to find out the test results, assuming that then it's difficult to either keep certain data -- and obviously, you have confidentiality issues. But then I guess that further complicates your efforts. If a student were found to be positive, I guess, one, you don't know it. Only the student knows it. And then you have no ability to follow up 455 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE on it to see whether if you had a positive, whether they actually sought treatment or not.

That is correct. That information is confidential. But the health department, who is conducting the testing process, they're the agencies who have that information. Obviously, we cannot share that information, because of confidentiality, with the administrators at the schools. But most certainly the health department can have access to the information.

Do you know what the follow-up process is for the health department?

Well, the health department has a couple of options actually. They can actually contact the student on an individual basis if they were to come back out to the school and to do some follow-up sessions for young people to let them know that in fact your results did come back positive and you have an opportunity to get free assistance to cure any problem that you may have. That is a process that we do have in place as a result of follow-up if a young person decides that they don't want to, obviously on their 456 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE own, go into it.

Do you know whether there's any contact with the parent or guardian?

Actually, the law allows a student's rights in terms of the testing to be held confidential. A student can, however, share that information.

Regardless of age?

Yes, years or 11 older. 12

Just at least at 13 these younger ages, Councilwoman Reynolds Brown and 14 I -- and Councilman Ortiz has a couple younger 15 children. Now, I know that my daughter has to basically -- I think they have to bring a note to school that she has -- I don't know -- had a physical or had some series of tests. This is an elementary school child. Are there any physical exam requirements of older students on an annual basis?

Yes. At the 9th grade level students are required to enter high school with a current physical. 457 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

What about after they get in high school?

No. With the exception of students who participate in particular activities, such as sports.

Sports?

Yes.

I mean, 9th grade you're what? 14?

14, 15.

14, years old. 13

Has there been any 14 thought or is there a discussion in the academic 15 community, the pediatrician community about any of this kind of required testing for slightly older young people who I would hope -- who I would think might be involved in a few more activities than a 9th grader?

There is talk about not mandating such testing, but making the testing -- just a general physical examination available. In fact, in the budget we're looking at the whole issue of health care support system-wide. There's going to be major efforts to 458 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE register young people for the comprehensive health insurance program so that we can get them physicals. And there is money in the budget right now, in this budget for our healthy kids, healthy minds initiative, which focuses actually on the zero to eight kids. But we have talked about using this unprecedented partnership with the Department of Health and the STD testing and treatment, we have talked about using this as a vehicle for providing more comprehensive health care out-reaches to our students. In fact, we've talked about in all the new high school designs there will be health care clinics. And in many of the major high school renovations, we'll be also contemplating literally having health clinics. Not having health clinics for the dissemination of anything controversial, but having health clinics where kids can go in and get physicals. One of the things that we did in our previous life was we would always identify high schools and health clinics in high schools and then we would partner with the hospital and the hospitals 459 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE would come in. And as long as we built out the clinic, the hospitals would willingly run the clinics because they get medicaid reimbursement for the majority of the cases. With area hospitals 6 and medical institutions, we think that we can very 7 easily establish that same relationship. 8 So that's a long answer to your short 9 question. But the answer is yes. We're not looking 10 at mandating, but we are looking at making those 11 services available. 12

Two last questions. 13 Maybe three. This is not a question. 14 The information you provided us on the 15 capital improvement plan, at least as a part of my 16 request from yesterday -- and I know you provided us 17 with a listing by Council district. What I think 18 might be helpful to all of us is if every school in 19 the district -- not your district, but our 20 respective districts -- are listed with whatever the 21 capital improvement plan is or is not. 22

Sure. 23

But that there is a 24 full and complete listing of, again, all the 25 or 25 so schools that I have in the 4th District. And 460 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE other members have probably about the same number. But that you could see every school on a list and what is anticipated to happen in that school over the next few years. On the capital improvement plan, what's your anticipated debt service for that?

We won't peak out until -- when is it? In terms of maximum debt service, in either 2007 or 2008.

Because you have a sliding scale, starting low and going high.

I'm going to get you the number. What will happen is we will not peak until five, six, seven years down the road. Let me also point out in I think 2010, 2011 our debt service from other obligations actually begins to dip, and not insignificantly, which is going to give us a window of opportunity to either reduce our debt service or to issue even more bonds.

Why don't you get us --

We'll get you a breakdown.

-- a full debt service schedule over the next 20, 30 years. 461 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE

Absolutely. And let me also, just as a footnote to that, that debt service also assumes what we're going to be able to get subsidized through the state PlanCon. That's the school construction reimbursement program, which generally reimburses to the tune of 20, percent. 8

20? 9

Is it 20 percent? Well, it 10 can go higher than that depending. But on the 11 average, about 22 percent. It can go as high as 30 12 percent depending on the project. 13

One last question 14 I'd like to follow up with you and work closely on. 15 I believe in your testimony you talked about a 16 summer job program, which, one, I'd like to get a 17 little more information on. 18 And secondly, I mentioned to you 19 yesterday my interest in working with the district 20 on some amount of incentive, which might be small, 21 medium or large, but some amount of incentive to the 22 business community in the creation of generally something called a youth job tax credit, which might work as an additional incentive to business people to hire young people, whether it's primarily during 462 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE the summer or even during the course of the school year. But certainly in the summertime a lot of young people available don't necessarily have jobs or find themselves reverse commuting out into the far away suburbs, into malls and shopping centers and the like, when certainly there must be some job opportunities here in Philadelphia.

Absolutely. Once again, for the first time the entire city has comprised a team to look at job opportunities for youth during the summer. As a part of that team, the school district is represented and is apprised of all of the activities. The entire movement is attempting to secure upwards to seven or eight thousand jobs throughout the entire city. Of that seven or eight thousand, we anticipate that the school district would do upwards to 1,000 to 1500 of those jobs. We are working collaboratively as a group to look at all the tax credit benefits.

Let me make sure I'm understanding that. You're saying that you anticipate the school district would be an employer 463 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE of 1,000 to 1500 out of the pool of 8,000?

Yes.

Is that what you're saying?

Yes, sir.

All right. I just wanted to make sure.

In addition to that, we are looking at ways to ensure that employers are aware of the tax break opportunities that may be available to them. There are two in particular that we're looking at. The first one is the education improvement tax credit. And the second is the Neighborhood Assistance Act, which allows a certain amount of tax credit for companies that give donations to other entities which will then employ students.

Are these federal or state programs?

Those are both federal.

Both federal. So you get to take something off your federal taxes? 464 03/25/03 - COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE