IVANHOE, Minnesota (STPNS) -- IVANHOE?It took two tries to pass a motion that increases the amount of money that is paid by each district to the other district for tuitioning students at the regular monthly Ivanhoe School Board meeting held in the ITV Room of the Lincoln HI High School in Ivanhoe last Thursday night, June 15th.

In 2005-2006, both the Ivanhoe and Hendricks School Boards approved a resolution to pay the other school district $4,000 per student in a tuitioning agreement, under the assumption that the two school districts could later change the amount if they saw that the amount needed to be increased.



The Hendricks School Board passed a resolution on a 4-2 vote to increase the cap number from $4,000 per student  to $5,000 per student at the regular monthly board meeting of the Hendricks School Board in April.

?Presently both boards are over the $4,000 cap and the Hendricks Board passed a motion to increase the cap from $4,000 to $5,000 at their April meeting on a 4-to-2 vote,? explained Ivanhoe School Board Chair Norm VanOverbeke. ?[John] Olson and [Nick] Citterman opposed. One district or the other is going to pay more to cover the overage.?

After Ivanhoe School Board member Amy Clarke made a motion to increase the cap from $4,000 per student - per building to $5,000 per student - per building, VanOverbeke said, ?I have no idea where we are going with this, we?re going against stubbornness [of two members of the Hendricks School Board]. I?m voting no ? we should not increase it.?

?We need to pay more close attention to it,? said Clarke.

Lincoln HI Business Manager Mary Swenson said that the shoe may be on the other foot next year.

After further discussion on whether or not to increase the amount of the cap by $1,000 from $4,000 to $5,000, the Ivanhoe School Board voted to raise the cap, and the vote failed on a three-to-three tie. Voting against the motion were school board members VanOverbeke, Milan Sik and Gene Panka; and voting in favor of raising the cap were school board members Clarke, Mary Dwire and Linda Sorensen.

Next on the agenda was selecting a date to meet with SGN Architects of Minneapolis about a plan that SGN has come up with to build a new addition on the high school in Ivanhoe.

At an Ivanhoe School Board meeting in May, Ivanhoe Interim Superintendent Dick Orcutt had told the Ivanhoe School Board that the roof on the 1923 building needs to be completely torn off and replaced. Orcutt said that the roofing company that did the work 14-years-ago, put a foam overlay over the old roof that was leaking and over the years the foam has been deteriorating and as a result he said the roof leaks.

At the May 18th school board meeting Orcutt told the Ivanhoe School Board that he had a telephone call from Gary Nyberg of SGN and he said that he has drawn up plans on tearing the old 1923 building down and building a new portion [building] that will connect the two other buildings. Orcutt said that the architectural plans call for building a new L-shaped building connecting the 1957 wing to the building that houses the Library, FACS and Industrial Arts classrooms. Orcutt added that he didn?t know how money it would cost to replace the old roof with a new one, but he said that it would cost a lot of money to fix.

If the school board decides to go with SGN?s plan, Orcutt said during the May 18th meeting that once the L-shaped building is built, classes would be held in the new building, while the 1923 build is demolished and removed.

During last week?s meeting VanOverbeke said that SGN was in St. Cloud on Thursday and were unable to attend the Ivanhoe School Board meeting.

VanOverbeke said that he could call SGN and tell them that June 22nd would work before the meeting with the board chairs, vice chairs and the superintendents of Ivanhoe and Lake Benton meet.

He said that he invited the board chair, vice chair and the interim superintendent of Hendricks to the meeting with Ivanhoe and Lake Benton on Thursday, June 22nd.

?I suggested that we invite Hendricks to find out where they are at,? VanOverbeke said.

?We have to come up plans for long-term and short-term. We have to come up with a plan on what to do in the future. We can?t survive on our own. Not one of us can. We must get together,? said Dwire.

Panka said that, ?We are losing students because we haven?t made a decision at this table.? Sik echoed Panka?s comments.

During graduation Panka said that he had heard comments from parents who said that they are tired of the way our school boards are acting, and they wished that the Ivanhoe and Hendricks school boards could get along.

?All that it is, it?s a fight between 12 people, between both boards,? said Lincoln HI Teacher and Lincoln HI - Lake Benton Joint Athletic Director Craig Midtaune, speaking as a citizen.

?Your number one goal should be for all three school districts [Ivanhoe - Hendricks and Lake Benton] to have one superintendent, one leader,? said Lincoln HI High School Dean of Students Garry Leuning. ?We need one person to lead us down the same direction.?

Midtaune said that the average length of stay that a Lincoln HI superintendent stays at Lincoln HI is three-years. ?We [Lincoln HI] were paired together for all those years and now we?re in a tuitioning agreement where we tuition our students back and forth and the longest period of time that a superintendent has stayed at Lincoln HI has been three-years,? Midtaune said. ?Why is that. It?s because both [school] boards [Hendricks and Ivanhoe] play the superintendent against each other. You [all three school districts - Hendricks - Ivanhoe and Lake Benton] need to have one superintendent.?

?This is why we need to have all three districts represented at the meeting on June 22nd,? said Dwire.

?There is no more patience left in the communities, but tomorrow is going to come. We need to include all three school boards. I feel 100 percent with Garry with Garry. We need one leader. We need one superintendent to lead us,? VanOverbeke added.

Dwire added, ?Parents need to stand up and voice their concerns, they need to stand up and voice their opinions.?

?If we don?t try, we?re not going to get any answers,? VanOverbeke said. ?We need to have all three [school] boards involved.

?Maybe we need to involve the public more. We need more input from the public,? Dwire said. VanOverbeke said that there seems to be more mistrust now than ever.

?Could we add to that group a few parents and make it kind of like an advisory board,? Dwire added.

?Give me some dates for SGN?? asked VanOverbeke.

VanOverbeke added, ?We?ll meet in a work session with the board chairs, vice chairs and the administration, which are the superintendents on June 22nd, here in Ivanhoe [ at the Lincoln HI High School I.T.V. Room] at 6:00 p.m.?

The Ivanhoe School Board picked June 29th as their first choice to meet with SGN. The second choice they picked was June 27th and their third choice was June 26th.

VanOverbeke said that he would call Gary Nyberg of SGN and give SGN those dates to choose from to come to Ivanhoe and meet with the Ivanhoe School Board about SGN?s plans for building a new L-shaped building that would connect the 1957 wing with the building that houses the high school library, FACS and Industrial Arts classrooms; and tear down the old 1928 building.

Under personnel, the Ivanhoe School Board approved the yearly contracts starting July 1, of Nancy Blanchette, administrative assistant; Brian Fleahman, assistant custodian; Lenny VanOverbeke, head custodian and p.m. route bus driver; Mary Swenson, business manager; and Diane Bunjer, para-professional/librarian.

During the approval of the Community Education Director, Swenson said that because Mr. Hollom resigned as an elementary teacher because he took another teaching position elsewhere, Hendricks continued his contract as Community Ed Director through August. ?So, I recommend that you continue his community ed director contract through August,? Swenson said.

?You would hate to have the summer rec. program dropped in the middle of the summer if he would say that he is done,? Dwire added.

?Maybe we need to have another community ed meeting,? VanOverbeke said. Clarke said that she thought that the community ed contract could be tabled until the next meeting.

Jessica Jordahl?s social studies contract was approved at .625 and the approval of the head varsity coaches for the combined Lincoln HI - Lake Benton  fall and winter sports programs  for next school year  were approved. Kelli Kurth of rural Hendricks was approved to coach volleyball and Jim Hall of Lake Benton was approved as the new head football coach. Approved as the head boys basketball coach was Dave Busselman of Lake Benton and Steve Krause of Lake Benton was approved as the new head girls basketball coach.

The Ivanhoe School Board then approved the resignations of Katie Kilichowski as the high school business teacher; and Alan Panka resigned all of his extra-curricular assignments including knowledge bowl coach, lifesmarts coach, head track and field coach, assistant football coach and all basketball coaching positions. Alan Panka will continue his job as Lincoln HI junior high and high school math teacher.

The Ivanhoe Board then acted on Lincoln HI  Band Instructor Joel Nelson?s contract. VanOverbeke said that the total band instructor position next school year will be a .625 position and of that, .25 will be picked up by the Hendricks School Board. VanOverbeke said, ?We are offering a .625 position for band and .625 for high school social studies.

The Ivanhoe School Board then approved its preliminary budget for fiscal year (FY) 2007 on a five -to - one vote with Sorensen opposing. The preliminary budget for FY ?07 for Independent School District #403 - Ivanhoe has total expenses of $1,977,655; and revenue of $1,824,468; which will put the district into deficit spending in the amount of $153,197.

?I don?t have the fund balance figure yet,? Swenson said. ?The fund balance will be close in covering the projected deficit. The soonest that I will have the fund balance figure is sometime in July.?

During the business manager?s report, Swenson reported that comparing cash flow from last year to the current year that will end on June 30th, 2006, ?the cash flow is down which is not surprising. Basically our expenses are higher this year than last year. Higher fuel costs, the consolidation vote with Lake Benton, bus repairs and the communication mailings by Linda Schroeder are all extra expenses this year,? she said.  

The school board then approved the resolution of establishing dates for filing affidavits of candidacy for school board elections.

VanOverbeke said that filing for school board opens July 4th and closes at 5 p.m. on July 18th. ?There is a $2.00 filing fee and the General Election will be held November 7th, 2006,? VanOverbeke said.

VanOverbeke added that there will be three board members from the Ivanhoe School Board who will be up for re-election. They include Board Members: Gene Panka, Amy Clarke and Linda Sorensen.

Towards the end of the meeting, Swenson said that the cap has to be resolved before the board chairs, vice chairs and superintendents of the three school boards [Ivanhoe-Lake Benton and Hendricks] meet, ?because it looks bad,? she said. ?It?s like an albatross. If you [the Ivanhoe School Board] can?t approve the $5,000 cap, it?s going to create problems.?

After further discussion on the cap, Clarke re-introduced her motion that she made earlier during the meeting to increase the cap from $4,000  - to - $5,000 ? per-student ? per-building.

Following the second vote, the motion to increase the cap by $1,000 passed on a four - to - two vote. Dwire, Clarke, Sorensen and Sik voted in favor of increasing the cap from $4,000 - to - $5,000 and voting in opposition to the motion were VanOverbeke and Panka