Jeff Reed and Tyler Dickey from Blue & Company presented the audit findings to the Board for the fiscal period ending June 30, 2018 and noted that it was a clean audit. The Supplemental Audit Report is required by Marion County, which has different guidelines that need to be followed.

They did note one item, which is the same they noted last year and Management has put in place a process to remedy that.

The last three pages of the letter is where you would find communication if Blue & Co. had any issues. This is a required statement as well. If they had any difficulties with management or internal control deficiencies those would be listed here and there were none.

The Board took a vote to approve the Audit and it was unanimous.

Through the walk through today we will review the two year plan so that we can approve this document.

Rachelle thanked everyone for the time and effort put in to this process. She felt they did a really good job summarizing the overall goals. Pages 5 - 8 go into detail of the strategies. Today the focus will be on goals 1 and 2 and we will review 3 and 4 at the next meeting.

One of the tactics for Goal #2 is 2.1-Determine the Right Organizational and Partnership Model. Which means we will need to develop a taskforce and this one is really important because we have to determine the path forward for Hope Academy. The Charter comes up for renewal and we have to push forward to be prepared.

The strategic plan was agreed upon and adopted.
 

We want to talk about the Charter renewal timeline. The Governance Committee met with Patrick McAllister of the Mayor's office, a meeting that was at their request. They want to help us understand what the process is for renewal and the options on the table. In December there is a renewal report that goes to the mayor. Our charter renewal is coming up in June 2020 and the process to renew begins in Spring of 2019. We can seek a renewal of the existing charter or seek a new charter. They are willing to help us whichever way we choose to go.  They pointed out that we are located in Indianapolis but we're not seeing a lot of Indianapolis kids. I sensed that they want us to be located within the boundaries of Marion County. Being located within the IPS district would allow us to get a higher level of diversity that will add on to the base ADM.

Patrick has indicated he would work with us to become an innovation school, rather than a charter school. He also recommended that we talk with Herron School, which Rachelle has done. They are very supportive of our charter and our mission and they want to see us succeed. They also let us know that they have resources available to us and that there are pros and cons to each of the different models of schools.

If we go for a new charter we would have the Fall and Spring application process. In July 2019 a letter of intent needs to be submitted for a new charter versus June 2019 for a renewal. One piece of a new charter would be a change from a STEM program to a liberal arts program. The mission stays the same but our partnership may change. 

The mayor's office sees our location as a challenge, we are outside of the IPS district. If they can keep the students within the IPS district that might open up transportation for us but would that open up to us a pipeline of students? We could either be an IPS school or a 501(c)(3) independent charter.  We could look to start an arrangement with an IPS. Patrick thought that the Mind Trust would be willing to come talk to us. We thought we would have them meet with the Governance Committee and the Committee Chairs from each of the Hope committees and have a deep dive with the Mind Trust. We would like for them to present to us what all the different models look like and what we should be thinking about with each of the different models. This is too large of a task for the board members to undertake, this is something that the Mind Trust could present to us to help move us through this process with important knowledge.

We have to notify the Mayor's office by May 2019 to indicate our intent to renew so we need to have a recommendation by the January board meeting narrowed down to a couple of options. It sounds like we are leaning towards a new charter. If we add a different partner to it, if we have a new location, then we're looking at a new charter. We can't renew a charter that shows that Fairbanks is a partner for the next 7 years and the current model isn't financially viable.

The strategic plan focuses on whether we request a new charter or request a renewal. We have a meeting in December and at the February board meeting we need to have a very good understanding of what the recommendation will be.
 

L. Gagyi advised that we currently have 29 students. She reported on the substance abuse side that marijuana and alcohol are the biggest issues, but they do have kids with issues with opioids.

In November they will have an annual Thanksgiving dinner and would love to see the board members there.

A lot of different agencies have come to speak to the kids and that is very empowering.

On Saturday we will go to the Mayor's group and one of our students will be speaking at that event.

R. Gardner went over some of the work that Nick LeRoy has been focusing on with her and M. Giesel, which are the main sources of referrals for Hope Academy. They have identified the focus of who they're going to work with on these points and what they're going to do to engage them to the point of referral.

She also reviewed the list of schools that have been identified to target to develop or deepen a relationships with.
 

M. Manlove stated that there is nothing more to add, because the Marketing Committee has been focusing on what Rachelle just spoke on.

K. Turner stated that the discussion focused on the next charter plan. They reviewed the board tenure and they will talk to individuals that have terms coming up.

C. Kenney stated that the Taste of Hope activities are well underway. They have a goal of having 20 restaurants participate, up from the 8 they had last year and they have already secured 8. The attendance goal is to double the number to 400 up from 200 last year. They have added a parent to the TOH board and she has brought a lot of energy to the committee.

The date for Taste of Hope is February 24th. It will be held at the Recovery Center on both floors this year.

As part of the event, we have awarded the Face of Hope. The board has been asked to offer nominations for that award and the development committee has vetted those nominations and we bring to you our recommendation of Congresswoman Susan Brooks as our Face of Hope. She has visited here several times, Hope Academy is located in her district. She is an advocate for issues and policy making that is beneficial to substance use disorder. The opiate crisis is one of her top focuses. A motion to nominate Congressman Susan Brooks was put forth and she was nominated as the Face of Hope.
 

Our last meeting was around the strategic plan. Outside of that we put together a survey to see how well we are serving our students.

J. Shopp shared that we have already talked about the changing of the timing of the payments from the state and how that would affect our cash flow. We talked about KPIs and agreed to keep those the same.Fairbanks has taken no official action to amend the MOU but they are aware of the impact in the payment timeline by the state.
 

J. Shopp reviewed the KPI sheet for September. There was capital spending this month for i-pads, but funding is fairly well spread out through the year other than that. The Grants variance is because of timing and when funds can be released.

We do have cash through the end of August because we received our Alternative Education funding up front and we'll see that spend down over the next few months.

We're behind about $50,000 in operating income and that's due to grants, which are below budget. Our operating expenses have been below budget so we're on the right track but we have a lot of timing issues that will catch up with us over the next few months.