There were no public comments.

The Office of Inspector General suggested that Mr. Hussey state every year, for transparency and on the public record, that he hosts international students.  This is his 10th year hosting international students; he is hosting three students this year.  Also, Mr. Hussey reminded the Board that his daughter, Stephanie Hussey, has been working at the school on weekends for Youth Services.  
AVID students participated in a coastal clean-up day; 29 students and 2 teachers volunteered on a Saturday.  They were part of the overall team of volunteers who collected 35,580 pounds of trash at 73 sites. 
Mr. Zahur's physics class participated in a 2-dimensional project during lunch, using slingshots and spongeballs to test angles and velocity.
Mr. Hussey will be meeting with Jose Cole-Gutierrez to ask for clarity regarding issues that all conversion charter schools have jointly been having, such as middle school articulation and the oversight requirements.  The goal is to subsequently have a meeting with Mr. Cole-Gutierrez with all conversion schools attending.
Programming for the Spring semester has started.  Juan Alba, assistant principal in charge of counseling, was introduced.  Mr. Alba is in charge of the programming.
Mr. Alba and Ms. Clark have been working with departments to create a more uniform grading and curriculum policies, to create more equity among classes and for students.
Open enrollment lottery is being moved up to November 1st through January 11th, in order to allow us to compete with other charter schools.  The lottery will take place on January 24th, and students will be notified on that day whether they were accepted or put on a wait list.  We will also enroll local students earlier, so we know how many students we can accept through the lottery.  The principal of Hale has agreed to provide numbers earlier.
Mr. Hussey and Mr. Alba will be visiting a number of schools in the area during their high school nights, including Chime Charter, the Multicultural Learning Center, Hale, Millikan, Jordan, Ivy Bound Academy, and Portola.  Mr. Alba shared what happens during these high school nights, and what we are trying to do to distinguish ourselves.
Schools tours will start, two per month starting October and ending in April.  These tours are typically conducted by Mr. Bennett, and we will ask some teachers as well.  Students have not previously been part of these tours, as we do not want to disrupt learning time.  Mr. Archibald shared about the ambassador program at Chaminade, which is conducted by Chaminade students.  The Board asked that Mr. Hussey consider having student participation, whether exceptional students who are TAs or members of Student Council.
The 2018-19 CSD oversight visit will be in April 2019.  However, we have to start turning in documents starting October 5th.  
Regarding the Prop 39 allocations, to date we have received $775,932 in grants; we have spent $783,627.54, for a net cost of $7,695.54.  The Tech Dept. is asking to install 2 new dataports.  LADWP came to the campus on 9/19 for an inspection, and will take up to 30 days to complete the review of the project.  If so, we will receive the final rebate of $256,000 after LADWP's final sign-off.
For facility usage, Mr. Hussey stated that classrooms are rented out at $100 per room, plus utilities (which range from $300-$600) and custodial hours.  For Youth Services, the main gym and small gym, the track, and the football field are all rented out at various rates that are comparable to what LAUSD charges.  All users are required to provide proof of insurance.  Mr. Darby will provide a breakdown of how much income this has brought, broken down into the various facilities.

A total of 63 teachers voted, 86% voted for Gregory Basile.

The revised May and June check registers were presented, with all gaps accounted.  Mr. Kofahl noted that the registers appeared to indicate that we were spending about $15,000 per week on substitute teachers.  Mr. Kofahl asked if there was anything we do to encourage teacher attendance.  That is something that administration has discussed, whether we can offer incentives.  
The register items in blue are those items that were previously in another month's check register, but are being repeated in a subsequent month's register to account for a gap.
Mr. Archibald also noted that there were a manual payroll checks in the registers, and asked how we are making sure that duplicate checks are not being issued.  We would need to create a policy that would ensure that such duplicate payments are not being made.  
Mr. Kofahl asked that, since our payroll company did not get our June payroll checks to us in a timely manner, is ECR being compensated for the time and expense associated with having to rectify this issue by having to manually cut 30-40 payroll checks.  Mr. Darby noted that we have continued to work with EdTec on such issues.
Mr. Silverstein asked who was overseeing ECR's investment of its resources.  Staff and EdTec is asked to look into whether an oversight board could be created to oversee ECR's investments.  

Unaudited actuals were presented last month, but there were some adjustments that were needed.  The adjustments resulted in a reduction in income of @ $1M, due to:  the updated lifetime benefits actuarial report; some expenses that occurred in July and August that were not previously identified; and a bill from LAUSD going all the way back to 2014 for maintenance and operations work orders that were finally reconciled.  The Business Office is still discussing this last item with LAUSD to ensure that it is reconciled correctly.  Mr. Hussey asked why this would not be covered by the approximately $50,000 quarterly for our maintenance account.  
Mr. Darby also gave an update on the tree trimming - the initial work was done on September 15th; the remaining work will be done on October 13th.
Mr. Archibald asked why there is no update aside from the Unaudited Actual Report.  Susan Kim responded that there was an error made in the reconciliation in Netsuite between ECR and EdTec, which the Business Office is working on to correct in time for the next Board meeting.  
The 2017-18 Balance Sheet shows a positive adjustment in the cash balance.  
Mr. Silverstein asked as to where we were in the unfunded liability for the lifetime benefits; Mr. Darby stated that we are about 50% funded now based on current market conditions.  The goal is to be 100% funded in about 15 more years.  Ms. Silverstein questioned whether a committee should be established to oversee how the money was being invested for lifetime benefits.  Mr. Darby is one of the trustees of the lifetime benefits trust, and works with the actuary and the investment company to make sure the money is being properly managed.  The other option is to create a separate Board to oversee the investment account, which may require a change to our Charter petition.  The Board will table creating the committee depending on what impact it may have on the Charter petition.

Mr. Delgado noted that, five weeks into the school year, approximately 77% of teachers are using Canvas now.  Mr. Delgado also discussed August and September technology tickets: 88 tickets submitted, 80 resolved, 8 still open.  Mr. Delgado was asked to provide information as to how long it took to resolve the tickets.  Also, this only reflects tech tickets; other staff will either email or come in to the tech office with issues.
Professional development (PD) is taking place, including this past Wednesday during common planning time, and this Saturday for 4 hours.  There is a 3 month calendar in place for tech training.  Mr. Hussey and Mr. Darby are working to create a budget for the additional PD needed.  Mr. Silverstein questioned out of which budget this additional PD would be deducted; this has to be discussed.
A Promethean Summit is taking place on Saturday, November 3rd from 9 am to 2 pm here at ECR.
The Tech Committee has met and talked about the parameters for an independent IT audit.  The Tech Committee is requesting quotes to look into the infrastructure only, which will include hardware, network security, connectivity, etc.  The budget would be up to $25,000 to conduct the audit.  The Tech Committee will provide the parameters and reach out.  The Tech Committee advised that they were going to reach out to two vendors, NIC Partners and GST; however, as GST has provided goods to ECR, the Board requested that they be not considered.  As such, NIC Partners will be the vendor from whom a quote will be requested.
 

Ms. Rodriguez presented a packet of documents with marketing updates. 
New website is going up shortly, as soon as all stakeholders have an opportunity to provide feedback.
Mr. Takeguma questioned how spirit-building activities for students was designed to increase enrollment, and how to get students involved in such activities.  Ms. Rodriguez replied that she was working with student council for ideas.
Mr. Archibald questioned what the marketing plan was, based on measurable metrics.  Ms. Rodriguez replied that one of her goals was to increase our wait list, from approximately 100 students to 200 students.
Mr. Ryburn asked if alumni was being notified to participate/donate, etc.  Ms. Rodriguez stated that she was having difficulty finding a list of alumni, she has been reaching out to private groups to see if she can obtain this information.  Mr. Lee noted that this information should be kept by the historian of each class, perhaps look through ASB records. 
Mr. Silverstein asked about the grants, and whether Ms. Rodriguez was writing the grants; Ms. Rodriguez replied that she was, and she had reached out to organizations such as Kellogg's and Nissan.  Mr. Silverstein requested that staff look into finding a grant writer(s) who would be paid out of the amount they are able to obtain.
Ms. Rodriguez advised that she was sending donation envelopes out, with a goal of raising $50,000.  In the past, a similar campaign had raised $20,000.

The contract with AEGIS allows for AEGIS to request an increase in the hourly rate paid, to reflect an increase in minimum wage.  The overall increase in cost to ECR if we were to agree to raise the rate by $2.00 per hour, would be about $23,314.  The Board asked how much of the rate we pay AEGIS actually goes to the individual officers, and how much of the increase would go to the safety officers.  It has been noted that there is a concern as to the quality of the guards that we have recently been getting, and part of that may be due to the fact that they are unable to pay a competitive wage versus the increased minimum wave, for the limited hours and available working days.  The Board questioned whether increasing the rate would necessarily improve the quality of the safety officers sent.
Mr. Ryburn advised that he would communicate with the head of the safety officers, Suki Dhillon, to discuss the concerns and whether the issues with current safety officers are being documented in order to increase the quality of service for which we are currently paying.

The campus passed final inspection today.  The next step is to get the Certificate of Occupancy, and then to submit the material revision.  The Board thanked Alan Darby and David Honda and all the others who worked to make this happen.  Mr. Hussey noted that a special meeting is necessary in order to approve the material revision so that it can be submitted to LAUSD before their October Board meeting.