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He listed the spending limitations they face this year because of the State budget. They have instituted a hiring freeze on all local and State paid positions except teachers, principals, and assistant principals; they are strictly enforcing expenditure deadlines; they have placed a freeze on out-of-state travel unless approved by the Superintendent; they have placed a freeze on new travel plans for this fiscal year and they have placed restrictions on expenses incurred for internal meetings. Regarding collaboration, he made reference to a cover memo and statistical backup on the student collaboration survey. There is some interest from the students in taking advantage of opportunities outside of the school system. Regarding collaborating on purchasing certain items, there is some interest from the Institute of Government in doing a study on this possibility. The School Facilities task force is studying and will report on citing and planning new facilities. He gave his definition of a budgetary mandate, "A funding requirement created by a Federal or State directive, enrollment growth, or increases in regulated costs such as utilities." He gave some examples of past mandates such as salary increases, changes in student-teacher ratios, and increases in health insurance costs. He explained the process they followed in doing their budget. He provided the schools with a projection of their budgets with no increases and required them to look at how they could reallocate those resources to meet their goals. If they could not meet the goals, then they had to justify any budgetary increases that they were requesting. They presented all of the requests from schools and departments to the board at the planning conference in February. The requests totaled an amount very similar to what they have seen every year - somewhere in the $5-6 million range. They agreed that they would submit a budget that was based upon the same per pupil County appropriation that was in the current budget. He said that their requests were na fewer this year, but they were trying to be sensitive to the situation that the County was in and put a restraint on their request. This is partly why the request is lower than the Manager's recommendation. The budget request includes $576,192 for growth and $411,700 for recruitment, retention, and development of quality staff. This would have been above the per pupil appropriation, so they made some internal budget reductions in support services and instruction services for a total of $866,292 net increase in revenues. The net increase in revenues proposed by the County Manager would be $1,098,691. Neil Pedersen said that the funding of the per-pupil and the recommendation to reduce the district tax by one cent will increase their per pupil amount by $24.00. Regarding the additional $232,399 that would be allocated to the school system, he outlined the possible State budget reductions based on preliminary Senate reports which would total $393,287. Regarding State employee pay increases, he is not sure if any increases are planned but they have not planned for any salary increases. Their fund balance of $2,032,747 or 5.45°~ is right on target. After all bills have been paid, they project their fund balance to be a little over $2 million dollars. The recurring capital reductions totaled $572,418 and a list is in the printed presentation in the Permanent Agenda File in the Clerk's office. He feels that once the budget process is aver that they should review their pay-as-you-go CIP budget and they may come back with a recommendation to change some of the funding for certain items in their Capital Investment Plan (CIP). Chair Jacobs said that the budget does not look any better, at this point, far next fiscal year and he appreciates both school systems working with the County. Commissioner Halkiotis made reference to collaboration and joint operation of services and said that transportation right now is coming out of one revenue stream in Raleigh for bath school systems. He is wondering if there could be an economy of scale for both systems to work together on transportation issues. Regarding child nutrition, Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools have outsourced this for several years to Marriott-Sedeco. He asked if Marriott pays a living wage to its employees. He made reference to outsourcing custodial services and said that the County Commissioners found out that the people under contract were not receiving a living wage or