Senate Standing Committee on Education

Hey. Calling to order the Joint Committee on Ways and Means and Education. This morning we're going to hear from the charter schools who will be presenting their supplemental budget requests. Good morning. Good morning.

Aloha. Chair De La Cruz, Vice Chair Moriwaki, Chair Mikado Kim and Vice Chair Kidani. Members of the committees. My name is PJ Foehr. I'm the Deputy Director at the state Public Charter School Commission. I'm here on behalf of Dr. Ed no. Our Executive Director and Commission Chair, Maklubua Alan Castor.

I'm joined by Danny Vasconcellos, our Finance Director, and Diane Goya, also our Early Learning Programs Director. I'm going to share just a few successes related to the work of the commission which aligns to Edn612 and then also the work of some of our charter schools in our portfolio, which aligns to Edn 600.

All right, Danny, there we go.

So just really quickly at a glance, this is the current portfolio as it exists. We have 40 charter schools currently. That's due to the closure of one school this past year and the opening of three new schools. Two of those are pre K only charter schools and one of those being Namahana School in Kilauea, Kauai.

So that's how we get to the number of 40. At this current time, we have 13,000 students just above that currently enrolled in charter schools across the state of Hawaii.

Of that 13,000, the largest demographic that we have is our native Hawaiian population, which is 37, comprises 37% of the enrollment in public charter schools in the state of Hawaii. That also includes that.

That that Native Hawaiian population also includes or the 13,000, the only Kayapuni schools that are on or public schools on the islands of Kauai and Molokai. Yeah, next. Next slide. Skip that. There we go.

So as far as enrollment is concerned, like I mentioned, we've gone up to, you see a steady increase from the inception or the creation of the charter commission in 2014. We've now increased up to over 13,000. We've seen a steep increase over the past two years of almost 1,000 students.

So our public charter schools continue to provide a choice for the people or the parents in the state of Hawaii. We expect that number to continue to grow a bit with our two most recent schools, Kalia Academy in Kalihi and Namahana in Kilauea, Kauai.

They're both on slow growth models over the next couple years going up to the 12th grade. So we expect that number to continue to increase a bit.

Go to the Kalia Academy.

Keep.

There. So the successes, Kademy, which did open last year and is expanding to 12th grade over the next couple years, was identified and did really well in their initial year and was the top performing. That says school statewide. That is not the case. We were corrected. It is the top performing charter school.

They are one of the highest performing middle schools. But I think think Mililani Ike in is the highest performing school. So we, we were corrected on that. But they are the top performing charter school statewide in their first year of existence. We opened the three new charter schools like we said.

Those two, you see Parkway Village Preschool and Waikiki Community Preschool are two preschool only charters and both of them are full with students at this point. We also want to highlight that one of our successes is the ongoing work and the update of our strategic plan to focus on systems.

If you could go back please to the early learning slide there, the key, one of those key successes, we continue to work with the lieutenant Governor and the Ready Keiki initiative to open classrooms for early learning opportunities for students across the state of Hawaii.

That includes those two preschool only charters that you see there, which comprised 10 classrooms. We opened another five classrooms this year year as well. We'll open one more classroom next year and 14 the following year. Those 14 classrooms we're working with closely with SFA. They do involve some new construction and they are on existing charter school sites.

Let me go back to. This slide. So as I mentioned the charter school, one of our successes is the continued revisit of our strategic plan.

You see there the key point being in this middle of the systems, we really continue to look at that goal four and designing systems of continuous improvement, assessing what we're doing, making sure that we're meeting our statutory requirement to authorize high quality charter schools, monitor them and do what's necessary.

The last slide would be just to quickly thank our volunteer commissioners. We do appreciate the work they put in. And then from there we would like to go to table six. Wait, can you go back on one? Sure.

So there's this slide and then you can you go back to your accomplish your successes? So do you do any analysis to see trends on why the clothes, the schools that close?

If there's a consistency or there's patterns of why they close and when people, when some of the schools have success, there are patterns that you see and then how do you make sure you kind of implement those, what you learn from those patterns into the new strategic. Plan, the patterns of the school.

So if there are certain like Things that you, that you recognize. Wow. Every school that we gotta close experiences these same three or four things. And every school that does really well does these three or four things.

And then I'm not sure if you can, if you are able to extract that and include that in your strategic plan. So we can minimize future closures.

Yes.

And then hopefully help other schools succeed.

So as far as patterns are concerned, one of the parts that we've done, and I had deleted these slides from the presentation. That's okay because we have the full presentation. So if we look now, if you look in the presentation, go to the next.

One of the things we'll be putting up to ensure some of that transparency and make sure that we can identify patterns. We do collect data that's used in renewal from the standpoint of identifying patterns.

But there must be some anecdotal, right. Like you think, wow, the principals really need these qualifications or they need these many teachers or the student ratio or the environment. There has to be, you know, I don't know it's anecdotal at this point. But if you, if you ever to track that so we can.

Yeah, you know, then, you know, if they didn't meet those certain, if they didn't have those things that you need to succeed, then don't open. You're not ready yet.

Right. So, okay, that's a two part then response. One of which is as we've been compiling data, it's been in house, we're unveiling and putting up in February public dashboards regarding the three frameworks which we use to monitor school performance. So that'll have academic, financial and organizational.

And I think to your point, the organizational piece may come around about assessing a school's capacity to implement its plan and its contract. So that's. Are they meeting their statutory requirements? Is the governing board asking the right questions, say at a governing board meeting, are they following up on their finances, holding the principal accountable?

Those are pieces that we do collect anecdotally at this point, but we'll be able to put them forward on a public dashboard that has each charter school that you can dive into each charter school's performance.

Okay, so if you were to get ahead of that, then if that seems to be an issue that lots of principals may not have the financing background or skill set, is that a class or some certification that you would require or provide to make sure that you provide assistance ahead of time? Try to stop the train wreck.

So two parts again. One would be the application process, which we're in the middle of now, we worked on last year and improved it. We believe we made it better. We need to continue to make it better.

So the more stringent our application process is to ask those kinds of questions of people who are proposing new schools, we can make sure that we're authorizing schools to open and supporting them, that they open in a successful mode as opposed to finding too many struggles.

Yeah, because the one in Wahiawa was having trouble for several years. Correct. And it's really hard on the families.

So with exist. Yes, it is. It's really hard. And with existing schools, we have stepped up our efforts to monitor governing boards and attend governing Board Meetings to make sure that their oversight is asking the right questions and collecting that data as well. And part of that is putting together governing board resources and training. What I'm.

I'm actually doing that right now with three volunteer governing boards who have joined a work group to assess our practices. And we're out of that. Going to develop some resources that we can share with all governing boards.

And these dashboards will be public facing. So not only are these available to the public, these are going to be available to our governing boards and they should also be the ones going through the different data, data sets that are going to be available.

And as Deputy Director 4 has said, we've been monitoring or we've been trying to work more with the governing boards on that oversight and with the different tools that we'll have available.

This is definitely going to be one of, we hope, our strongest tools that again, we can make available to the boards to say you should be going through the data.

So do you have an accreditation practice. Or charter schools are not required. No. But for you guys, just because if we see schools closing, you would want at least some. And you're trying to monitor.

So can we formalize the monitoring process by actually doing some type of or building out an accreditation system that you guys oversee to make sure that all the different schools are meeting certain standards. So you can see these things way ahead versus waiting for it to fall apart and then now you have to come in and react.

So to address that, part of what we've been doing is systematizing our monitoring practice. So each school gets an annual report of the data that we're showing here, academic, financial and organizational. So. And commissioners receive that as well. So that just as you said, it's not a surprise decision.

We don't suddenly, after five years, show data and a school surprised. Each of those annual reports has areas of strength, but also areas of deficiency that they need to improve on that we've noticed, whether it be meeting organizational framework or underperforming in academics or perhaps at a moderate to higher.

Do they know what all the standards are at the beginning so they can continue to strive for them? Yes, but you don't have a real, you don't have a formal accreditation or even informal accreditation process.

Not accreditation. We have the contract and we monitor the contract performance.

And just to build on that. So two things. One, as you see some, as you monitor it, you see some problems. Do you have training or do you help them so that they do succeed? And secondly, if you are closing, what are you doing with the kids that are in the program?

Do you have an exit strategy that you can assist so that they're not just left out in the cold?

Yeah, especially because it is a hardship for the families.

Correct. Regarding if we notice deficiencies, we continue again, the governing board is the authority over the school directly, like the Director about practices and operational and what to do to correct the issue. We continue to monitor what we've identified as a deficiency. This the authorizer is allowed to provide technical guidance. So we do provide technical support.

But we also. So in other words, working with the governing boards on what good practices for governing boards are. But as far as identifying specific corrective actions, the governing board would work with their Director to put in place the practices to correct what we've pointed out as deficiencies.

We wouldn't as the authorize to go in and tell them how to correct it.

Yeah, but you would have a fund or does the governing board have a Fund for training professional development so that you can prevent the closure if possible through, you know, helping the either the faculty or the Administration in terms of really providing the right kind of service.

That would be up to each school to allocate the funds to do that. Our office through EDN612 functions on our staff and the supports we provide, whether it be technical assistance or monitoring so we can gather the data and let them know how their performance is from EDN 600, the per pupil allocation.

The that is where governing boards then authorize the how they use their funding and where they allocate it to.

You may want to relook at that because if they're individually looking at training, then there's no consistent training versus if you guys develop a training that everyone needs to at least participate or attend, then there's consistency in training.

But there's no commission policy on training.

Boards or teachers or principals. Teachers.

No. That. So each school is Their own in state agency. So they, they conduct their own professional development related to their mission. It's not.

The skill is not there that's the problem. Right. And so they're the. When you have skill, at least you.

But, but it can't be a condition of their, their charter.

Each of their contracts has performance data that they need to achieve. It's, it's. You're right, it's, it's not across the board. Yeah. It's expensive then for the charter schools. Correct.

But is there, is there an opportunity for you guys to share with the charter schools some of the performance evaluations so that you prevent those schools that are struggling from having to do it on their own?

Because if there's a step ladder or something that they can look at and you share it with the charter schools, it would be helpful to them so that they don't make the same mistakes.

One of the things we're doing, we're currently in the renewal process for 13 of our charter schools. And in this renewal process, one of the items we just almost released under our current charter contract is a performance report. So it does take the data from the term of the contract. So usually that's about four years of data.

Right. It's hard to get the data for the current year, but four years of data are collected and presented in this performance report. And then this report is then given to the charter school and its governing board as part of the renewal materials. So the schools as well have the data, have the information the.

That the commission will be utilizing in terms of making renewal decisions and going forward. Part of the monitoring process that deputy Director for has mentioned is that we do have different teams out at the charter schools on an annual basis.

Our performance frameworks team that monitors the contract and the three frameworks that make up the contract are out at the schools at least twice a year physically. So that's a chance for them to go out, talk with the school Director, talk with governing board. They'll even talk with financial staff, with SASAs.

Yeah.

The only thing is it's all talking.

No formal process.

So is there a website you can share with all the charter schools of ideas or missteps that happen and you don't without naming the school that you know so other schools can see.

They did name one school so we can just be transparent about that. We did what? There is at least one school we know publicly that closed. Yes. Yeah. So if you were to refer, if you were to relate her questions to at least that one school. Well, how do you Use the, the lessons learned.

What are the reports that were generated so that you could share that. Do you even have like a newsletter for all the, the, your, a commission newsletter that kind of goes over training.

And we do a monthly newsletter that we do provide, as you know, to our subscribers as well as most charter schools. The other item we do have is our commission general business meetings. We do have the materials readily available. They're posted with our agenda. So we create submittal reports.

So when we were going through the unfortunate non renewal of Kamalani, all the different reports that the commission used in making its decision and you know, coming to that decision are readily available to the public.

You guys are old enough where I think it's time to mature even a little more.

Thank you.

In regards to some of these more formalized processes and if you, you look.

At consistency in some standards. So if you're looking at performance and you're actually evaluating and you can, you can have training that you could develop, professional development that you can send these people to and it's consistent and not just I'm going to, you know, hire this person or hire that person.

So I think that's what we're looking for so that you can really elevate.

Elevate.

Yeah. And support the schools being successful.

Yeah, we probably have started that maybe more on the, I want to say administrative and practical side. We do have a annual training session in April. Either schools are, can either come in person or participate remotely. But we'll bring together things like working with the DOE systems. We'll have ethnics discussion there as well.

So we've I think started maybe the rudimentary items that you're looking at. But in terms of let's say formal governing board training, I know that's something we've been looking at and thinking about. And again, Deputy Director Poor has been sort of leading that charge, so he might have more.

I just want to point out though, the weighted student formula for charter commission is slightly different than the weighted student formula for doe. So I think the dollar per pupil is little higher. Right. Because you're based on the, the charter. The formula includes Edn 100200300 and 400.

But not all of those monies go directly to the students at DOE in those, those four program IDs. But you get the, the formula allows you to have a weighted student formula based on those 444 doe. Even though they don't spend it all on students. Correct.

So that's where if you took some of that money since it's like slightly inflated for the commission to do these more overall things to help the system? I think that would be prudent.

I think that's something we can definitely work with the legislatures and education Committee on going forward. Know the one thing with the EDN 600 allocation, it does go directly to the charter schools.

You should look at that so that you can formalize some of these things with consistency. Evaluation and training is not just educational and professional training for the teachers, but really operations. Right. Training for operations for the governing boards. Yeah. Are the. Are the governing boards all subject to Sunshine Law?

No, in Charter Law 302 they are not subject to Sunshine Law. However, they do have public requirements for posting of agendas and minutes and time frames and that. And that's outlined in 302D12. I believe it's 302D12H.

Okay. Is there a requirement on certain items that should be on an agenda throughout the year at some point throughout the year, like the evaluation or training opportunities, financial numbers and there should. That way at least it's forced to be public.

Okay.

Versus just this, you're writing them a letter and it's never really required to be at any meeting.

Okay, I hear what you're saying.

Closure and what your procedure is. Do you have that formalized?

Yes, we do. We have a closure protocol that's in.

Place to the students in the program when you close.

It depends on how the closure is structured or goes. If a school does something egregious and has to be closed immediately, we have processes in place to notify the parents, be able to help and work with the school and the parents to get them placed. This past closure that took place went over the course of five months.

We identified the school closing in January, closed by June. And we were able to work with the schools around in the area and with the current school staff to make sure all the students had a place. Parents obviously have the choice to go where they wish to go with their children.

And then we worked with Department of Education to make sure cumulative folders were sent to the appropriate schools.

And so we have a process in place to work not only with the school, but with the DOE and to make sure parents have all the information necessary for surrounding schools so they can choose their next step for the children.

I believe was 2017, approximately seven years. Seven years.

At what point did you alerted that.

Well, I believe we identified them for non renewal years prior or four years ago.

And then it went through an appeal process with the Board of Education and we were asked to offer Them a new contract term and we did for two years. So it was. They were in operation for four years.

Was there any harm done to the students during that period of time?

Academic performance that we could see the data came in pretty midland. It wasn't. They weren't on the highest quality, but it wasn't also our lowest performing school academically.

And the area based on parent testimony during some of the governing Board Meetings and processes is that they love the school and that it met their kids needs in that area. So academically we didn't see that. That's again to senator's point, that's more anecdotal data than say formal.

But during our monitoring processes they didn't flag highly for academic low performance. It was more financial. Financial challenges.

Okay, it is in that situation. But in others it could be harm to the students in the meantime. Right. While you're mulling over or trying to get it closed for four years and if students could be harmed in that in the future, I think we need to look at.

Correct. And that is to the point why we're really making sure we can get academic performance data public so that everyone knows what we're looking at. The school can see it. It's all public facing data. You don't have to go digging for it.

You can go onto our website and you'll be able to identify a school and see what the performance is so that there aren't any surprises and that commissioners, the public, anyone can look at that. That's a good point. Pardon?

We can go online and see the performance.

We can ask if so just that there's so much information. How do you find it? You know, some sometimes.

So that's correct. So for the closure. So in this case I would assume that it was a clean closure. You said it was financial issues. So what if you know a charter school ends up with a huge amount of debt, who assumes that debt does that come back to the state?

We have to work with not only the school, but we also work with in this case, Department of the Attorney General. They'll handle or they'll take the lead on looking at any potential liability issues that come up. And we usually take our instructions in terms of priority.

But I guess what is the mitigation strategies? Right? Like in theory you're supposed to be getting these compliance reports. I would assume they're not filing it. That could accumulate and what do we do?

Or that could be potential reasons for closure or non renewal. No, exactly.

But if it takes multiple years for us to eventually close it down.

We do monitor their performance on a quarterly and annual. So they do submit quarterly reports and our schools are generally very good about getting the reports in if it comes late. It's not usually very late. Right.

Part of the closure protocol is there's a point in time where the commission gets access to their bank accounts and makes sure that we're able to monitor the funds in the bank accounts and we also have make sure that we can pay off all debtors and creditors. We get a list of that.

So part of the closure process is identifying what bills are outstanding and making sure there's enough money in the bank accounts to allocate for that. So that's part of the process. If there isn't enough. That's a question that then we begin to work with the Department of Attorney General and find out what we can do.

But I would hope that we would never get to that. Right. Because then your reporting requirements should be valid enough.

Our intention. That's why we try, we keep up on those, those quarterly financial.

So everyone in the system is compliant?

Yes, yes. Right now that's.

So is there anyone, are there schools that you are concerned about that are. What's that number?

One of our slides? No, no, no. The financial framework slide. Keep going back. There. So we have a risk assessment model in place to monitor the finances for our schools. You can see that the schools, the majority of them are in the low and acceptable.

The one school that's in a high risk at this point is our newest school or Julia Academy, which has only been open for one year. So they're still there. Some of their numbers aren't growing yet due to their student population. So they're still young.

That number should move more towards the acceptable and low over the next two years as they add students and we monitor what that ratio is. I can say having attended their governing Board Meetings, their governing board monitors this closely.

They do it in their governing Board Meetings and they go over their finances in detail, including their year to dates, budgets, cash on hand, etc.

What kind of financial reports do you. Get from each of the schools?

Quarterly, we get the school's P and L as well as their cash flow statements. Again, that comes to us quarterly. And then at the end of the year, all charter schools as well as the commission are required to go through a financial audit.

So in some schools, cases, especially those with higher receipt of federal funds, they'll go through the single audit process. So these are outside auditors that the schools as well as the commission have to contract with at what point are.

The parents notified when a school is in trouble?

Immediately.

Yeah. That they can start looking for. In trouble. Yeah. I mean the process takes a while, but.

I'm sorry, I jumped the gun on there. I thought you meant when they're closing brain scenes thing.

You see where it says hi the one. Do they know now that the parents know, hey, your school is in high risk financially.

Not. We don't send them a notice saying their school is in high risk. That's part of why we're putting that financial dashboard on the website so that public can access the governing Board Meetings are open to the public.

We don't send notice to the parent. Okay, so the answer is you guys don't send. Correct. But do you require the school to send. We do not require that point.

I want to know.

Yeah.

When a child's education is not. Not is going to be interrupted, shouldn't the parents know so that they can plan what happens on the day that the school close or it takes a while for them to decide, make decisions. Can they afford something else or does a child now have to go to a public school school?

And I think that's important for parents to know or guardians to know. Right.

You know, I think we got to reassess the accreditation component maybe and formalize some of these processes maybe and then relook at the weighted student formula for you guys so that the inf. I don't want to. I guess I don't want to describe it that way, but I don't know another word.

But for the inflated part of the weighted student formula because it's not equal. Weighted student formula for charter schools is slightly higher than it is for doe. So the difference should go to the commission so that the commission can do the administrative work it needs to.

Okay, that's something. We can definitely work with this.

At least a portion of the difference because then you can do the training and accreditation and the communications.

Okay, but do you have that data when schools close, where those students go and how long it takes them to be placed?

With Kamalani, They. We. We monitor that with them. And we, the students all found homes. We track that. The ones that moved out of state, we have their folders or files here at our. At our office. But we, we track that data. When that's happening, it's it Kamalani. I think who. Who closed before them was Halo Kahi.

So it was a few years ago. So we, we haven't had to do that. Thank goodness. But at the same point we need to understand that and it's part of our process is to track where students go.

I guess what I'm asking. So if help is needed for these students to find other homes. Yes. How long does it take? I mean, are they waiting weeks before their place? They know ahead of time they could start the process to find another school. Do you guys have that data?

We can put that together in terms of the last closure that we went through with Kamalani. I think in this case because the school, I want to say accepted their non renewal and worked with the commission and were able to wind down and close out the school year.

You know, the children were then, you know, the students were able to finish up at Kamalani and as and because they knew they weren't, the school was not going to be open the following year. Again, worked with the DOE area schools as well as with other charter schools that parents and students were potentially interested in.

So it is something that the commission as well as the school itself worked with their students on.

You said they accepted the non renewal. You don't have the authority to close the school and say these are, these are not criteria not being met. You're going to close the school. They have to accept a non renewal. Or can they?

The commissioners can authorize the non renewal so they don't meet their performance. There is an appeal effort or option that they can appeal that decision to the Board of Education. They chose not to.

The prior time when the commissioners approved the non renewal for Kamalani, they appealed to the Board of Education and the Board of Education gave us the choice of continuing on a contract or offering a new contract for a term decided by the commissioners. So there's an appeal process.

That's what they can appeal that decision to the Board of Education this time they chose not to. That's what he means by accepting the decision of the commissioners. And so they worked with us to close the school over time.

Okay, so they don't have any ads then table 6 is correct. You know, but their weighted student formula will be based on the ADS we put into one EDN100200300400. So their budget could still change based on us. Any changes to DOE's budget, any impact.

To DOE's budget impacts charter schools? Yes.

And there currently is a reduction in Table 5 to the per pupil. It's about 1.8. But again, that's the Executive budget request. Yeah. So no additions. Yeah. That's just a point in time until we get to the end.

Yeah, yeah.

So at what point did the. When Kamalani did the parents and students know that they were going through the process so they could start looking.

They knew it early in actually the decision, the governing board made the parents aware of the renewal process and the non renewal in December of the prior school year. The commissioners made their decision in January. And so parents were made aware in January.

And through the appeal process timeline, which put them into February parents, it was confirmed to parents by February of that school year that the school would be closing and that they would be working with us to place their students for the following school year. So they had four months.

Okay, so they were able to close out that school year. Correct.

At the school.

Okay, why don't we move on? zero, go ahead. I have a question on table 11 vacancy report. So at the top of your vacancy report, it's for November 30th of 2024. Do you have an updated vacancy report for 2025? And are you actively recruiting to hire for these vacancies?

But that's not your role. Right? The school got to go because the school has to go and recruit themselves.

And our apologies for the typo. This is our updated vacancy list. If you're looking primarily at the preschool teachers, that's part of the Ready Keiki initiative expansion program that we're currently working on from last year. We did have a larger list.

We can provide more details, but we have some teachers in a teacher prep program as well as the new opening classrooms which led to the reduction in this list. So again, but who. Whose responsibility is for the recruitment?

Is it the school or is it the commission? The schools.

Yeah, schools. The schools.

And as I noted in the at. Some point what we could do is write a letter to the each school that we see the high number of vacancies and ask the governing board, what's your plan?

And in the list that we talked about the preschools opening classrooms over the next year, one classroom, next year, 14, the following. These are positions that are cited there. So we're trying to get them into training programs so that they walk in prepared for those classrooms.

Thank you, Chair.

Okay, why don't we move on to travel.

What's the total cost of travel for the year? What's the budgeted amount?

This does. Our travel table wasn't totaled. Just a quick estimate that I give that I can give you right now to be probably in the $70,000 range if it includes our early learning program.

Can you turn that into us? We want to know what the total cost of travel and what the budgeted amount of travel. So did you stay within your budget went over your budget or under your budget.

We'll get that information to the.

Okay, but to put it in context, do you have any oversight on the schools on their travel? No. Yeah, so that one. This one is charter school. Slightly different.

Yeah, but we still want to. Yeah. What? The. What? The travel. And then maybe.

No, we should. But the accountability part is. Is a little awkward.

Maybe you can also tell us what schools was the highest travel travel school.

We can request that information from the school. From the schools, yeah.

Want some data?

Okay. Why don't we recess for just a couple minutes so that libraries can set up? Okay. Recess. Thank you.

Okay. Reconvening. Okay. So next we're going to hear from the libraries who will present their non existent supplemental budget requests. So good morning.

Good morning. Happy New Year. It's so nice to see you all. Thank you. Chair Dela Cruz and Chair Kim and Vice Chair Moriwaki and Vice Chair Kidani and Members of both of the committees, thank you for this opportunity to share with you a brief presentation about our public libraries.

And we do actually have a little bit of a budget request. I'm Stacy Aldridge, state Librarian, and I have with me my awesome colleague Mallory Fujitani, who is the special assistant to the state librarian. So our libraries continue to be community hubs where we create opportunities for all to read, learn and connect.

I want to first thank you all for the support that you gave us for rebranding our libraries in 2022. We did a survey of the public and we heard very clearly from even our users, they didn't know what services were available at the library.

So you have, you gave us funding to do a project to bring awareness and to invite people back into our libraries. And so we launched in May of this past year, 2025, and we've seen some really nice increases in the use of our services.

We had a 44% increase in the number of people who participated in Summer Reading Pro program this year. We've had a 66.4% increase in the use of some of our online databases for learning. We've had an 18% increase in the number of people coming to our programs.

And we've seen a 10% increase in the number of people coming into our libraries. So it is making a difference. We also were able to institute an e newsletter that goes out to all of our users, which is about 400,000 emails.

And we have a 47 to 50% open rate email read rate, which is actually pretty good for a newsletter. And we hear from people because now they really know about our services and programs and we can see little bumps. And the use of ebooks. We've seen a 7% increase in the use of our ebooks.

We also continue to involve our services around digital equity. Libraries are the best place for people to learn how to use all the digital tools that are available and to be able to manage in a digital environment.

And we have, we finished up core classes across the state, digital literacy classes, and we've just implemented our Digital Navigator program, which has Digital Navigator 4 hours twice a week in all of our branches where individuals can sign up for up to 45 minutes for individual help on particular issues that they're having with technology, which is very popular.

And we've had about 520 appointments already in just three months. So people want to have different ways to learn how to use their technologies and it can be as easy as how do I turn off my phone? And we've again, people have found this to be a very important service for them.

We continue to innovate around the foundations that we've built with RFID. We added 7 self check shelving units in our libraries. You can see one over at the Hawaii State Library.

A library patron can come back and just put their books on the shelf and they'll check in right away and, and then they're left there for people to see what else people have checked out.

And then they can check out those materials, which saves time for staff because they don't have to reshelve all the time and patrons can see what's back in the library. We're also looking to expand our services by doing a pilot project with a book locker in Hana.

So the hours of Hana are difficult because it's hard to find people to actually keep the library open. So we continue to look for a new librarian for Hana, but our janitor and one staff Member do a great job.

But to increase those hours of access, we're going to be adding a book locker so people can pick up their holds after hours so they don't have to wait until the library is open. And we continue to build our collections. People still like paper and plastic.

We had about 3.5 million items circulated that were paper, 1.7 million items that were digital. So those are ebooks, audiobooks and magazines. And we were excited to add the Nihau collection of stories in our in our Lehui library. So we're very excited. We were able to expand the stories to Kauai.

And we continue to look at what kinds of programs and services can we implement to create equity of access. And this year, Matt Brown, our manager of our library for the blind and print disabled, started a book club.

So he has a book club for the Members of the library for the blinding print disabled service who come the he can get up to 60 people who are just having a wonderful time getting together and talking about books. There's celebrations every year. We're going to be celebrating Louis Braille's birthday at the end of this month.

And so it's another program. And they also have Dungeons and Dragons, which is pretty amazing. They have special dice that the users can can use to play. So we're continuing to look at expanding our programs for everyone. I wanted to do a light touch on LSTA. That's our federal funding.

So we receive about $1.5 million from the Institute of Museum and Library Services in Library Service and Technology act grants to state funding. It's a formula based program and all the states receive the money if they can continue their match and their maintenance of.

Many thanks to the Attorney General's office who made sure, along with 20 other states, that the program continued because DOGE shut down IMLS in the spring and 21 states went to court and they were able to keep it. So we were able to keep the funding that we have for their fiscal. Federal fiscal year 25.

We have about 400,000 left of those funds that we have to spend by September. We don't know about FY26, so we're just federal fiscal year 26. So we're waiting.

If we don't get the funds, it will directly impact the digital services we have available like New York Times, Mango Languages, some of the more popular online tools that are available to everybody. So that's just a little bit about our LSTA funds.

And as we look ahead, we remain grounded in our mission and inspired by belief that every person who walks through our doors or counts a, or connects with us through our online resources has access to what they need. And they also have a welcoming space to learn, dream and to thrive.

And we're happy to answer any questions, but we also did have two requests of the Governor that were not considered and we would respectfully ask consideration for.

Okay, we just. What are they? Part of the decisions table.

I think so. I think so. Our original request to the Governor was 1.5 million.

Yeah, I see that. For security. For security, yeah. Okay. And then.

And the 5 million for NCIP for planning design at 401. Oh, okay.

No, that's in CIP.

So. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

So you have one operating request.

One operating, one CIP.

And then did you. Have you guys been trying to work with DLE to help?

Yes, we're meeting with them. We, we had to go to a new contract for security because we were having horrible experience with the other security company.

And so when we went to the new company, which is more expensive, we did do a review of all of our libraries to identify the ones that would be less impacted by not having security guards. We, we looked at our data on incident reports, we reviewed everything.

So there are about five libraries that we could pull back on and we've been talking with them now on how can we support the libraries where we don't have security. So we have about 35 libraries that.

So the 1.5 is for 35.

It's in addition to the cost that we have the current budget that we already have. So we need 1.5 added to the base.

And the base is what? 2.9.9.

The contract is about 4.1 and the base is 2.9.

Okay. And you cannot take from any of your special funds.

Funds are designated for certain activities at the libraries. Yeah.

And collections.

Okay. And then the CFP requests. Oh, it's not there. What was it?

5 million for planning and design for four Oahu libraries. Ewa beat, Kalihi Palama and Kaimuki existing libraries.

So pen and design for refurbishment.

Yes, yes. And to upgrade any AC electrical, all the things that haven't been upgraded since they were built.

So we right now we have in the existing biennium budget we have 25 million in lump sum CIP Fund for both 25 million and 26. And 25 million. 27. I have pre existing projects that are ready to go out to bid for in 2026 as well as 2027.

So we pretty much have used up all of our lump sum funds and we actually still have projects that are waiting. Could use some construction funds if we have, if we were had the opportunity to spend more money. They're ready to go. So that 50 million that we have in this biennium budget will not lapse.

Okay. So RIM things I think can be handled under operating though, right?

I'm sorry, Rim. Yeah. Yes, we do have 1.5 million in our budget for repair and maintenance.

Okay. But like for instance, changing out an AC if the lifespan is not longer than 78 years, you don't need to put that in cip. You can use that in cash.

It depends on. Yeah, depends on what we're replacing. Yeah, yeah. And we have tried to do some with the cash when we can.

Questions?

Yeah, no, the CIP lab chair with regards to the Pahoa Library. So the county hasn't moved and also would the funds be lapsed?

Right, those funds are going to lapse because they lapsed and we have to. We would have to encumber them by June 30th of this year. Yes. And the issue with the Pahoa Public Library is that we were going to co-locate on county owned property which they have identified through that planning process.

The county has not yet acquired the land. So because of the title of the cip, which is Pahoa Public Library and transit hub. And we don't do projects, including transportation projects, and we're waiting for the money to purchase the land for that transit hub.

Yeah, well, that was kind of interesting because I thought it was going to. Be on state lands and I thought the community has been having, I think recently about the proposed new library and I didn't attend that, but I'm just kind of concerned that not given the right information. So for many years we.

We had actually a while ago, right.

At the shopping center.

We looked at many different. But there's really no. A lot of the land in that Paho region is on lava zone one and two. And. And so it was. And. Or it's in really poor areas for the.

So you're going to just continue to stay at the shopping center?

Well, we're currently in a high. In high school and we're still working with the county. I think they're still trying to acquire the property.

What was the shopping center that was nearby the green. Is that the one?

Yeah.

This one I remember sending to Ruderman. Is that the same one?

Yeah. Yes.

He took us to parcel for the.

Transit hub is across the street.

Okay.

Yeah. From the shopping center.

Okay. Maybe that's what it was.

Yeah. Yeah. So it's actually an ideal location.

Yeah. Because you have lots of people.

County said they were going to have. They had federal money to purchase the land, but we just don't. We're just not aware of the details on that.

Yeah, but I remember when we had this conversation back then that we talked about that. Well, the one Bill that the Governor had vetoed which would have helped you so you could have did like coffee shop retail and then to pay for some operations, get somebody to do free WIFI.

So I don't know if you know, different Administration, if that's something worth pursuing again for this one. Because it is. That area is next to a shopping center.

Yes, it is. It's. It's all close by. Yeah, I'll check. I'll. I'll work with Senator San Buenaventura on it and ask her if she's aware.

Yeah. Thank you so much.

Julian, do you remember.

You remember the Bill number and the year? No, just send it to us and I did. I wrote it for you guys, but I gotta go look it up.

That was X232 30.

Yeah, well, it would help them. And then if we did land acquisition, then they could do a PPP on it, have a library and then do some mixed use so that the mixed use pays for and they're all supportive of it, so it's not like they were against it.

Oh, yes. They say they're gonna.

You know, then. Because some coffee shops, they give you free WIFi. Right. So let's say they had a coffee shop right. Next.

From 2017. They said they were film.

Yeah. I mean, when the transit hub project started, it. It seemed very. It was like a. A great Mary in Mary.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

With the people at the transit hub. Yeah.

With the library.

Right. And then. But it's just taken time for the county to kind of acquire the. Yeah. Because they. They went through the environmental assessment process already. We've had community meetings.

Oh, yeah. From the. From. I don't know. That was when I was, I think, CIP chair.

They were supportive. I mean, if it's been. Yeah. I was just gonna see it's change of Administration as well, too. So I think they're getting settled, but I'll. I'll work with Senator Joy. Okay, thank you, Senator.

Yeah.

I just give a question. Who. Who negotiates on the security contracts? Who doesn't know who?

No, that's RFP.

And for the. Who's in the library.

That the priceless vendor. That the state procurement office.

Yeah. The only reason why is that again, you get the security companies out there charging the state 30 to $42 an hour. They paid a security guard minimum wage. And the part that I get upset is that they also charge state for vacation. Yeah. Holiday pay, sick leave. And none of the security guards get that.

So to me, again, if you guys put in this. The bid for security guards, you got to actually put them inside there that they're actually giving them. Again, this is the same thing that happened at airport. So we need to watch the contract because they putting in $42 plus Frenches vacation and. And sick leave and medical.

But none of the security guards ever get that because they hire them. Yeah. And then that's $42 an hour, and the guy only giving minimum wage, you know, and that's the problem we had at the airport. Yeah. You know, so can you guys please, you know, watch that?

Because we. We actually do monitor. Yeah. The. The. The. The list from the state, I mean, has two. Two vendors.

Well, that's why you're trying to change vendor.

Well, we did. Yeah. We had. Oh, that's why you had to change vendors. We're using the same vendors and the capital. Yeah.

I think it depends on the SPO office negotiating that part into the contract, if that's.

But they're all pretty much the same These security vendors.

Yeah, yeah.

We actually are experiencing better security. Much better than we had the last.

One because people, people go with both security. They do part time at each one or something.

Oh, you have vacancies?

Yeah, go ahead. Can we look at the vacancies?

Yeah. Table 11, this page.

First of all, what's the red numbers indicates.

Under the budgeted amounts?

Red? What does that mean when it's red? I don't see.

The table. So library assistant three budget amount is 38,000. That's how much they get paid.

Yeah. Full time. We have so much turnover in that, that position.

And that's with college degree.

Not the library assistant.

What is that? AA CTE. High school. Oh, okay. Wow.

So I think when we were reviewing. Them, sometimes we make notes. So I, I mean, I'll go back and check. Sometimes we're Reorgang and trying to make.

Sure that was secret code for something.

Yeah, it's not sometimes secret code. Sometimes it's just with staff or copy putting in updating figures.

Yeah, I think that's an editing, but we'll check.

Yeah. National treasure. Are these secret codes with the libraries?

Question? Yeah, go ahead. Well, some of your vacancies have been vacant since 2013. 2016. Two of them.

Oh, nine.

2009. I mean, really expect to fill them.

For some of the vacancies. We actually have been trying to fill them.

We did a vacancy chart 2009.

Yes. There are some positions where we get list of names and we try over and over again where people don't or we have substitutes in those positions. And then depending on how many vacancies we have, we have to prioritize how we're hiring and how many vacancies and which vacancies we have.

So if we have branch managers, they rise to the top in terms of making sure that we fill those positions. At the same time, we have the issue of the restrictions on our budget. And so we don't have the full allotment of our budget to pay for all of the positions because our budget, 80% is people.

So we have to prioritize which are the positions that will. It's not that we don't need them, but how do we make sure we can keep our libraries open?

Well, which ones are vacant? Which ones have no budget? They all have budget now. They all have the dollars there.

Last year is the first year that you, you turned back, we had about 64 positions that didn't have budget for almost three years.

Okay, that's what I was looking at. I thought maybe that's what it meant that there were no budget at all. So you can't hire every single one of these individuals.

Oh, that's now because of the restrictions. But if you didn't have the restrictions, then you could.

When we start the fiscal year, we. We basically are. Our budget is based on personnel costs and current expenses. Those are the two main. The current expenses are all the utility, security guard, contract, all that stuff. And it's much smaller. It's only like 20% of our total budget.

So at the beginning of the year, when we have to identify where are we taking the 5% restriction, actually the 10% restriction, we have to identify where the 4 million is coming from. And so it has to come out of personnel. Otherwise we don't. We have to, you know, kind of worry about whether we can have enough.

We can keep the lights on, keep. Pay the water bills, pay for the security guards.

Going back to these. These vacant positions have been vacant since 2009. You only show one of them the vacant since 2017 that you intend to fill here by February 3rd of 2026 page. The first page of it towards the bottom. I think seven or eight from the bottom.

So is that one coming on board on 23 if it says the fill date.

We've already done the interviews and we've already offered for people to begin, so yes.

Okay, so I can expect that this is not going to be on the list next year. It would not be unless somebody leaves. Okay, well, I've, I've seen, I've gone over lists where you folks say fill date and then the next year is still vacant. The next year is still.

Not necessarily you guys, but the agencies do that. But then the rest of them, the 2009, it doesn't even have an expected fill date, which is. Yeah, I'm trying to. 2000. It's on the last page 13. But yeah, you have 2019-2016-2019-2019-2018-2019.

Yeah, that position actually just moved. It was sitting in another. I think this might be a position that I have to go and double check because we have two sixes. One six. We are. We have moved to be a project librarian and we're working with D. Herd on the. The description of this position.

And then there's helpful for you to let us know. That's why we asked for these charts because if you don't give it to us, then we're going to ask. Ask it.

No, I get it, though.

So your total amount of vacancies total up to what, $6.3 million should that be 6.3 but it's not 6.3 million.

Oh, your whole total 11 doesn't add up to that. Well, how much is your total vacancy in salaries?

I would have to get back with you. I get another table for that.

Well then how would you know if it's not 10?

Well I don't think it's 6. I mean half of them I know that about 30 positions can be again it depends on which position it is and.

Okay. And none of these. Oh, go ahead.

If we were to sweep all of these positions that I just went over since 2009 to now. I mean you've lived with it without all of these years so I guess you could go without it. Right.

That would end up with closure on a lot of our smaller libraries on the neighbor islands.

But they're vacant now. Yeah.

For all those years we haven't been operating with them. So actually. Well some in many cases we put in. We rotate staff, we put in subs.

But you don't even have 89 only what? You only have 289.

That's the current when we can find a 89 or a sub 2.

And this is as of November account. We can update here for what we have up to now because we have filled some of these positions.

Okay. Why don't you resubmit your table 11 then?

Okay.

Up to what you're current. Yeah.

Okay.

Just like bring this up because the problem that I guess table seven, page seven. Because giving the consistency of the 9.1 budget restrictions over the last three years fiscal years. We just was talking about you talking about that which other libraries has been seeing a significant reduction in operation hours for to public service.

The reason why I asked that because now you just said if we sweep all the vacancies it's going to change the hours and operation for some libraries. Okay.

So you already did that. So if we sweep the vacancies they're at 100%. They need whatever they got is what they're using. Right. If you sweep the vacancies. So if the Governor says 10% restriction now they have. They have the. They don't have the vacancies not to to cushion them anymore.

Now they have to eat into live bodies.

Right. Right.

So that it's a trickle down effect. It's not as direct. You're not. They're not explaining it as correctly as maybe they try not to throw anybody under the bus. Yeah.

So definitely.

Definitely. But it ends up resulting in that over time. If is if there's a depending on the percentage of the restriction.

Because I just. For the last three years it's been going up on you guys. Restrictions.

Oh yeah. So this is like a shell game every year. That's. That's what it is. I mean you gotta.

They all pad their budgets with some amount or they wish they at least have that amount because you're guessing at to what the percentage of the restriction might be that the Governor and the MBNF is going to send them.

And then now they got to figure out, okay, of all my budget, how do I restrict 8 or 5 or 10% depending on what the Governor tells them.

But that's not real restrictions for the. Last 10 years, which is the libraries. That was.

Yeah.

For the times and the restrictions.

So when we can't sell positions. So you'll, you'll see there's a lot of newer positions. We have smaller libraries in neighbor islands that do not have as many positions. And so we have to drop our services. No, but I mean we can't fill the position.

But the question is not cutting all the vacancies. It's cutting the really old ones been vacant for you.

Right. And I think we've done a really good job trying to get at those really old ones. And as I said. Let me. I'll follow up on. We have, we had a lot of.

Like you may have an updated table that does not include that one or I can. Or you want to make sure by the time you send over the updated table.

Two sixes. We just reorganized and it takes a long time for us to reorganize. We've been looking at all of our positions. We had 64 that we couldn't touch for three years. We didn't have the funding for them. So we're trying to be very strategic with the vacancies that we do have.

And we have gone back to creating island managers which will help provide better services on the islands. They provide an additional staff Member, but they also provide support directly to the island. And so we have actually moved positions around to better serve the needs of our libraries. So I am sure that 6 is one of them.

And it was, it was out there for a while because we, we didn't use it. But now we do have a way that we want to use it. So we're not trying to leave some in the. The dust. There are some positions that again were not filled because we only have so much money.

So we really. For the vacancies. Right. You know, I call Senator Dela Cruz always say so if you guys kind of feel some of the positions because like he's surprised and I surprise seeing that the position for Assistant 3 is 38,000 a year.

So there's any way the vacancies or the money that you guys have in the areas that you guys haven't filled fall out to, to kind of entice the position so that you would be able to hire somebody on a higher pay scale to adjust that.

I think it's actually a larger issue that we have to work with D. Herd on changing the classification, which is a whole group because they're doing different levels of work than they did when the original library assistants were created. Yeah. And that's a larger project because it'll need more money to actually provide the.

Positions because the library officers work for 30,000 and less.

And a lot of times that's the problem. Right. We are able to find somebody, but then they stay only for like four to six months and once until they can find another higher paying job.

So that's why that there's like this constant churn on the, especially the LA positions, the library system positions, the ones that pay the lease, they have the, they're their entry level positions. Like in the fiscal office. I've. I've reviewed like 17 lists for the entry level audit Clerk position that we desperately need.

But I've been through 17 lists over the last 34 years. We, we've made many offers and either they've been hired by another Department, they decide to come and then they reject it. I mean, so it's.

So then if you know that for 17 years, why are we doing the same thing over and over? Why aren't you repurposing these positions? I know it takes a long time, but 17 years, you could have done it.

No, it was 17. So we found someone that actually.

No, but you've this for years. Because I've been in this, these hearings for, for years.

And you got part of the wallpaper.

That's a little scary. Scary. So more recently, specific to that position, we actually have two positions, same exact classification, same level and everything. That's why there's 17 list. And we're constantly trying to fill one of the two. We finally found a temporary employee that actually worked out really well.

So we spent the last year to downgrade the position so she could qualify. So it's a longer discussion about how this is an entry level clerical position. But the requirement is there's no degree requirement. Experience. Yeah.

Why don't you guys come up with a Bill or something so that you can have the Flexibility you need. And then she's willing to consider it in subject matter. I think that's kind of her. Her point is that they. She wants to help. But you guys know the. What you need to help yourselves. If not.

We would be guessing.

I guess we would. We've tried every which way through the T herd process. Let's try a legislative field.

That's her point.

You know what we need in government? We need positions. That's called fixers.

Yeah.

So the fixers. Let me fix the problem.

Yes. Somebody was telling me their CEOs, CIOs, COOs and FIO. FIOs.

Yeah.

Figure it out.

How can we figure it out? I would love to talk more about. It because every year we say the same thing. No, no, no. But I need to talk about the proposal possibilities.

No. So yeah, when you write the Bill, then you'll have lots of discussion. When you talk about when you have. When you hear the Bill come up.

Yeah.

With several options. And you guys, have you.

Have you guys seen a drop in the visits to the library because of lack of security? No, she said it's. No, it went up. By about 10%. People have come to the library. But yeah. So what I'm getting at is that maybe we can put more funding into the.

The position descriptions and to up the pain so we can get.

No, but it won't matter because they still got to work with D Herd because the classification is what's difficult. That's why you need the legislative fixed.

We gotta fix it.

Yeah.

Yeah. Can we? Okay.

Table.

Table 13. Overtime. My question is not so much on the overtime. My question is regarding the increase in salaries. Is this based on. On the contract that you're projecting? Because you know, you've got these base salaries for actual. And then you see a base salary for 2026 goes up. And then for 2027, base salaries are going up.

It will be based on contract because everybody. Most positions are part of the union. A union. So.

So I'm just asking. So that base salary is based on the. The projected. Yeah. Negotiated contracts.

So it goes from 2.2 to 2.8.

And then to 3. Look at the 2027.

But the big. That's 200,000. But this would jump is 600,000.

Just like the.

Because that's a big percentage. Then from 2.2 to 2.8 just like.

The third 15.6 to 6.5.

Anyway, you guys should double check that. Double check.

We have a new financial person. So we'll take this. This table back and we'll get.

Yeah, you guys should check these things before you give it to us because it raises all these questions. Okay, can we talk about travel? Table 23. First of all, I'm going to ask that you folks provide to us a total of how much travel that you've for the year that you folks spent. And what was the.

What was your travel budget? Were you over, above, below? Having said that, what is Staff Day?

Every two years, we bring staff together on each of the islands for staff development. So the Friends of the Library actually pay for the day itself. They help us to bring in speakers and to have an event where we do staff development.

So we close the library for one day every two years and we bring everybody on Oahu together, everybody on Hawaii island together, everyone on Hawaii and every money on Maui.

Okay, so this cost that's listed total cost of trip, it's the airfare. So is that paid for by the.

So the airfare is paid for by. We've as. By the state. So Staff Day occurs. Well, the projected is. Occurs every two years. But the last staff day we had was pre Covid. So it was five years ago in 2019.

Hawaii staff day. That's the island of Hawaii, right? Right. Where's they fly to?

No, so state librarian, certain manager managers fly out to that island where that staff and all the. All the big island staff gather in one space.

Okay, where did they come from? 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13 Hawaii staff day people came from where? Okay, so. Did they all come from Oahu? Did they all come fl.

Yes, most of them do. It's their managers of the support offices, our IT section, our fiscal head of fiscal or head of hr. We all go. So the Executive team basically goes to whatever island is having that staff day.

So the same group goes now because then you have the Maui Staff Day. Right. And then you have the Kauai Staff Day. Yes. And then I don't see Oahu Staff.

Day because we don't have to fly. We can just drive. Right.

But there's no cost associated with. Right.

Is the cost of the actual training and staff date is covered by. It's covered by the Friends of the Library. So we try to do it every two years, but it's. Right. As I mentioned, the last one was pre Covid.

So. So you don't have your total travel budget. No, we can provide it.

Okay, why don't we recess and move on to Executive office on early learning? So we'll recess for a couple minutes. Thank you, adjourned.

Okay, reconvening. So next we're going to hear from Executive Office of Early Learning. So, good morning.

Hi. Good morning. Chair Dela Cruz, Vice Chair Moriwaki, Chair Kim and Vice Chair Kidani and Members of both Committees. I'm Yuko Arikawa Cross, Director of the Executive Office on Early Learning.

So of course our vision is that every child in Hawaii has access to high quality early childhood development and early learning experiences which lay the foundation for lifelong well being.

So of course our two main functions coordinate and improve the early childhood system while also hosting the Head Start Collaboration Office in our office and working in partnership with the DOE to administer the EOEL Public Pre-K Program. I'm going to skip over the next slide so that I can come back and speak to table six.

I wanted to highlight that we just recently completed the Preschool Development Grant in partnership with Hawaii P20. And through this we updated our comprehensive birth to five needs assessment. We created a new state plan. We maximized parent and family engagement in the Birth to Five system. We supported our workforce program quality improvement and enhanced and expanded access.

And this photo is a picture of the brochure from our symposium which highlighted all the work that had been going on in the early learning field. And we are able to give you a copy if you're interested in.

Another part that I'd like to highlight that came out of the Preschool Development Grant is the new First Five Hawaii. This is a common eligibility portal for all residents of Hawaii where they can enter simple basic information about their family and they can be screened across 18 different programs to see what their families may be eligible for.

And these programs span early learning, health and safety, food and nutrition, special needs and early intervention and parenting, family support and also housing.

How many, how many families actually utilize that or what?

So we just released it in January and I pulled a traffic report and there were over 33,000 hits. As part of our Preschool Development Grant as well, we updated our Hawaii Early Childhood State Plan. We are hoping to formally release this within the next month and we will also share with you a copy of this.

In working with our preschool, the reauthorization of our new state plan, we did a lot of community engagement and visited each of these islands that are represented here and had 296 responses from people across all of our islands.

A couple of years ago when I attended the Hunt Institute, there was a session that the Children's Funding Project highlighted and this was to create a state fiscal map. So I attended an online session and the Early Childhood Action Strategy actually was also showed a similar interest. So we partnered together with a children's funding project.

This too was is looking to be released within the next year. This tracks public investments for children and young adults from 0 to 24 between the years of 2019 to 2023. So our work began in 2024. So the last comprehensive year that we had was 2023.

And we are looking to update it every, I think within like every two years roughly. It shows the funding landscape for state, federal and federal relief funds and it looks at how Hawaii is working towards our outcomes, how we Fund our services and how we support different age groups and populations.

So again, this is going to be formally released within the next month or so. I wanted to highlight that through the support of the Legislature, the Governor and the lieutenant governor's Ready Keiki initiative, the number of EOEL Public Pre-K classrooms have more than tripled since 2022. Our interest in our program remains strong.

The number of applications still continue to far exceed the number of seats statewide. So Currently we have 89 sites, 117 classrooms, 2,275 seats and as of January we had 4,979 applications with 3,490 of one of them being unique because there were 42 pairs of twins.

As we also expand our Public Pre K program, we are still committed to maintaining a high quality early learning environment for our students. We're happy to report that EOEL met 10 out of 10 benchmarks on the latest near public pre K report.

Five states met all 10 of the National Institute for Early Education Research Quality Standards which are Alabama, Hawaii, Michigan, Mississippi and Rhode Island. We continue to support our Early Childhood Educator Stipend program and so far we've had 162 recipients.

It could look as 163 because one person has gone through the program twice so far and we've had 61 completers who are now filtered into the early childhood system across many different programs.

One thing that's not shown on this slide is that through the Preschool Development Grant, the Executive Office on Early Learning also supported the National Administrator's Credential that is hosted by the National Early Childhood program accreditation or NECPA. And 48 community based providers were interested in this opportunity and took us up on this offer.

And it helps to develop Director skills in our community based program. So it's for directors, aspiring directors or people who are interested in what the role of a Director is. And so it helps them with marketing, legal and fiscal management, operations, educational programming, community relations.

And so we are really Excited to offer that to our community based programs. One thing that we're all tracking is the progress towards our Act 46 outcomes which state that 50% of the currently unserved children in Hawaii should have a seat by 2027 and 100% by 2032.

And so as we take a look at this chart here, the declining top line are birth rates in Hawaii according to Department of Health statistics. The very bottom line are the number of seats. And when you see the line drawn at 2027, this marks our first marker.

So this looks like we are on target to meeting that first mark in 2027. You can also see the low, the lowest 2027 target line and that's where we're at right now. Then we continue our trajectory out to 2032.

If we continue to see this 1.97 decrease in birth rate and also if the seats were to hold steady, there's just that minimal gap at the end. However, we also know that we are increasing additional seats to close that gap.

And we are also going to continue to need to watch the trajectory of births or for children population because if it stays steady, as you can see in that dotted top line, there would therefore be a 14% difference if the trajectory of the births stayed the same as it is at this moment and also if we did not increase seats.

But right now we are definitely on track. So looking towards our future. While we just closed our final preschool development grant, the Executive Office on Early Learning for the first time applied for a federal grant on our own. And there were 34 states that applied. Only 23 were awarded and we were one of them.

And so we are going to be focusing on this next year of systems building grants. Previously, PDGB5 grants were awarded in three year cycles, but now they're going to be awarded in one year cycles, which is also tied to our request, which I'm going to be speaking about shortly.

We are also continuing to focus on the next 25 classrooms that are going to be opened this upcoming school year. And so now I'll go back to. So when you look at table six. So this is based on what the Legislature appropriated last session. This is our base budget for fiscal year 27.

This includes positions and funding needed to continue our existing 117 classrooms and to open 25 new classrooms this upcoming school year. So for our supplemental budget request, we are requesting General Fund position counts only to support the growing workload and responsibilities of the office in coordinating the early learning system.

The program specialist positions were previously funded by the preschool Development grants. But now that they are being offered on one year cycles, it's no longer really possible to have positions for funded through the preschool development grant. But we also just created our new state plan. We also have a new preschool development grant for this school year.

And so we would like to continue to have these positions and put them into our fte. What's your total FTE. Including? Okay, so one moment, I have to. So we have. What is the big total? 200 group? 331. We're going to double check. Maybe. 331.

So 331 positions. Yes, that includes the early learning teachers or that's just admin.

So these are classroom teacher positions, educational assistant positions and then EOEL office positions. Majority are in the schools. And so we are also looking to add an evaluation specialist to our office. So what we have learned is that we are continuing to do additional research on the early learning field.

And so we're looking for a person to provide leadership, planning, coordination and evaluation of the effectiveness of programs and assessing the extent to which the objectives of our early learning system are being realized at the state level.

And so along with our request, we are asking to transfer funds from other current expenses to personnel to cover the cost of these positions.

Yes.

You guys are asking for the four positions, but you got quite a bit of vacancies.

So these are three positions. So when we look at our vacancies. So we have. Okay, let me go here. 11. Yeah, sorry. Okay, sorry. So when you look at the vacancies that we have right now, so we filled the office assistant position and a secretary position.

And then one of the things to note is the date of vacancy. So when we were looking at the date. So there, there's definitely one, but there may be more than one. That is probably incorrect.

We think maybe the school repurposed the prior position number, the one that's from 2013, because we did not have that school open in 2013. It's a brand new school this year. So we're not sure about that one. But we have currently only 10 truly vacant EA positions at this time.

And then those 12 month state office teacher positions are actually in our office. So there's a process by which we have to go about creating the positions and then recruiting for them. And then within the Department of education system there opens a teacher transfer period.

And so there are some rules that we have to abide by during the teacher transfer period. And so we are looking to fill the remaining state office teacher positions in our office. But what that means right now is just that our team works harder to meet the needs of all of our 117 different classrooms at this time.

When you say in your office teacher, what did you just say? Teacher.

Our early learning state office teacher positions.

Yes. So state office positions meaning.

So these are teachers that are held in our office versus place at school versus being hired by a principal at a school. And then where do they teach? So they are the coaches and the mentors that are assigned to each of our public. Okay. Okay.

So they don't actually teach, they just mentor.

They don't. In the classroom, they do not teach students. They are responsible for the adult learning.

Okay. And when you say 12 months, state they work 12 months out of the year. They do. Versus the teachers in the classroom are nine months.

Well, the Department of Education has 12 month and 10 month state office teacher positions, depending on what their roles and responsibilities are. So over the summers, our teachers still do work with onboarding new teachers who are coming into public pre K. They work on developing our workforce as well over the summers. So they are working 12 months.

Why do you have so many EA3 vacancies? What's the problem there? That you can't recoup or you don't. Where are they stationed? You know?

Yes, that's a really great question. So the first thing about educational assistance, number one, is that our EAs have what we call a select certification. So beyond meeting the Department of Education's requirements for typical educational assistance, ours also have to have some early learning coursework.

And so some of these have to do with the timing of being enrolled in coursework. So they have to enroll, then they have to submit their documentation to say that they're enrolled in order to even come onto the list.

And so trying to really open up those pathways for people to get that early childhood coursework and hours completed is what we're actually really focused on for the EAs.

You can't downgrade the positions, bring people in without the certificate, and then have them develop with the certificate and then upgrade them.

So that's a good question. So in our statute it says that they have to either have it or be enrolled. And so we will work with them until they fully satisfy the requirements. It's just that they have to enroll first. And so lots of times principals might find some people.

What we find is that an educational assistant is an entry level position. And so sometimes people are just curious about early learning and maybe are not really ready to commit yet. And so they're willing to substitute while they kind of figure out if this is what they want to do. But then we hold sessions for them.

Our workforce development specialists host online sessions to tell them about the requirements and that you don't need to pay for these certifications because we have a stipend program and we can help you, walk you through that. So I think that that helps. And we have converted a lot of substitutes or potential substitutes into permanent positions.

So how many schools do you have and. And are they all do? If you have these many vacancies, are they all stacked up to being able to serve the kids in this?

So every single one of our classrooms are open, Every single teacher position is filled. And so we only have 10 where there's not an educational assistant. So what we have provided the school are paraprofessional positions. So every school is open right now.

So the ones we have only 10 sites that do not have a person in the position for the education assistant. So they typically will enroll up to 10 children until they can get that fully staffed second person. We just don't want the inconsistency happening in the classroom.

So we'd rather staff at a ratio of 1 to 10, which is what it is according to our near benchmarks, and then provide that second additional person for the classroom. But we really want a solid two people for the full day at least.

Are you projecting, as you're looking at, you're saying you're going to get more schools. What is the projection of that in terms of staffing?

So all the principals that have indicated interest have said that they have interested people who are willing to move into the position. What we found is that sometimes principals are not familiar with select certifications for the educational assistant position.

So that can be a little tricky as well as the timing of these types of positions in the system. And so I'll give one example. So prior to the school year, we have to make sure the positions are created and that they're posted. Sometimes we have had a posting missed.

So once you miss a posting, you have to wait for the next posting, which could be a month out, and then you have to wait for them to vet all the people and then you have to go through the interview process. So if you miss a posting period, it can push it out at least a few months.

And so Wiki Wiki. I'm not familiar with Wiki Wiki. I'm not sure what that is because it's very unique.

Yeah, yeah, you should talk to D. Herd.

Yeah, Wiki Wiki hire. Because all your positions are the same and they're unique to your program.

Okay, thank you for that.

I can, I can look into that. It's an expedited hiring process.

Okay, I can look into that. Thank you. Travel. Yes. Do you have a total of your travel?

Yes, I do. Our Travel total Is195,638. And that's just for the calendar year up to November. 638. A lot of that is with our early learning state office teachers doing travel to support each of our 117 classrooms.

Okay. Because if you look on the last page, table 13, the second to the bottom, it says educational specialist, 12 months date 102,000. Which. Right there. So you're saying the rest only total up to 90 something thousand. And then why isn't that one break broken down? Why is it a lump sum?