ALC - Executive Subcommittee
Video
Transcript
Machine transcript
May contain errors. Verify important quotations against the official video.
About transcript accuracy
- Source
- Whisper
- Model
- ggml-large-v3-turbo.bin
- Processing date
- October 4, 2026
Unknown speaker
0:00
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
2:00
All right, members calling executive subcommittee to order. Thank you so much for
being here. I'm going to ask Senator Hester, if you would open us an order prayer, please.
Senator Bart Hester
Unverified
2:30
father we love you we are grateful for uh the opportunities that you've given us father pray that we would uh represent you and all your children in the way that you would expect us to today we are fruitful in this meeting ask us
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
2:52
your name amen all right thank you senator all right any comments from my co-chair we're going perfect we're going to begin with uh item b consideration emergency
rules go ahead and invite uh desi to the table to present i think
we have miss salas ford and greg rogers and if you would identify
Speaker 9
3:18
proceed good afternoon courtney salas ford
Speaker 8
3:21
department of education greg rogers department of education you're recognized so we are asking approval for an amendment to the rules governing consolidation and annexation amendment was necessary to incorporate provisions of act 919 of 2025 and act 157 of the 2026 fiscal session which allows previously isolated schools to vote
and detach from their existing school districts and establish new isolated school districts This will allow the existing school district who has had students go to the new detaching school district to not experience any significant financial undue hardship because of the loss of those students. they will still get declining enrollment funding under existing statute but they will also be
given funding to account for the students that have gone to the the new newly established school district and just one other note i'd like to make is that this is being done using existing funding that the department has had for many years and it has not been utilized so there is no new funding being asked for our state board adopted these on may 13th 2026 and we are happy to answer any questions that you have all right thank you miss for i'm
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
4:42
going to go to uh senator ervin and i
appreciate you being here and bringing this and appreciate
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
4:51
the work of senator ervin on this as well so you recognize senator ervin thank you mr chair and i just want to say thank you so much to the department of education for your entire work on this entire project starting in 2025 It's been a monumental policy change with very, very technical changes made in the law and now in rule. And I asked for you to bring this rule change forward when you identified this funding, and I'm so grateful for that.
And I'm going to ask you just to lay out the financials of how this will work, just to update everybody. We did have four successful votes at the ballot box from community members that supported a new isolated school district with Timbo, Rural Special, Umpire, and Kingston. Then to uphold the will of those voters, we acted in special language. Really appreciate the Special Language Committee for their indulgence on that.
to basically create some very clear parameters of detaching and what that would mean. And so through that process, we worked, and I appreciate my colleagues as well as their support and help on this, identify this fund, and then to bring this emergency rule change. So my question to you quickly is just if you can outline what funding is currently in place that the parent districts will retain and how then this will be calculated
with the subtraction of declining enrollment funding, which is currently in state law. But what's also in state law is property taxes that will be retained with those parent districts and not go to those new isolated school districts for a time just because of the way those property taxes are dictated to in state law and how complicated that was to change that so it became necessary to kind of forward fund these isolated new isolated school districts uh which is why the the special language was so necessary
so so just if you can outline that for everybody so that people understand the real financial landscape that's out there for those parent districts yeah absolutely um so
Speaker 8
7:07
i'll give an overview and then mr rogers can add specifics if i miss anything but essentially um school districts are funded on the prior year enrollment and so i'm going to use mountain view as an example because they did have two schools vote to detach and create two new school districts
but so mountain view received this year funding for the students they had last year and next year they will receive funding for the students they have this year which would include any students who may decide to leave and attend the newly established school districts so what act 919 and act 157 did is say to mountain view you need to give 90 percent of the foundation funding that those students generated to the new school district so that they have some money to start start operations with the mountain view school district the existing school district will still
get their foundation funding on those students for next year they will still get the declining enrollment funding as you mentioned which will be calculated once we know exactly how many students are going to the new school districts they will still get the local tax revenue because not addressed in these statutes and not governed at all by the department of education we spoke with the local county clerks and they stated the way things are calculated the mountain view school district would continue to get the local tax revenue generated by the
school district as it is now before the detachments for at least the next year um in in the two acts it also talks about the division of property and so anything that has been labeled as belonging to these isolated school districts will go with the school districts including any property any debt assigned to that property mountain view will retain all other funding that they have um on hand all other property and they will not any debts that they keep will be those that are attached to mountain view properties not any to the detaching properties
um i think i've the only and then the only other finding the isolated funding they will have received isolated funding because of the detaching school districts and only the last quarter of the isolated funding is going with the newly established school districts so we truly feel that by providing these additional funds that the resulting or the the resulting existing school district mountain view in this case will not experience any financial hardship
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
9:41
you're recognizing for follow-up my follow-up is just thank you i think that needed to be clearly stated uh not just for our purposes but for anybody watching
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
9:59
online thank you all right seeing no further questions thank you so much and without objection the proposed emergency
rule is reviewed and approved and the review and approval shall be effective upon adjournment of the legislative council meeting friday june 19 2026. thank you very much
next we'll bring up the department of human services i think miss paula stone And as she's coming up, I'd just like to point out we have Miss Laurie McDonald with us today. I think this, unfortunately, might be her last week, or last ALC. I know that maybe there's an event later tonight to honor her, and we'll be doing so on Friday as well. So thank you for being here, Miss McDonald. If you would introduce yourself for the
Speaker 23
10:43
record. Paula Stone, Director of the Office of Substance Abuse and Mental Health Department of Human Services.
You're recognized. So this rule allows us to amend the hospital manual, the general acute hospital manual, and add the ability for hospitals to open an adolescent substance use disorder unit, a separate and distinct unit, and be paid for those residential services being provided to adolescents. And that is pretty much the summary of this bill.
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
11:20
great uh do we have any
Speaker 5
11:25
questions all right see no questions you got this was easy
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
11:33
it was without objection the proposed emergency rule is reviewed and approved and the review and approval shall be effective upon adjournment of legislative council meeting friday june 19th 2026 thank
you very much senator ervin do you have comment or question? Thank you.
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
11:50
Can we just put this on the agenda for a public health next meeting so that
we can kind of just get an update on that? I think
Speaker 23
12:00
that'd be beneficial. Thank you. Yes, I would love to do that. We have one that is opening, so yeah, that's going
Speaker 5
12:07
to be exciting for the state. All right. Thank you.
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
12:11
All right, we're going to move down to item C. I think we have athletic director from white hall and the superintendent from white hall had a family situation arise and could not be with us today uh so he is standing in for gary williams and if you would sir please introduce
Speaker 28
12:27
yourself for the record and you'll be recognized mark can't will athletic director at white hall and you're recognized uh first i want to thank senator gilmore representative eaves and the committee members for considering our waiver request to exceed million dollars usually utilizing cooperative purchasing for construction services. The request for the waiver is based on the history with the vendor, the system used by the vendor. The base for the project carries a longer warranty than other systems, and it's a good system for our project. The vendor has a long history with
high schools, colleges, and municipalities in Arkansas and other states, along with professional sports teams around the country. The contractor has been very responsive to any needs of the district and they have a good working relationship with the district based on past results of the same system. We expect a great system and great service at a good price, which is extremely important to our district. We value quality vendors and we believe the use of Tenkata Geo is the best interest of the district. If this request is granted, we will anticipate beginning the work in late August of 2026 and completing the work in November of 2026.
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
13:36
Thank you, sir. Any questions from the committee? Seeing none was the will of the committee I Have a
motion to have a second any discussion see none all in favor say aye Any opposed eyes have it. Thank you so much for being here. Thank y'all Okay, we're gonna move down to
Speaker 32
13:59
item D and I will recognize director Garrity Thank you, mr. Chair Before you, under Exhibit D,
Speaker 34
14:04
is the committee fund allocations for every year for per diem mileage and expenses.
This body is required to establish the allocations for the fiscal year beginning July 1. As you can see, none of the committees expended or even really got close to their allocated amount. So the ending balance is there, but if you want, the beginning balance for each committee is under the first column, and you can go ahead and, if the committee so wishes, establish the same exact funding allocations as last year.
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
14:45
Okay, well, then I'll entertain a motion to keep it the same. Do I
have a motion? I have a motion. Do I have a second? I have a second. Any discussion on the
Speaker 34
15:00
motion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Ayes have it. Director Garrity. Last item under Director's Report is the July ALC meeting. This meeting is usually either canceled, postponed, or delayed. This year with conference schedules, there is no one week in July where ALC could meet in its entirety,
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
15:20
including its subcommittees. Okay. And I'm going to recognize my Vice Chair, Senator
Senator Justin Boyd
Unverified
15:27
Boyd. I think you might have a motion. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move that the legislative council meeting for the month of July 2026 is canceled. The ALC subcommittees are permitted to meet only to take up items that have an imminent need such that they cannot wait until the regularly scheduled August meetings of ALC. The ALC subcommittees are permitted to meet outside the regularly scheduled ALC week in July through
July 31st and all actions of the legislative council subcommittees taken during the month of july 2026 will be considered final and she'll be reported to the legislative council at its meeting scheduled for august 21st 2026 thank you senator so i have a motion do i have a
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
16:06
second all right i have a second and members just on discussion before we call for the vote this is the normal
practice of alc this is what we typically do as you're aware so with that. All in favor say aye. Any opposed? Ayes have it. Okay. I see no other business and we are
Agenda
A. Call to Order
B. Consideration of Emergency Rules:
C. Consideration of Fiscal Year 2027 Committee Fund Allocations
D. Director's Report
E. Other Business
F. Adjournment
Documents
No documents posted.
Speakers
Senator Ben Gilmore
Unverified
Senator Bart Hester
Unverified
Speaker 8
Speaker 9
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
Speaker 23
Speaker 5
Speaker 28
Speaker 32
Speaker 34
Senator Justin Boyd
Unverified