The Ponca City Board of Education held a special meeting on Tuesday, March 21 at noon. Judy Throop called the meeting to order.

The Board approved a required motion for the approval of the Consent Agenda for contracts/ agreements under $10,000.

One of the items of the approval is a peer review from an external architect. The architect in question has to be used to review the drawings from school’s architect’s proposed safe room drawings.

As part of the safe room design required to meet FEMA ICC ratings, an external peer review is required of the safe room drawings. The occupancy of the safe room must be of the total occupancy of the new space. The safe room will withstand up to 250 mph speeds, provide missile protection to critical infrastructure of the new safe room, and extreme pressure changes.

Once the peer review is completed, work can progress with the new concert hall classrooms.

Next on the agenda, Pam Dotson with Wilson, Dotson and Associates provided a presentation on the annual audit report with the Board.

In the report, it showed that the district was able to increase its financial position by over $3 million last year. Last year, the initial allocation for ESSER III funds was almost $11.5 million. ESSER III funds are a part of the American Rescue Plan (ARP) and their purpose is to assist school districts in safely reopening schools and keeping them open for in-person instruction, while addressing disruptions to teaching and learning resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.

During 2022, the district spend over $3 million and that carried over $8 million into 2023. This additional money will go away in June of 2024 and the district has until then to use those funds.

Federal expenditures for the district last year was almost $12 million, this is a significant increase over previous years. These funds help to better the district and provide additional support services to students.

Dotson stated that the Board were ahead of others in the state as they have worked on budgeting this money to the best of its ability, while many of the superintendents that came in during this time frame are working with inflated budgets because of the ESSER funds.

The auditor’s results, in summation, found that the district had no material weaknesses or instances of non-compliance or other matters that are required to be reported under Government Auditing Standards.

The Board then approved the following action items during the meeting: -An action on receiving the annual audit report from Wilson, Dotson and Associates on the FY22 financial audit to the board.

-A contract where Oklahoma Natural Gas will relocate the main gain line from East Comanche to East Brookfield between 5th and 7th Streets for the PCPS Indoor Athletic Facility project. The cost is $47,856.38 and will come from Bond 33.

-An agreement with Ponca City Energy to reroute the electric feeder in the alley between Brookfield and Comanche. This will have Ponca City Energy reroute the existing double circuit overhead lines in the alley between Brookfield and Comanche, and install two underground primary feeder circuits along Brookfield Avenue. Cost is not to exceed $275,000.

-An agreement with Apptegy to enhance an online platform. The is oneyear mobile app and web development agreement for Ponca City Public Schools will be $28,850 and will come out of the Bond 33 funds.

The Board then voted to convene in into executive session.