Check out the meeting agenda! go.boarddocs.com/oh/akron/Board…

Bruce Alexander (board member) started the meeting at 5:15 pm There was no vote on previous meeting minutes There were no requests to address the committee

Carla Chapman (Chief Diversity Officer) said Joe Vassalotti (athletics coordinator) and Steven Keenan (interim director of facilities services) will give a presentation about Qualifications for Construction Managers at Risk and give updates about sports facilities

Vassalotti said there is a 7 student pilot sporting official licensing program at North High School taught by a former North football coach

Students are halfway to being certified basketball officials and will be taught another sport later this year Vassalotti said those students will have a path to employment after high school and can help officiate APS middle school sports

Vassalotti said the board spends 60-70% of the athletics budget on event workers (including ticket takers and announcers), game officials, and grass field maintenance (except for Ellet and Buchtel that have turf fields) beaconjournal.com/story/sports/p…

Chapman asked if grass field Main comes from the facility budget or athletics budget Vassalotti said it comes from the athletics budget and the work is outsourced to contractors Keenan said contractors do seeding and field repairs and APS grounds staff mow fields

Vassalotti said Firestone has a higher budget for game officials because they host more indoor events such as Volleyball, wrestling, and Basketball invitationals School teams can keep ticket sales if there is "net profit" according to Vassalotti

East High School does not have a home stadium, so they use Ellet's stadium as a home stadium. Currently, Ellet gets to sell concessions for East's home games at Ellet. Summer Hall (board member) asked why that is still the policy

Vassalotti said Ellet's boosters pay for the equipment and supplies for the concession stand so Ellet's boosters get to operate concession stands for all games at Ellet He said East makes more money by supplying stand workers rather than bringing their own stand equipment

Diana Autry (board president) said it "doesn't seem equitable" that Ellet gets "a piece of the profit no matter what." She said the equipment in the stands is district property Vassalotti said the stand equipment Is property of the non-profit (501c) status booster clubs

Chapman said they need to seek attorney general guidance about separate non-profit organizations in schools Carla Jackson (board member) said the district needs to be "realistic" about how they are looking at things and how booster club property is dealt with

Jackson asked if it is feasible to make booster clubs more equal Chapman said she doesn't "think you can" because every booster clubs is a separate entity from APS with different needs, levels of parent support, and resources but the district can regulate facility access

Keenan said APS is finalizing the request for proposals for a "construction manager at risk" (CMR) for the Pfeiffer and Miller South building in Kenmore He said the CMR will take on the overall construction for the project including hiring contractors for the district

signalakron.org/akron-school-b…

He said he is bringing this request before the Equity Committee to consider other additional requirements when hiring a CMR including being local or being a minority owned business that go beyond mandatory requirements

Michael Robinson said a CMR is needed now that the district does not have the administrative staff for construction it had when constructing the CLCs Alexander suggested having another presentation at the next meeting when more information is available

Carla Jackson asked what Keenan needs from the committee Robinson said the board has input as to additional requirements for the CMR "like a job description" The Request for Proposals for a CMR will be discussed again at the next meeting

The meeting ended at 6:13 pm. The next Equity Committee meeting will be November 18th at 5:30 pm at the Administration Building. For more coverage check out Akron.documenters.org

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