Shana Harstad appointed to Ten Sleep School Board

TEN SLEEP – The Ten Sleep school board appointed Shana Harstad to fill the vacant position due to Sarah Anderson's resignation earlier in the month.

Harstad will hold the position until the election in November. Harstad said in her interview that she felt that being a part of the school board is an opportunity to contribute to the school that is educating her children. In her letter of interest she wrote, "I work as a designer/drafter for an engineering consultant and feel that my experience and training looking at details, figuring out problems and working under pressure with tight schedules would benefit me in looking at problems in a different light, gathering information and coming to a resolution with any problem I face."

Lara Gertsch, who had applied during the previous vacancy, also was interviewed on Monday.

GYM FUTURE

Ten Sleep Mayor Ernie Beckley and Arete design architect Karen Kelly attended the meeting to discuss the Town of Ten Sleep acquiring the old gym once the new school is built. Beckley said that it would be good for the community, make it easier to hold tournaments and open the door for other opportunities for the community. Beckley and Kelly explained that the portion they would keep would include the gym, gym boiler room, bathrooms and the office. The reason that they are choosing to keep this segment is because it is part of the original building making it the simplest place to separate and to make a stand alone building. Existing exterior walls would minimize the cost and difficulty of the project and would include closing up the hallway entrances and creating a new skin for the building.

The Town of Ten Sleep is looking at a business grant for the construction aspect of the project and the possibility of an endowment fund to maintain the upkeep of the building going forward. Beckley also explained that part of the new school planned includes a strip of Town of Ten Sleep property and legally it is easier to trade that property for the gym rather than transfer property. The board asked when a decision had to be made, Kelly said that the latest they could make the decision would be early fall but that she would have to contact a couple different entities to get a hard timeline for a decision. The board decided to wait for this information before moving forward with a decision.

Business Manager Connie Gay brought the board two topics that needed action, insurance and salary increases. Insurance premiums will be increasing by 15 percent for the district which gives the board the hard decision of who is going to pay those premiums or how they are going to split the payment of the increase.

Gay provided the board with different scenarios for how the extra premiums could be split and what that would look like for the 2022-23 fiscal year budget. The board did not seem interested in either option of the district absorbing all the cost nor the employee absorbing all the cost, which leaves them to decide how the premiums will be split.

Another option discussed was making dental and vision still an option but a responsibility of the employee which would save the district $46,000, which could help absorb a portion of the extra premiums. The board decided to delay the decision for a week to get staff input including the importance of the vision and dental plan.

The salary increase that Gay presented to the board was a $1,500 increase on the base and the board members were in agreement that the salary increase was a necessity, but no decision was made at Monday's meeting.

In a comparison of nine other districts, Ten Sleep had the second lowest base, just ahead of Saratoga. Ten Sleep's current base salary is $41,500 and Saratoga is at $40,500. Basin is at $45,446, Meeteetse at $43,900. Other schools compared were Dubois ($45,000), Upton ($45,000), Worland ($45,000), Guernsey ($44,500) and Arvada/Clearmont ($42,000).