Hays Post
The Hays USD 489 Board of Education approved a five-year copier contract in a split vote during a special session Thursday morning.
Three members voted against the $52,000 annual bid from Sumner One. Mandy Fox, Lance Bickle and Greg Schwartz said they wanted the district to be more aggressive in reducing the number of copiers used and the number of copies the district makes.
The district has 23 copiers, including two production units in the copy center at administration center.
The district makes about 5 million copies per year. This is down about 2 million copies from several years ago, Superintendent John Thissen said at the May 21 school board meeting.
The new contract is about $13,000 less annually than the district’s previous contract.
The contract approved Thursday would allow the district to decrease the number of copies it makes, and therefore its cost, by 10 percent each year of the contract.
Schwartz said he was not comfortable with the length of the contract and would prefer it be rebid for a one-, two- or three-year term.
“I would like to see us scale that back at a much quicker pace,” Schwartz said.
At the previous meeting, Tracy Kaiser, finance director, noted a shorter contract would cost the district more annually.
The new contract includes software that will allow the district to track individual copier use. It can limit the number of copies an individual staff member makes.
The district hopes to use this software to further reduce the number of copies being made. The district is also trying to cut costs by encouraging staff to send fewer materials to printers, which is more expensive, and send more materials to the copy center, which can print materials cheaper than the smaller copiers at schools.
The district has tried to eliminate as many printers as possible, but needed to keep some to print confidential IEPs. The new copy system will allow staff to hold print jobs in copier queues until they are released with a swipe of their staff badges. This will allow the staff to maintain confidentiality.
The board also approved several items for the Early Childhood Center. Among these were an application for a $1.4 million grant for improvements to ECC facilities. The grant would require a $368,000 local match.
No project would move forward unless the grant is approved. The item would come back to the board for approval if the grant is approved.
The board also approved a grant request that would pay for a cost-of-living increase for ECC classified staff and the annual ECC IDEA VI-B Application Assurances and Certifications. VI-B Funds are used to help pay for special education certified salaries.