Coraggio Consulting
Loudoun County School Board, Finance & Operations Committee Meeting, Tuesday, April 21, 2026

Date: Tuesday, April 21, 2026
Place: Loudoun County Public Schools / School Board meeting (see BoardDocs / LCPS-TV)
Length: 32m (video)
Official meeting video (Vimeo / LCPS-TV): https://player.vimeo.com/video/1184985270?rel=0
BoardDocs (School Board): https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/loudoun/Board.nsf/Public

Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting.
Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-10-11. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:00] Good afternoon. My name is Dena Griffiths, and I'm calling to order the Finance and Operations Committee today. I am joined by Ms. Riccardi and Mr. Pepper. We will first start with public comment, but I was just told that we do not have public comment, so we can move on to the minutes.

[00:00:18] May I have a motion to approve the minutes of April 7th Finance and Operations Committee meeting? I move to approve the minutes of the April 7th, 2026 Finance and Operations Committee. Second. Thank you very much, and it has been moved and seconded to approve the minutes of April 7th, 2026 Finance and Operations Committee.

[00:00:39] All those in favor, say aye. Aye. We will now move on to the consent agenda. May I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? So moved. Second.

[00:00:55] It has been moved and seconded to approve the consent agenda, and all those in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. We will now move on to our action items, starting with item 5.01, Support Services Contract Award for IFB 26-544 Woodgrove High School Bus Parking Expansion. Thank you.

[00:01:20] Hi, good afternoon. So this is an approved CIP project. This project includes extending the bus parking lot at Woodgrove High School to add 25 new bus spaces and approximately 30 passenger vehicle spaces.

[00:01:38] It will address a shortage that we have for bus parking in the western part of the county. Upon approval of this, the work would begin this summer. So we put the project out to bid, received five bids, and we are recommending award to the low bidder.

[00:02:00] Thank you, Mr. Pascarelli. Thank you for that information. Is there any discussion about this expansion? No discussion. We will proceed to a vote. All those in favor, say aye.

[00:02:17] Chair, there wasn't a motion made yet? There's a motion. Oh, go ahead and make your motion. I'd like to ask somebody to motion to approve. I move to approve contract award, item 5.01, contract award for IFB number 26-544, the Woodgrove High School bus parking expansion.

[00:02:39] Second. It has been so moved and seconded. We will proceed to a vote. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. We will now move to our information items.

[00:02:55] Item 6.01, Business and Financial Services, RFP, R23261, Fresh Produce Renewal, presented by Ms. Villaw. Thank you. Thank you, and good evening. Before you this evening, I have three different contracts for renewal for our school nutrition program, with the first one being the fresh produce.

[00:03:15] This is the third of four renewals with Keeney Produce to provide produce for our school nutrition program from August 1, 2026 through July 31, 2027. If so chosen, you can either move this forward as an action or a consent item for your next meeting, and I welcome any questions.

[00:03:37] Is there any discussion? Yes, Mr. Pepper. - Thank you, Madam Chair. Do we know, in comparison with last year, how much the price has increased on some of these items? - Under the budget impact, you'll see no change in pricing.

[00:03:54] - That's really impressive. I'm just gonna say that a lot, there's no change in pricing. Can I ask a follow-up question as well? Do we have any program in our schools that allows, perhaps in the vein of sustainability, something where students can grow their own produce for usage in any of our school nutrition programs i'm not aware and miss miss sampson is not here with us this evening but that's a question i can bring back and answer unless miss willoughby wants to chime in it's a question that comes up often so i think what i could share that miss sampson would share would be that

[00:04:30] we support school gardens however in terms of that being a supply for the cafeteria is not typically what is done we do encourage the local vendors as well because another perhaps anticipating maybe another follow-up question that comes up a lot is farm to table and so we also work with you know community farms to you know direct them to getting on to the the federal contracts related to commodities as well as other cooperatives that we may engage with

[00:05:04] appreciate that i can also add to that we are working on an agreement with 4p foods to do farm to table um they actually are the go-between between the farming community and us for getting those items here i also believe that there's been some partnering with the school nutrition program and miss sipped who's doing the sustainability program for us she's also doing some work with the school nutrition program appreciate that you know we live in the county that we still have departments that are primarily agricultural so anything that we can do to support locals to support sustainability and you know support our students having the opportunity to see where their

[00:05:40] food comes from is very important not that this relates to this contract but i feel like it was a good kind of point to bring that up so i appreciate you guys thank you mr pepper um any other discussion no um i guess we can since this is an information item we can uh have this go on the consent agenda. Um, is everybody okay with that? Yes. Thank you. Um, we can now move on to 6.02 business and financial services, RFP R23263 ice cream renewal, uh, presented by Ms. Villa.

[00:06:19] Ice cream always gets a lot of attention on the ice cream. I will start with Mr. Pepper. This does have a 3.76% increase over last year for the ice cream. I will share that some of the cost we are trying to monitor related to fuel costs as you know fuel prices are going up and down and vendors are concerned about delivery to our hundred schools but right now this is for product an increase of 3.76 percent and our current contract is with garber's ice cream this also is the third of four renewal options with garber and once again this can either move forward on your consent

[00:06:58] agenda or as an action item at your next meeting any discussion yes mr pepper so thank you madam chair i know that ice cream is i have two children who really like buying ice cream although one can't because he's a kindergartner but the other one really likes buying ice cream in school um i know this is an a la carte item in our cafeterias will there be a price increase to correspond with the fact that the cost is also increasing each year as part of the budget process when we're developing pricing for the following school year we bring forward for the school board included in the

[00:07:37] budget with the meal prices will increase by we also look at the a la carte pricing and the samson could go in greater detail but there's a various calculations looking at all the a la carte items that we have to determine what the appropriate adjustments need to be should be for for each year so it's not necessarily just because we saw a price increase here it's it's looking at a variety of factors but we do take into account um you know increasing a la carte as appropriate thank you miss willvey mr carty yeah thank you madam chair i'm not familiar with garbage just

[00:08:15] out of curiosity are they a more local company are they regional national i believe um miss sampson did just walk in um hello not to put you on the show um but i believe they're out of winchester winchester okay yeah yeah they're out of winchester okay great thanks i had a quick question um as far as the contract going up um have you seen in the past when uh gas price is full i mean this is for a year right um have you seen them come down ever um or are they gonna because we paid uh the higher price this year are they going to just still go with that even if gas

[00:08:54] prices for next year? As I shared, this is for product itself, okay? This is the cost of the ice cream. Ms. Sampson worked very hard with our vendors to get them to not increase costs because of fuel charges. So this is related to the product. So the prices that you see in the attachment would be the prices we would pay for ice cream during the upcoming year. If a vendor sees a decrease in cost, there is always the option they can bill us less, just to throw that out there.

[00:09:23] but this is what we would budget for and plan on being the cost for ice cream for the next school year thank you um and did we have a question for you no okay uh all right so with that um does everybody feel comfortable uh with the consent agenda for this item okay consent agenda for the item thank you so much um item now we'll move over to um item 6.03 business and financial services

[00:09:55] IFB 121331 milk and related items renewal. Thank you. Ms. Blanc. On the milk we did see an average price increase of 2.33 percent but keep in mind also this contract's an escalating de-escalating so the price can go up and down depending on the market because it's always been that way with the milk bid. This is the last renewal on this so we will be going out to bid next year. Right now our current contract is with dairy made dairy this year and we did add some whole milk into the contract for the upcoming year we added that in and once again this item can either be moved

[00:10:35] forward on your consent agenda or action and Ms. Sampson is here if you have any questions regarding this or on the other contracts. Thank you so much Ms. Moore. Any um questions any discussion? No? Okay so if you guys feel comfortable we can move it to the consent agenda. Thank you so much.

[00:10:55] we're moving quickly here item 6.04 business and financial services rfp r19201 vehicle repair services renewal and that will be presented by miss vlog again this is for our transportation department and there is a mistake in here and i want to draw to your attention the following are services included in this contract it says part way down on the bullet list not included these are the items that are included as examples of what the vehicle repair services are used for.

[00:11:31] We can use them for towing to our other location if we need to because they help us with windshield replacement, alignments, body work, and overflow work. Things that our transportation team may not be able to do, have the equipment to do, that could take an extended period of time as they're moving their fleet in and out for repairs and standard maintenance and upkeep. This, as you can see on the attachment there are many vendors on this list this list is created to meet the various needs within our transportation department and the maintenance of our fleet vehicles once

[00:12:06] again this contract is there was no change in the hourly rates for the service so the vendors held firm on the hourly rates for their services during the upcoming year and this also could be brought forward as consent at your next meeting or as an action item. Thank you, Mrs. Falah. Any questions or discussion here? Ms. Riccardi? Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for clarifying that because I had the not part I had in my notes. I'm like, this doesn't exactly add up. So thank you for clarifying. I'm good with this. Thanks. I also want to thank you for keeping some of these contracts

[00:12:44] at the same level, at the same cost. I understand, you know, we have fuel issues right now. So I want to thank you for um your effort to keep us at the same levels um if there's no more discussion this item will also go to consent does everybody feel comfortable with that as long as we can remove the not i'm sorry as long as we move the word not oh okay good good thank you so much um and with that we will move on to item 6.05 business and financial services rfp q 558 558

[00:13:19] 787 Petroleum Products Renal. Thank you, Ms. Fela. This contract was actually a solicitation that is issued by the County of Loudoun, but they also include our usage for Loudoun County Public Schools and the Town of Leesburg when they are doing that solicitation. There is better pricing strength in numbers, right? They like having our numbers on the books as far as what we purchase based on the number of sites we have. This is for heating fuel oil as well as diesel fuel.

[00:13:50] And there is an increase in the markup per gallon for the heating fuel oil, off-road sulfur diesel fuel, and diesel fuel for the generators. So this is the fuel that runs things attached to our schools.

[00:14:07] But contingent upon, right now, the contract is with the county's legal team. Once that is completed, we are prepared to award the contract, renew the contract for the petroleum products. We're bringing it before you this evening to get the process started, contingent upon contract approval.

[00:14:26] Thank you so much for the information. Any discussion? Mr. Pepper. Thank you, Madam Chair. I noticed when I'm looking at the bids for this that there was another company that came in with a slightly lower bid than Valley Energy.

[00:14:43] Is there any particular reason that we chose Valley Energy? You would need to look at a few things. You need to look at the total across all the products, the usage for all the entities, the ability to deliver and meet our delivery requirements for multiple locations.

[00:15:03] So there's other things that go into, went into this other than just lowest price. When you award an RFQ, it can be what's in the best interest of the organization and best meets your overall needs with price only being one factor within the RFQ award.

[00:15:19] Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you very much. Any other discussion on this item, knowing full well that petroleum products are going up right now? Okay, so with that, we can send it over to consent unless anybody has an issue, and we'll just move on.

[00:15:42] Everybody's okay with that. We'll just move on to item 6.06, business and financial services budget development. This item is being presented by Ms. Willoughby. Thank you. continuing the discussion that we had i think two meetings ago regarding the budget development process at the last meeting i had shared how we were working on developing the the agenda and the presentation and activities related to the may 12th school board budget work session that is

[00:16:16] currently on schedule so this is really just i'm going to just punt it over to the committee to share additional feedback of information that we can incorporate into that work session there was an interest of polling the school board of certain questions and so you know really just having a transparent discussion related to the feedback from this committee and again to incorporate it into that may 12th meeting and in addition to the budget director we also have a slew of budgets that you know the team members here ready to take copious notes to make sure we don't miss anything

[00:16:54] thank you miss willoughby any discussion mr corney thank you so much i really appreciate um the conversation around this and i think that it um there's just so many really great opportunities i think in doing this so can you have you all put together an agenda yet for that meeting or are we still in the agenda development process still a development process but what i can share with you is what what's been roughly drafted so far and what

[00:17:27] typically has happened is an update on just the the process in general and so the information that was shared at the committee to two meetings ago a summarized version of that would be presented to the full board just to kind of get everyone on the same page in addition to that we plan on sharing information as I've mentioned since we're entering into this new era of budgeting with the county and the the fiscal constraints that they have enacted and that for the first time we have a multi-year projection of revenue from the county we're able to do something

[00:18:04] new and do a multi-year projection for um for our operating fund so information related to that will be presented to the board so that we want we won't just be talking about fy28 but also multiple years beyond that the additionally we have information to share related to an update on the FY 27 budget that was adopted you may recall that for any of the new investments that were included in that budget when those items were presented to the school board we had information related to the outcomes and how we were

[00:18:41] going to measure return on investment for those for those new items and so we'll give an update on that work that is ongoing and then lastly we're also developing because we are entering this new era of budgeting a strategic budget plan and so an outline of what that looks like so those are kind of like the main points which will take up a considerable amount of time just right there there's already I believe placeholders have been placed on school board members calendars for a June school board budget retreat where we can

[00:19:17] dive even deeper into all those items but also then building on to that more information on the base budget has had as has been discussed in the return on investment of some of those base budget items so a lot of work ongoing to you know feed into that May 12th which is really the official kickoff of that FY 28 budget then that June budget retreat as well as we have proposed not just one fall budget work session with the school board but actually two so you know adding an additional meeting with the school board before the C on is

[00:19:57] presented in January thank you for that so I I mean I know that we've all I think seen a couple of different presentations now on the actual process timeline so I think that's helpful but I think we've I don't know I can't speak or everybody else but as new people i think we've got the process part down i think pretty well um so i think from the last meeting one of the deliverables i had promised were some draft questions for the survey so i have that prepared i will email that to you um and i think my thought

[00:20:33] my thought process on this is we're in the process we're at a really interesting crossroads right now with our financial reporting and with the ERP system coming into play. And I think one of the things from a board perspective that would be really helpful for us is, and at least for me, is being able to see that CION document clearly broken down by departments, right?

[00:21:00] So by each department and then within that the programs, the services, the staffing, and the total cost of the programs that are run out of that department. So from board perspective, it's super transparent for the public and for all of us to really understand what we're buying into.

[00:21:16] I think the cool thing about being able to redesign the SEAN right now is that it gives you all also a roadmap in your ERP reporting requirements as you guys are building out the reporting structure for the ERP. And not that what we're asking for is the end-all, be-all of the reporting requirements, but it certainly is, at least from a board perspective, a list of potential reporting requests that you could have developed in the ERP.

[00:21:44] I think it's all pretty standard, too. I've spent a lot of time over the last two weeks since the last meeting really thinking about what that document would look like, how it could be designed. and I've actually crafted a draft of it that I'm going to share with Dr. Spence on Thursday and then with you as well after that.

[00:22:04] And again, I think it's more just as a jumping off point than it is this is how it has to be. I don't have any pride of ownership around that part of it. But I think it's just easier to explain it if I can show it and show you all kind of what I'm thinking.

[00:22:20] And then from there we can have this. I really hope this is a really collaborative effort, obviously. and then everybody on the board, you know, has a say in a piece of it, but basically it breaks down by all of the different departments, and then within it, all of the staffing for that department, all of the programs in that department, and the cost per student for those programs, so that we can really take a good look at what's happening from a financial perspective, and I'll kind of leave it at that. I mean, I've got plenty more I could say about it, but that's the overall, that's the overarching goal. I really, it's not to say that this, the SEON has a lot of really

[00:22:57] good information in it it's just really really hard to go through it in a five-week period and fully understand the entire financial position of all the departments and all the programs that we're offering it and then as the budget um you know as we kind of enter into more challenging financial times which at some point in time we're going to because enrollment's declining and the county's already indicated that the revenue from the data centers is going to start slowing down we'll just put it that way, we're going to have to start making more challenging decisions on the

[00:23:35] budget at some point. And so being able to see things with more clarity, I think, is going to help everybody in that process. Plus, I think it's just a really good time also to start looking at programs and making sure that they're as efficient and effective as they possibly can be. So with that, I'll pass it. Mr. Pepper? Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Ms. Riccardi, for sharing your thoughts. Quite detailed. And so I'm going to come at it with a similar lens, but a slightly different perspective and that is you know having been through one budget process and really and i think we say this to the public but they don't really realize it you know when you're a new board member you start in january you immediately get thrown to the wolves and you

[00:24:14] get this big thick budget book and then a series of presentations and for me my biggest challenge in going through the budget was just i thought it was the cion but it was the presentations and so it's just kind of aligning those as we go through the budget that would be really helpful because i know that i would you know as we try to get to the end and we're like okay we want to do this but we need to cut from this part it's the ease of use of the two documents and finding the right place to go to get the exact numbers we need and that's for me it's really more about

[00:24:47] streamlining than it is and making it easier a little bit more digestible perhaps is is where is where i kind of would like to see things go in the budget process and and i too know that have said this and very concerned maybe not as much next year but in the next however many years the budget situation that we may find ourselves in as a school system and so making sure that that it's easy for us to make the tough choices is probably the best way to put it as we go forward is something that is is very important to me I'm very eager to see where we land on May 12th right I'm eager to see how we start because I think knowing where we're coming

[00:25:27] from will help really drive a lot of discussion this summer it'll help drive our discussion at our planned june retreat as we you know craft our priorities for fy28 which is crazy for me to say in my head um because we're in 26 right now but so i'm looking forward to that and i'd rather use that as a launching off point i'm also in the part of you know i don't know what i don't know right and so i think that that's that's really helpful and so i'll leave it at that and miss Griffiths, give you a chance to. Thank you very much to my colleagues. I appreciate doing things

[00:26:00] a little bit differently. I have always mentioned everybody's different, right? Everybody looks at the budget differently. I'm more so taking out the investments, looking at that, keeping them separate from the departments. But I appreciate working with Mr. Riccardi's ideas as far as I believe you mentioned that you would have it's investments slash programs correct yeah and I think the thing for that I had to wrap my head around when you say investments you're really

[00:26:36] meeting programs yeah you're so I think that's going to be key for us to make sure we're all in the same using the same language for the same things but yeah yes and thank you so much for clearing that up because some of these programs that we have brought on are investments in our students, and that's why I use that particular word. Me personally, I'd like to see them broken out where I can digest them better. I'll use Mr. Pepper's word. And that's where I am. So anything we can do to take a dive and take a look and see what works for us and what doesn't, where money

[00:27:15] should be going um maybe some programs are just not um viable um and putting all the money towards them uh will not work in the end um that's where um i would be looking at for some of the programs enrollment um to see if it's worth what we're uh putting money out for as an investment or a program so um that's where we're to a great start um we'll look out for miss ricardi's um information and we can hopefully have that discussion at the next meeting my intention is to take this feedback

[00:27:53] and incorporate them into the may 12th school board budget work session so just to clarify versus necessarily bringing it back here if i may i'll just add that the team has actively been working on the feedback that we have received so far the aligning the book with the presentations is already ongoing we've you know realized that the final budget book which is a little more prescribed to meet best practices related to the awards programs, can be something that's different than the SEON, which we are really beginning to look at that as being more of the working document.

[00:28:32] So having the SEON be the exact same as the final is something that we are already working to adjust and providing that additional level of detail because, again, I can't emphasize enough the new era of budgeting that we are entering and that it is not just going to be about what are, you know, trying to prioritize what new investments to go in, but what we are able to continue to support going forward.

[00:28:57] So having those programs and that additional information is actively being worked on. Well, thank you very much, Ms. Willoughby. Is there any other discussion on this subject? Oh, Mr. McCarty. Yeah, I just wanted to add, too.

[00:29:13] I think one of the great things, too, about the new design is it would be really great to start seeing kind of year-over-year trends as well in that document so that we can kind of check and see kind of how we're doing on those various investments.

[00:29:31] In particular, I'm, you know, looking at the staffing and making sure that we're fully staffing to the best of our ability, especially our schools that have significant staffing needs. So that's another piece of this, too. But like I said, I am a little bit of an overachiever on this because I really, I really, I think there's, I feel really excited about being able to do this because there's, there's a lot of benefit to it.

[00:29:55] And I think, and I understand that you all have requirements in order to meet your awards needs, but I took those into consideration too when I drafted this and pulled this together. So I think it meets the same needs that you're looking for as well. It just provides the information, I think, in a much more transparent way so that people can really dive into the numbers.

[00:30:15] And it allows us to provide a lot more oversight, you know, as is our job. So I'm looking forward to working with you guys on this. Thanks. Thank you. And I also wanted to point out some programs are looking to expand. So that's another – they're not new investments or programs.

[00:30:35] They are programs we might want to expand on. So I really think we have to take a look at that. They might expand to other schools. We have to make sure that we would have the enrollment and the room at other schools to expand some of these programs. So I think there's a lot involved.

[00:30:53] A lot goes with it when we're doing the budget. And I know it's not an easy task. So I thank you very much. And I look forward to the collaboration. Thank you very much. And if there, is there any more discussion?

[00:31:12] How about new business? Does anybody have any new business? Okay. And with that, we will adjourn for today. Thank you.

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