001Live stream audio test. I'll turn on my microphone. The board of trustees of the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District is called to order at 5:00 p.m. This is a special call board meeting workshop being held on June 16th, 2025. We have a quorum with all members present. Um, and we will now have reports and presentations on the information items. All right. Thank you trustees for making time this evening. We have uh Mr. Buchanan that's on the uh at the podium and tonight is uh as the president also said conversation about uh upcoming upcoming possible bond referendum. And so it's a workshop and so it's uh very uh uh formal and informal questions. So whatever questions you may have, you know, we can get those answered. And then also we'll come back again tomorrow night uh
002and our bond council will be here tomorrow night to answer any kind of legal questions we may have as well. So, Miss Buchanan, good evening board of trustees and Dr. Nevin. Tonight, we want to bring forth a discussion and provide the input from our uh bond citizen committee. These are our committee members that met. The meeting was held on June the 10th, 2025. The committee discussed the proposed projects. They also discussed the financial impacts of those projects. And then they voted on each individual item. So tonight we're going to go through our proposed projects um in sections and we'll ask questions after each section that we we go through. So the first was in our proposition A. There's two propositions in this uh proposed bond. The first one is our elementary schools. Um elementary school
00339 through 45. The next column is the years that they would open and the budget amounts. Just to remind the board of trustees, the budgets amount budget amounts are based off current project cost with a 7% inflation annually until the school opens. That's why the the cost differentiates between the 27 schools, the 28 schools, and the 29 schools. If you'll look on the far right hand side, our bond citizen committee's input was they were in favor of 95% for elementary schools 39 and 45 and all of them were in favor of elementary schools 40 through 44. Do you have any questions about the elementary schools or the bond citizen committee input before we go on to our secondary campus section? Okay, the next section of the proposition was our secondary campuses. You have the layman
004and Robert's additions. Again, in our last bond in November of 22, the board approved a thousand seat addition at Fulsure High School. We need to now come back and add the additions to Layman and Roberts, Layman Junior High and Roberts Middle School to increase their capacities to match the high school to create a true feeder pattern. Then we have secondary complex 9 which includes a high school, junior high, middle school, an auditorium upgrade increasing the capacity of our auditoriums from 850 to 1,250 and then a Terry High School George Junior High Navaro Middle School replacement. Um before we go on to where uh that will be placed is the input from the committee is is the layman and Robert's editions along with secondary nine had 100% in favor of all the members of the committee.
005Auditorium upgrades to 1,250 seats was only 86% and then the Terry George Navaro replacement was at 95%. So to remind the board of trustees, this is our current secondary zones that we have with Tomas opening this fall. If you'll look in the upper leftand corner, the octagon shape with number eight, that is the location of secondary 8 that's currently under construction. So those three campuses, the high school, the junior high, and the middle school will open in the fall of 2027. Currently, if you'll look in the middle of the red track, you have the star located and it's located on Spur 10 and Clausterhoff Road. It's where our CTE center is currently being constructed that will open in the fall of 26. If you'll notice the distance between Lamar High School and Terry High School,
006um it's really putting us at a disadvantage when we need to reszone. if we need to give us some room to put more kids into a blue track or less kids into those because of those campuses being closely located together, it would present a a unique challenge to have a secondary campus located within a another campus's attendance zone. Um, so if we were to expand it now, you would have Terry High School's complex sitting in the in part of and surrounded by Lamar's attendance zone. By putting it on the bottom, you would have three high schools spread out across the southern side of our district. Also putting the Terry George Junior High Navarro in the middle of the red track current zone as it continues to grow with Brookwater and Emberly. it's more centrally co
007located within that attendance zone. So, one things that we did discuss and was part of the bond citizen committee was what are we doing um with the Terry George Junior High Navaro campuses. Um we've explored some options that we have. Uh one of the options would be is is repurposing those buildings. Uh, another option would be is if if in our next bond cycle we were to replace Lamar Consolidated High School, Lamar Junior High, Wessonorf, it would give us a place to be able to possibly move those kids to those campuses until the new campuses were rebuilt and then move them back and then repurpose those buildings in the future. So, it gives us a transition campus to be able to put those in. It could be um that we use a fine arts academy.
008One thing that we um have discussed is possibly putting together a committee because anything that we do to re um remodel those buildings needs to be done in the 28 bond which would be our next bond cycle. So, it gives us plenty of time to get our input from our uh our community with uh again a committee put together by the board to appoint people to be able to sit on that committee to decide what we're going to repurpose that, how we're going to repurpose that, the cost of those facility repurposing and remodeling um as we proceed to move forward for our long-term plan with those facilities. Are there any questions about the secondary campuses? M Mr. Buchanan, uh I'd like to discuss this and be sure that I understand uh with respect to to
009this anticipated or this proposed move of Terry High School. Now, there are two major subdivisions that that ideally we're preparing for. If we could go back Yes, sir. to that map. There there's Emberly subdivision and that that development that that uh that we're preparing for off of Highway 59. That is correct, sir. And there's one other major sub development down in that area. What is that? Brookwater, I'm sorry. Sweet Brookwater. Brookwater. It is just south on it is again located on Highway 59. That is where elementary school 38 will be opening in the fall of 26. Sorry. And so either way with those two developments coming online in the near future, we're would you venture to say that we are going to need a high school at at that location at Highway 59 and in
010Spur 10? Yes, sir. Okay. So, so either way, we're going to need a track, a color track at that particular location. Yes, sir. All right. Now, now also with respect to to Rand High School, um I believe that there are some major developments that are coming that are coming online south of Rand High School, including Austin Point. Is that right? Well, um when you look at Randle High School, Yes, sir. where it's located currently, it wraps around Randle High School, is called the George. It's 4,400 homes, and that's the major subdivision that is in the silver track. But there's also three more subdivisions coming in right off of Power Line, just south of Power Line around Grey Elementary School. Yes. Austin Point sits directly right here, which is currently in the maroon color track. So
011all of those developments are going to put quite a much larger population on Rand High School. Yes, sir. As it is today. Yes, sir. So, so by by locating a high school at spur 10 in highway 59, that should alleviate some of that overpopulation for Randall High School. Yes, sir. So, in the last bond part of the 22 November bond, what we did was is we added 500 seat additions to George Ranch, Randle High School, and Foster. Um, that puts those capacities at 2575. But what we also did was expand the cafeteria and added a third gym. And by doing that, all those three of those campuses can handle another 500 seat addition without having to expand those support areas. Yes. So, we have some different options to be able to approve any kind of
012growth, either adding an additional 500 seat addition or if by putting these three on the south side of the district, it gives us a chance to be able to tweak and modify those attendance zones to help us with the growth moving forward. So, so with that in mind, it makes logical sense to me that we would locate a color track at Highway 59 and Spur 10. Now, given the the proximity of Terry, the current Terry High School to Lamar High School, it also makes sense that all of the students within that area be zoned to the same high school. Yes, sir. that that's when we have to start looking at numbers and population growth as we look forward. But currently, you see where the blue track and the red track currently, yes, sit to expand
013the blue track, you're encompassing a lot of where Terry High School is currently located. So, so refresh my memory, uh, this past graduation cycle, approximately how many graduation class sizes for Lamar and Terry High School? Approximately about 400 just ballparking it. Yeah, I will Dr. Weights will be able to provide you with Yes, sir. Approximately 400 and 300 for Lamar. 400 and 300. Yes, sir. So that's a combined 700 graduates. Yes, sir. How would that compare to what we had at Fulsure High School? Fer had 800. 800. Okay. So, so eight Fulsure High School alone graduated more graduates than than Lamar and Terry High School put together approximately. Yes, sir. All right. Thank you, Dr. Yes, sir. That makes perfect sense. So, so that makes sense uh to me. I think the key word here
014that you've just explained is repurposing the Terry High School facility. That makes a lot of sense from the standpoint that that we could utilize uh Navaro and and George Junior High and Terry High School for other reasons, for other purposes, and even perhaps use them as a transition uh facility uh for potentially building a new Lamar High School. Yes, sir. All right. Thank you. You're welcome. Um, Mr. Buchanan, the the high school that we're talking about building at Spur 10, what is the size that you're the number of seats for? Currently, we're looking at 2575 would be the capacity of the high school that we're looking at now. Terry High School currently has 1,875 seats. So, it's it would be 700 additional seats at the high school level by building a new high school at
015that location. Now, with all the anticipated growth down Highway 59, would it not be better to build that as a 3000 seat high school? Now, we can if that's the board's wish. Um, what we would do is is we put it as an alternate. um depending on how that comes out when the bidding process goes if it comes out that we can afford it within the project that we would build it to if that's what the board wishes to to match Fster High School and secondary complex 8. Can you go back one slide to the to the list? Okay. So I remember from the citizen bond committee I was there as a fly on the wall. Uh there was some confusion about the auditorium upgrade to 1,250 seats. We're talking about one of the district's
016auditoriums, high school auditoriums, upgrading it alone, and it has not been determined which one, upgrading it to that number of seats and possibly putting a balcony, an orchestra pit, and and those other type of things. Is that correct? Yes, sir. The plan would be is we currently have 850 uh seats in our current auditorium. Um what we don't have is really a performance area. Um so an orchestra pit fits underneath the stage. So, it lets you to have a live uh orchestra underneath there to play music for the theater productions. The other thing it do is it have a larger stage, expanding the stage, being able to have a larger production as itself. The things we were looking at is our prop room. Currently, right now, our students that have props within our plays, they
017can't have they don't have room to store those long term. So, when one plate goes out, one plate comes in, if they don't need those props, they have to tear those props down. So, this would allow us a larger prop area, a larger production area for the props to be able to keep the larger props so they can be used over and over again without students having to build and then tear down and rebuild those current propos props for those stage areas. I I just wanted to be clear for the public um we're not talking about upgrading everybody's auditorium to this this number of seats, just one in the district. Yes, sir. There would be significantly more dollars if we were to do everyone's, but that is just a single auditorium. All right. Thank you.
018If we were to add the 400 additional seats to say high school number nine or um the replacement for Terry High School George, um would that equal 41 million if we were to add that in at the construction costs? Yes, sir. When we we started talking with our architects and engineers when we started looking at this, it's square footage. A lot of our square footage is our square footage is based our cost, right? So the more square footage you have, the more cost you have. So when we expand the footprint of either one of the secondary 9 or the Terry replacement, we're increasing the overall square footage of the building. Do we know what that additional square footage is for that cost? I mean, if you're looking at it, it's uh for each if you're
019going to go per seat, that's 400 seats. You're looking at $103,000 per seat, but we know it's more than just seats. It's all the other stuff, too. Yes, sir. because you're looking at the balcony additional the structural steel then you're looking at the orchestra pit that you have to dig down and then you know we are in the Houston area so anytime we dig down we have to put in any kind of flood control that comes in there to be able to get the water out if water ever were to get inside of the building and not create a pond underneath our stage do we um currently have any partnerships in within the community that would that provide those things for us or have we looked into partnerships with I mean we are in Houston
020it's they have a lot of I'm talking about the the upgrade to the auditorium do we currently have a partnership with anybody that allows us to do those things have a orchestra use their facilities so currently no the only thing that we currently have within our area would be the epicenter and it is not a um production facility um a lot of the things that we've encountered by using the facility is the acoustics versus when we do an auditorium, it's there's a lot of cost when it comes to designing the acoustics and the sound quality with inside the auditorium itself. So the next section of um Proposition A was our campus supports. This really supports all of our tracks. If you'll notice the bond citizen committee on the right hand side, it was 100% in
021favor of all of these. If you'll we'll just go through them quickly. You have land and land development things that we've learned is to be able to buy land for the next bond to keep up with the growth and the growth patterns. The other thing that we've experienced um in particular is the Peak and Beachnut site is to be able to develop that land to get it ready for an ele elementary school or secondary site before we actually need it. So that way the utilities and roads are already there. So when we do, the site is prepped for construction. We talked about portable buildings. We put new and moved on on the proposition. We hope to not buy any new, but once we list both, it gives us a flexibility of being able to do
022both of those for both purchase if we need to or move. Currently, right now, it cost us $300,000 to relocate a portable building from one campus to another, 600,000 for brand new. We put vehicles, bus, and white fleet. The reason that we put both of these on here, it allows us the flexibility to purchase both police vehicles, maintenance vehicles, and our buses. Um, with the capital outlay of our bond program, safety and security. We can talk a little bit more in our close session because those things are related um to the security of our students. And then the next section was roofing and air conditioning. Um, if you will pull out your large uh three- ring binder. Once you open up your binder, there's a cover sheet on the front that says facility assessment report.
023Currently, we had four different architectural firms help compile this report for you. Um, one thing that we've we've changed in the past is instead of putting out surveys to staff and surveys to community members and stuff of of what should be improved within our facilities, what we did was we took our current prototype elementary schools and our secondary campuses and says this is the district standard. The board has approved the educational specifications for these. How do the campuses within our district compared to a brand new facility? So that's how we became generated this report. Once you on once you open the cover, if you'll turn past the table of contents, there is an executive summary by category and it looks like this. Has all the campus pricing broke down. This lists all of our campuses
024and it breaks everything down into four different categories. And then it totals you on the right for each category. If you'll flip over one more page where it says safety, HVAC and roofing, if you will notice, compared to our new facilities, we have $600.3 million worth of repairs and um that we need to be making within that facility. Currently, right now, we're looking for $165 million. If you will open up in your second, Mr. Canon, where where do you see the $600 million? Where's it at? If you look at the bottom of your summer category, it summarizes the bottom here. So, there's a total of $1 billion worth of repairs to bring all of our facilities up to our current new standards. Just for air conditioning, roofing, and safety, it's 6 $600.3 million. So, if
025we were to do all of the repairs and bring all of our facilities up to our current standards, it would be just over $1 billion just to be able to do that to create to address all of our safety, HVAC, and roofing needs would be again $600.3 million. Inside your front leaf of your notebook, this is what we bulled the $600.3 million down to. And this lists out every campus, lists out every track. So for instance, if you'll flip it open to your first page, you have the blue track and you have Austin Elementary School. It then lists your replacing chillers, the cool condenser units, exhaust fans, air conditioning, our MDF and IDF closets, which are for our servers to keep our technology equipment cooled, our building automation system, and then replacing the chilled water
026pumps. This cost that you have on the right hand side of your column is the current projected construction cost and construction cost only. There's no design cost in it. There's no contingency in it as we get into the buildings what it would cost. So that is where we're generating the cost for each facility. If you'll notice as you flip over each um page and I I can answer any questions for this, but if you'll look at the bottom of page three as a Dolphins Elementary School. Dolphus Elementary School is one of our newer elementary schools, but if you'll notice, there's only one line item and that is air conditioning, but it is just for our server rooms. Those are called MDF and IDF closets. our main distribution framework and our intermediate distribution framework. So those
027are just to cool our technology servers within those facilities. So just because it has says air conditioning listed on our list, it doesn't mean we're replacing all the air conditioning within the facility. If you'll notice, majority of our new campuses, that's all we're doing is coming back and air conditioning those server rooms were in the last bond. We increased the amount of servers that were going in there and the number of devices attached to those servers. So, we're just going back and air conditioning those to keep those optimum temperatures for those to operate at at peak efficiency. This is a lot of information to to digest. So, I'll give you a minute to just look over everything and if you have any questions. Yes, sir. on the if we go back if new you don't
028have to go back but just saying all the new schools that we are building at the beginning that were requesting for new elementary schools all that all those are going to include these air conditioner server rooms correct that's correct can you explain why they were not built air conditioned if we knew servers were going in there or I don't know if that was predates you arriving to us a lot of it does sir the other thing is is um that I know as we add devices especially as we do state testing we had to increase our Wi-Fi network which had so each Wi-Fi we need to increase the number of servers number of servers put off more heat um so those are the type things that we're having to put with inside those facilities the
029other thing I know that we added in our last spawn was a lot of battery backup systems so you have some battery backup systems in those server rooms to last 30 minutes to transition um to be able to keep those up and running those also as those charge put off heat like when your phone charges. So, it's just the accumulated heat of all those devices causes issues sometimes within our um tropical weather that we like to have down here in Houston. Okay. First of all, thank you for putting this together because this is pretty incredible. Um, before I got on the board, I would have never appreciated just the sheer amount of dollars that it takes to run our district and keep our buildings in working order. Even so, when you're talking about $165 million
030in just basically maintenance, one of the questions I get a lot is why why don't we account for this? You know, like why isn't this included in in our M every year and we're constantly making repairs? So, could you kind of explain how that works? Yes, ma'am. you know our our state lawmakers have decided that the uh interest in syncing fund which is funds our bond it's our debt service that is the mechanism that we are to be used to provide um new buildings and remodel buildings our facilities or upgrades um the reason being is is any part of our M that we were to allocate for this we'd be pulling out of the classroom so the dollar amounts that we pull out of our maintenance and operation fund pulls out of a classroom to
031be able to fund these items let's say legisl E said, "Okay, we'll give you an an interest in syncing fund, which is to pay your bond bonded debt." That is for your facilities, large major renovations, air conditioning repairs, things of that nature. But also, it's the flip side is is we can't take our INS fund and pay for teacher raises or employees or anything nonrelated to our capital projects funds. So you can take your general fund and pay for other things, but this debt fund, you can't go back and pay for new teacher, teacher raises, additional paras, things of that nature. So that's why taking these um items and be able to put them into our bond proposition allows us to free up money to be able to put back into our classroom. Do we
032have a maintenance schedule for buildings every year uh that we can use our INS fund for? What is our what what is our maintenance schedule? Do we just wait for a bond before we repair any buildings or do we do anything throughout the year goes to make sure uh that buildings are still up and running and functional the the actual structure of the building? Yes, sir. Um that's a great question. We we have a maintenance fund that allows us to maintain a facility um but it does not cause allows us to replace things like carpet coming in and doing major remodels within our facilities. It just really maintains the quality of the building that it currently has. That's what our maintenance fund is is there for. Now, we have come to the board here recently
033to be able to fund, you know, some fire alarm replacements at some campuses, to be able to fund some chiller replacements, things of that nature. We'll be able to use the bond funds that we've saved from other projects. But our our current M fund that's set aside for maintenance is just to maintain the facility in its current state. So that that bond that money that's set over for maintenance comes out of M. Yes sir, it does. Which comes out of the classroom. Yes sir, it does. Uh Mr. Buchanan, I remember uh in the 2020 bond. Somebody asked me this in the public and and I asked the the person in your position at the time, so I want to ask it again because somebody might be thinking of it. Um we have the M department,
034maintenance and operation department. So on uh one of these pages, let's see here. It's Reading Junior High. Just to use it for instance, we're going to spend $318,000 to repair the roof and to mitigate leaks. Uh help us understand why our maintenance and operation department can't maintain the roof to mitigate leaks. Yes, sir. So, one thing that we have currently within our in our maintenance department is we we don't pay market value for a lot of trades. Um, so because of that, we have to outsource that work. Um, our our roofing is one of those many trades. HAC is another. Um, we we've had multiple issues with Reading Junior High in this particular area that we're talking about. Our maintenance crews have attempted to address it. Our contracted services had attempted to address it. This
035is a much larger repair to actually pull back parts of the roof, get underneath it, be able to address the the the leak permanently, and put it back. Could we do that within in house? No, sir. We we currently don't have the skilled positions to be able to address that within our facilities. The other thing is is if if our maintenance crew is addressing certain things like that, it pulls them away from doing our general maintenance to be able to upkeep our current facilities. So, we don't have we're not overstaffed within our department to be able to address these issues. Um, a lot of these issues we end up using contract services because they are one-off type projects that do take three, four, five days to be able to use. And once it becomes a
036much larger issue, that's usually when it becomes part of the bond and capital outlay. Okay, another question. Like let's just look at Campbell Elementary School and replacing the boiler 90 $93,000. What is what's the typical lifespan of one of those boilers? And do we have warranties on them when we buy them? And at what point do we say, "Okay, we have to replace it." Currently, what we like to do is replace our boilers between 20 to 25 years. Okay. Um, so think of a boiler as a water heater in your house. So, they only have a certain lifespan. We do preventive maintenance on all our boilers. They have to be inspected annually. Once we we get them installed, we're looking at about 20 25 year lifespan. Depends on different types of manufacturers. Depends on the
037type of warranty. Some of them could be five years, some could be 10, some could be 15. So, it really depends on the manufacturer when we purchase the boiler of what kind of warranty they offer us. The other thing is is when we we do look at those, if they have a larger warranty, sometimes the boilers cost more money. So, you're really paying for the warranty as part of the price of the boiler equipment. So, we look at all of those when we look at specifications when it comes to our boiler equipment. And then our architects and engineers review those during the submittal process because the vendors have to submit what they're actually going to put in and make sure that they meet the specifications that we outlined. Thank you. Is this going to be
038posted online? Yes, ma'am. We didn't want to post it until the board had a chance to thoroughly dive through it and and look at everything. Okay. Thank you. Can I ask one other question? Um a lot of them have it says replace um building automation system for HVAC control. What is that exactly? So our building automation system what it does is it takes all the thermostats within the facility and all the units within the facility and allows us to be able to monitor them and control them. So, some of our our building automation systems have reached either lifesa or um we're having difficulty with the older systems integrating them into our newer controls. So, what it allows us to do is if a teacher says I'm hot within my classroom, we can immediately pull it
039up on a screen and say, what is the temperature of the classroom and what is the unit that's providing air to that classroom? Is it actually functioning? So, if we look at the classroom, she says it's warm and it's 78 degrees and the unit's not working. We can immediately identify it and send someone out. Or it could be she's saying it's hot, it's 75 degrees, but the set points at 75. We can lower the set point and then it cools down the room and then we don't have to send a technician across town to be able to look at a piece of air conditioning equipment to to know if the room's functioning. The other huge advantage is one of our largest expenses outside of payroll is our utility budget. Um, so because of that, it
040allows us to shut down schools when no one's there so that we're saving efficiencies. And we don't really shut them down. What we do is we just raise the set points. So it allows the air conditioned equipment not to have to run as much because the building is not occupied with students and staff. And like we talked about facility rentals last month, when people do rent the facilities, it allows us to schedule that so the air does come on, provides air for that, and then turns itself off after the event. Yes, just on a much larger scale. Does anyone have any more questions about this specifically? I don't have questions. I would like to make a couple of comments. Correct me if I'm wrong. It's my understanding that we are considered a hyperrowth district because
041we are growing at a rate of approximately 2,000 students per year. Is that correct? Yes, sir. All right. And and it's my understanding that that we are the fastest growing school district of our size in the state of Texas. Yes, sir. Okay. So, so, so with that in mind, one of the things that that that I encountered during my campaign is that my constituents understand that we are in a rapid growth mode. And so, my my constituents fully understand and that my charge to uh serving on this board is to address and plan for this rapid growth. And and with that in mind, I just want to commend my colleagues, my predecessors on this school board. Uh one of the when when I decided to run for the school board, I knew that I would
042be joining a a very effective school board, a board that has done a good job for many years and and really my intent was to build on on the success they've already established. And I cannot commend ha having some prior experience serving in public office. I look at that land and a land development line item and commend my predecessors and this superintendent uh for uh establishing a land bank when it occurred because that that is that is huge. It's paramount in in planning for growth. Uh so so kudos to everyone who has served uh most recently and especially to our superintendent because I know that the land bank has not been established for many years. I think it's to the best of my my understanding it's been about two two to three years. Yes, sir.
043And of course, we all know that land is not getting any less expensive. So, as a as a as a fiscal conservative, I I would like to buy be able to buy at I'm a value shopper. I want to pay the less least amount for the for the uh for the best value. And so, you know, that's why I'm excited and I think it's prudent that that we continue to to add to the land bank. But by the same token, uh, touching on the on the relocation of the red track schools, I have talked to some of my constituents who are alumni at uh, Terry High School specifically recently, and several have expressed to me that initially that the idea of that relocation was a emotional, you know, issue to them. But as they thought
044it through, they realized, yes, it is prudent. It is it is good planning. It is proactive for the district to start to consider relocating the red track. Uh so, you know, uh I just wanted to express that because those are some recent comments that actually came up during our bond uh committee meeting as well. So, uh those are the comments that I wanted to share and express. Thank you. Thank you. And that was actually a good segue into what I wanted to ask next, which is land and land development. So the elementary schools that we have on the bond, is the land for those already purchased and part of our land bank partially fully or is this land to buy those the land for those elementary schools or future? So our current elementary schools, it's
045a little bit of mixed. Some of them we own, some of them are under contract. So, we're in the process of purchasing. But currently, right now, we have enough money in our current bond of the 22 to pay for all of those sites that we currently have. Uh trustees, before we move away from this section on the facilities assessment, uh when we post this, we're also going to um have a link up there uh for folks that are interested in becoming vendors in our district. Uh because a lot of times when you post this, you'll have uh u people that sell these products and then what they'll do is they'll they'll email me and they'll email trustees and say, "Hey, my business can get you that chiller for half the price, right?" Not know, you
046know, and we don't know what kind of chiller that is. And so then they'll start emailing you directly expecting a expecting a response. And so when we post this, we'll put up a link also that lets people know if you're interested in becoming a vendor, you know, in our next in our next uh bond cycle, whatever that is, here's a link on how to do that. And we'll ask them not to email trustees directly because that that'll fall outside of the process. And so it'll make sure that we follow the process and make sure that the community knows that we have a process, a bonafide process to do that. Um, but when we post this, you will often get those that information. And so when you see it online and you see that, that's what
047that's where that's coming from. So I will, this is just a brief uh version of the handout that we've already uh looked at tonight. Color track, campus, and if we're doing HVAC or HVAC and roofing. So here's our blue and red track. This is our gold and green track, [Music] maroon and purple track, silver, and then our support buildings. Next, I'm going to bring up Dr. Dr. Chad Jones. He's going to talk about our technology which is our prop B as proposed. Good evening everyone. For the technology portion, it's broken out in a separate bond prop uh proposal is required by state law. State requires that technology devices be a separate proposition that the community would would uh vote on. Uh I've broken this down into three different categories for us. Three different projects so
048we can see what those main sections are. Uh the first project is technology equipment refresh which would be about $43.8 million at the bond citizens committee. 100% of the committee agreed was in support of that project. The next was a 1:1 student laptop ratio which is 10 about $7 million. 73% of the bond citizens committee were in favor of that project. And the final one was the graphic arts updates which is $250,000 and 100% of the bond citizen committee was in support of this. Total the technology devices portion of the uh proposition would be 54.8 uh million. I'm going to walk through each of these projects to give some explanation of that as well as uh some common questions that we get for projects like this. Uh for the technology equipment refresh to make sure
049everybody's on the same page as to what that means. Uh technology refresh is replacing technology equipment that has an expired warranty or is no longer supported for security or functional purposes. Uh for our computers, we're talking things like desktops, laptops, and monitors. All of those devices are purchased with a 5-year warranty. And at the end of that life cycle, the device is probably not really terribly usable anymore. It may have a little bit more life in it, but the warranty is expired. And so any sort of damage or repairs would have to be paid uh locally by the district. iPads are not purchased with a warranty. it's uh it's cheaper for us to be able to just repair those as those issues happen. Uh and typically those devices have a five-year functional lifespan. That's what
050we try and get out of those devices. And it's that that lifespan is when we're talking about Apple no longer provides updates for those devices, security patches. And so it's a concern having them in our environment at that point. for the refresh. Uh what you see on the screen is a table that walks through the different types of devices and the number of devices per school year that would be uh falling out of warranty or for that last row there iPads where they would be fun falling out of our expected functionality uh area. And for monitors you can see over the course of those years it would be 1436. For student laptops, I included uh through 2028 2029 because if we if we move forward with a onetoone uh program, we would want to make
051sure that that school year, which is when our next bond cycle might come around, uh that we had devices that would work throughout all of that school year uh for that uh program would be. So that would be 20,753 laptops. Student desktops over the those four years 4583. Staff laptops two uh just a little below 3,000. Staff desktops 4,600 and iPads would be just under 21,000. For the student 1:1 laptop ratio. Uh just a little bit of information about that. Uh currently the Lamarcisd has 36,459 student laptops and enrolled we have 3 35,08 students in grades 3 through 12. So, it is technically possible for us to do a 1:1 program if we reallocated the current student laptops that we have right now. Uh, but what that would leave us short on is those support
052devices of as break fixes happen, uh, being able to replace those devices and getting them quickly turned around in the in the hands of students. Whenever a device is broken or it has an issue, it can take two to three weeks before we receive a warranty back uh, for a replacement of that device. Uh this also uh one key note is that the 1:1 student laptop ratio pro proposal does not send devices home. It would be primarily on campus. Looking at this uh what we've done is uh looked at our enrollment currently for grades 3 through 12 and projected the growth of the district over the next few years through the 2028 2029 school year and then defined what that plus 10% would be. And that's the number of devices we would need to have,
053student laptops that we would need to have to maintain a 1:1 student laptop ratio uh in grades 3 through 12. The bottom row of that table shows you how many devices would need to be purchased by year. Uh it starts off at about 2,000 gets up to close to 2,500 per year for a total of 11,65 by the end of this bond proposal. The final section there was graphic arts updates. uh for our graphic arts department supports large-scale printing needs for the district including high volume printing and large format printing. Tools identified for replacement are or additional need are one large format printer. Uh replacing a large volume paper cutter, replacing a cutter, creaser, perforator and folder machine. It's an all-in-one machine. It's really cool machine actually. Uh and then replacing a four wakecomm tablets.
054That's a design tool, an electronic design tool where they can draw out graphic uh graphics that they want to ultimately print out or make available on our web page. So, estimated costs for all of these projects. We covered the big picture uh but to make sure we have understanding of why those number where those numbers came from uh per device pricing is based on current quotes, what we can currently get for those devices plus an additional 15% to cover possible price increases over time and implementation costs. So you can see on this uh table here you can see the devices and then the estimated plus 15%. So monitors would be $230, student laptops $966, student desktops and staff desktops 1,150 and then staff laptops would be just under $1,500 and iPads at $4250. overall cost
055of the projects. You can see each of the uh different line items there with the number of devices that would need to be replaced or purchased original per year with the unit unit estimated costs. So the total number of devices times that uh per unit cost gives you the totals on the last column. So for monitors it would be $330,000. For student laptops just to refresh not going one to one would be 20 million uh47,000 student desktop would be 5.2 2 million staff laptops 4.4 million staff desktop 5.3 million iPads would be 8 about4 million and then if we chose to do with a 1:1 program adding those additional laptops to our environment that would be $10.7 million and then the graphic arts project would be $250,000. Different way of looking at this just to
056see the different amounts and how much each project fits into the larger hole. You can see each of those projects broken up by broken up inside of there. I think another nice way to look at this is to see the difference whenever we talk about just the equipment refresh. That's about 80% of the projects and the student laptop ratio is 20% of the projects. The graphic arts part is just a very small sliver there of the total project. We do get a lot of questions about technology devices that I think is helpful to discuss to help uh everybody understand why the costs are what they are because sometimes you know you you have your expectations of what you can go to Best Buy and do. So we we gathered some frequently asked questions to help
057cover some of this. The first one is the price of of laptops. The price of a student laptop seems high is something I've heard. Why are we budgeting $840 for a student laptop? Uh the first thing is the cost of student laptops has significantly risen in the past six months. It has gotten more expensive in the past many months. Uh but with bulk pricing, it is possible we could get lower prices for those devices. Another part is that we're buying a different device now. We're uh buying laptops that have larger batteries. The number one piece of feedback that we receive from our uh instructional staff is they wish the batteries on our laptops lasted longer. And so we've purposely uh started purchasing devices that have bigger batteries to support that request. And then the last
058idea there is that unlike standard consumer devices, student laptops are built to be more durable and include a 5-year accidental damage warranty to man uh minimize long-term repair costs. We're getting a device that needs to be able to handle a little bit rougher wear and tear maybe than what it's going to get at home uh if it was a personal device. Another question we get is uh we've heard I've heard that other districts are purchasing Chromebooks. Why aren't we purchasing those? Uh, Chromebooks are a very affordable option, but they tend to be less durable and typically come with shorter warranties. Uh, I'm not aware of any Chromebook that you can purchase that comes with a 5-year warranty. Uh, average is really three. Sometimes you can get four. Uh, and that because of that, it often
059requires being replaced more frequently than a student uh than our current standard for student laptops. There's also the limited ability uh to uh run installed applications. it's a web-based device and so if it's not a web-based tool, it's not something it's not going to be a good tool for that instructional need. Additionally, uh Chromebooks are prone to more damage and may not really withstand the daily use of students as some of our more sturdier devices. A final note there is some of the technical backend. Uh right now we are an environment that supports this Microsoft environment that we're a part of. If we decided to go with Chromebooks, uh we would need to make sure that we were developing that Google backend to support that environment. we just currently don't have that. So, we would
060have to do that uh locally to to make sure we're able to utilize those devices effectively. One of the questions is the need for computers from the teacher perspective. What are some potential benefits of teachers having laptops available for every student in their classroom? Well, by providing every student with a laptop, it ensures consistent access to essential digital tools such as online textbooks, Canvas, and other instructional resources. This access enables our teachers to more effectively integrate technology in their classroom. uh from a planning perspective uh because they know it's going to be available for them. In addition to this, it also supports the everyday learning uh and fulfills Texas Education AY's requirement for online star testing for grades three and up. It gives students that the opportunity to regularly practice on these uh technology tools
061for what they're ultimately going to have to test on at the end of the school year. From the student perspective, what are some potential benefits for our students having access to laptops? This is some ideas that was actually came out of the bond citizens committee. some of the comments that came there. Uh, having a laptop in the classroom is valuable for our students because it helps them build those essential technology skills like typing and navigating digital tools. Uh, it also prepares them for prepares them for success in an increasingly tech-driven world by giving them that hands-on experience with the tools they'll use in future careers. Additionally, the regular laptop use ensures that our students again are having those opportunities to practice for those statemandated tests that are going to be required to be on a
062computer. What if a teacher did not want to use a laptop in their classroom? That's the beauty of this of this pro of this idea. Uh teachers are our very most valuable resource in the classroom. Without them, instruction does not happen. A laptop for every student provides teachers the known tool available for every student, but it does not require the teacher to use that tool. If a teacher wishes to not utilize a laptop for a particular lesson, uh they have the discretion to do so. But by providing the laptop, we give them the peace of mind knowing that if they did want to use that tool in their classroom, it would be available there for them. Take-home, the last question there is, will students be taking those laptops home? Right now, the plan is not
063for to for students to be taking these laptops home. They would be on campus. Uh we're looking at storage solutions where they could be checked out on campus quickly and easily. Uh so that our teachers again know that those tools are going to be available for them for daily instruction. What questions do you all have for me? I have a question. Um, can you go back to the slide that talks about the individual costs of the items that are listed in the It's kind of towards the front of your Um, yes. Okay. So, I know you said so the student laptops are more expensive because there's a reason for it. Yes, ma'am. So, I have a couple of questions. So, student desktops, I mean, how many student is this more like a computer lab at
064an elementary school? Like, do we have labs anymore that we utilize? We do have some labs uh at all of our elementary schools have one computer lab in them. So that a lot of times it's part of the specials rotation that they'll come into those classes. Um and in our high schools and secondary schools oftentimes they'll have at least one computer lab. And then we have like our CTE classes where some of those classes will have uh specific desktops associated with those classes. So we don't have a lot of student desktops uh but we do have some. Okay. And then so the cost of a student desktop like does that in that does not include the monitor. It's just the desktop itself. It is just the desktop. Okay. So that seems high to me too.
065Is there a reason we could look into that and and see if there's a way an opportunity for some cost savings there. Um that's the price that we currently get for those student desktops. It's about $997. It was the last quote I saw like yesterday. Uh so that's a pretty standard cost that we're getting for those devices right now. Uh but that's something we could investigate further. Uh or possibly it could be if it the will of the board it could be an opportunity for student laptops in those spaces instead. Yeah. Yeah, I guess in my mind I think our students I mean unless they're in a CTE class where they're using like you know AutoCAD or something like that where they need a higher processor speed or whatever but in just the average classroom
066where they're accessing web-based star canvas edgeoria or whatever it is it seems like it would be real basic that there might be some opportunity for costsaving there. We can investigate that. Um and then I also had the same thing for the staff laptop. Obviously, they need a laptop. They need to be I I did talk to um teachers and the the respon uh the feedback that I got about having a desktop in the classroom and having a laptop is that often the desktop is what runs their smartboard. So, they're working that's running their smartboard and they're working in conjunction on their laptop. So, again, if the if the classroom desktops are being used just really to run a smartboard, then it also wouldn't need to be have a high processor speed. You know what I
067mean? Just like basic functionality. We want to make sure it has a video card that can handle the dual screen opportunity there. There is the touch capability of those interactive flat panels. So, we want to make sure it has the processor power to be able to do that that type of functionality for a desktop perspective. Um, but so that's the current specs that we've been investigating for those types of devices. Okay. And then staff laptops. Again, that seems kind of high to me. again if they're doing lesson planning and I know some teachers have specialized things where they do have programs like AutoCAD or whatever it is that they need to utilize and have a higher you know capabilities on a laptop but if we're mo most teachers are using it for lesson planning canvas
068coordination with their teams to me it seems kind of steep. So right now this is act actually a little bit of an average of pricing that we do do instructional laptops that are a little bit cheaper but then we also have administrator laptops that are a little bit more expensive uh to meet the needs of the different roles in those. Most are the instructional laptops that are a little bit cheaper than this. Uh they're going to be closer to the $1,200 range. Um but then the administrator laptop is a little bit a pricier device. Uh, another piece with this is for these staff desktop or laptops, it is a beefier machine than the student laptop and it also includes an even better battery to ensure those for those devices and with those types of things
069that just raises that cross cost up a little bit by little bit. Okay, Dr. Jones. Um the law is very specific in some some of the bonds that we pass. Uh you can't take you can't say you're going to build item A and later say oh we've changed it. We're going to build item J instead. Is it is it that specific when it comes to technology? Do we need to say we're going to buy iPads for instance and later you use it to buy a district server or something like that? No, it doesn't get that specific. It goes into say we have to make sure that we're approving devices. So, it would be living within that device uh project list of those types of devices, but it does not have to be those specific line
070items of each of those devices necessarily. And you're not asking in this for any kind of uh the routers or any kind of infrastructure like that? No sir. Um those are projects that we would include in like the prop a infrastructure side of things because those are things that are built into the building that there are wires and cables that are part of the building itself we have some remaining bond funds to continue covering any of those projects. So when you replace a server at a school that would be a prop A infrastructure. Yes sir. Gotcha. I think uh one note for the community to know is that House Bill 1481 uh was passed by the House and the Senate. Um and that's sitting on the governor's desk right now and that's going to prohibit
071um personal communication devices used by students at all times during the school day. So, um I know on some of the campuses where there isn't enough or if the laptop check cart is being checked out by one teacher and it's not available for another um or some teachers, we allow some discretion where teachers can use request our students to use like their cell phones or their own iPads or whatever. Um that current bill could potentially be signed by the governor that is going to restrict us from even doing that. So that's just a note to educate our community on a potential change that's going to affect every Texas student. Yes, sir. Yeah. In addition to that, I I would say yes, for personally that we need the the technology. We do. However, I don't think
072that we need to be onetoone. Um I've talked to some teachers who say that. I mean, and it having access to a computer all day in the classroom, um, lends to more teaching on a computer. So, if you have a kid who's doing math on the computer, social, then they go to their social studies class and they're doing social studies on the computer, then they go to history and that, oh, they're doing history on the computer. You have a child who's almost on the computer all day. I'm not saying this is every day or all of our teachers and everybody teaches in their own way. Um, but having a student on a computer all day to learn in my opinion because not all, you know, math teachers coordinate with other math teachers. They don't coordinate
073with history or social studies or CTE or whatever it may be. So, I feel like that lends to our students being on the computer, you know, potentially every class period. So, do we have access to computers now? Yeah, we have. We do. Are we onetoone? Well, apparently we we kind of are. So, I don't know. I don't know how that that plays into lesson planning and how teachers teach and um how often our kids are on the computer all day. Can I'm sorry, were you going to say something? Can we go back to this slide that talked about how the the committee voted the percentages because this was one of the sticking points. Um 73% thought that the one one um you mentioned that we could I'm sorry we could be one to one if
074we spread the computers out essentially the numbers are close right now they're very close next year we're immediately behind because we're adding we're we're so hyperrowth um and so but we're very close it would require reallocation to devices from this campus has this many so we're going to move this many to this campus are title one high schools computer to be one to one that is funded correct is it just our high schools I don't understand your question right so title one schools are able to be onetoone they they get the computers right so title one schools do receive additional title one funds okay uh that they can then choose to utilize eyes and many of them do purchase technology equipment but that is not necessarily the the the case for all campuses. Uh but
075many of our title one campuses do have a higher ratio of of devices to students. Okay. But so we can take some of their computers and spread them around or we cannot. Well, that's where we have to make sure that if it was purchased with title funds, it it stays at a title funded campus. uh that it all has to be coded the correct way. Uh once a device is then replaced by a bond fund a bond bond funds then it is now it's no longer originally p it's no longer purchased by the title funds it's now been purchased by the bond funds gives a little bit more flexibility if necessary. Okay, I understand. Any other discussion about the one one laptop ratio? Thoughts, opinions, concerns? So, if we don't go to the 1:1 ratio
076where we're not right now, basically, we're not. Uh, what does that do to student learning in our district? I mean, you might not want to speak to that, but you're welcome to. I'm just kind of asking the administration to to speak to that. I mean, because of Trusty Box's point, if if she's against it and the majority of the board is against it, just just a hypothetical, what would that look like for education going forward? I'm going to continue to cover that one. So, your question is, if we don't go onetoone, what does that do to instruction? Is that right? What does that do for instruction for 3 through 12? Grades 3 through 12? It just makes it to where teachers then have to coordinate with each other as to, you know, who gets the
077devices which day. Um, you know, the technology, we all use technology every single day. And so the technology is just an aid in the instruction. And so if the social studies class needs computers today and the math teacher needed computers today, then that could be the problem. They just have to coordinate more with each other as to who gets the computers what day. Does that make sense? Does that answer your question? Yeah, I I guess what I'm getting at and and I'm asking in a roundabout way, the math class, for instance, would that re would that force the math teacher to teach and the and the and the students to use pencil and paper more is basically what I'm getting at. Yes. The oldfashioned way. Yes. And and well, I was just going to say
078I mean that's what we do now. It's what we do that's what we did this year. It's what we did last year and the year before. So I feel like it is coordination and I understand sometimes maybe that can be difficult for teachers but I mean it's a workaround. Could we maybe look at an option where it's not necessarily a one for one but a one for need? Um is that are we essentially a one for need? Now we are to some degree right now. We could probably be a little bit more purposeful of saying hey let's look at ratios per campus. this number of devices per campus. Do we need to reallocate or coordinate efforts to ensure that we're hitting those needs a little bit better? Uh, that's something we could definitely investigate. Would
079it be possible also to separate the one to one out of Prop B and put it by by itself or does it have to all be together? Yes, ma'am. If the board wishes, we could make a Prop C and put that as a separate line item if that's what the board wishes to do. My I mean my only concern is that I I understand both sides, right? As a parent though coming to the to the to vote and I see one to one my immediate reaction is going to be why if I'm uneducated I would hate for one to one to sink the much needed you know rest of it because we did a poor job of explaining or just you know people or they don't don't want it. Yeah. And I think it's um
080I believe is Terry High School and Lamar are both onetoone. Is that correct? They're very close. Yes. Yes. Um and I guess it doesn't bother me as much with high schoolers, but when I think of my I don't have third grader anymore, but I had five of them. Um being on a computer all that time, um for me, that's hard to it's hard to swallow. Elementary especially. One of the things that was mentioned in the citizens bond committee meeting was that when it comes to third graders, fourth graders, fifth graders, they have to take the star on a computer. So, we have to teach them how to how to do that. Correct. Um, K through two are they typically on laptops? I mean, not iPads. We recommend that if we were purchasing a device, we
081would recommend an iPad for those lower grade levels. It's a little bit more tactile, uh, easier for them to handle. Um, but some are still going to be on laptops. Okay. And they all go to the computer lab probably, so they're using a computer in those environments. Okay. So, Dr. Jones, of the one to one, uh, 10.6 6 million. How much of that would would you need would you guess estimate if we didn't move one to one just to have an inventory of of replacement computers based off of what our current needs are or based off of our current number of devices. If we were to say we wanted 10% replacement to turn have faster turnaround. How much dollar amount ballpark debt? Hold on. I'm going to grab my phone because I'm not going to
082do that math. This is a workshop so we have time. The number of student laptops we have is approximately 36,000. So times 10% is 3,600. So that times is 3.477600. So 3,477,600. So, if we were to break out that line to a different prop, it wouldn't necessarily be the full 10 million. It would be more like a $7 million, right? Because you could still Am I Am I understanding that right? Explain to Could try more. You still need $3 million no matter what for laptops, but you need an additional 70 million of that to get us to the one to one if Yes. So, if we were looking back at I'm going to go I'm going to try and find it here. So, going back this is the number of devices that we would need
083annually to ensure we had the 10% overage every single year. So, it's the 250 for really this current school year if we were going to get it up to the one to one number there. 2079 for 2526. So those are the numbers that includes the getting us over the 10% amount. And to say again publicly for the com community, if we were to take were to purchase these out of our operating budget, that would pull money out of classrooms. that will pull that's that's teachers, that's um everything else that it takes to run the school's day-to-day operations. So, um the law again for the community, it's very clear on what we can spend money on. And if we spend money on this on a piece of hardware that's potentially a staff person in an overc
084crowded classroom or an overcrowded sped classroom or a pair or anything like that. So, y'all also said that when um the district is finished with computers, when their warranty is expired and we are are getting rid of them, we are selling them off. Do we does the school actually auction them off and then get like someone auctions them off for you and we get they get 10% of it and we get the rest or do y'all just sell it to somebody who then goes and takes care of it? And how much of that typically what would you expect to get that would roll back in to purch for purchasing more, you know, doing a refresh or whatever? It's going to depend on the qu on the how the how good of a state the device
085is in. So it's hard to give you a number on that. I could do some research and bring some numbers back to you all of what some of our recent have been. What we do is uh we sell them to a re uh a reseller who will take the device and then they part of that because part of our uh the of what we have to do is ensure the device is cleared completely completely wiped so that there's no data left on it. So they provide us a certificate to show this device has been completely cleared. And then based on the the the state of the device, they then say, "Okay, this is a quality C device, so we're going to give you $80 or you know, this is a A device, so we're going
086to give you $150, something like that." But it's going to be different per cell and and device. But with that, we do get the district does receive a check that we then put back into that fund to purchase additional devices. May I ask a question just for clarification purposes? I think I understood that that Terry and Lamar High School are currently at a 1:1 ratio. They're very close. As population grows and and and okay, diminishes, it may be a little less. So question for Mrs. cotton game. Is that to say that the students at Terry and Lamar High School spend more time on their computer than let's say students at Foster and George Ranch High School do? During the during the school day, it's all on how the teachers plan their lessons. I mean, it
087really all boils down to does the teacher use the computer in the classroom in their lesson plans or do they not? And that right now that's teacher choice. Okay. And so going forward, could instruction, let's say if we decided to to to provide the one-on-one or one to one, is that I mean, could instruction be designed so that students would not I mean so that it would prevent instructors from allowing students to rem to be on their laptops literally all day to where we want it to be where students are not on their laptops all day. Is that exactly? So we could balance that. Sure. Okay. From an instruction standpoint. Okay. Good. Because I mean I I share the concerns because my my concerns are that my grandkids are on their laptops too often because
088they if they're at if they're on their laptop at school, then they come home and they're on their device. Well, you know, I'm I'm concerned about that. However, I will say this that as a as a college instructor, um I teach students communication and and I have students from literally all LCISD high schools. And and knowing this, it it impresses me that that the Lamar and Terry High School students have just as strong interpersonal communication skills as my Lamar or George Ranch and Foster and Fulshire students do. There's no disparity. And I teach communication and I challenge them, you know, I challenge them to speak in public and listen to each other and and conduct interpersonal communication. So kudos to you. uh that that you know that you're you're you're able to to teach them
089effectively. But I do share the concerns though that that students should not be on their computer literally all day every day. Sure. And that's that would never be our goal. Yeah. So how would you do that though? Because then you would take some of the discretion away from the teachers in in their lesson planning. Like how would you do that? Well, be kind of a lot to monitor is all it seems to me. And I don't know if if if what you're thinking is the teacher would put the lesson on the computer and the kids just sit there at their computer all day long and just, you know, do all of their assignments straight on the computer. The way we kind of view using a computer in the classroom is just like we use it
090at work. We use it as a tool, just like we would use pencil and paper. And so there would still be collaboration, there would still be communication, there would still be interaction. It's just, you know, you might get on it and say, "Okay, well, let's look up and see what this means right here." or you know, let's put this in chat GPT. Everybody put it in chat GPT. Now, what did chat GPT tell you? What did chat GPT tell you? Which one of these do we think is the best answer to this question? You know, so it's not that we're just going to have them sitting on their computer all day long. It's using teaching them to use it as a tool like they would use it in life. And so that's that's the way
091it would be, you know, but then also with lesson plan feedback and with classroom walkthroughs, you know, if we see that that's going on too much, we can put that in their walkthroughs. Or if if the board wishes, we could also say you're not going to use your computer more than x amount of time in the classroom. But I I do think it can be used as a tool in a positive way that encourages interaction instead of reduces that interaction. I agree with you. I do. I like I said, I think it's more for early age is where it it is more of a concern for me. Sure. For for younger kids, not not so much high school because obviously they're in the next phase where they're going to be, you know, graduating and being
092out in the real world and we want them prepared for that. I just feel like, you know, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, don't they're not at that phase yet. So that's what concerns me. And just one other thing, you know, with the STAR test, they do have to know how to take the STAR test online, but also that's a different kind of thinking, too. And so, we have to be able to teach them how to think that way so that they can take that test online. I mean, think about it. You know, you're a third grader and you're taking an online test for the first time. And I think about the skills that takes. Instead of having my paper right in front of me and being able to make all my notations and things on the
093actual page, now I have to read it. I have to think about it. If there's highlighter tools and things, I can use that. But then I have to I have to do my scratch paper down here on a blank piece of paper. So, there's more than just teaching them how to take the star test. There's a little bit of the thinking stuff that goes in that as well. That's another I don't like that, but I guess we don't really have any control over that one. Another thing I'm thinking of as we're talking about this is being onetoone. So, I know KDISD went one to one last year and they let their students take home their laptops, I believe, and a lot of parents were not happy about that because they didn't want to be responsible.
094And I know we're saying we're not going to do that. We're going to have to be really clear before the bond election that these are not computers that your kids are going to be responsible for taking home. Um, but that raises another question. Do we allow students to check out laptops if needed? We do currently. If there's a special cause scenario, uh it is allowed to be checked out from the campus. Okay. Okay. And are kids at 1621 place? Do they take theirs home? It would be a similar thing. It would be on a case-byase basis of need, but traditionally, no, that is not what they do. Okay. Would one-on-one uh districtwide would that be every student uses the same laptop every day or we we would be we are looking at solutions that could
095allow us to do something like that. Um that's desirable for you. That would that is desirable. Part of that is ownership of the device. If it is your device and you're not treating it well, well now you your tool isn't in good shape for you to use tomorrow. And so we want to find solutions where this is your device uh so that you know you're responsible for taking care of this. The other thing I think back to what the legislature did and during the cell phone policy meetings when we were kind of coming up with that policy something that came up was at some of our high schools maybe they're not taking tests on their phone but they're playing like cahoots. They're doing educational things on their phone. So if we are not able to
096have that discretion anymore, that may be another reason why we need to be one to one, at least in high schools. Do do you think that we should possibly break it down to high school, not not K through 12? I mean for I know I'm sorry 3 through 12 or leave it just leave it as is. Well in that case I think it's going to affect because I don't I don't think seventh or middle school and junior high kids or elementary kids were pulling out their cell phones to do classwork. It was just at the high school level. So I would say one one to one on high schools would be the priority if we were going to do it at all. Can you speak to the district's assessment policy? Because I know on my
097children's personal campus starting in third grade, they are required to have all assessments in all four subject areas on the computer. Therefore, if you look at any given week, they're approximately taking four to six assessments that are completely unrelated to STAR, just their daily classroom assessments, not you know, those are all on the computer. So, we're not talking just your benchmarks and your STARS and your EOCC's, but you're talking about your everyday classroom assessments. Is that across the district that they're all to be computer based starting in third grade? No, we do unit our unit assessments are all online and then of course our benchmarks and star are online. But then anything else the teacher wants to put online they can but the ones that are for sure online are those unit assessments for every
098unit that they give and then benchmarks and that starts in third grade. Correct? Yes ma'am. So 3 through 12 it's it's not just state assessments it's our unit assessments. So they are accessing those devices a lot. And so I've personally seen that grabbing game, who's going to get them first? And then what's happened to my personal children is that those assessments are not necessarily given in the right time frame because the teacher couldn't get their hands on the devices. And so by the time that teacher could get their laptop cart to take that unit assessment, that unit assessment is already 5 days past when that instruction closed. Could be. Yes, ma'am. Anything else? So, currently the way we have it structured is we only have two props, Prop A and Prop B. Um, we could
099move forward with a Prop C based on tonight's discussion, but our total dollar amount is 1 bill999,55,872. So, now I will bring up Miss Lewig and she will be able to discuss the financial data. Good evening. Tonight we will cover very quickly the financial side of this. Uh with a $2 million $2 billion bond election uh in front of us, it's good to um go back and review where we are at this point. So currently we have uh bonds outstanding of a little over three billion. Uh the 2024 25 interest in syncing tax rate is 48 cents and over the past four years we actually have decreased our total tax rate by a little over 12 cents. We've been working with our financial advisor postto municipal adviserss to estimate the cost of the election. We
100ran through several different models of it and for $2 billion worth of projects uh and conservative assumptions which are the variables we use in the estimation uh we looked at four uh bond sales annually starting in 2026 and we found that the tax rate would never have to exceed 48 cents which is where we are currently and so there would be no increase in the INS rate based on this election. Mrs. Lugway. Hi. Hi. Um, no rate increase of the 48 as for as part of the overall tax rate is the estimate. Is that correct? anticipating a certain annual appraisal percentage that must be hit in Fort Ben County. It is for that to remain true. It is uh for the first year out we used 6% and then we used 8% for several years
101after that. um the highest rate that was needed through that model was 48 cents and after that um I don't recall exactly which year it is but the rate starts dropping after that unless we were to issue new debt under a new election. So four sales would be once per year would be obviously over four years, right? I would assume that Lamar would need another bond before another four year passes. Is that correct? I believe uh I believe Greg was uh talking about 2028. So help us walk through that financially. What would that look like as far as growth and the tax rate then when another bond would be we would have if this all passes we'll have $5 billion in bond debt right the overall tax rate will not increase is what we tell
102the public but the obligation to the taxpayer increases so if we add another bond in 2028 what what are the best estimates of of the overall tax rate at that time well um the debt service on this. The right now our debt service is about 173 million a year. Um in this election the highest year of debt service we're at about 291 million based on the for sales and the conditions that we modeled. Um once the debt rate starts dropping we are able to layer on more debt at that point because our values will have grown uh to accommodate additional debt. Hopefully interest rates will have dropped u by then. Um you know and our financial position will stay the same or get better. Uh all those things impact what rate uh what interest rates
103we pay. Uh and also then of course the tax rate that we have to assess on taxpayers. So it's your estimation that if we go over $2 billion in this bond that INS rate would need to be raised from the 48 cents. Is that correct? If we go over two billion or our property values don't grow as fast for some reason. uh some years um what we've seen in the past is some years our growth is higher than what we've used in the estimation and so that'll cover us you know for a year where the growth might not be as high really what I'm getting at when this financial part is over I would like to have a discussion uh about a possibility of a stadium there's a lot of buzz on the internet about
104why we're not building a stadium so but my question though is if we were to wiggle in a stadium on this bill. I mean, on this bond, we could not go over $2 billion total unless we raise the tax rate. Correct. So, if we're going to add a stadium, we're going to have to take out something to accommodate the approximate cost of that stadium. Right. All right. Thank you. I I have a couple of questions. Okay. Uh so what is the amortization period of of pay off on these bonds? Roughly 30 years. 30 years. Yes, ma'am. And you you mentioned the interest rate that we pay. Is that going to be based on a a bond rating? Yes, it is. And uh what's modeled in here is four and a quarter%. Okay. A and so
105does when we go to Wall Street to to market these bonds then then do they do they they look at the district's bond rating? Yes, they they look at uh several different things. Um typically we are covered by the state of Texas um PSF guarantee or the permanent school fund guarantee which uh equates to a AAA rating and then we also um have an underlying bond rating as well. Okay. And um so that helps us. Yes, ma'am. So u one last question. I recently read where the legislature has agreed to um increase the I believe it's the the homestead exemption from 100,000 to 140,000. Yes. Uh I think I believe that's that's going to be put on the ballot for November. November. And so has have have those numbers been baked in too? Uh they
106have they have not but the rationale for that is the state typically gives us uh hold harmless funding to cover that differential. Okay. Thank you. So we're made whole. Thank you ma'am. Appreciate it. Thank you. Is there any other questions for Miss Lewig? Okay. So, we have reached the end of our presentation. Is there anything that we need to go back maybe clarify, have more discussion on, or have more questions? Yes. I think what Mr. Welch mentioned is um the Facebook committee and the uh the stadium. And so, let's explain maybe let's go back to the 2022 bond. what was proposed then, what failed, what we then proposed in 2023 or 24 that also failed, and just maybe give us a little history on the stadium. Yes, ma'am. During the uh 2022 bond citizen committee,
107um we had multiple priorities that we asked that committee to prioritize within our district. Um one of the things that was at the top of their list was a second football stadium. So, one of our propositions in the 22 bond was to go out and do repairs to Trailer Stadium along with uh building a second football stadium within the district. Uh both of those propositions failed, both the repairs to Trailer Stadium and um the second stadium. Then in the fall of 23, we went back out to the um community to ask for repairs just for Trader Stadium. Um no impact to the tax rate. that also failed. Um, so the last three athletic props that we brought to our community in two and 22 and one in 23, the community has said no to. Mr.
108Beck, I just want to throw in there in November of 2020 when I was on this board, the community said no to a second stadium at that time as well. So in the last five years, the community has said no every time we've asked and now. Yeah. So, I was not on the board after the 2022 one failed, but I do remember the discussions about, okay, well, it failed, but trailer is in need. Uh, we can't move forward without making some of these repairs that we asked for. So, we have since then we cut the athletic budget by 600,000 $600,000 per year, which meant we cut staffing positions. um programs pay we moved a lot to pay to play. Um what have what improvements and renovations have we made on trailer since then and where
109do where do we stand now in terms of what's still needed? So in the first year of the cuts we replaced the turf um so that we came back and made that a playable surface as we move forward. Year two, what we have done is is we have kept the cuts in place and then uh replaced the current stadium lighting, not the poles, just the lighting themselves. We went from incandescent to LED. Um we have not replaced the wiring in the poles or the panels serving the poles or any of that kind of stuff that also needs to be addressed. Um so that's currently the two areas that we have um been able to make repairs at. Again, when we look at the stadium, um those are more significant when we look at the foundation
110for the bleachers and replacing the bleachers. Um the other thing that um as part of that, if we can't find an engineer currently that will evaluate the bleachers because they did not design them and there's no engineering stamp drawings anywhere. So, they're basically telling us if we go through and having to do any major type of upgrades to those stands, we'll have to take them down and rebuild them. Well, that kicks in all the codes for restrooms and concessions and all those type things that we currently do not meet at the at trailer. So, to clarify, once you touch the structure, once you decide we're going to replace the bleachers, we then have to bring everything else up to code. Yes, ma'am. That includes ADA compliance, that includes ramps, and then a significant amount of
111restrooms. Um, when I say significant, we'd have to get back to you, but I'm I'm assuming anywhere between 80 to 100 restroom stalls, both for male and female on both sides. So, you're looking at a significant because it holds 10,000 people. So, there's a certain code for so many stalls per occupant for the facility. Can I ask would it be possible to because those those problems exist on the home side. Is that correct? Yes, ma'am. So, if we could we just replace the bleachers on the home side and leave the visitors. I mean, I we still have to dress restrooms. Obviously, that's for the whole stadium, but that that could be an option. What I'm worried about is the Vistro side's not up to current ADA compliance. So, I think that's where we may have
112to even if we're not touching that side of the field, we still have to Okay. So, we've closed off a section of the bleachers. Is the rest of the stadium safe and structurally sound in your opinion? Right now, yes. Um, we have asked engineers to come out to say, will you load test this all again? Because there's no stamped engineering drawings, there's no anything like that. We cannot get a certification. What we do is we monitor the condition of the facility. Um, so that's how we base our our assessment on now is the section that currently is uh sectioned off. It does have some deflection within the the structure itself. That's why we have sectioned those off and we continually monitor those stands. Something we also did since that bond failed is we decided to
113make Tomas's make sort of a mini stadium at Tomas. Can you explain that? Yes, ma'am. The the board of trustees made a decision with some 2017 bond savings um that was pre- legislature to require that. It's we were currently having to build the stadium at Tomas is to increase the locker rooms and the um concession areas and the restrooms at that facility. We'll be coming back after that facility gets completely opened. Um we'll be coming back to the board um requesting approval in September as a future action item in October as an action item to increase the seating up to 4,000 seats. Um, currently Trader Stadium's at 10,000 minus a little section, we're probably at 9,700 is currently at Trailer Stadium that would seat 4,000. Last school year, based on the number of students and
114visitors that attended our stadiums, that would hold majority of our football games, 4,000 seats. Okay. Well, do we want to talk about whether or not we should consider the repairs to trailer again at the very least? I know that is going something is going to have to come out in order for that to happen, but does anybody have any thoughts on what that would be? I have a question. If you look in this facilities report, trailer stadium, it says 16.9 million to that is the needs. Is that the total needs? If 16.9 million would bring it completely up to code, it would be fully functioning everything that we need. I would say yes and no. Okay. Because that is a construction budget only, not including inflation, soft cost and the oversight of the program. So
115I could bring that number back to you tomorrow night if you would like a total all-in cost at Trailer Stadium. Could I also ask if if a 4,000 seat stadium covers most of our needs and when we if we tore down all the bleachers and rebuilt would we have a need to build it at 10,000 and if we're having to add so many restroom I mean that space is going to have to come from somewhere to add 80 bathrooms I mean a trailer the footprints I guess my point is is if we if we did say 6,000 in the bleachers and then made room for the restrooms you mean like scale it down somewhat Maybe that would help with cost and logistics as well. That could be an option that we move forward with is
116just a smaller seat stadium. Well, somebody ask for thoughts. My thought is um the the the auditorium balcony thing that we're that was proposed. Um because there is discussion long-term about creating a possible fine arts campus in the district. Uh because of the way you worded it, Mr. Buchanan or didn't word it the current condition of trailer stadium. I would propose that we take that the re the money needed to repair trailer stadium completely out of that 41 million and and either scratch that whole item or uh come up with something creative with the remaining money because that's imperative that that we have a stadium that's that's safe in every way shape and form. Yeah, I would agree with that. Yeah. Um the additional seats at Tomas, uh do you know what a rough cost
117would that be? And if we would to add that into campus 9, if we would just from the get-go just say, "Okay, we're going to build this with 4,000." as well cuz cuz one of the shifts we had to make with trailer issues and the bond failing is that each campus had to play a game at their home school and I assume that will continue for the unforeseeable future until we get a second stadium. Do we know? No, sir. We we had to do that but that was when we had the turf. the turf and uh the turf was not safe to be play on and plus we needed it to last and so that's why we had to divert some of that traffic to the smaller stadiums. But now that we've replaced the turf,
118it's really just a matter of scheduling now. But we can play all of our games in Trader Stadium now with the current turf. Um I think maybe too what you might be getting at, correct me if I'm wrong, is the idea out there that we should just have all these mini stadiums at every high school. like why do we not have the infrastructure for a for a game? So, like Mr. Lambert mentioned, could we go ahead and build a another version of Tomasa's stadium at High School 9? And the answer is no. The only reason we were able to do it at Tomas is because we had 2017 available savings from that bond. We don't have enough in that left to be able to do it at another high school. So if we were to
119add it at high school 9, we have to go out for a separate proposition to add that at high school 9. Okay? Because stadiums have to be separate. Even if seats more than a thousand seats by state law, it has to be its own proposition. Okay? So we can't build it so that we could add it in the future. the way that term loss is being built. The bond attorney will be here tomorrow night and we can ask her that question. That's just a little outside my comfort zone this because she is uh aware of the attorney general's office and how they view different things. So I would I would like for her to answer that question. Okay. Anything else? Anybody thinking through anything else? Well, since this is a workshop, I'm I'm curious of
120the my colleagues uh thoughts on my the opinion I expressed. I mean, what what do you what do y'all think? Yeah, I I said I agree. Um I love the idea of an auditorium upgrade. Like I love the idea of having one central big beautiful auditorium. Um I do. But I think that trailer might just be more of the priority going forward, especially with um and I know you mentioned creating a committee, maybe more of like a long-term strategic planning committee with like what to do with our sites once we start doing some of these things. And so if a fine arts academy or something to that nature is going to be in the mix, I think it would be wise to wait and see where we go with that. And if we can't do
121a bigger auditorium there and spend the money instead on trailer, do we have an idea of what it what it would cost. I know you said 16. Did you say 16 million? That's currently within the facility assessment. So, I just want to verify that with the architect, but then I have to add all the additional cost um to all of that to make sure that it's a complete program cost because all of that is construction and then I have to add inflation, look at it when it will be part of the bond sale because it may be a couple of years before we can be a part of the bond sale as we move forward. If if the board decided to um replace the auditorium with repairs of trailer, is it safe to say that
122$41 million uh is enough to get trailer up and functioning and all the repairs done? It won't go over that $41 million. That is correct. Probably half of that more than likely. To put in perspective, it was 25 millions for Tomas when we did it, but we were also in construction. So, I just want to verify what all of that looks like. we and then couldn't possibly discuss different I mean I guess it would be hard hard for you to come up with a number if you don't have a design right because you don't know well once we come back we we will ask them you know because what I've heard from the board is about a 6,000 seat stadium so that helps with it too um downsizing it um of what that looks like
123bring it back up because one thing that that the current facility assessment has is it has repairs to it but it doesn't have everything house that you may want in a more modern stadium. So, I just need to make sure that that number is good. It seats 6,000 has enough in it and then come back with what that number looks like. And then we would have we would have Tamas to be able to utilize that while these changes are being made to trailer so we wouldn't be without a field and we might be able to phase it in where we do this side after one season and then after we get it and things like that. Yeah, I like that idea. So, Mr. Can just to be clear, uh when Tomas opens, it will not
124be a 4,000 seat auditori and then so that means this this this season that's coming up that campus would be a regular campus stadium. Yes, sir. And then so we would expect the um additions to be functioning fall of 26. Fall 26. And so essentially we're adding 2,000 or a thousand bleachers on the home side and like 2,000 on the opposite side. Yes, ma'am. With the if with this switch because it's more than a thousand. So this will add prop C on the ballot. Kind of what I've understood. It's either going to be Prop C or Prop D if the board wants to pull the one to one out. Right. So it'll be an additional prop. That is correct. Do we have time to survey the community? Like if we were to come to a
125consensus on what we thought the props should be and then we sent that out in survey form, do we have time to do that and get a response? Yes, ma'am. We have we have uh time to do it. Just depends on how much time you want uh the survey to be out because the bond the board has to make a decision to call the bond uh in mid August. And so um uh we have to be able to send the survey out, get the data back, get it to the board to dissect the information, you know, and u digest it and have a conversation about it. And the next meeting is August 12th. Now, I have had conversations or some board members have asked me or brought up what about moving it back to uh
126May, May of 26. And so the bond, yes, the bond, moving the entire bond back to May 26. So Mr. began. We talked about the timeline if if everything moved back to May 26. Yes, sir. So, if the bond were to be moved back to the May of 26, which you're looking at currently for our elementary schools, the 27 schools wouldn't open until 28, 28 schools wouldn't open until 29. And then the 229 schools would be removed off of this bond because opening in 2030. They would be part of the 2028 bond. When we look at these, you're looking at high school 9 being pushed back at least till 2030 along with high school 8. The auditorium upgrades, we talked about those. The layman and Roberts, um it would be pushing it to get that
127open by the fall of 28 with this bond. These it wouldn't it wouldn't have as much effect on these. It would increase the pricing because again pushing it back till May, opening these all up one year, you're looking at basically adding set percent to all the thing items within the bond, right? Yeah. I don't I'm not in favor of pushing it back till May. Personally, um it's one of two things. I think either we we finalize, you know, what we're thinking propw-wise and then either ask the bond citizens committee to meet again or send out a survey that would, you know, with the understanding it would have to be done pretty quickly. What are you are you interested to hear hear their thoughts on the repairs of the stadium or striking the 41 million for
128the upgrades or what? I think all of it. Um, you mean in the survey? Yes. You're one you Well, I mean, I'm just I was I was surprised by what I saw in line. You know, I thought I think a lot of us were thinking the voters did not have the will for the stadium. They didn't they didn't want it. That's quite the opposite of what I am seeing online. So, but I'm cur that's also a small sampling. So, I'm wondering online is is a very small sampling. Right. Right. So, I don't want to pay attention to the loudest voices just because they're being loud. I'd like to know what the community at large thinks as well. But I also think this this bond would be for the stadium would be a lot smaller because
129we're talking about repairs. We're not talking about adding culinary. We're not talking about like a legacy stadium, right? You know, we're talking about bringing trailer up to an a normal standard. You know, making it a stadium that we can be proud of and play in. Doesn't have to be fancy. It doesn't have to have everything that Legacy has, but it needs to be safe. It needs to, you know, house our student be big enough to where we can have games and other functions, not just football games. It's band, it's um, you know, all the different things that are there. So, enough to hold those capacities and um, have a have a stadium in our district. And that I mean, we we attempted that twice. And so, I think that's one of the things is now
130our community um, elections have consequences, I think. And so we attempted to do just that and we try to communicate that clearly that this is for the safety and this is for all students will touch this not just high school football 22 people out there on the field at one time. Um, and I think, you know, our community now is realizing like, oh yeah, I think we do need this. And as we're growing so fast, and they're I'm I'm a taxpayer. I have property taxes just like every single person, you know, it's I don't want my property tax increase, but for the greater good of our community. And I think people are now seeing and after going there and them, um, I've se I've seen more people show up for other events other than football.
131So I think it's more eyes are being put on it as well. So I mean we're we're not trying to put out a Taj Mahal kind of thing. We want safe environment for every single student that's going to touch it. Every single staff member, every single participant that's sitting in the stands. Uh 1998 I was at a football game when one of my really good friends fell through a stadium in Leander, Texas. and being there and seeing that in a stadium that was unsafe. And I'm not saying that our stadium is like that by any means, but being in a space as a student and seeing that and having one of your really that go through one of your really good friends. That has always stuck with me as I walk into spaces. I look
132at risk management. I look at what we have and I look at our situation and no, I mean, we have metal bleachers. That was wood bleachers. That was back in the day whenever you get splinters when you sit down kind of thing. But um it's just always something like we have as the stewards that we are up here, we want the most safest environment and we can't do that unless our voters get out and vote and help support us in that area. Right. I was I I do have some questions about the auditorium. Um, I too I I think it's a wonderful idea, but the more I think about the logistics of sharing one. If you look at the number of high schools we have, it would be like one high school doesn't even get
133a full month to do a production there in the course of a year. I look at are the students being bust? So, are you saying I mean if we were just to say we're centrally located at Foster? Also then are the students from George Ranch being bus every single day for a month to go build their sets to bring their orchestra to and then do we have the buses to provide them the travel to that and I know in our bond committee we said well it's open to the whole district. So now we're looking at okay 36 37 elementary schools all trying to share that one on top of the middle schools trying to share that on top of well we're doing a play with our props to stay but our orchestras perform like I
134don't know if that's a feasible option of sharing and that's on a high school campus so then you're telling that high school well I'm sorry you can't use your auditorium because George Ranch is doing a play today. I think the idea of a fine arts center where it's not tied to a campus, you're not taking that away from a campus and you're actually creating that central site where it's open to everyone. And I and I think if you I think if you're presenting it that way because I will say the very first time that I was presented this I was under the understanding that you were upgrading every single auditorium to 1250 seats and then every single auditorium was getting that orchestra pit and the prop storage. But when you say no no no just
135one in our district I don't think that's a feasible option for the size of our district. All good points. Question. Do we have enough land at considering the even after we move the the red track if we did to build a stadium similar to what we're doing at Tomas out at uh Spur 10 and Highway 59? I don't believe we do because by the time we use the land for the high school, the junior high, and the middle school, there's about 15 acres left just for an elementary. So 15 acres would not be large enough. I can go back and and look because it's really parking, but I don't know if we're allowed to use the elementary school parking, the middle school parking, the junior high parking, the high school parking, the CTE parking as
136part of that. I'd have to go back and look at that to see if that's feasible for us to be able to do that and I can bring that back tomorrow night. I I I'm just thinking from the standpoint of the easy access off of Highway 59 and I'm I presume that by having a stadium at Tomas that our intent is that Foster and the Fulshire high schools would primarily use that facility. And if that's the case, then ha locating a stadium in the southern part of the district would also provide the ability for the southern high schools to use that particular facility and would free up some area here where Trailer Stadium is located uh in for in the event that we build Lamar High School. It would just provide a larger footprint for
137building Lamar High School and and and and so forth. But but regardless of of of the decision, I concur. I think that's a great idea to to utilize that. I mean, I concur with what Miss Henderson just expressed. I think those are all good points and I thank you for bringing up that idea because I I'm with you. I'm I agree that that'd be prudent and and it's time it's timely. I think that people have just now re realized the need, the necessity. And so, um, I just want to say that that I'm in agreement with, uh, using either the entire line item or part of the line item, um, in order to to repair trailer stadium. I think it it needs to be communicated to the public to the to the extent that we
138can as to why it would be a smaller facility. There's so much misinformation that people sometimes don't realize when they're not in these meetings. that uh and and it's not because our intent was just to build it smaller rather than there's much more involved when we're when we're starting to to redesign it with respect to the restrooms and everything else that we're going to have to deal with. So, uh but thank you for that very good idea and and I'm I agree. This is a little cynical, but my other idea is to take the name trailer off the stadium too because of the whole idea of like trailer park kind of thing. So, I think maybe we could call it Trailer Field at Lamar Stadium or something like that. Well, we have talked about trying
139to find like a like a sponsor sporate sponsor to name it after. Yeah. Did you have something? What is the approximate square footage for the auditorium once it's upgraded? Are you adding square foot? Yes, ma'am. I'll have to bring that back. That was one of the information items for me to bring back. Okay. To the board tomorrow night. I if we were to do the auditorium offsite, not on an existing school, could we repurpose one of the locations that we have now that like where either uh Navaro or or George Junior High is for an auditorium that's in the future? Yes, ma'am. That could be an option. Could you go back to the map of just all the whole district? So like forward thinking, strategic planning wise, if we were to have trailer and then
140we have Tomas, it makes sense to me that we would one day put a third stadium somewhere more in the Randall George Ranch and probably there's probably going to be High School 10 down there eventually like the Austin Point area. Um, I feel like that would make more sense at that point. At that point, you're talking about doing something like they've done at Tomas, either Tomas or or a big brand new stadium. I mean, even something within Austin Point, if we're going to have a high school in there eventually, which we will. Yeah. Have we looked at well I guess we can't talk about that but say have we looked at land but we know it's all we know there's a lot of land and a lot of houses coming so another bond. Okay. Are
141there any other concerns questions? Yes board. So, what we'll do, the team and I will get together this evening in the morning, uh, revise uh, this presentation for tomorrow night's board meeting u, and we'll we'll make some adjustments and then we'll bring that back to the board. And again, tomorrow night uh, we're not asking board to make any decisions tomorrow night. But again, it' be up another discussion with some other items, but we'll make sure that we uh, revise it and bring up the latest latest uh, information that was discussed tonight. Can I also ask that um y'all put together some sort of timeline maybe for a survey if we were to to go that route just so we could kind of see if that's what we want to do. Okay, thank you. Anything else?
142Okay, we have no public participation. No. Okay. Well, then that is it. It is 6:55 and the meeting is adjourned. Thank you.