001e really you e e e the Lamar CISD Board of Trustees meeting will begin in 5 minutes the Lamar CISD Board of Trustees meeting will begin in five minutes e e e the Board of Trustees of the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District is called to order at 6:30 p.m. this is a regular monthly uh board meeting being held on March 18th 2025 we have a quorum with 6 members present uh trusty ubac is absent please join me for a moment of silence to observe as you feel appropriate thank you please stand and join me for the Pledge of Allegiance and the pledge the Texas flag led by Ellen vertilus did I say that correctly all right um she's a sixth grader from Navaro Middle School right please join me for the pledge I pledge allegiance
002to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all now for the Texas pledge honor the Texas flag I pledge allegiance to the Texas one State under God one and indivisible [Applause] thank you please be seated all right now we will have um recognitions and awards Dr nens yes sir we have Miss Cole Hamilton coming to the microphone trustees Dr nens and the Lamar CSD community and those who have joined us in person or virtually tonight it's been a busy spring for our students and tonight we'll be celebrating several of our dedicated student athletes for their UI L accomplishments along with a talented group from Randall High School who recently brought home a national championship title but
003first we are thrilled to celebrate the incredible achievements of two outstanding swimmers from fure high school seniors Avery Dylan and Kyra Robinson come on in who have proven themselves the highest level of competition Avery Dylan is a four-time state qualifier she made an impressive Mark by earning second place in the 500 meter freestyle and third place in the 200 meter freestyle those are remarkable Feats at the most prestigious level on top of that Avery was honored as an athlete of the meat for the 6A regions and a world deserve recognition for her Talent dedication she will continue her swimming Journey at Texas Christian University joining their Collegiate swim team we're incredibly proud of her and look forward to her future success and Kyra Robinson is a two-time state qualifier she displayed incredible speed and determination
004finishing second in the 50 meter freestyle at the 6A state championship Kyra's hard work and dedication were also recognized and she was also named an athlete of the meet at the 6A districts uh Kyra will continue her swiming career at Penn State University Kyra and Avery are coach by Hannah Schmidt and Eva Peterson congratulations the 2025 U State wrestling meet met in Cyprus Texas and they showcase some of the exceptional Talent from Lamar CISD with 19 students from Lamar Consolidated High School Terry High School Foster High School George rench high school and High School competing these athletes earned their spots at the state tournament after a strong showing at regionals and over the course of a two-day competition our wrestlers made a significant impact Foster High School junior Sally kazim come on in Sally had
005an outstanding performance finishing second place and proving herself to be one of the top competitors in the state despite having stepped onto the mat for the very first time this season Sally is a basketball player turn wrestler she immediately applied her grow mindset athleticism and coachability and made huge strides Sally is coached by Scott Kimble McKenzie Kimble and kend Jones congratulations Sally and in addition this evening we're excited to honor the members of the Randle Royals dance team and celebration of their first place National win at the national dance Alliance championships the Royals made hisory his three this past summer by attending the prestigious national dance Alliance camp where they earned a highly competitive bid to compete at Nationals in Orlando this marks the first time in District history that a dance team has competed
006at such an elite level before Nationals the Royals showcased their skills in several local competitions uh their efforts paid off and they were named overall grand champion at both the Ascension Space City Challenge and championship at Nationals rools completed competed in two highly competitive categories game day and palm in game day the Royals made an impressive leap from the preliminaries directly to finals bypassing semi-finals due to their exceptional placement in the finals they placed 12th overall in the most competitive division of the competition and in the intermediate Palm category the Royals continue to impress they earned third place in preliminaries and they ended up placing first overall woo they were Crown the 2025 NDA large immediate Palm National Champion securing their first ever national title on their first ever attempt in addition they earned the
007prestigious Unleashed award for their outstanding Palm choreography this historic achievement is a testament to their hard work resilient and talent of the Randall Royals dance team a team that is just four years old the victory not only brought immense Pride to their school but to the district we are pleased to congratulate members of the Randall Royals this evening for the national championship with us this evening head coach to Shane o Haver assistant coach Madison stubs co-head Captain Katherine CIS netos co-head Captain Gloria as morero Captain Eileen Hernandez Captain Isabelle Mario Captain jasine Simon line Sergeant Malia peret and line Sergeant Mia madrano congratulations [Applause] ladies awesome president Lambert this concludes the recognitions at this time thank you very much good evening president Lambert Board of Trustees Dr niens tonight we're excited to introduce to you
008all our new police officers on the police force so to do those introductions I'd like to turn the microphone over to Chief Garcia good evening Dr ni Mr President and esteemed members of the Board of Trustees tonight I have the distinct honor of introducing the three newest members of the Lamar CISD Police Department first we welcome officer Richard white with over 30 years of law enforcement experience and a wealth of senior leadership experience officer white brings a vast array of skills to lar CISD he is married a proud father of seven children and a US Army veteran officer White has an extensive background in criminal investigations gang suppression and police training coordinating he has served with the Harris County Precinct 7 and Precinct 2 and spent the majority of his career with the fortman county
009sheriff's office in addition to his law enforcement career officer white is a non-fiction crime novelist and a screenplay writer next next we introduce officer Kevin Rodriguez with over 20 years of experience with the New York City Police Department Officer Rodriguez has a distinguished career including serving in a Precinct dedicated to safeguarding schools born and raised in the Bronx officer Rodriguez is married and a proud father of two notably he was the first responder he was a first responder during the 9/11 tax and Ground Zero his wife was also on the front lines as a nurse who treated patient zero during the covid-19 pandemic in New Jersey last but certainly not least we welcome officer derric Gates officer Gates comes to Lamar CISD with four years of police experience he is one of 12 siblings and
010proudly served in the United States Army for 6 and a half years earning the rank of Sergeant officer Gates entered the Wharton County junior uh College Police Academy in 2020 and upon graduation joined the KD Police Department before transitioning to Lamar CISD he is joined tonight by his wife sagario and their three children these are the newest members of the Lamar CISD police department and we are honored to have them on our team thank you [Applause] president lamber and Board of Trustees that concludes tonight's introductions all right trustees now we'll have board member reports and shoutouts trustees please keep your comments to one to two minutes yes ma'am you know me it's just a couple um right before spring break I was asked to come to Austin Elementary to read to the whole kindergarten class
011for um read Across America and they have an adorable kindergarten class and those teachers have worked wonders with them this year but they also did a shout out to the administration to us that their classes were a little bit smaller this year and they said every one of their kids are reading so it does make a difference but I was glad to be able to visit with them and then the day we got the right before spring break the fort Ben County retired teachers donated over 300 books to arod donda's prek kindergarten and first grade classes take the books in the children get to choose one that they want to take home to keep and we put their name in it and they were so thrilled and the teachers are thrilled and it's also a
012lot of the retired teachers are thrilled because they enjoy being back with those kids again and reading with them and seeing their joy for reading and learning so that's a couple shout outs Arondo and Austin Elementary secretary Welch yeah I'd like to uh say thank you to uh Jan Simo principal of Morgan Elementary uh Robin Stover principal of Lindsay Elementary and uh Tamila Allen principal of tamaron Elementary who all hosted me on campus uh since we last met in the boardroom here and I got to go to all campuses for uh second third or fourth time however long it's been for each one but it's been a while so I appreciate your hospitality and thank you very much uh for mine I would like to acknowledge all the hard work that some of the teachers
013at Jane Long put in they do an event called The Amazing Shake every year and um this is they take fourth and fifth graders um teaching about handshakes but also how to talk and speak and do public speaking and it's just a beautiful event so they makeing a competition where they start with a larger group then will Whittle it down um and I was invited to be a judge along with I believe six other people in the final round which is the hardest round to judge um but the students did great so shout out to roxan Anders uh Miss Katie Jones Miss Debbie hbert Angela Cruz Allison Monday Miss Jessica Watts Miss Dana Watts uh Lura vakul I mispronounced that I apologize and Miss Darcy Montoya um they all did a great job the the
014kids showed up and they were dressed to the nines and very polite handshakes eye contact and just public speaking and speeches um and then I I was invited back to go see the awards ceremony it was also on their house house Celebration Day um so they did all that and so while they were doing their house celebration um the teachers at Jane long they were playing games with the kids um and they were doing some measuring and so while their kids were playing games they created an environment where kids were still still learning during the games so the kids were having fun they were all in the gym just going crazy in a good way um but miss uh Miss helbert was up there and Miss ktie Jones was on the floor leading the games
015and so they were interacting with the kids from the microphone asking math facts and problems and all that so they created the environment during the games it was still learning going on so massive shout out to Jane Long anyone else okay all right uh are there any board committee reports all right Dr nans superintendent report yes sir uh I just want to give a shout out to everyone our entire district and Community yesterday as we open up green we celebrated the green track and so we announced the uh the Gators uh and the green and uh you know it did my heart well to see so many pictures of other campuses and other tracks wearing green and so that just shows that you know we are lcisd you know we're not the red track we're
016not the blue track we're not the purple track we're are lcisd and so I was very pleased and happy to see that uh and so we have a lot of great things coming on the green track as well we do others and so y'all keep looking out and we those gators going to get them Miss Johnson are there any public comments okay it is the desire of the Lamar CISD Board of Trustees to appropriately and effectively fulfill its governance role in accordance to best practices for Quality organizations and to the applicable provisions of the Texas Education Code trustees also desire to afford an opportunity for input from the public public members of the community who wish to address the board must have completed a public participation public comment card and submitted it before the presiding
017officer called the meeting to order public participation allows individuals to address the board regarding posted agenda items public comment allows individuals to address the board regarding non-agenda items trustees may not respond to public comments as they are prohibited by law from discussing or deciding any subject that is not on the board's publicly noticed agenda all patrons Desiring to speak and who have completed the public participation public comment form will be heard during the public comment or participation portion of the meeting before final board action is taken on an agenda topic while speakers generally have 5 minutes to address the board the presiding officer May establish an overall time limit for public participation and public comment and adjust the time allotted to each speaker when when necessary to accommodate a large number of speakers however no
018speakers shall be given less than one minute all of this is in compliance with HB 2840 each speaker tonight will have five minutes if two or more individuals are speaking on the same top topic the district May encourage enourage speakers to consolidate their comments to allow for more time each speaker must address the board from the provided Podium unless special accommodations have been requested and approved speakers are to present their remarks to the board and not to the audience speakers having complaints against individual District employees may only address the board after filing a complaint form and in the manner provided for in board policy D GBA employee complaints FNG student and parent complaints GF public complaints the presiding officer or design shall determine whether a speaker has filed a complaint according to policy any speaker
019who complains of individual District employees during public participation public comment may be directed by the presiding officer to refrain from naming the employee and will refer the speaker to the appropriate complaint policy Schoolboard meetings are meetings held in public but are not public meetings while the board values hearing from members of the public trustees will not answer questions or respond to comments from patrons speakers will not engage in dialogue with the trustees please state your name when you come forward our speaker tonight is viven hang good evening Dr niens and the members of the board my name is Vivian H I'm currently a freshman and a varsity member of the Foster High School athletic training student aid program I am present today to address the unfairness of athletic training students many of you have probably
020seen us and have not realized the role that we play in athletics some think we just hand out water but this could not be furthered from the truth while hydration is a vital role in keeping athletes safe and healthy so are ACL prevention protocols such as P pep our commitment to helping athletes range from taping before practices and games assisting in long and short rehabs to being the first ones in and the last ones out of athletic facilities originally we were informed that if we were an acting member of The Varsity squad we would have an opportunity to remain a student at Foster High School it was then brought to our attention that we would no longer have this opportunity and must attend Tomas high school we find it unfair that we are held to
021the standards and expectation of student athletes throughout the year but not in the situation our requirements to become an atsa is the exact same of an athlete marching band or drill team member by having a physical and rank one form completed prior to participation also under the UIL side by-side rule we are required to follow the Noth has no play rule for El eligibility just as any athlete or extracurricular activity additionally we are also required to have a certification in CPR first aid AED and concussion as well as stop the bleed training we also have the responsibility to work a football season plus a second Sport and sometimes even a third in one year unlike athletes we do not get a offseason we work the entire year on top of those sport assignments and duties
022with the team teams we also assist with the business and administrative aspect of athletic training which includes filing and documentation in with of assisting with mass physicals at the end of each year we are the behind the scenes of athletic dep department at each campus which is just as important at the athletes themselves we are the blood that keep a that keeps athletes on the field therefore I am asking you to reconsider letting student athletic training AIDS be included in the Legacy guidelines thank you for your time and a happy National athletic training month thank you all right thank you at this time we will take action on the consent agenda trustees are there any items the board would like to pull all right may I have a motion to approve the current consent agenda
023all right trusty Daner makes a motion do we have a second all right secretary Welch makes the second is there any discussion hearing none we will now call for the vote all in favor say I I None opposed the motion carries we will now have presentations and reports on future action items Dr nens all right trustees we have uh 10 we have our chief of police is going to come up and talk about the RFQ process for artificial intelligence good evening Dr NIS border trustees Mr President today I get the opportunity to discuss the propos uh RFP process for our AI weapons detection technology so the purpose of this R RFP is going to allow us as a district to evaluate and speak with a variety of vendors who are specialize in artificial intelligent-based weapon
024detection systems the goal is to enhance the school safety uh protocol and an integrated Advanced realtime weapon detection technology in our current existing security protocols and Hardware the RFP will also allow the Safety and Security coordinator to evaluate the equipment firsthand uh and it gives us the ability to reach out to those companies who have deployed these systems in the state of Texas in a K12 environment the evaluation criteria that we that we're using in order to evaluate the uh the vendors that come in is governed by Lamar CISD board policy CH local uh under purchasing and acquisition I don't have anything to share regarding the type of Technology because I don't I don't want to infract on this policy and sway the bidding process in any manner the RFP timeline is proposed as as
025is right now the first advertisement went out on February 11th followed by a second advertisement on February 18th uh vendor questions were due at 2m on March 4th and we had a pre-proposal meeting prior to that with the vendors uh on February 27th the deadline for any addendums for the RP is is uh Wednesday March 26th would be next Wednesday and a proposal package due back to uh purchasing is by 2 p.m. on March 27th the committee will then begin to evaluate the the criteria and the information and the proposals received to the district uh between the week of April 1st and April 4th that would be the first week of April the top rated proposals will be selected and emailed by Monday uh by Friday April 4th with and give them two weeks notice
026to prepare for an on-site demo that demo would take place between uh demo evaluation will occur on April 22nd to April 25 with hopes of having a vendor or some questions answered and brought to the board be on Tuesday May 20th any questions no all right at this time we will take action on the action items Dr hens all right trustees we have Mr buan up to talk about El mention number 37 good evening Board of Trustees and Dr n tonight we're bringing back uh a decision item that was tabled at last board meeting about the locationd design development for elementary school 37 so these are the three options that were discussed the first one is to keep um Elementary School 37 at Peak and Beachnut and then add Portable Buildings to both Melton ha
027good and Rando elementary schools to address capacity needs um the cost of this these moves would be $4.5 million from the 2020 Bond available savings option two is to keep Elementary School 37 at Peak and Beachnut and just manage the enrollment if it were to go over capacity at Melton Randall or he good through a cap and overflow process the third is to relocate Elementary School 37 to tamaron West neighborhood but we would keep $10 million of that funding to continue to do the land development at the peak in Beachnut s which would be our utilities water sewer roads and our drainage issues so as we discussed about option one this is the peak and Beach Nut if we were to delayed until the 27 28th school year so we would leave the site there
028but it would not open until the fall of 27 which would be one year later than what we anticipated tamaron West if you'll notice on the first set of enrollment data this is without Portable Buildings for these elementary schools if you'll notice 2728 is when they go to Red and just to remind the the Board of Trustees and the public if it is white we can hold all the students within the building four walls brick and mortar if it's in the orange we're having to use Portable Buildings and the building itself if it's red it's a decision point to either enroll um cap and overflow or to build a new school or to add Portable Buildings so if we were to add Portables if you will notice the red that is in the current 2728
029school year would extend out to the 29 2030 school year for he good but it would put majority of our um well all of our campuses in Portables by the 27 28 school year based on the last demographers data is there any questions about option one this is the layout for the roads utilities and again the Board of Trustees has already decided the exterior of that facility at the peak in Beachnut okay if there's no questions on option one we will go to option two option two is very similar to option one except for we would not move Portable Buildings the enrollment data would still stay the same Elementary School 37 would again open in the fall of the 2027 pending uh border approval and the calling of a bond the possibility would be to
030open an elementary school in the 2728 school year in the Tamron West neighborhood but if not if any of these were to um exceed the projected enrollment there would be if you'll notice especially at tamaron they have a capacity of just over 12200 and their enrollment after opening H good you see it just slowly starts to decline there and then Lindsay also has a Capac of 1,00 they start at 900 and stay right around between the 900 to 925 range so those are campuses that would be available within that area to be able to overflow those students to if it were to be necessary but according to our current demographers data we would not need to use the cap and overflow and again open a school in the 27 28 school year pending a bond
031we will continue to work on the utilities drainage building layout and again this is a design development for the peak and Beachnut site are there any questions about option two okay then option three would be to relocate that elementary school what it would do is we would continue to do the Land Development get the utilities and Road drainage ready and then the elementary school 39 pending a bond approval and calling for a bond would possibly open in the 27 28 school year and again we have draft if if everyone notice we put a big draft mark on this this is a draft enrollment Zone that Dr Maxwell helped me put together um so this would be an example of what the enrollment could look like if you'll notice everything would open in the fall 26
032but again just even with this one the Melton attendance Zone we would um have to be looking at some different options other than this because it still goes um red in the 27 28 school year but this is what the projected enrollment would look like opening um Elementary School 37 in the Tamron West neighborhood this is where it's located so if you'll notice it is it is in the middle of the triangle between Melton ha good which opens this fall or this August tamaron and then Elementary School 37 would sit there at the Tamron West neighborhood the this is option one that was looked at for the exterior this was option two this was option three these were our committee members that uh ranked the options they ranked the option as number one had zero
033votes one person liked option two the other six act option three so this is option three alongside the ranking again these are the three options um that we're looking at tonight are there any questions or discussions Mr ran can you go back on option number three to that map to where the right yeah right there um I know we need this school for like the next 20 25 years my concern is as a trustee that we're building our elementary schools too close to one another and then when these neighborhoods age out we're going to have a problem of having too many schools in a general geographic area and not enough kids to fill them all so are you have any thoughts on that so so just looking at the demographic data one one thing that's
034not showing is where the where melon is at currently all that is part of the DR Horton neighborhood so those will all be single family homes the part that you're not seeing is this upper section here this is what's putting a lot of pressure on Melton elementary school because that is the extension of Jordan Ranch which is the Johnson development where H good currently sits is part of Cross Creek West but Cross Creek West also extends between FM 359 and woods road all the way up to secondary complex 8 so there are probably approximately probably another 4500 to 6,000 homes that will be going up in this area so even putting this Elementary School there based on the current demographics we may need to open two additional elementary schools in this general area in the
035near future if we go with option three the folks at Peak and Beachnut those folks uh won't get that school right now we cannot build a school there right now no matter what we do tonight that is so that that that needs to be reiterated um uh and just so the public knows we've we've had this conversation we had public forums at two different locations uh last uh last month and we talked about it in this board room last month but so if we don't if we move that money to this site if we take option three that's going to continue to put uh pressure on Adolphus Elementary is that correct and mcneel is do I have that right yes sir when when you look at these are the Q3 current enrollment data so you
036you will see adulas will continue to be over a th students um in the near future I mean it doesn't look like that drops at all one thing that we have noticed is that Neils and roma does drop but it drops ever so slightly over the next six years so they would not get any relief from their their Portables and the growth that's happening in that area do we still feel confident um updating from last month we still feel confident that the pipelines that are the issue on that property are going to be moved as was discussed at the public forum yes sir Taylor Morrison has bought this this section of land that sits Northeast of of 99 um I like to say it's a bridge to nowhere if you go down 99 there's a
037bridge that everybody takes off the sides the extension of Peak Road is a fortb county project that can't be completed because all the drainage has to come actually runs north and east and then runs East down Beachnut because of that those two pop lines are there um Taylor Morrison has been working with di chemical and Atmos uh energy because there's two pipelines that run there we're really close to having the design completely um approved by both entities and then we'll start the process um one thing that because of the rain and the flatness of our of our area we have to get the drainage Pro in in we have to get the drainage installed before we can start moving any kind of dirt that site right there we're looking at having to add anywhere between
038two to three feet it's how far we're going to have to raise it to be able to put the site on and so because of that we didn't want to add additional water onto the long metal Farms neighborhood which sit adjacent right there to the site so right now everything is still moving in progress they're having they were projecting to have the drainage completed by February of 2026 which is great great because if we want to open it in Fall of 27 we need to start construction in March of 26 so right after they got the drainage completed we'd be able to start working on the site and be able to build the school so so you're saying if we postpone 27 at beach night 37 sorry 37 um that we would be able to
039open it in 27 still yes we would so scheduled it was scheduled to open in the fall 26 but because of the drainage issues it would be delayed a year okay and then if we did the Tamron West that would be able to open in Fall 26 fall of 26 okay because the roads and utilities are already there and we verified that with the developer the only thing is is the peak and Beachnut Elementary School like we show here we don't have funding to actually build the school we would have funding to do the roads utilities and water but unless there is a bond called really in November of this year 25 to get funding for it in August of or January of 26 for us to be able to start construction March of 26
040for it to open in the fall 27 that would have to be the timeline to be able to open that elementary school in the fall 27 because we currently don't have funding for it so I guess in summary if it passes tonight that we decide to move 37 to Tamron West how how soon can that start under construction well the the second item on our on our action item tonight depending on what option is chosen we've already bid that project um so we would have a notice to proceed tomorrow yes ma'am okay so truthfully to be good stewards of our students if we want to make sure our children are not being moved from school to school or out in Portables or spending money to move Portables by voting to go ahead move 37 and
041hopefully again get the funding for 39 we're not hurting a huge majority of students but if for waiting a lot of children will be misplaced or moved around that's what I'm getting okay thank well vice president hustel did you have anything um we haven't re own at do in ever have we it hasn't been recently one thing that we did when so so again just to remind the board Melton Elementary School was supposed to be at Peak and Beachnut and it got moved to IR it yeah was supposed to have been the peak and Beach Nut site and we moved it to where would be opening this next school year so the rezoning we did not touch the atopus attendance Zone expecting that elementary school to open so no that that attendant Zone did not
042change now this section that's green to mcneel that is east of 99 did come off of HUAC onto McNeil this past school year okay that's what I was going to ask is that weird little triangle that or rectangle that splits big Neil in half is there are there a lot of students in that zone Dr Maxwell will be pulling up that data I know l Creek is there and they are building uh apartment buildings just north of Beachnut and Peak I don't know how many people have actually started moving into those apartments yet okay well I think regardless it just doesn't make a ton of sense to yeah all right trustees um we will now may have a motion yeah I I'll make a motion um because we cannot no matter what we cannot begin
043construction on a school at Beachnut and Peak Road right now no matter what we do and my heart goes out to those folks who who voted for this and yes it was what 35 and it was 36 and now it's 37 our hands are tied because of these darn Pipelines um because of that though I feel like we're going to waste the money due to inflation and some other things and we're not going to give relief over by ha good and Melton and some of those other places so I am going to make a motion for that we go with option number three all right secretary Welch makes the motion that we go with option number three for Elementary School number 37 do we have a second all right trusty box makes the second any
044discussion all right hearing none we will now call call for the vote all in favor say I I None oppos the motion carries Mr banon good evening board trustees and Dr nans tonight we bring forth a discussion of possible approval of a con competitive still proposal number 042 025 for elementary school 37 because the board has chosen option three to move forward with again this is the location of the elementary school 37 the timeline for our bid we we uh advertised the bid in the paper February the 2nd and 9th we had a pre-proposal meeting on February 11th proposals were due on February the 25th and then we evaluated the proposals on February the 26th this is the ranking um we had five proposals come in so this is the ranking of each one of
045them based on the best value for the district are there any questions or discussions can you go back yeah I um I had a somebody who's in the construction business make a comment to me that Lamar CIS gives a lot of our work to drala and that's been the case since I've been around and I don't know how long before that but as I understand it it's a lot to do with quality and most of all price is that is correct is that accurate competitive s proposal is is not really a hard bid it allows us to evaluate other things but price is our number one factor um when you look at this risk this list here jamala was considerably lower than the other biders but they also have performed they've been on budget and
046they've been on time and they produced good schools for us in the past yeah and these are just to let the public know who might not know these are sealed bids that come in and they're they're advertised and asked solicited from companies any company uh and and that's how you receive them is that correct yes sir when we when we put these in the paper we we have to advertise them out publicly we also put them in plan rooms where all General Contractors see what those bids look like construction plans all of that we also have pre-proposal meetings in case they have any questions you know about the plans about the process about anything so we're available to to be able to have those and then when the proposals are due on February the 25th
047we take the proposals or do at a certain time I think it was 2:00 on February the 25th we open them all one at a time and we read the pricing out loud so that everyone in the room knows exactly what the pricing is for each vendor that that uh bids on the project the then the board is not involved in that process but that's correct that is correct it's our bond program office that does the evaluations we also do reference checks with other districts that have used jamala in the past um our Architects and Engineers also go through the evaluation and then we have a financial component because we want to make sure that each one of our general contractors is financially solvent to be able to build our buildings and and not go
048bankrupt or something like that have any issues during the process I I uh trusty w i i re Reed some of the same feedback um and uh what I communicated was U you know just because you live in an area doesn't necessarily mean that we're obligated to give you work uh because anytime you open a building it is uh trying to find the right words it is uh timelines are very important you know it's it's you can't I I can't come to the community and say okay Community you know Tomas is going to be uh open four weeks late because now we have students that are misplaced displaced and we have to make sure our buildings are in on time and so dral has done a good job of that for us and so the
049feedback I gave was just because you live here doesn't mean that we are obligated to give you work but if you want to compete uh and we have a very transparent process you can compete in that but until you um can show that you are going to give us quality work and be on time and compete compe compete competitively in our in our biding process then it it is what it is and so I'm trying to say that the best way possible because I get a lot of feedback from folks that live in our district that says hey you know I do this and I can't I can't get in well that's because your bid came in $100,000 $200,000 over their other bids and so uh you know we still have to be good stewards
050of taxpayer dollars but we still have to give our students the best possible facility that they deserve to get and so uh I just want to say that publicly and so people continue to email and ask you know why why is it that I can't get the business well it's because you may come in over over over budget um or you have a history of not performing well in other districts and other places because we do check references um and so uh those are the conversations that we're having but that that that's a frequent call or email that I get U you know but we're managing billions of dollars in in in construction funds and so evidently there's a lot of folks that like to be a part of that yeah I I I brought
051this up just for the sake of transparency and as as a as a sitting board member for nearly six years I have found the administration to be very transparent the previous administration and this current one and I'm always telling folks out there who are interested that we have uh uh everything that is available publicly you have access to and if the law requires anything else to be given to you that's not already out there that that I will help them find it I know this Administration would not fight that either so um it is a very public process and and I just want to talk about that again here because we don't talk about these things sometimes and a lot of people are tuning in and for a period of time and then they're they're
052not paying attention anymore so it's just we have so much money flowing through here I don't want there to be any kind of any kind of questions of why this one company or why those two or three companies get all of our business because it's it's it's a very open process so thank you very much can I ask a question so when we do put out the vids as you said do we set a budget like what our budget is or no we we say what we want and then no part of the process is is that not only do we have to give them a defined scope we give them what our construction budget is oh okay and it was considerably more than what the bids came in because they know they're competing against
053other General Contractors not just our budget okay so they have a number and then they come back with their proposals okay yes ma'am okay trust es any more discussion okay because we went with option three may I have a motion for the Board of Trustees to approve their rankings for Elementary School number 37 and authorize the superintendent or design to negotiate and execute the contract for Elementary School number 37 all right trusty danzinger makes a motion do we have a second uh Vice President Hotel makes a second any discussion all right we now call for the vote all in favor say I I motion carries well none oppose motion carries we will now have reports and presentations on the informational items all right trustees we have Miss cotton game who is our chief learning officer
054to come present our latest instructional update good evening board good evening Dr nens so tonight as he said I will be giving the instructional update so um benchmark assessments are given twice a year once in the fall and again in the spring to all St tested areas as progress monitoring the results of these assessments are analyzed and used to determine necessary interventions for the students spring benchmarks are released star tests which cover all tested content for the year and the purpose for this is to determine tees that need intervention as well as pre-assessment to help pacing for the remainder of the school year here are the District results of the Benchmark that were taken in February comparing Apples to Apples the green shaded areas are gains for the spring benchmark last year to the spring
055Benchmark this year purple shaded areas are double digit gains and areas that are white stayed the same and orange areas decreased from last year's test as you can see there are many more areas of green and purple showing that we are improving we showed Improvement in 93% of the areas and 33% of the gains made were double digits some actions contributing to the gains are teachers having more time to plan a focus on plc's and training and implementation of how to use data to guide instruction actions We are continuing to take to support campuses include celebration of the gains that were made conducting campus performance review meetings with high priority campuses we're visiting plc's to provide feedback data analysis to determine areas of focus training through the instructional coach principal track and I uh ilt
056meetings as well as calibration at the district level the success we are seeing currently as a result of all of these things that we have in place is like making a cake when all the ingredients are added in the correct proportions you have a delicious dessert but leaving out one ingredient can cause the whole thing to fail questions or discussion I do yes ma'am um so when when you have all those percentages does do we have goals that are set for where we want to reach like what what our goal is going from Fall to spring or fall to fall the the following year do we have specific goals set that we're measuring whether or not they're met or each campus has their own campus Improvement plan where they've set goals for individual areas but
057then also the goal we've shared that you know we're striving for is every campus an A okay and you know that can be reached a couple of different ways it can be reached by student achievement but it can also be reached in domain two by showing growth okay and then what is calibration training calibration training is so that like with the area superintendence we will talk about about what does it look like to do an SE analysis so that we all speak the same language so when they go out and talk to the campuses all of the tracks are hearing the same message so you know Mr Moren may not be saying something different than you know Dr hood is saying so we make sure that we're all calibrated and understand things the same way
058speaking the same language so we're communicating the same message when we have 52 campuses it's it's that's a big job to make sure that everybody's hearing the same message uh Miss cotton game can you go back to the Chart please yes sir all right um can we just stop and look at that um why am I getting emotional like y'all we're doing good things in Lamar cic this is something for all of our teachers all of our staff from um maintenance and operations and custodial and um Athletics and Fine Arts and everyone like this is massive gains and this shows that all of our staff play a role in this and so the fact that we have the majority of them are green and then we got double digit growth um this is huge so
059I want to give a thank you to all of our staff because seeing that much growth in a year something we're doing is working so um extremely proud uh of that chart and I think that's something that we need to put out districtwide Communications or something like that just to show that you know our students are learning our students are excelling and doing better um our teachers are doing a great job our um instructional coaches and our principes and APS and Associates and um every single person on a campus is playing a role and making sure our students are getting growth like this so um again thank you to instructional and just curriculum people and it's just it's that's huge I I I want to piggyback on that too and I know coming from that
060side of the fence where you every day you're a teacher and you're in the mud and you're working so hard and you're not sure you're making a difference I can imagine when you share this with the teachers and I get emotional too that they're seeing the difference so that can make them work harder and want to do more and feel good about themselves because now when so many teachers are saying I don't know if I want to continue this as my career or my job or however they uh place it in their uh lives that they see this so I hope that we are celebrating every little gain on every campus on every level and telling we see you we hear you and the what we're going to continue working on this together and thank
061you and thank you to our teachers because I know they're making that difference yes ma'am I made at ilt meeting I made the coaches and principes get up and do a dance when we shared this can I ask one more question question and I apologize because I believe this was explained last month but can you explain the percentages to me like you have so just the first line reading you have 70% and then 35% and then 15% can you just explain yes ma'am for the star test there are three different levels of achievement okay and so 70% is approaches and so that's it's passing the test but it's passing the test at the lowest standard and meets is a little bit higher the kids have to get a few more questions correct on the test
062and that's what we yeah see I build on Masters is I got so that's the different levels and so you know we strive we always strive for 90 6030 that's that's the goal because that would give all campuses an a an achievement so you're always trying to move one up to the next level is what you're trying to do yes ma'am what what would you account for like such a a double digit increase like what are yall doing that gets you to that point this year our Focus has been and I shared it last year when we talked about the the planning process but this year you know we've given them the Innovative school day so they have time to sit and do the planning that's necessary because I don't know if you've ever sat
063down and looked at our standards at our te they're they're massive you know and there's there it may be you know three tis that you have to teach in this unit but there's so many different pieces and a lot of times we will teach we'll hit one area of the teak really well but we're not hitting the other two and so giving them that time and giving them this process to go through now they're looking at every piece and our instruction is so much more aligned and the rigor that we have to have to meet that standard is is there awesome anyone else than you you go to that last slide of again miss C game I just want to I just want to reiterate uh like like she said about the cake you know
064you don't you don't eat butter by yourself you don't eat sugar by yourself you know but you put all those things together you get this delicious cake and so all those things uh I want to reiterate also a part of the success that we have in the MARC ISD is because I mean we have our teachers are really working hard and our staff is really working hard but you know they have to do all those things and so the NV school day gives them time to do that and if you leave one piece out then you won't experience the same success that we're getting now and so we just want to continue to celebrate all the hard work they're doing at the campuses thank you yes ma'am you're back up still there all right so
065now we're going to talk about the teacher incentive allotment the teacher incentive allotment was established by the Texas legislature with a goal of providing outstanding teachers a pathway to a six figure salary the system is built for Texas school districts to designate and reward top performing teachers teachers can earn one of three designation levels recognized exemplary or master and teachers with national board certifications also can be designated as recognized districts receive an annual allotment for each eligible designated teacher they employ which are used to be used to incentivize teachers to remain in the classroom through the Tia system teachers can earn designations which are distinctions awarded to highly effective teachers there are three levels of designation recogniz exemplary and master the amount earned is based on the teacher designation and the C campus average student
066point value which comes from the students consensus block group teachers at campuses with higher economically disadvantaged percentages have the potential to earn a higher reward than campuses with lower economically disadvantaged percentages once the designation is earned teachers keep it for five years and if they move to another District the designation does follow the teacher the district does not determine the amount of reward a teacher earns this is determined by a funding formula campus allotment values change yearly due to the makeup of students on the campus and their census block here are the campus allotment values for the 2425 school year for three of our campuses as an illustration of potential reward so you can see fure the the top earning potential for a teacher there for this school year would have been $2,814 at Randall
067High School the top potential would have been $16,234.73 from other sources that align with the district goals and values into their plan as well but tea only validates data from the required components the timeline for tea is a three-year process year one is the application year and for us that's the 2425 school year districts will be notified in August of approval status if approved the 2526 would be our data capture year and then in the 2627 school year that data would be submitted for validation and teachers would receive their designations and rewards full implementation um of the system is a phase in process so our plan is next school year we would include prek using their Circle assessment kindergarten using their Tex Kia assessment 1 through 8th grade algebra geometry English one and two teachers
068using the map assessment these are approved assessments with the state that we already administer and they include a pre and a post test year two would add the remaining star and EOC teachers special education teachers as well as AP with the exclusion of the Fine Arts courses this allows for time for creation for Quality pre-test because these areas already have post tests and year three would add all other teaching areas so by the end of the third year of implementation all teaching areas would be eligible for the designation the reason for the phase in process is the creation of pre and post test the year as I said the year two areas have post- test but not pre-test and they would have to be created along with acceptable growth measures to determ that would need
069to be determined and year three that category would need both pre and post test along with their acceptable growth measures the lcisd Tia plan allots 90% of the funds generated by the teacher to that teacher the remaining 10% will remain at the district level to support implementation of the plan the only portion of the Tia plan that is board approved is the spending plan and this will be included in the overall budget the year those funds are generated the committee to design the lcisd Tia plan was composed of teachers from every track principles from every track as well as District leadership and here's a list of the people that served on the committee any questions or discussion um maybe I missed it would every teacher upon employment be up for this or would they have
070to be in the district not as a first or seconde teacher or does it matter they're they're eligible from the get-go from the GetGo upon their evaluations and it's student performance and their evalu results yes ma'am and if there are multiple teachers that basically tie along the way they would all be eligible for the same amount yes ma'am so there not competing against each other they're competing against themselves and the job they do well they're yeah they're all working together for the achievement of the stud but you know they're having plans in the past that have put teachers against each other no it's not competitive yeah but that's what I'm saying and then years ago we had what was a career ladder where you had to jump through so many Hoops to get any type
071of recognition Okay so thank you I just wanted that explained out loud that you're doing your job you're eligible yes ma'am if you're in one of those fields yes ma'am um to kind of piggyback off of that can you see any potential downfalls to doing this like any negative no I really can't I mean it's rewarding teachers for you know for doing their job is the way I see it and I know teachers in other districts that have earned this and it's I mean it's life-changing for them right so it's five years and I'm not sure if you said this but this is a separate State funding allotment so everyone's talking about student funding right now it's separate from your student allotment it's extra yes yes this and we've been assured that this money is
072in in statute and it's not going away is the latest we've heard right okay exactly right um for the public and for our teachers um there's Senate bills and house bills right now that are being discussed there were House Bill six was discussed today but Senate Bill 3 and um multiple out there that are meeting in committees right now so I want to encourage our uh and many of them include funds that will increase this teacher incentive allotment so I want to encourage our community um to email um get on the state ledge website or the state senate website find out um who's on the Committees and email and say increase our teachers pay our teachers doing a lot more work and so um as trustees we do that um are our people making decisions
073in Austin need to hear from our our teachers and from our community members so that's a a plug and I know we're going to have a legislative update in just a minute but this is all stuff being talked about today in Austin so tomorrow get on your email and that secretary Welsh um can you uh am I understanding right that onethird of of teacher qualifying is subjective to the evaluation is is that how I understand it that's a piece of it but we actually our committee and our meeting voted as to the percentage whoops I go past it and our plan will only have teacher observation and student growth and so the thing one of the things we took to the committee to vote on was the percentage of this that would go to each
074of those components and what they voted on was 60% would be student growth and 40% would be observation how do how will you determine the student growth will with those tests with either the map test or with the E with the star test or with um Circle text Kia with those assessments we have to have a pre and a post assessment and would the teacher observation be the equivalent of what they have now for test yes sir and that's another piece of it is we our part of our job is to make sure that we are Cal sorry that we are calibrated across the district in expectations for that observation what the observation is so you know they can't be really easy at this campus and really hard at this campus the expectation is that
075we're calibrated across the district and what we say is proficient is proficient across the district yeah I I love the idea because it's a state law that we're just now taking advantage of um as as uh Kay was saying a second ago though we're we're not setting up a system to purposely pit teachers against each other I think that my fear is that what might happen is that that happens because of the subjective evaluation so do you have any thoughts on that that's part of the data validation that we send in if and if we send it in and the and we send our data to Texas Tech that's who all this is contracted through and so if they see something that's a Miss then they they address it and so we won't be able
076to participate in the program so it's it's on us to make sure that we are very calibrated and so we have to when we submit our application we have to submit what is our plan for calibration um and we already have you know we have our principal meeting our ilt meeting our AP meetings and so we can work those things in through those meetings where it's not anything extra on anybody it's just we're going to spend part of our meetings going through these calibration steps um I'm sorry okay two things one so some of the teachers possibly wouldn't be able to qualify till even after schools out because some of those test scores don't come back till later am I correct on on that they well they don't yeah we have M be R star
077but remember we submit our data the year after so this year soel next year would be our data capture year okay we don't submit data until the fall of the following year so it's all the data would be in by that time and will we have something because anytime you of a teacher who feels like they did not justly get what they deserve would they have a process to um be able to I don't know appeal well data is data but also you know what I'm saying we already have a process in place that if you know you disagree with your observation you can have a second observation so we have those things in place okay good so certain teachers will know who of other teachers are getting the allotment and those who aren't is
078it all going to be public they'll know what their designation is but they won't know the amounts unless that person shares their amount can I ask a question um can you go to the the page I had the three charts about the um keep going I think forward uh later in the one more what oh back this way yes that one um so so in the first thing we use maps testing and STAR testing for those things in the next one prek is circle and tex Kia for kindergarten okay and then we have special ed in the second column and then the third non-store nonar core content CTE and Fine Art so how are we how what we what will be um how will weall decide growth measures for those that's why they're spaced out
079like that because next year is easy because all of those tests give us a pre and a post test already and the for most of those has guidelines like we already have those things set up within our district yes and so then the next year those already have a postest we just would need to come up with the preest and then we as a district would set what our growth measures would be for those okay so the committee you would have a the same committees y'all would it could be the same we could come up with a different one um but then that third year they don't have really any any tests in place so we would have to put a pre and a post test in place and determine those growth measures so that
080was kind of the way we determined what would take us the most time what could we Implement now now and then what what would take more time and that's how how we've set this up okay and then y'all have to turn those plans into tea it's an application process okay so they'll say okay we think these are good growth meas measures or we don't think and okay yes ma'am okay do can y'all look at how other schools do that who have districts okay okay I I know it's called teacher incentive allotment but not everything from govern government is accurately described um are there any other staff that are eligible for this besides they have to be a teacher according to their their service code so an instructional coach would not qualify no sir so would
081that be an incentive you would if what if they got the designation and they were on a path to become get out of the classroom on a on they have to remain a teacher they have to remain a teacher MH and so this doesn't touch anybody else do it doesn't touch uh Paras or diagnosticians or nurses or anything else in our district they have to be I think it's what is it 087 that has to be their code their service code okay and that and that just to reiterate that's from the state government it's not Lamar thing yes that's they can go to the Tia website and and look at all the regulations thank you but I mean this whole program was set up for them to have incentive to stay in the classroom correct
082yeah yes I have a personal experience I have a cousin who gets this and you know she said you know she just got raised to master teacher and she said and now now I now I need to stay in the classroom I said well that's what it was designed for any other questions discussion well and then once lcisd is approved or approval right um is there's certain things that we have to do each year to remain in the program or we R Tia District or how does that work if you want to um I think there's a certain number of years and then you can reapply or you have to reapply but then we can go back and amend our plan like if we decide next year that we could do our plan for 26
08327 and 2728 we can go in and we can reapply or resubmit our plan to amend our plan to move forward differently okay I just thought of one more thing so they get the designation for 5 years M if you are what's the the lower designation called uh what is it recognized recognized okay so say you get recognized the first year you don't just Coast for five years you have to you would want you could become Master you could you can you can move up and let's say you know if you get it this year and then next year you get it again then you're that starts a new five years you know your five years can keep rolling either way I mean you and then this is probably obvious but it goes it counts
084towards TRS yes that's a big deal yeah all right thank you thank you all right trustees next we have Dr Maxwell to talk about legislative updates good good evening Board of Trustees Dr niens uh before I begin Miss Hotel just so you know uh there are 207 Elementary School students that are currently living in that Western chunk of mcneel um if Mr banana would have you know delayed for another five minutes I would have had that number while he was still up here so I just wanted you to know that uh but tonight I'll be providing you with a quick update about the 89th Texas legislation uh legislative session as well as some identified priorities areas that could directly impact uh Lamar CISD the 89th legislative session for Texas began back on January 14th and
085is scheduled to go through June 2nd of course the governor could call special sessions that would occur after that June date also uh as you guys talked about uh to determine who represents your uh you in the Texas legislature you can go to the website uh that is on the screen right now now or scan the QR code enter your address and it will tell you who represents you in the Texas legislature to help you remember the wrm in the uh website is who represent presents me that's what it stands for so as we look at the legislature uh we've come up the district has come up with and identified four District priorities for Lamar CISD they are a revision of the current Bond language especially for hypergrowth districts designating schools as critical infrastructure for
086local mun municipalities increasing the basic funding allotment for school districts and shifting to an enrollment driven funding equation from an attendance driven one that we currently have I'm going to take you through each one of those priorities and give a few more details as we go through so the first one the revision of bond language the issue is current Bond language mandated by House Bill 3 includ need we need to include the statement this is a property tax increase for a bond election which is misleading for hypergrowth districts like Lamar CISD this could confuse voters and hinder our ability to pass necessary Bond propositions because the p because the p few bonds that we did pass did not increase the taxes for our residents what we're asking is for support of legislation to update Bond
087language to re reflect the financial impact accurately especially for rapidly growing districts where the bond does not increase property taxes why this matters is clear language Fosters voter trust and allows lamarc ISD to address critical facility needs without confusion and let me remind the board and the general public what it what it means to be a hypergrowth district um hypergrowth is when a district has a single area that has over 300 annual housing starts that district is considered hyper growth currently Lamar CISD has six areas that have 300 uh housing starts annually the second one uh priority is schools as critical infrastructure the issue is Lamar ISD is facing overcrowding and facility shortages due to the rapid residential developments the growth in residential development has outpaced our ability to build new schools this has resulted
088in overcrowded classrooms and strained resources currently municipalities are unable to require developers developers to set aside or sell land for schools to meet the needs of these growing areas what we're asking is support for legislation to designate schools as critical infrastructure that would enable municipalities to require developers to set aside to sell land to schools so we can develop those schools for those neighborhoods why this matters is it will help better manage Community growth reduce overcrowding and ensure children of new residents have access to necessary educational facilities by designating schools as critical infrastructure we can ensure that developers contribute to the infrastructure needs of the growing Community preventing overcrowding in the future the next priority is a increase in the basic allotment as our district grows the financial demands to educate our students grow as
089well the current funding model is not keeping up with the pace of our expansion so the issue is Lamar CC needs increased funding to address inflation growing student populations and the rising cost of providing quality education increasing the basic allotment will uh ensure the marcd can continue offering excellent Educational Opportunity opportunities and maintain a high standard of teaching what we're asking is advocating for an increase in the basic allotment for school funding without restrictive conditions and why this matters is an increase will help recruit and retain high quality Educators expand programs such as career in technical education CTE and better support all students and the fourth one of enrollment driven funding so the issue is funding for lar CISD is based on attendance rather enr rather than enrollment making it difficult to app plan effectively
090for our growing student body our district is experiencing rapid growth and funding based on attendance doesn't reflect the reality of our increasing enrollment what we're asking is advocating for funding based on student enrollment to ensure stability which would then lead to better planning with funding time to enrollment numbers we can better anticipate needs plan for the future and ensure resources are allocated where they are most needed Lamar CISD is a is growing at an unprecedented rates we serve nearly 47,000 students across 53 campuses with many more students expected in the coming years the community support in addressing these critical issues will allow us to continue providing Elite Education ensuring our community remains a great place to live work and raise a family so with that on March 27th 2025 Lamar CISD will be sending a
091delegation of District leaders and board members to Austin Texas we're going to be meeting with state representatives and share the district priorities the goal of this trip is to ensure is to strengthen the relationship with State lawmakers and work collaboratively towards solutions that enhance educational opportunities for all students uh and just so you're aware in the public uh we have already confirmed meeting times with representative Stan kitzman Senator Lois kulur representative Matt Morgan and representative Dr sulaman Lani and we have reached out made contact we haven't heard back from Senator Joe Huffman and representative Gary Gates so in conclusion we're looking at our four District priorities of revision of bond language for hypergrowth districts designating schools as critical infrastructure increasing the basic allotment and shifting to an enrollment based funding mechanism uh these AA will
092have available resources for the public on our website including Flyers that Communications Department is working on to have up there so that it will have a all this information included and I also I've included the QR code again to be able to find Representatives with that any questions or discussion go go ahead Jessy box um so when when we talk about designating school districts as critical infrastructure does that have anything to do with I know we've talked about you know having them designate land but does it also have anything to do with the timing of their development in in conjunction with timing of being able to build schools no I I don't believe so I I would have to look at to get but I don't think so um the critical infrastructure is allowing the
093municipalities to have some form of Leverage over a developer to say hey if you're going to be coming in and building all these areas we would designate this as a need because schools are critical for serving the public in that area yeah the timing of that is solely up to the municipality where that development is going to is going to land and so the city can say uh they can put some parameters on the timing of it what they can't do is put parameters on if the if the developer gives us or set set aside land for us us and so that's what we're asking for but that timing solely depends on the municipality so now you're saying that now the municipalities have the capability of saying oh wait you can't build here just yet
094because there's not enough schools they can really they can slow that down they can they can put it like a 30-day moratorium on development but that's it there's a municipality in the northern part of near Dallas that did that slowed it down I mean 30 days to me is not really slowing it down so but yeah the distri I'm whereare of um was it Dr Maxwell I mean told him that we're going to stop for the time being until we can catch up yeah they were weting to catch up for the infrastructure I can't remember the name but I were reading the article um it was near Dallas and they said we're not allowing any new developments until we can beef up the infrastructure to meet the needs of our current um citizens and that's
095yeah and that school district was next door to my school district when I was when I was superintendent up there so I that whole area is fast growth in Colin County see she have anything um Dr Maxwell I have two two questions I want to ask you about your first and your last Point uh I agree that the the ballot language should change what are you or the what is the administration proposing the language change to I think that's going to be a discussion of a back and forth of talking that through um to make it much more accurate especially if it's in an area that is as designated as hypergrowth or fast growth growth um it's almost like that idea of one size fits all does that work all the time and so I
096think that's a discussion of building that towards of how would that work and be accurate for the areas that those elections are occurring in yeah I want to I want to flush this out a little bit in in the details so the last time we went out for a bond we said to the public I won't use we the board did not the administration said when they were making presentations this is not going to increase your taxes so if we use whole numbers and let's say you have $10,000 of credit card debt and you owe $500 a month to Visa American Express and you're going to increase that debt amount on your credit card to $155,000 but American Express or or Mastercard says no no no you can still pay $500 that's what we that's
097what the Lamar administration was telling the public would would do you agree that was accurate because it it was no intention to be deceptive MH you're still you were not increasing your $500 a month payment not a tax increase the other flip side of that is we are increasing the amount of debt you owe to the credit card company agree so it needs to say I would be in support of changing the ballot language to something from what it is but it needs to let the public know this is not just a a benign big problem for you or or a decision for you this will extend the debt of the district and extend your debt as a property owner and as a as a taxpayer so would would you agree with that I just
098made my note to write that down as one of a possibility yes sir yeah um second thing uh the enrollment driven funding I I I hear the arguments I've been listening to some of the committee hearings in Austin that anybody can do from their laptop their phone um I I I think it's a it's an interesting idea I know a lot of states do it not all states do it but the the biggest hurdle I see to that is having kids enroll on a certain time uh let's just say like November 1st Family moves into the area and all of a sudden they're captured as an enrolled family or as enrolled students and then they're they're not showing up to school on a regular basis or unbeknownst to us the par parents pulled them out
099and enrolled them in a private school I mean so how would we how what do you think a responsible way to address that with the legislators are so we would be using the pe's uh data that we have and as Mr Moore I used to work very closely with M Mr Moore and the RNA uh they're shifting to this matter of continuous data that is going back and forth from the state and the the the the district and so it's not these checkpoints anymore of when data is submitted from the district to the state it could be instantaneous and following upon those so I think it opens up the options of those uh opportunities of how that could look the problem we have now is that when it's just a snapshot days certain times of
100who's sitting in their desk that day which doesn't give a true snapshot of what the district is and let's say children do move around and we have children that leave other uh either private school or charter school and come to us after those days then we're not having funding for those students whereas if they would do an enrollment snapshot several times during a year to see the fluctu how it fluctuates I think you get a more accurate picture than just saying who's sitting in that chair that day no I don't know I don't know what the solution is but right now school districts are having are losing money and they're and that's when they started putting that pressure on kids you need to be in school you need to be in school yeah and yes
101they do but we don't want them here sick we don't want them here when they can't be here and parents are freaking out because their kids are getting notices that they're not there so yeah the other thing that the public might not understand is that there's two pieces to the tax rate is one is the property and one is the uh well we call the maintenance and operation and that the maintenance and operation is is the part that's determined by have a butt sitting in a seat or not the property the taxes on the property itself no matter what goes to the local school district and the state of Texas and does not follow the student is not determinant whether that student shows up or not so um it and I don't think a lot
102of folks understand that so there there's a lot of moving parts of this thing and I I hear what you're saying that that might be a good thing to do for the legislature I I just don't know the the things that I've been listening to I don't just I don't know if both Chambers are going to agree to though I I don't think it's going to go there this legislative session yeah the the current Esa plans that are being proposed in both the house bill and the Senate bill is that the esas will be enrollment based and then so we'll be what Esa so esas are the Ed educational savings accounts so that is what some of the the vouchers the the representatives are proposing um so we're um a family already has the choice
103of choose how they want to educate their Childs and we believe as a board that that is a parent right to do so um what the esas are doing that's separating saying okay now Family a you want to go over here you apply to get the esa the educational savings account and then you will be able to take x amount of dollars with your child to go to this school and apply those funds there um when the current Senate bills and house bills have those dollars designated as enrollment based funding so whether family a son is enrolled at a private school and never shows up that school will still be getting that full enrollment based funding where the funding coming to us from the basic allotment will be attendance based and so I think as
104we're advocating we would like just equal play playing fields and say okay if they're going to be enrollment base um and then then this should be enrollment based because it's still those dollars are being applied to education no no let me ask you a question I haven't read the house version I've read the Senate version but there's two different versions of bills we're talking about so are you saying that both of them are saying that both of them will be enrollment base but from what I can tell reading through the bills and watching the Committees um of course the two different houses the Senate and the house they think they can create a better plan than the other then they'll merge together and maybe agree on one um but those will be enrollment based so
105if if if we can Advocate one of our points could be that one will be then why is the other one not and so because we when we do our budget when we look at the big District as a whole we have to staff and we have to buy curriculum and we have to buy consumables um as if every student will be there so if we're you know student doesn't show up and then then also then sometimes our students have circumstances that will keep them out whether it's health or something like that but we still have to have that staff member there to yeah educate them U I think it was back in December uh trusty broncel and Dr niens and I met with Matt Morgan State Rep Matt Morgan and Gary Gates and that's
106one of the things we said is that it's not fair when a a kid goes to a private school if if it passes if the whole voucher Esa thing patch passes if they go to a private school and then they come back to Lamar that money needs to be prated for the amount of time that they were at that private school and they don't need to keep that money for the entire school year or or whatever but um there's a there's a lot of there's a lot of different interesting thing happening up there in Austin right now regarding education but I do want to say also that the difference is that the property tax money stays with the local school district Statewide it does not follow the student and that that is the case if
107as I understand it at least in the Senate bill that's being proposed for the esas so if a kid in the Lamar footprint takes and there's not going to be a lot of money compared to the number of students in Texas but if one of those if one of the students of Lamar takes uh the the amount of money to go to a private school and the property tax money on that kid's family's house will still go to lar and they will pay the tax rate that we set as a board and with with that the clarifying part of that is that money can only be applied to certain things that does not apply to the Educational Learning of the student would go pay for for the bond bonds and different things like that a
108good distin a lot of the the the postings on Facebook and on X and all those ones it talks about how there's $15,000 being spent on students and uh the majority of that some of it well maybe not the majority of it but a lot of that does not even apply to what happens within the classroom so that's one of the things when we're talking about um they're they're they're supposed to say that there is more money being spent on students than ever before well because construction cost cost more than ever before and so some of that property tax dollars yeah there's more money being spent because it costs more to build a building so our students are benefiting from being inside those buildings but it's not going into the instruction of the student so
109we go back to the previous presentation where we had all those gains double single digit gains and all that that's coming from the basic allotment that the state gives so that's where we're asking for the increase of the basic allotment because that's what actually affects our teachers teaching our students so uh I I want to add a couple things because I want to make sure the community knows we we've been having these conversations even since last session and so last session the board and I went down to Austin during fortb County day um and some of some of the same trustees were in the room when I brought that up to a representative uh or Senator either one I brought that up and I say you know about the Level Playing Field and they looked
110me in my eyes and said that'll never happen and so that's why we that's why we're asking for more people to call and Advocate um because they looked me in my eyes and said that would never happen and uh I don't I just don't think that's that's the right way to do that that's not the fair way to do that but also as uh president Lambert talked about you know when you see this information about the state is spending $155,000 per kid they're using the overall tax rate and this trusty was talked about you know we have two different tax rates we have ml tax rate ins tax rate M maintenance operations happens what is what happens in the classroom our basic allotment for that is $61,000 and6 61 $6,100 right uh we spend roughly
111$10,000 educating students uh maybe more so the basic a lot is not keeping up with what we do in the classroom and so the other part of that money is for capital projects it's for building buildings and you know we have to build a lot of buildings if you heard that we have a lot of folks in the mar D A lot of people still coming inor CISD and so that money is set aside for capital projects we cannot use ins dollars for capital projects to pay teachers we can't use it to send kids on field trips we can't use it for anything other than capital projects so I want you read between the lines as board president said is when you start seeing that information um and I even had um a legislator argue
112with me on what the basic allotment was uh they didn't know what the basic allotment was and I said no it's 6160 uh and so finally they looked it up and you know a couple days later told me I was right but we we have to make our voices heard we have to say something if we say if we say if we don't say anything we'll get anything right if we don't say something we'll get anything and so that's why these priorities are so important and make sure that you know you're a voter and that you find out who your representative is your Center is and you make it known that you're supporting the mariz D and everything that we're doing so we can get the assistance that we need to make sure that we
113can still educate students one thing about knowing who our people are like so you know um with our our Senator and our Miss Los kuler she's an amazing woman she Advocates well um with representative Morgan representative gates for us um there's also these committees where these people are making decisions so we also need to reach out and Advocate to them as well so I want to throw that out there yeah our people they hear us but then there's also different there's a public Ed commit there's highered committee there's all these the the the Appropriations all these other committees where there's other Representatives they need to hear our voices as well thank you sir thank you all right trustees are there any items on the future consent agenda that you would like to pull for discussion
114at the April board meeting all right all right it is 8:04 p.m. we are journey to close session pursuant to Texas government code sections 551.071 551.074 and 55108 to the open meetings act to discuss Personnel land acquisition or consultation with our attorney is Clay here okay there he is years educating e e e the Lamar CSD Board of Trustees are returning from closed session the Lamar CD Board of Trustees are returning from closed session we are now back in Open session it is 8:45 p.m. we have a quorum are there any motions to be made uh Mr President president I move that the Board of Trustees approve the superintendent's amended employment contract as discussed in closed session we have a motion do we have a second all right motion by um trusty bronzelle second by
115trusty danzinger uh any discussion hearing none we'll call call for the vote all in favor say I I motion carries do any more motions yes Mr President I move that the Board of Trustees approve the employment of the professional personnel as discussed in Clos session we have a motion by vice president Hassel for the um Board of Tres to approve the employment of the professional personnel as discussed in close session do we have a second all right secretary Welch makes a second any discussion hearing none we'll call for the vote all in favor say I I motion carries any more motions yes Mr President I move that the Board of Trustees approv the purchase of the Elementary School site in Foster Farms and authorize the superintendent or designate to negotiate and execute the contract all
116right hearing a motion by trusty danzinger for purchase of the Elementary School site in Foster Farms do we have a second trusty box makes a second any discussion hearing none call for the vote all in favor say I I motion carries all right the meeting is adjourned at 8:46 p.m. come