001This m meeting of the Midland Independent School District is now open for business and any transactions which may be properly presented. Board is present. Uh verification uh agenda item number two, verification of compliance with open meeting law. This is to certify that the provisions of sections 551.001 of the Texas government code have been met in the connection with public notice of this meeting. So if everybody would stand for a moment of silent and a pledge and join us in the pledge of allegiance from Emerson Elementary. We'll follow Principal Nick. Good evening, President Hodes, members of the board, and Dr. Howard. The mission of Midland ISD is that all students who will graduate college, career, or military ready. At Emerson Elementary, we work towards this mission every day with our mission of rise, grow, excel, reach
002our full potential. I am proud to introduce Emerson Elementary sixth grade student representatives leading today's board meeting pledges. Shamira Leandu Lorenzo is the daughter of Zoil Lorenzo Figueroa. Her favorite subject is math because she likes to figure out patterns. She enjoys drawing, participating on the campus robotics team, and wants to be a dermatologist in the future. Shamira is a model student and participates daily in community service at school in our Roadrunner Leader student program. Her favorite community service job is walking younger students to their afterchool locations. Ukari Uswamp is the son of Richard and Katie Oswampe. His favorite subject is math because his teacher, Mr. Nei, makes it fun and easy to learn. He enjoys playing soccer and is looking forward to playing soccer on a college team. Ukari is a model student and participates
003daily in community service at school in our Roadrunner Leaders School program. His favorite community service job is taking care of the flags before and after school. We are so proud of these two wonderful students and at this time they will lead us in the pledges. I pledge allegiance to 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. Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas. One state under God, one and indivisible. Moving on to agenda item number four or five public forum. We've got six speakers tonight. And the first speaker, Miss Burlson, is going to announce. Remember, you've got three minutes and the microphone will be cut off. Thank you'all for being here and doing
004public comment. Patricia Mau. Next up will be Elena Brooks. And third will be Reagan in a host. My name is Patricia Mau. I live in your district, Mr. Hodes, and I have a granddaughter who attends Sanorita Elementary School in the second grade, also in your district. I'm here today to speak about the item related to it's an action item the administration to provide daily access to all communication exchanges with the public and I'm concerned about the exponential ways that privacy could be violated by this policy. When you talk about administration, you're talking about everybody from the director of food services to the director of nursing services to vice principles and principles and supervisors and assistant superintendent and the superintendent. And I'm not really sure what information the board thinks it needs access to. Does it
005think it needs access to a conversation between a parent and a principal when she's calling to talk about a confidential matter involving her child? I just really don't get it. The other thing I want to comment on on is the fact that to me this repres represents a governance issue in the state board rules talking about what school boards are supposed to do. It is very clear that school boards are to allocate the daily operation of the school district to the superintendent. And I would consider communication with the public to be the purview of the superintendent. And so I'm just not sure what kind of information the board is trying to find. And then again, when it talks about all communication, are we talking about emails? Are we talking about text messages? Are we talking
006about um what kind of communication are we talking about? Communication that is um made through districtowned devices during school time or are we also talking about communication that occurs on personal devices outside of school time? The action item, as it is stated, is ambiguous and leaves much concern on the part of parents and grandparents about how how the privacy of their children and grandchildren could be literally invaded by this policy. Thank you for your time. This is Elena Brooks. My name is Elena Brooks and I'm a parent of two third graders at Fascin Elementary and a former MISD elementary teacher. This has been a difficult past few months watching our school board be overtaken by a four-person majority who seemed bent on destroying our school district. I am especially appalled by the actions of Mr.
007Hajes, my district representative. It would take much longer than the three minutes I have allotted to go through all of his deplorable actions. So, let's start with this social media post. And forgive my language, but I'm just directly quoting our leader here. At grade level and above, you get to tell Maggie that you [ __ ] quit. Don't be fooled at approaches you ain't never get. Sorry, ma'am. Mr. Cado, the decorum, we can't have that. Not in public meeting. Thank you. I will I will retract that. I will keep going. Mr. Hodes has just written. Man, I'm sorry. Thank you. Okay. This is just another example of how he has disrespect for women. Thank you. Next. Reagan in a house. Good evening, President Hodes, members of the board, Dr. Howard. Uh, this board policy that people are
008receiving as they walk into this auditorium is one of the most fascist behaviors I have seen in my entire life. Never did I think in the state of Texas and the United States of America that the public would be restricted in their freedom of speech. What are you trying to hide, Mr. Hodes? Well, let me educate the listening public that it was revealed that Mr. Hodes has personal ties to Third Fure Schools operator. While this may be technically legal, it carries ethical and moral hazards. And if this were former board presidents Mr. Bishop, Brian Murray, or Rick Davis, Mr. Hodes would be all over social media and radio crying foul. It has come to my attention that a records request was submitted because it seems that Mr. Hodes did not want Dr. Howard on the
009stage to keep her from giving the board her input on the agenda item regarding third future schools. His lawyer has submitted this request to the attorney general, delaying a simple request. What does Mr. Hodgees have to hide? It seems that he was trying to slam down these partnerships down our collective throats with no time for discussions or research. Moving forward, I'm requesting the billing statements for the lore that they have hired because this obstruction using the attorney general as an excuse has been utilized by the law and killer ISD and its current council and who uses the same MO. I also want to raise a strategy Mr. Hajes has to improve student outcomes. He doesn't have a strategy. Although we have funds that would have prepared the district for a soft landing due to the
010fiscal cliff, uh we are cutting important staffing positions such as the three bilingual sped resource teachers. The overwhelming research and evidence and data all show that smaller teacher to student ratios directly impact student outcomes. Forcing Dr. Howard to make a budget fit into your ideology is increasing the number of students into classrooms and cutting creating special education legal risk for the district to fill to fulfill federal law. Mr. Hajes is bad for special education. He's bad for children. He's bad for MISD. He's bad for freedom of speech. And I request that the board make a motion to replace him with another president. And I would recommend suggesting either Mrs. Burles or Mr. Hernandez, both who have experience with special needs children and education. Thank you for sharing your feelings. Next up, we have Amber Davidson,
011then Kristen Vasquez, and Crystal Dear. Good evening. I'm here tonight. I would like to highlight our PTAs and share just a where we've come in the last few months and how much we've grown. As of this afternoon, we are at 6,461 members. We are 90 members away from 2,000. That is the biggest increase across the state in our out of 51 councils. We have done an amazing job of engaging our parents and bringing them to the table to be engaged and know what's going on and to be involved in their child's education which is amazing. I would like to highlight Buoie PTA. They received the voice for every child award at the platinum level. That means they have one PTA member for every single child that's enrolled in this school. That is a success that
012is not achieved by many PTAs and that is a huge accomplishment for them and I want to highlight them and their hard work that they have done. That is a 49% increase over last year's membership for this campus. I would also like to thank our administrators and our teachers for partnering with our PTAs and allowing us to be involved and to be engaged and to help our students succeed because we know that when parents are paying attention and they know what the homework is and what when tests are coming, our students do better. And so I want to thank the administrations at every single campus for allowing us to be a part of their team. Overall, we have a 42% increase from last year. We are leading. We are second behind DODTO, but we have
013more PTA members than them. Um, and so I am very proud of the engagement that we have, of the support that we have because they're supporting the teachers and the administrators who are and if you've never been in the classroom, it's hard. It can be discouraging. It can get you down and you can make you want to quit one day. And so I want to thank those parents for stepping up. I would lastly like to speak to because of our engagement and because of the increase of our engagement of what's going on. While this auditorium is not full tonight, we have a lot of parents who are engaged and want to communicate with you. Some of them have voiced concerns that they don't have the ability to communicate with you. And so I would ask
014that you consider and take away that limitation of 15 minutes. I understand that last month was a very long meeting with a lot of remarks, but I think it's important that when you do not put an agenda out until 5:30 on Friday afternoon that you give greater than 72 hours for everyone to voice their concerns and to ask you questions so that they understand what you as their elected representatives are doing and how you are leading this district and is supporting Dr. Howard and her cabinet in their in their efforts to make us the best district in the state. Thank you so much. Before you leave, if we'd like to I'd like everybody to give you a round of applause for for the PTA. Like that's we might not agree on everything, but you do
015really hard work and do it really really well and it's very much appreciated. Thank you very very much. Thank you. And I'd like to just say it's not me. I can't be on every campus and so I have wonderful team that's very transparent in what they're doing and how they're working with every single campus and it's an awesome um ability to be their leader. So thank you. Thank you. Good evening. Um I just wanted to share with the board some conversations that I've had with teachers over the course of the last few weeks. This is not exclusive to a particular campus. This is not even exclusive to a pic particular side of town. This is throughout all of our neighborhood schools that this is what teachers are experiencing. Um it's even in all of your
016districts. I had a teacher that reached out recently that shared with me that she had a student in her class that had a violent outburst and was destroying her classroom, destroying all of her personal possessions. She um hit the panic button so that the administration could come down and help and no one ever came. She was later told that the proper procedure in this situation is to remove all of the students from the classroom and just wait in the hallway until the student was finished with their violent outburst. I had another teacher reach out to me that works for a a junior high and she was just encouraging students to get to class and a student told her to shut the f up and drink your effing coffee. I had a friend that was volunteering
017on behalf of the PTA for Valentine's Day at a junior high and she was passing out Valentine to teachers to just give them a little bit of joy on Valentine's Day. And there was a student that kept trying to mess with the Valentine's. And she asked him, "Hey bud, let's not mess with these. You know, these are for the teachers." And he told her to shut the f up u word. I had another friend that um recently shared at her campus that they are not allowed to send students for any disrespect, for any disruption. The only reason that they can send students to the office is if they if they assault another student. And I know that this board and this administration has tasked our teachers to improve student outcomes. And I fully believe and
018trust in our teachers. I think we have phenomenal teachers in our district that will be able to reach these academic outcomes that you guys want. But I don't believe that that's going to happen until behaviors like this end. And to be honest, behaviors like this are not going to end until we start inconveniencing parents of students who behave like this. We cannot prioritize attendance over our classroom culture. Every teacher that I personally know that has resigned in the last three years has done so because of behavior like this. And I just have to ask if we are going to be a district whose mission is to have students that are career military or college ready, what would happen if they were to refer to their their college professor or their drill sergeant or their boss
019and tell them some of the things that they're telling these teachers? I don't think that that's a very good representation of our district and I think that we need to do better for our teachers. Thank you. Thank you, Crystal Dearman. I'm reading on behalf of those who do not have a voice tonight and are being silenced. First off, the question is which they don't have anything against the opportunity cultural program or MCL's, but they would like some more information. They would like to know how much money the district paid towards opportunity culture and if those funds are being used to coach teachers who have proved themselves through their testing. Also, we would like to know why did we do away with the schools for our bilingual kiddos since we have a large influx of students
020who are speaking no English. And now that we have larger sizes of classes that we also have more students who don't speak English, they've reached out to the district and asked for support, were promised support, and received nothing. To follow up, a lot of concern is with Mr. Hodgeges and his personal behavior in pro uh against our teachers and our community itself, especially women, and how we look at our START test and that teachers aren't necessarily doing the best that they can in the classroom. I'm going to echo what I heard earlier. Being a former teacher, we pour into those students and do the best that we can with the limitations that we're given. And yet we are being judged and I know this as a teacher by a state standard test that we don't
021all necessarily agree with and that we all agree should be kind of narrowed down to maybe only being tested so often instead of being tested for a whole entire month of April. That's like the dislike of everybody that's out there. However, when we see posts from our board president that belittling the fact that we're not doing what we're supposed to in the classroom or even belittling women, it does not look good for the district itself. While teachers, as the email just went out, and while we don't have these people here, we're told that they're not allowed to communicate. So, how does a board president can go and speak their mind? But a teacher is limited to only positive things about their district, their board, etc. That's all. Thank you for sharing your feelings. No, ma'am.
022No, ma'am. So, moving on to agenda item six, consent agenda. A. Approval of board meeting minutes. B. Approving of monthly financials. C. Approval of quarterly investment report. D. Approval of the 2025 summer school compensation manual. D. Approval of the 20 I'm sorry, approval of the 2025 2026 certification of provision of instructional materials. F. Approval of the 2024 2025 application for low attendance waiver. G. Approval of RFP number 18-53 board resolution extending depository contract extension 30 of3. H. Approval of annual FIS uh financial audit engagement letter. I approval of construction materials testing services firm for 2023 bond program package number 8 elementary group B and authorization to negotiate and execute agreement J. Approval of geotechnical services firm for 2023 bond program package number nine, middle school group C and authorization to negotiate and execute agreement K,
023approval of surveying firm for 2023 bond number eight or bond program number eight, elementary group B, and authorizing to negotiate and execute agreement and L approval of donations over $20,000. Does any board member want to pull any item for discussion? Do we have a motion to approve consent? We have a second. Second. It has been motioned and seconded to approve uh agenda item six, consent agenda. All those in favor, raise your right hand. is unanimous. The motion passes. Moving on to item agenda item number seven, superintendence update. Dr. Howard. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Hajes. Members of the board, um want to start off with a couple of things. First of all, those of you who spoke in public forum, um if you shared something that we need to follow up with, I'm going to ask
024that our team visit with you and find out which campuses so we can certainly follow up and make sure we're handling everything right. Um yesterday we announced our top graduates from our five high schools and so this is when it starts to really feel real that graduation's right around the corner. Uh Midland High School recognized and will recognize their top 10. Uh for the sake of time I'm just going to introduce their validictorian Elelliana Agia and their saludiatoran Austin Strife. Legacy High School, of course, top 10, but their validictorian is Jerry Roston III and their saludiatoran, Vivian Meyers. Coleman High School recognizes a top student, and that is Hi White. Early College High School, uh, validictorian, uh, Lucia Estrada, and Young Women's Leadership Academy, uh, top student, uh, Angeli Vad La. And so we'll recognize
025those students at many events over the next four or five weeks um at our shining stars event on April 25th. Hopefully you can join us for that. That is um a recognition that started probably about 12 14 years ago by our education foundation and they recognize our top students and award them with scholarships. Also at our district recognition program on May 6, we'll recognize these top students and uh get to shake their hands and congratulate them. And then of course at their own graduation ceremonies which start as early as May 15th. Early College will graduate on May 15th. Coleman May 22nd, Legacy May 22nd, Young Women's May 23rd, and Legacy High School May 23rd as well. So a lot going on uh this time of year. State testing began last week and it continues this
026week and into next week. Advanced placement testing for our students who are taking advanced placement courses. Those tests are going to run May 5th through the 16th. And then some news that came out u just last week I guess it was speaking about assessments is the courts have determined that the 23 ratings will be released. So we're preparing for that. Um those rel uh ratings are expected to be public next week and uh we'll actually be issuing a press release that goes along with that. What I want to share with the board tonight and I think we've talked about this before but uh we expect those 2024 ratings will follow. We don't know when that will happen. We're two years into the 203 ratings being released. Uh but back in 20 in August of 2024,
027we actually released our 2024 preliminary ratings to the community to our families so that they knew where their campuses stood. Um but more importantly, our team since 2023 has been focused on school improvement. We launched our strategic plan. Much of that plan was built around the data that came out of those 2023 results in that uh first semester that I was here and gathered feedback from a number of people. And so our work really doesn't change uh now that they're releasing ratings a couple of years later. And so um I want to highlight a couple of things that I think is really important that that I think speaks to the adjustments we made when those those scores came out in 2023. That's when we reorganized um our teaching and learning team and got our content
028people back in place. But when we look at our 23 results compared to 2024 and we look at our students as a cohort, so when our third graders left third grade and went to fourth grade, um they went from 41 to 46% meets grade level. So they had a fivepoint jump in one year. Uh fourth grade when they moved to fifth grade, they went from 39 to 49. So they had a 10point growth. fifth to sixth grade had a 49 to 52. So, a a smaller growth, but still the three. Uh where we saw a dip and we tend to see this dip going into seventh grade is when our sixth graders transition from elementary into um our junior high schools. And so, that is some work that we're doing. And uh we're going to
029be bringing some recommendations to you next month about uh junior high and the work that we're going to be doing there to make um a real difference at those campuses starting right now. Actually, they had a meeting yesterday. And so um we saw that dip from sixth to 7th grade EL from 50 to 44. So we dropped six points with that same group of students. Um but then our seventh to eighth graders uh bumped up two points from 41 to 43. I do and you all know this but just a reminder that this last year was our first year to have those consistent EL curriculum resources uh K8 and so that was the first year they'd use those. When we look at math we don't see that consistent improvement and I think there's a number
030of reasons for that. One is this is the first year that we have consistent math resources K5. And next month we'll bring you a recommendation for consistent math resources for sixth grade through algebra 1, as well as we're going to um uh bring some recommendations for how we uh sequence our math courses in junior high, how we allow students to accelerate in junior high. because many times students accelerate and if they're not completely ready for that that creates gaps and uh with math building on itself that can cause some pretty significant differences. The other thing is uh when we transition our students from sixth grade to 7th grade they go from a 90minute math block to a 45minute math block and we're going to change that starting next year. And so Trisha Terron is working
031with our junior highs um and Miss Bueno and Mr. Oo and already looking at ways that we can um make those adjustments so that our sixth to 7th is not so different from the elementary. I think we see that big drop because in an elementary going from a true middle school we might see that from fifth grade to sixth grade but we're seeing it in that sixth to 7th transition. Uh so when we look at math our third graders when they moved up to fourth grade they went from 38 to 45% so they did see an increase of seven. Our fourth graders when they moved to fifth grade stayed at 50 uh 50% meets and our fifth graders dip from 44 to 43 when they moved to sixth grade. Um again we saw the biggest
032concern when we move our sixth graders to seventh grade. Um and so that's something that that I just talked about that we're going to be looking at. And then 7th to 8th grade math actually improved from 20 to 34. Uh so, you know, we're going to continue to keep the board and our families and our community updated. Uh these press releases are going to seem kind of unusual because they're two years old and and trying to talk about what happened two years ago compared to what's going on right now. Uh but we're certainly not at all where we want to be, but we're not where we were in 23. And I'm I'm proud of the team, all of our teachers, our principles that have done the work to make that happen. I didn't know that
033Miss Davidson was going to talk about PTA tonight. So, also had those celebrations. I won't reiterate what she said other than uh we appreciate each one of our PTA presidents working with our campus principles because that partnership makes such a difference and I do believe that's why we've seen those increases. Uh shifting to next year where uh registration is open and so parents can enroll or reenroll their students. Um I'm a parent and I found that process to be easier. So, I hope those of you that are parents, if you've gone through the process, we've worked uh to streamline that and try to make it easier for our parents. And then prek and kindergarten roundup, uh those events continue into May. And so, um families can do that. If you see some of the social
034media post, uh we actually have campuses that are doing signing events for their prek and kindergarten incoming students. So, just like we get our students excited to sign to go to college or the military or athletics, um they're now signing to be a kindergarten or a prek student, and that's pretty cute if you haven't seen any of those. Um next year, 26 of our campuses will have prek. That is every campus except Carver, and that's because they don't start until first grade at Carver Center. And then tuitionbased, you know that we added Buoie and Scarbor tuitionbased preK last year. Um, and then of course preK at Midland College has that. We're going to be adding tuitionbased pre-k at Ben Malm International Academy, Fannon, Lonear Trails, and Rusk. That's been very popular and there's been a
035big interest from the community to have that. That is a break even. And so um that's something that we're going to be able to provide our um uh community. Sorry, I've had a cold. I don't always sound like this. Um much of our district leaders time since September has been spent on budget preparations. You all know that we've you've seen many reports and you'll get a full report tonight. Uh want to talk a little bit about the process that we've taken the philosophy that we've taken and then um you know working with you all. Uh we know that that money isn't coming back. Formula transition grant went away. We knew that in 2019 that it would go away last year and so um we started last year looking at ways that we could be more
036efficient and then we've worked on that since September. We've looked at every area recognizing that the work has to continue quality education improvements must be maintained and um while we anticipate some support from the current legislative session and I think Mr. Durham has about a 20-minut presentation on this coming up. Um, we know that's not enough to close the gap. So, we continue to work on that. You know, when we when we make decisions about positions that that we keep or positions that we absorb, um, those are not taken lightly and and we've allowed our leaders at the closest level to that work to make those decisions and to make that recommendation. And so what we did is ask them to look at all of the people they had, the programs that they're running, and
037how is that working? Because in some some cases um that may have been in place for 20 years, and it hasn't been reviewed and really looked at is that being effective. And so one of the things that that um happened and and that we saw, of course, 702% of our current budgets in payroll. And so we have to look at people, but we had 93 uh teaching positions that were allocated at the district level. So they're teachers, they go out and work with students, but they are officed at the district level under a department rather than under a campus. And so some of that works and makes sense. And some of that uh we found that while we were working through this process that we were staffing for those students at both the campus level
038and the district level. And so that's some of the decisions you've seen us make. Um, everyone on our team knows that the regardless of the positions that we have, we have to continue providing services for our students and we are committed to doing that. Um, and then I wanted to talk a little bit about through round one and two, we've reduced the budget by 19.7 million. uh which leaves us at about a 17 million deficit still at this point. Uh 14% of those positions have been at the coordinator uh level or above. So we really tried to look at administration first uh because many times that's an area that doesn't get looked at and then 4 and a.5% of those positions have been at the campus teacher level um through round two one and two.
039Uh the current state of where we are does not include step raises for teachers nor raises for other employees. Um I've actually had questions about why would we even be discussing teacher you know salary increases when we're also having to cut the budget. Um a couple of reasons. One uh depending on how the legislature approaches the basic aotment that will require um additional compensation for teachers which we certainly agree with. Um, but the other reason that if we can figure out a way to uh work that into this year's budget, we're going to ask people to do all the same work while we're looking at reductions of, you know, close to 230 40 employees. And so, everyone will be taking on a little more. And so, I think if that's something we can work in
040and and our team is working to figure out how we can do that. Um, so as we move into round three, and that's where we are right now, we're in the middle of secondary staffing. Uh, and staffing is one of those things that happens every year. So staffing is not necessarily tied to the reductions that we're having to make. Um, in some cases that may be the case, but in other cases, campuses enrollments fluctuate. Students at the secondary level, what courses they're signing up for, what programs are offered at each campus. And so all of that drives that. Um, we're also looking at stipen reviews. We've gone through a salary study and that's going to come to the board in May, a high level salary study review for you. And then we hope to bring
041the comp plan to the board. Um, I'd like to do that at a special meeting in early June just because we'll know a little bit more about what the legislature does and that's going to be really important with how we finalize the comp plan. And then we're looking at perfect attendance incentives in round two. uh those we didn't have for a couple of years and uh that was a an ask when I came back into the district because we had so many subs um or unfilled teacher or classrooms that we were having to cover. So what we're looking at and and working through right now is u keeping those for teachers and instructional pair of professionals. Um but that would be the only two groups that would keep those perfect attendance incentives. So trying to
042to make sure that we have people in the classroom every day and that um we're keeping those incentives tied to that. And then the retention incentives is part of round two that's currently in the budget, but we need to refine those numbers of course with um more up-to-date um staffing numbers. So that is all I have. I do want to hit on real quick on opportunity culture because that came up. Opportunity culture is a budgetneutral strategic staffing model. And so the way that works is let's say you have five teachers and you um reduce a teacher, a teacher leaves and and for some reason you can't fill that position or you want to go with that strategic staffing model to utilize a multiclassroom leader. Um a principal trades that position in to build out their
043opportunity culture team. So they may trade that position in for two other positions, a reach associate, um a apprentice, something like that. And so that is a budget neutral. We actually have budget hearings where each campus principal comes in and presents their opportunity culture plan and we're looking for that to cost the same amount of money. So that's all I have. I'm glad to answer any questions. I I just have one quick question on we talk about the transition formula grant funding but the esser funding also the loss of the esser funding has absolutely caused stressors on the district as well correct sir yes absolutely anybody else have any questions or comments thank you very much Dr. Howard, appreciate it and thanks for thanks. We're headed the right direction. So, thank you. Uh, next on
044the agenda item eight, the districtformational reports, a bond 2023 monthly report. This will be Mr. Smith. Thank you, President Hodes, members of the board, Dr. Howard. Uh we'll be bringing you the uh update on each bond package that we have out again at the back end of this presentation and and actually every uh bond update moving forward. We'll also be providing an update on the current tariffs that are uh hitting our country right now. So uh you do have your overall progress slide here in front of you updated uh current as of last week. Um package one, Lonear Trails construction is almost 70 uh 70% complete, still on track to open in the fall. Um our our steel erection is complete. Metal studs almost finished. Um expect that to be done by the end of
045this week. Uh same with the roofing. Our all of our air conditioners uh AC units will be delivered next week and our transformer installation is scheduled for the latter part of next week as well. Staffing is also uh fully underway uh with our HR department. Uh package two, the new high schools uh construction documents are 50% complete for both sites. We still are in in uh contact with the city and discussions with the city uh regarding Avalon and Thomasson and the widening of Wadley. So the developers agreement is still in in progress with us and like I said the city of Midland. Um interior design review was held back on March 5th and we're currently working through project cost estimates on both sides. Package three is our eight elementary school package. Uh these as we
046rec if you recall did not have secure vestibules. Uh scope to budget in the SD phase is almost complete 95% complete. Um and actually we'll be bringing to you tonight and asking for approval for a partial GMP or guaranteed max price um for this package to install fire suppression safety system um this summer. Really just to lock in early pricing um for for this package. package four um guard middle school and midland freshman renovations um construction documents will be completed by the end of next week um as best this abatement is scheduled for both sites uh for this summer portable relocation of course has been completed at Goddard and we're finalizing the construction schedule for for both sites package five is our standalone junior high package made up of Alamo we're halfway through the construction
047document phase uh this package here will also um wills also be uh asking for approval tonight to bathe the best uh at Alamo um this summer and a portion of this package is is already out out for bid. A small portion there. Package six is our safety and security package. We're are completely finished with the construction here. Um door access controls uh still have to be installed at a small portion of these schools. the the secure vestibules have been completed and the film uh intruder resistant film has been installed. The only thing that we're waiting here for 100% completion is uh FCC licensing to be completed on our radio repeaters. Package seven, the Midland Freshman site work. Um that project is complete. Uh by the end of this week, we should have all closeout documents
048reviewed and finalized, signed uh and and checked off so we can move on from this site uh this package. Package eight and nine. Um, package eight is our four elementary package. Scope to budget and schematic design is almost finished. We look to have that wrapped up by the end of next week. Um, we did have the pre-development meeting with the city a couple weeks ago back in March. It went really well. Um, no no major outliers, no permitting and things. We're all on the same page with what needs to be pulled. Um, a part of the four elementary school package 8 is under construction now. the Santaita drive, if you recall, we went out early um for that work and we're about eight weeks out to have that completed. And then our middle school renovation
049package made up of Sano and Abel um site surveys have have begun there. We're early in design and a portion of that project is also also out for bid. Um like I mentioned earlier, we did want to talk a little bit about the the tariffs that everyone uh is is on everyone's mind. Um there's for lack of a better term a lot of uncertainty right now uh regarding the tariffs. One thing that we are confident in is a probable 2% increase in steel and aluminum costs um across the board. Um the biggest question that we have right now is really will the contractors that do this work pass those costs on to the customer? The customer being being the school district. Um they really have two choices. they can absorb those costs um and and
050not make as much money and not make as much of a profit or they can pass those costs again on to the customer which will in turn uh increase construction costs. We don't know what's going to happen yet. We just don't. But if we look back historically um when when you saw these price increases in a short amount price increases in materials in a short amount of time like it in during COVID um during Katrina um the the contractors elected to not pass those costs on. Um so that's kind of that's that's what we have to go on for lack of a better term is what happened kind of in the past and again just some some uncertainty there. our construction economist. We had a call with them on with on on with them on
051Friday. Um they've got about 40 pages of research that they're combing through on a daily basis for us. Um Mr. Tennant could not be here tonight. Um but he will be available um moving forward uh uh to provide updates and like I said, we'll bring you this update each each and every month. Um I did also we do have a representative from Park Hill here. our program manager has been involved in these conversations, Mr. uh Dr. Finley, and he would like to add a couple uh points here on the back end of this for you. Mr. Hodges, Dr. Howard, board members, it's a pleasure for me to be here tonight to talk to you a little bit about this issue that Courtney has brought up. And I do know this has a concern of this
052board as well as many boards across the state and nation. Um, a couple things I hope to say tonight to put your mind somewhat at ease. Um, notwithstanding the main fact is the volatility that is involved in this issue. This is changing literally on an hourly basis. I'll give you an example. On Friday, iPhones were going to cost $3,000. Today, iPhones are the same price they were before this all started. So, these kind of changes are happening real time. Um, but I want to ensure the board that as your program manager, we are looking at every sort of mitigation strategy to do this. We begin by looking very closely at our construction cost estimates and we review that with our contingencies that we built into these projects already. A couple clarifying pieces I'd like to
053say. The 2% cost that Courtney mentioned, that is above our typical escalation that we see year after year in construction, particularly in the Per Basin. So, we have to add that on top of what we're seeing. Um, Courtney made in a couple other very good points. Um, one being that we have two historic models that we can look at which had a very big impact, dramatic impact on supply chain. I happened to be involved in both of those issues on the school district side and I knew exactly what that hap what looked like. Truth was there wasn't much cost that was pushed through to the contractor. There were delays and other issues that ended up costing money. We're not going to see that, but we want to watch very closely. Having this construction economist team
054on board is really critical to this process. Their whole job is to watch this every single day. So, I get an update every day. I got one today at three. And what that update told us today was there was some softening and some of the tariff talk. That is good news for us. Um, and then we're looking at other projects that are bidding right now, including projects that we're involved in in the Perian Basin where we've seen some really positive outcomes on bids fre recently, very recently as a matter of fact. And so we we want to assure you that we're looking at these things. Um, one thing I would like to point out and Courtney mentioned that um, you have an item on your the agenda tonight about approving a partial GMP. This in
055fact is one of our mitigation strategies is to define cost quickly and early to ensure we get prices locked in that that insulates us from changes that may be coming in the future. And so that's what you'll see tonight. We're looking at the same thing at the high schools. It's your biggest project by far. We have on the streets right now a 50% bid set and we're going to receive bids on that 50% bid set May 9th. We're going to comb through those to see what's happening in the cost as compared to our estimates and we hope to bring to you a partial GMP for the high schools soon after. That again is part of this mitigation strategy. We feel confident that we have the means to monitor this closely and what I will tell
056you I we will come back as many times as we have to to give you updates as we see these things changes. But do understand no one has a crystal ball for this and we don't know exactly what's going to happen. But also understand we are watching this every single day and we want to ensure that the costs come in on budget which is our goal and charge as your program manager and to do that we just need to be very effective in communicating this and figuring out ways that we can solve these problems in real time. Appreciate it. Board have questions. Dr. freeze. I have a series of questions for for many or several of you. Um Mr. Durham, you may have to answer some of them also. So, um I want to thank
057you all for come coming tonight. Um and especially as we kind of get going on the high school projects, I'd kind of like to discuss that and just to kind of not only keep us informed with what's going on, but I want the community to be on the same page as everyone. Um, so we understand that all these efforts demand an enormous amount of coordination. We appreciate what y'all are doing with the city and any anything that the board can do to help um try to bring the city along to um you know, we would like to be involved in that as much as you you'd like us to. So um we talked a little bit about tariffs. Um you know, there's lots of other uncertainties and so tonight I really want to kind of
058address uncertainties. Um to this point we've always heard we're on time. um you know, we're projected to finish on June 1st, 2028, 2029. Well, I kind of look at the baseball schedule and um it's a little bit comparable. Right now, the Padres's are on pace to win 133 games, but they're not that's not 100% certainty that they're going to do that. So, I kind of look at what you're on pace to do and what you may potentially be doing with any degrees of certainty as uh two different things. And I I I really want the board and y'all in the community to be kind of transparent where we're at on these uncertainties, especially when, you know, we talked about tariffs, we got supply chains, we got border policy, we got labor force availability, um fiscal
059and monetary policy, all kinds of variables, not just tariffs that uh can affect things one way or another. Um, so, um, here in Midland, you know, we we we look around and, you know, there's a road not too far away that's now on its third year of development and it was only supposed to last a few months and um, you know, it's it's probably the worst road I've ever gone down. It's bumpy and it's just it's terrible. So, I don't want us to do the same thing that this unnamed road that leads to the hospital is going to um you know that same fate. So, I I want us to be on top of it and and make sure that we're all you know we can we can the board can do its job in
060you know pushing for quality and timeliness. Um, so has your team experienced any local labor availability issues that could affect the timelines of our high schools? Is there anything that you're looking at right now? So very important critical point is the labor forces. Um, so we met uh Dr. Freeze for two full days in Dallas about three weeks ago with both Sears on the high schools and subcontractors to talk about these kind of issues that are coming. We knew that would be a case and when we budgeted these projects that labor because these projects are huge. I mean the mechanical system alone the subcontractors to do those are not locally found. So it's two things. You have a you have a labor shortage because you're so busy in the per basin. Then you have a
061project that's so big that it has to pull from other labor sources. What it comes down to is housing and how do we apply housing cost to our financial model. That's what we talked about. So we're looking at things right now where like we're identifying man camps. We're identifying potential agreements with other areas where laborers can come in and live at a cheaper while the while the project being completed. So we're looking at that detail by a trade by each trade. So we know the critical trades that are going to be impacted by this manpower issue and we are talking to those subcontractors. But um we have built that to some degree into our model. Again, this is it's it's hard to have a crystal ball on this. No, that's part of business is uncertainties.
062AB: Absolutely. But we we want to in our financial model, we want to we want to mitigate that uncertainty with things like contingencies and value engineering and alternates for projects that may not affect the overall project's charge and purpose, but could be used to to manipulate the cost when we get it to bring projects into budget. So, we're identifying all those things right now. And in this high school bid that's going out at 50% set, there's there's many alternates involved, up to 20. So we can look at these specific pieces and determine through full transparency with the district and with the board what options are available to get the project in budget. And what's really critical about this early set is is that we're going to get a eye we're going to get a feel
063for exactly those things that you just mentioned. And so and by doing it in this way which is the strength of the Seymar construction manager at risk procurement is if we see costs that don't make sense or that the subcontracting industry didn't we didn't get the competition we wanted to get good bids we will not take that subcontract and come back at a later date with another GMP and rebid it. So it gives us a lot of opportunities early to do that. It's it's a critical piece this early procurement and we believe that's maybe the key to getting our our arms and head around cost potential impacts. Okay. Um so what phases of the current timeline are most sensitive to delays just on what you're looking at now um with materials, labors, other factors? What
064what um right now part of the timeline? I don't see any that's really our timeline is not necessarily the issue Dr. Okay. We feel our schedules are healthy and we've been again working with the contractors to to establish a more specific more detailed scheduling. That has not been the big issue. The issue is the volatility of the construction that we're talking about tonight. Um and so if something was to come up that would be one of the first things we'd share with you is like this. Hey, drywall has gone off the rails and so now we can't get JIP board to come in. So we would come and say and this is what happened with us in Katrina is we had huge supply chain issues that affected and it was very very specific. I can
065remember clearly it was glass couldn't get windows in and so it was a huge impact. Those are the things we want to get ahead of early. Again, this is this early procurement process. Help us start to so um you know if if we do have uncertainty built in the system, is there any contingency? Let's say we do start to look at delays, would we prioritize academic facilities and classrooms and core facilities over some of our external buildings and fields? Is there a a contingency plan for that? That's actually our plan, Dr. Free. Okay. We're prioritizing things like the things that'll have the biggest impact on your students that must be done. Okay. Including safety and security as Courtney mentioned in package three. The reason we pushed that to the front was it was a campus
066and that was a safety concern. So, we wanted to hit those things first. So, we're prioritizing all student areas first and we've that's our plan all along. Okay. Well, yeah. I really like your presentation and, you know, as you come throughout, I just would really like um to keep, you know, any uncertainties that you can think of. Just like tonight, we talked quite a bit about tariffs. Please let us know if there's anything else we can do to um you know, lean on some people. Um if if if you know, we got people m giving us ridiculous prices. Um I think that's some something that the board can potentially help with. So, we we'd like to be involved as much as you you would like us to and could help. So, well, and I and
067I and I meant that when I said I really appreciate coming tonight. This is this is an important piece because you guys are hearing what we're hearing like I said at 3:00 today. This you you heard that and I think it's really important that you guys understand these challenges that we are all facing because it's not our project, it's your project. It's your kids' project. It's a community project. So, we want to make sure you understand the good and the bad and that's what we want to do. And so, it it is important for us to speak to these things very very honestly and very transparently like you said, Dr. Freeze. Okay. Thank you. Um, this one might be for Mr. Durham. I don't know. Uh, is there any way the board can get invoices
068and see some of what these margins are to make sure, you know, we're we're holding everyone accountable from a board perspective? I mean, how how are these things typically done? just we would like I would like to have as much information as we can um as this project goes along about who's getting paid what. There's a lot of questions in the community about this and I I think especially when we're looking at some of these margins, you know, we had the COVID situations where people, you know, not everybody was keeping prices down. I mean, there were people that were, you know, um, you know, inflating gas prices, you know, way too high and taking advantage of the situation. But I was just wondering if if there's any way that you can kind of keep an
069eye on some of this and and pass information along as it goes. Yes, sir. Absolutely. So, so what I do, um, I I have it on my calendar actually on Monday mornings is to review everything specifically regarding the construction projects on the actual basis. Um, and so what I can do is um see if see what we can do to better provide some of those um microlevel um details to y'all. Um, so rather than being able to actually look on our district's website under the bond financials, um, having a little more of that that micro and granular. Yeah, I would like to see that. A lot of people in the community want to know who's getting paid what in these deals. So, it's I think it's very important for transparency in in big government projects.
070So anyway, that's that's all I have. Say thank you all. If I could add one thing to what Tucker said, and this is an internal piece that we do on the on the program management side is that our construction economist why he's involved in the project is he's he looks at projects all over the state and gets real costs, not not estimates, actual cost of real projects and it's put into a big database. So we have what a typical tonnage of steel cost across the state of Texas. We compare those to the costs we get in and if there's if that piece is out of whack, Dr. Freeze, that's when we start talking to the subcontractors at that level and he does it for every single trade. That's one piece. The other piece and it
071was a decision that the board made which I applauded was having two seamars on the high schools. So what we have are two seamars working. So we have in essence we have two sears perspectives of cost and we have three other cost estimators involved the architect our construction our construction managers the seamars and our construction economist. So we're looking at this from again not guesswork. We're actually looking at projects including projects in the perian basin that are bidding now. We just bid a lot of work in Greenwood so we have those exact numbers and those numbers came in good. by the way and we just bid a project in Ector County. Small project but messy under budget. So there's some indication of some positive trending but we want to be very cautious on how we
072proceed. All right. Thank you. That's it. Anybody else? Booker Bishop Hernandez miss. I just I have one quick question I think for you Courtney and I think you kind of already hit over it but my question is about the row work for Wadley has I know that we own most of that property so we've got the row but do we know kind of a timeline on when we'll have all that buttoned up so we're think hoping by the end of this week uh I met with Mr. Edwards over that on Monday, as a matter of fact. So, we've gone back and forth with the city on redlining the developers agreement. Um, it's our goal to have that completed and wrapped up from both sides by this this Friday and an update for you at the
073next board meeting. Thank you very much. Nobody else. Okay, moving on to action item on district information report. 8 B financial and budget preparation for 2025 2026 update number three Mr. Durham. Good evening President Hajes, members of the board, and Superintendent Howard. This evening, the district brings the third budget preparation update for next fiscal year, which will be a reoccurring update until next year's budget is adopted in June. Annually, the board of trustees is required to adopt the budget prior to July 1st for three funds. The general fund, the child nutrition fund, and the debt service fund, which services our outstanding debt payments. Each fund must be adopted at the functional level, which helps categorize the purpose of all transactions. If a board does not adopt a budget prior to the beginning of the fiscal
074year, the district is not legally able to spend any funds until the board adopts a budget, including payroll. Once a district has adopted their annual budget, a board is then required to set a tax rate in order to sustain the budget prior to September 30th. For the 2526 fiscal year, the district has outlined three main budget priorities. The first priority is to adopt a sustainable budget. The second priority is to provide salary increases across the board for all district personnel. And the f third priority is to develop a budget based on board goals that are data driven and in line with the strategic plan and comprehensive assessment. Building a sustainable budget is the largest priority due to the expiration of the formula transition grant. However, the board has earmarked approximately $55.8 million in fund balance
075to help the district transition away from the funding provided by the formula transition grant. I've highlighted a few critical dates of upcoming events that are outlined in the board budget calendar. At the end of the month, the district will receive preliminary values for tax year 2025 from the chief appraiser. This is important as it will indicate what property values will look like once certified in July. We'll discuss the preliminary values in May after we receive them and look at historical comparisons between the April preliminary values and the certified values. The administration will bring the compensation study to review at the May board meeting and plan to also recommend the 202526 compensation plan at a special board meeting board meeting in June. Once we get closer to finalizing the compensation plan will include updates through weekly
076board updates. And last but not least, June is the budget adoption month, which will require public notice of a public hearing to discuss the proposed budget and tax rate recommendation and approval of the 2024 uh 25 um amendments and the approval of the budget. Shown are the major factors influencing the budgeting process on an annual basis with some years having more influence than others, especially during legislative years. A few key areas going into the 2526 fiscal year are legislative changes enacted during the 89th legislative session, enrollment and attendance rate, federal funding, and inflation. Funding for Texas school districts is based on property taxes known as local revenue and state aid. A few items going into property taxes include the appraisal district determining what values are, the two tax rates comprised of maintenance and operations, better
077known as M, and interest in syncing, better known as INS. The M rate contains the maximum compression rate determined by TEA on an annual basis. This rate plus any enrichment pennies added together give you your overall M tax rate, which cannot be exceeded unless you have voter approval. And lastly, MISD offers a 10% optional homestead exemption. Moving to state aid, values are determined by the comproller, which then compares the values certified by the chief appraiser in order to determine whether local values are within the 5% margin of error before getting assigned state values. If a school district is assigned state values, the district will lose out on revenue. State aid is also included by enrollment, the average daily attendance, special populations, enrichment pennies, local tax efforts, and property wealth, um, known as recapture. And as
078previously mentioned, the basic aotment has stayed the same since 2019 and has not been adjusted for inflation since then. The state's funding formula is structured around equity and ensuring all school districts receive relatively the same funding, whether they are property wealthy or not. This slide summarizes on a high level how school funding works. This graph illustrates how property values directly impact school funding. You'll note in step one of the graph to the left, the column indicates a school district's overall entitlement. Step two shows the local property taxes make up the first portion of the district's overall entitlement. If a district's property tax efforts are not sufficient, the state will make up the difference to ensure the district has the total calculated entitlement based off student characteristics. Shown in the graph to the right illustrates what
079happens if a district is property wealthy and has more than sufficient tax collections to make up their entitlement. The amount of funds over the district entitlement is recaptured by the state and redistributed to property poor districts. This is another example of how a district's overall entitlement is calculated and whether the state provides a share or the district is required to have a portion of their tax collections recaptured. This slide is forformational purposes only and is not advocating for any changes. School districts are allowed to adopt up to a 20% local optional homestead exemption on property values. The district is fortunate to be able to offer our constituents this additional 10% exemption on their property taxes. MISD is one of 198 school districts across the state that currently offers the additional local optional homestead exemption to
080their constituents, which is approximately 19.5% of school districts that offer the exemption. This additional exemption has an estimated loss of 2.7 million and shown is the breakdown between the M and INS portion. This graph illustrates the student student growth attendance rate fluctuations and average daily attendance over the past decade. As school as shown in the graph, enrollment has continued to trend upward along with ADA and the district is still continuing to address our attendance rate across the district. You'll notice the actual enrollment as of April 11th on the right hand side of the graph is slightly lower than the projected enrollment that was used to build the current 2425 fiscal year budget. The total enrollment is assumed to continue trending upward and projects the district will have a total enrollment of 32,843 students during the
081203435 school year based on the fall 2024 demographic study completed by Zonda. The district will continue monitoring these numbers moving forward to ensure our assumptions are in line with the actual enrollment. Over the past decade, the district's property values have increased at an average rate of 11.7%. School funding is largely impacted by property values, and increased values can help MISD pay down debt quicker, resulting in future savings for all taxpayers. While no one has a crystal ball to predict the future based on historical data, current trends and assumptions made for the future, the economy is expected to remain healthy. School districts have two separate tax rates. The maintenance and operations and the interest in sinking. The M rate is for daily operations like salaries, utilities, and supplies, while the INS tax rate is to pay
082back voter approved debt. INS funds can only be used to address outstanding voter approved debt and cannot be used for other expenses. This graph illustrates the district's historical tax rates by separating the M tax rate in blue and the INS tax rate by red. You'll notice over the past seven years, the district's total tax rate has steadily decreased, largely contributed to the statemandated mandated tax rate compressions. Shown is the district's M tax collections represented by the blue columns compared to the amount of tax collections sent back to the state indicated by the red line. The graph became the district became a property wealthy district starting with the 2013 2014 fiscal year and has since been subject to distributing funds back to the state annually through recapture. Based on the previous amounts paid and the estimated
083amount for the current fiscal year, the district anticipates having paid the state right at $1 billion since 2013. Shown are a few of the state aotments compared to actual expenses for last fiscal year. Districts receive additional funding for high-cost programs based on the number of participating students. For example, the district receives additional funds to address higher cost programs such as special education, transportation programs along with addressing safety and security needs and requirements. Based on these aotments, some have required spending um amounts. The special education is one that has a 55% spending requirement be spent directly on the program. As shown with each of these programs, the cost of them are slightly to significantly higher than the funds we received from the state. Specifically, we spent 636% of the safety and security aotment and 727% of
084the transportation aotment last year. While there is pending legislation to help increase funding specifically for safety and security, if passed as is, would still result in a grossly underfunded state mandate of having one armed security guard located at each instructional facility. This graph illustrates the district's fund balance over the past eight years and estimates the current year fisc the current fiscal year um fund balance. Blue indicates total fund balance for the district while the red column indicates MISD fund balance which excludes partnerships that have um fund balance in a restricted account. Note that 2019 2020 was the first year of the formula transition grant that that continued through the 2023 24 fiscal year. You'll notice an increase in fund balance for those years and an estimated decrease for the current fiscal year due to the
085expiration of the additional funds provided by the state. Currently, the district's overall fund balance is made up of 47% of unassigned, 24% specifically for the transition away from the formula transition grant, 9% for equipment capital expenses, 15% for construction, and 4% for partnership schools, while the remainder is made up of self- insurance and non-spendables for inventories and prepaid items. Based on the end of year projections for 2425 using the ending fund balance from last year and excluding 1882 partnerships, the district is anticipating to have 6.2 months of operating expenditures including recapture and approximately eight months of operating expenditures excluding recapture. In 2019, the state revamped school finance. One priority was to ensure all districts received at least a 3% increase and per student funding based on new formulas and implemented a hold harmless provision for
086the districts who did not receive up to a 3% funding increase. The formula transition grant was the hold harmless that was implemented with a 5-year life in 2019 and expired at the end of the 2023 24 school year. The district has been preparing for the fiscal cliff by building up fund balance and earmarking $55.8 $8 million specifically for the transition away from the funding. The district absorbed a number of positions at the end of the 2023 24 fiscal year through attrition and preparation for budget efficiencies. In September of this year, the district started working on the 202526 budget and has been diligently working through efficiencies through round two since then. The strategy of the district has been to work through budget efficiencies throughout the year and utilize earmarked funds in fund balance to help gradually
087transition the district back to balanced budget. This graph indicates the total state and local maintenance and operations revenue per ADA based on the state's school funding system. You'll notice in 2019 2020 school year a large increase in the revenue per ADA. This was mainly due to the 86th legislative session where the formula transition grant was created to ensure all districts across the state received at least a 3% increase in per student funding. Unfortunately, the legislators did not elect to extend the formula transition grant during the 87th legislative session, though they had a historical surplus on hand. This has resulted in the district's revenue per ADA decreasing by around 1,600 starting with the current 24-25 school year, which brings us to revenue per ADA levels close to the 2018 2019 school year. This year, our revenue
088per ADA decreased by approximately 11.66%. Shown is the projections for the current 2425 fiscal year. A few main factors affecting the bottom line is an ADA projection of 26,568 students, an attendance rate of 93%, 313 revenue, higher interest rates towards the beginning of the fiscal year, and utilizing reach network remaining fund balance to address operational costs of the Bunch and Gddard campuses. Before we discuss the numbers, I want to clarify what each of the different colors represents. The top four rows indicates the estimated amount of fund balance that will be used for the current fiscal year. The colors in the first four rows shows the amount of funds that will be reduced from the previous year's audited fund balance. By reducing the previous year's fund balance in each category by the amount reflected in the
089top four rows leaves you with the estimated remaining fund balance in the rows following. The colors help represent the rows that are tied to each other. For example, the use of the remaining reach network fund balance specifically for Bunch and Gddard will reduce the restricted Senate Bill 1882 fund balance to 627,000 at the end of the fiscal year. Moving into the numbers, the district is currently anticipating ending the fiscal year with a projected deficit of approximately $31 million. Out of the $31 million deficit, 7.3 will be used from the available funds from the reach network. 1.2 2 from rolled over purchases from last year, 10.3 in a rotation and onetime expenses and the remaining 12.3 will be used from the earmarked funds to address the transition away from the formula transition grant. We're projecting to
090have approximately $197 million remaining in assigned and unassigned fund balance at the end of the year. After excluding the partnerships, the district anticipates having approximately 6.2 2 months of operating expenditures including recapture and eight months of operating expenditures excluding recapture based on the current year's estimates. All school districts have fixed and required costs that must be addressed in annual budget and some of the largest ones are indicated on this slide with payroll being the largest of them. Shown is the projections for next year's 2526 fiscal year as of April 11th and does not include round three efficiencies. A few main factors affecting the bottom line is an ADA projection of 27,13 students and attendance rate of 93% and falling interest rates. The additional royalty revenue from the pending mineral lease and the sale of real
091property are not currently taken into account. Based on current law and projections, the district is working with an estimated $17 million deficit that we will continue addressing in order to reach a balanced budget for next fiscal year. This projection takes into account budgeted efficiencies made through round two, which prelim primarily consisted of positions at the district level and federally funded positions previously paid out of ESER funds. This does not consider any compensation increases, including step increases for those on the teacher pay scale. Based on this information, the district would have approximately five and a half months with recapture remaining in fund balance and seven months of fund balance without recapture remaining. If the district were to keep running a $17 million deficit, we would become insolvent in approximately 11.5 years if everything else remained constant.
092While the district's current attendance rate projection for next year is 93%, we'll continue to monitor current year attendance and make adjustments as deemed necessary. This slide represents each six weeks attendance rate for the past eight years, including the current school year. The column on the right, the far right hand side, indicates the school year's final attendance rate for each of the respective years based on attendance that qualifies for funding. You'll notice prior to the pandemic, the average attendance rate was 94.25%. However, since then, the average has been approximately 91.9% but is continuing to slightly trend upward. These numbers exclude years 2020 and 2021 due to hold harmless provisions enacted by the state, which skew the data if included. During the budgeting process, the district's budgets for ADA that is eligible for funding and then reviews
093trends in all special programs separately of each other. In a recent finance committee meeting held at the beginning of March, I was asked about why the district is budgeting for a 93% attendance rate when our attendance rate appears to be historically around 88%. The historical average for the attendance rate is referring to a calculation by taking the overall enrollment and final ADA which includes students who do not qualify for funding. The 93% attendance rate the district is currently utilizing is based on historical trends and only for eligible funds funded students. Through round two, the district has had approximately 22 million in budget efficiencies throughout all funds, which includes federal funds. When looking directly at the general fund budget, the district has approximately 19.8 million in budget efficiencies. The 19.8 million is included in the above
09422 million number, but wanted to show it separately since the general fund is the one being affected with the deficit due to the formula transition grant. During legislative years, an extensive amount of bills are filed towards the beginning of the session, and the deadline this year was March 14th. From November 12th through March 14th, 8,800 almost 8,900 bills were filed. One of the emergency items Governor Abbott declared was property tax relief. A couple of high-profile financial bills are Senate Bill 4, which addresses additional homestead exemptions to increase from 100,000 to 140,000. If passed, this would require a constitutional amendment resulting in an election being held to determine whether voters across the state approve of the amendment. Another bill filed is House Bill 2, which increases the basic aotment, which would have required spending attached to
095the increase in revenue along with implementing additional allotments. Senate bill two regarding education education saving accounts and house bill 2 are expected to be considered in the house tomorrow where changes to the bills to the current bills will likely take place. We'll continue to monitor all bills. However, the district will recommend passing a budget in June based on the current law at that time. Looking ahead, the administration is currently reviewing all requested budgets for next year and will continue reviewing federal funds and seeking alternative funding opportunities when possible. In May, the administration will bring the compensation study for review and will recommend approval of the 2526 compensation plan at a special board meeting in June. In June, we'll also have a public hearing to discuss the proposed budget and tax rate and recommend the approval
096of the budget thereafter. Then in September, the district will recommend the approval of a tax rate for tax year 2025, which will support the 202526 fiscal year budget. Lastly, the district started a compensation plan study in the fall that will be finalized in May. While going through the process, the district is looking at making efficiency adjustments as needed to address paygrades, number of days for positions, and stipens. And that concludes my presentation. Well, before I ask, if anyone has any questions, I'm going to be selfish. Dr. Howard, Mr. Durham, y'all's team, that is by far the best presentation. It got all the highlights. It got a lot of the questions that we've talked about in our finance meetings. Thank y'all for busting y'all's tail. It's informative. It goes out to the community. It talks about
097all the pieces of it. I I am going to give you a round of applause for doing that. Like seriously, that is a lot of work and excellent. Like thank you all so much on it. Now with that said, I'm going to add here's my butt. The reason that this board is concerned for a lot of reasons with the stability, the sustainability of our financial situation that the previous board has done a great job in building a fund balance right through a lot of different circumstances is I would like to see along with some other board members that we've we've discussed it everybody knows about it. We've talked about it in the finance meeting is we would just like to see what it's going to look like the projections on bringing a million square feet
098online to see how that that insolveny adjusts, right? Because we just that's why we're being so protective of as of right now and next year we're looking good. the year after we're looking good. But when you're bringing a million square feet online with the four million that we have with all the additional positions and all the things that goes with it, all of a sudden we can start eating up into our fund balance and we can reduce that solvency safety factor pretty quickly. But I cannot tell you, Dr. Howard, I'm sincere. Like, thank y'all. That was an excellent presentation. That just tells you where I'm at in my life where I get so excited over a financial presentation like that. But thank y'all very much. Any board members have any questions, comments? Yes, sir. I
099do, Mr. Hodgees. Mr. Bishop, a couple questions or several questions I have is uh as you mentioned, the previous board had set uh set aside some money because of we knew that the formally transition grant uh was going away. But a question to Mr. Uh, Mr. Tucker, is wasn't there from a board designation, wasn't there $35 million that was assigned to construction that that uh also sits in the fund balance? Uh, there is currently $35 million sitting in a assigned construction fund balance. Yes, sir. Okay. And there and there also another $20 million that is sitting in the assigned uh in the assigned as well as far as board designation. Uh, yes, sir. there is approximately or right at $20 million sitting in an assigned fund balance specifically for equipment. However, we will be utilizing
100approximately um I believe it was $10.2 million um of that fund balance this year um to show where the rotation and one-time expenses for capital projects um will be coming out of. And I can me go back to that slide. What? Yeah. Wasn't that you put it in a presentation or an email to move it? we had to approve of. Was that one of the transfers or no? Uh no no sir that was not that that was so whenever we adopted the budget um for the current 2425 fiscal year back in June um one item that I wanted to ensure that I was tracking internally is making sure that we were showing where the deficits were on the appropriate fund balances. And so you can see on this slide right here, the third um row
101from the top, rotation onetime expenses of right at $10.3 million in green, that is going to be deducted from our current fiscal year fund balance as of uh 6 2024. And so that brings our assigned equipment capital expenses down to approximately $9.6 million. Okay. Uh a couple other questions. Uh, another one is we have the $55 plus million dollars that we also have in fund balance that the previous board had set aside for the uh for the the formally transition grant going away. Uh, so my question is, and I'd asked for it to be put on the agenda for the whole board to discuss versus three or four people making a decision, is that I wanted the whole board to be able to talk about when I had sent an email asking that we pause
102on the reductions because I think if we took some of the money and paid toward or paid the deficit, then that would give Dr. Howard and her team that a lot of time point of order. It's not Germaine. It's not Germaine. Point of order. It's still talking about the money as far as on the board. Okay. But but so continue. Okay. So the next one is is showing we having a growth uh we having a growth of students and then we're doing a reduction as far as in in the amount of teachers that we have. Is that a fair statement? So what we're doing is we are updating our our um studenttoteer um ratio. Um however, whenever you that's something that is addressed on an annual basis um based off the overall district that does
103not have anything to to relatively um tie back to budget efficiencies. Um it's just one of those operational items. Um I can also mention that our neighbor also has a a 30 to1 um student ratio um for their for their um primary campuses and we are nowhere close to that. I believe um this upcoming year um it will be 22 to1 and 24 to1 respectively. Yeah, I I actually have that in front of me. Our our neighbors did go to 30 to1 K5 this year um to deal with their budget deficit. Uh we were at K2 we were 22 to1 this current year um in looking at reductions that we need to make. We went to 24 to1 for K2 next year. uh third to fourth third and fourth grade was at 24 to one.
104We bumped that to 26 to one. Now, what I think's important is that doesn't mean you're going to walk in and see 26 kids in every single classroom. Some are going to be a little less because it the math doesn't equate exactly right. So, um you know, if you have two extra students, you don't add a whole another section of of class. Um from an efficiency standpoint, fifth is in sixth grade, we're at 28 to1. This year we stayed the same for the coming year. Uh secondary is a little different. While we can set a number um it's really driven by course selection. So when students decide what courses they want to take uh we look at those numbers uh looking at around a 30 to1 in that area. Of course once we assign FTEES
105to a campus and we give them their allocation. It's up to that campus principal to decide if they want to keep certain class sizes smaller. For example, they could bump up their elective class sizes so they can keep algebra one small, English one small, uh things like that at elementary. If they have a grade level that data is showing they need to try to do something different, they have the opportunity to do that. And then also class size is impacted by opportunity culture. So when you um utilize that strategic staffing model, the whole premise behind that is to have a highly effective teacher impacting more students. So you want more students in front of that highly effective teacher u from a strategic staffing model. Yes. In closing uh on this particular topic, I would going
106like to going forward in the future that all seven duly elected board members be involved in the process when it comes to talking about budget. I appreciate again point of order. It's not germaine the seven board members. We can't be a walking quorum. That's what we have the public meeting for now. I appreciate it. So, uh, we're in a public meeting right now, right? We're doing it right now. That's where we're supposed to do it. So, that's where we're talking. So, clapping him down then, please. Any Do you have anything else? But I think Mr. Freeze had his hand at first. Um, I I I kind of would I this is just a quick point before you go, but um I kind of really do think it would be nice to I mean, this we're
107looking three years out, but have some kind of projection on what kind of costs we're looking at. I mean, granted, we won't have to maintain Midland High anymore, the old Midland High, but you know, our two new ones. And then again, I'm going to probably send out a word to Park Hill and just say that interior design is coming up and I would really like, you know, y'all y'all to be completely aware of, you know, what the financial challenges that we're having. I'd like as high quality and as durable materials as we can have and then interior design that we can maintain for a budget and won't have to replace um just for all these financial concerns going forward. So that's very very important uh I think for us. So well that's Can I speak
108to that? So one of the things we're looking at in both of the high school designs and of course at Lonear Trails as well is in all the commons areas, hallways, hightra areas, terazzo flooring. Terzo flooring, you know, if you walk into the original Midland High School that was built in the 20s, that Terzo flooring is still there. That has never had to be replaced. And so while that costs more upfront, it is it saves money down the road because you just strip that and wax it and you don't have to replace it um 20 times over the course of 80 years. Um so that's one. And then I think as we start to project our cost and we we've worked on that, you know, when we think about bringing Lonear Trails on, uh we
109need to put pen to paper because we're going to be running fewer buses. So that's going to save some money in transportation. the boundary changes that we've made the last couple of years are starting to get students closer to home. So, that's going to start to save money. Some of that's harder to to project out than others. Uh but that's one of the phases. And then, of course, grade reconfiguration is going to um going to impact that. Uh when we open our ninth grade, our high schools 9 through 12. um having been a high school principal, when we bring those ninth graders on campus, it doesn't mean every single person from the freshman school has to move because you're we're going to gain some efficiencies from having everyone at the same place. And so a
110perfect example is you have one principal now for that those two. Um you don't typically have there's certain areas where of course you have to have more people, but um it's not one for one. And then of course, you know, to Dr. Freez's point. Um, I know I need to look at the amount of money we spend trying to maintain Medlin High because something's always going out over there and we're trying to keep it up and running without putting too much money into it over the next three years. But I see us being able to phase some of that out so that we can start to provide updates on on what we see as potential cost savings as well as potential increases. Is that Dr. Freeze? Miss Fson. Yes. So, um I would like to
111see us uh we've gone through round one and round two cuts and um those have been pretty deep. The next cuts are going to affect the classroom directly and the children which were who are our constituents actually are the students. we've saved for this time and we have money to pause and re-evaluate throughout the year next year to see where we can cut more before devastating classrooms next year. And I just think that it's um time for us as a board to stop and think instead of just going to a zero bud balance budget. It's no feather in my cap to have a zero balance budget if it's going to devastate the classroom. Um, the next cuts are on the backs of our employees and we need to think about that as as a board.
112Our employees have bought into Dr. Howard's uh plan for success. The train's moving. The momentum's there to move to move this district in a positive direction. We've already moved positively last year with with her one year of scores. And um I do believe that this year we're going to see more momentum in our in our schools with changes. And this is um I think that we just have to stop, pause, and not cut anymore this year when we have the we're at a $17 million deficit. We've we saved 55 million. And I think that we can say stop. I I appreciate that. Now, next month, the the agenda item will be put on for next month, but we don't have that on the agenda item for discussion now. Nor it's it's policy of MISD that
113we have to follow a budget that the former boards have put into place. And as a board, we don't have the policy put in place here locally that allows us to even have those insights. That is an operational decision principles below on for Dr. Howard to make. We can have the discussion next month and we will have it on the agenda. But this has to do with changing policy. We can't just that's one of the struggles I think that we've this district has had is we just come up on the whim and it has to be policy driven and the policies have to be based on principle and not personalities. So we can have those discussions and we will have it on the agenda next month. But the pol there is currently and I believe
114Dr. Howard or Mike Leiser is here. our attorney's not here, but I think that those policies have gone out to the full board. I I believe on our fiscal policies. And so, again, it's not something it's not I'm not disagreeing or arguing with you about it, but I'm saying we have to put it in the form of a policy. We just can't agree to it. We have to have a policy. That's fine. But cuts are probably going to take place before the May meeting, I would I would assume. And um so maybe you call a special meeting, but also and we can and we can we can discuss that. And who and who has said that it's got to be a zero balance budget? We've based it on the policy. The policy went out to
115the whole board and it's spec it's pretty specific on staying within a a not having a deficit budget for the financial uh safety of the district. The policy is available. I believe you received it. So, but we can have this discussion and we can have a discussion uh you know later on by email and come up with a special meeting to talk about changing the policy but it's again it's policy. So if would you Dr. I think you know from our perspective and I appreciate you commending Mr. Durham on his work because he has worked very hard on this but it's also the entire cabinet and quite frankly at the entire district's been working on this. Um we have the May board meeting which is May 20th I believe. At that point we'll have to
116have some real clear direction because what we have been working on is what we cannot run the risk of is not getting to a balanced budget and then the budget not being approved. We can't run the risk of that because that's going to put the whole district in jeopardy. And so all I ask is that we get that clear clarification, clear direction by about that May 20th board meeting because what I don't want to do is bring you a budget at the end of June and we're in here trying to figure out how to cut 2 million out in the middle of a meeting and and run the risk of not being able to get a a budget approved. So we're um pressing on as we need to. Uh round two cuts, like I said
117earlier, are and when I say cuts, topics of secondary staffing is one of them. We're going through that right now. Uh we're looking at stipens. We're not looking at cutting all stipens by any means. We're looking at stipens. Uh that that in some cases when the team started looking at what is this stipen for, who gets it, um there was a lot of questions about that. And so we're looking at those stipens that um that make sense to go away. Uh we're also looking at tightening up parameters for if a teacher gets a stipen. For example, we have a $2,000 stipend if you're a secondary math teacher. Well, it hasn't been real clear over the years. Is that secondary is that stipened if you teach one section of math or all day of math? And
118so we're going to clear up some of that so that we're more consistent in how we apply those stipens. Um and then of course, you know, the additional things that we're working through. I think by miday, knock on wood, hopefully we have a little more indication of what the legislaturator is going to do. That'll help us firm it up. But I feel like May 20th is going to kind of be that point in time where we really have to have some good clear direction because we have to publish, I believe, by June 10th, 14th, I believe, something around there. Um, and once we make that publication, then that is the budget that we bring to the board. I I don't see I don't see those deadlines being a problem to make sure we hit those.
119And it might help with clarity and maybe calm the seas a little bit if the district will send out the policies from MISD that have been approved from the previous boards that specifically state this board is not responsible for making personnel cuts on principles and blow and send out that policy that's readily available on the website too that talks about us not running a severe deficit budget as well because I agree with you Miss Burlson that the the object is not to cause fear and chaos, but we there is a policy and we have to deal with it on the policy and that's probably what has got us in to some situations that we're trying to dig out of by not following these policies. And Mr. Bishop, Mr. Bishop, I appreciate your concern on the
120finances as well too and being on the previous board and y'all working to have a fund balance and we want to continue that. And so this again is based on policy that was set in place by previous boards, not this board. So, but Dr. If we could send out some of that communication that might help cool the the seas as well. I think I think we've been very clear with our employees about the process that we've gone through. I don't feel like that is an issue, but we can certainly make those policies available. Um, and like I say, we've tried to make those decisions closest to the the positions, uh, the people who know the programs the best. I do believe it's I appreciate that very much. Yes, ma'am. I do believe it's not that
121they are the ones making the cuts. You are right. But it is our responsibility up here on the board to um, be cognizant of the cuts that we have charged the superintendent with making by the budget. And I just want to say that when you properly and staff and support your teachers, the the people that win are the kids. Thank you, Miss Burlson. I totally agree with you and that's why we probably need to look at this policy as a board. Dr. Fre, sorry. Sorry, Miss Burlson. Go ahead. Sorry. Um I think that if some if we had had more um I know that you talked about that you had talked about on the finance committee. I don't even who which you and who else are on the finance committee? Well, there's two board members
122on every committee that way. That way it leaves open a third place so anybody can rotate because previously they were all full and so they were appointed. So we I I didn't like that. I think that board members should be able to attend any committee meeting they want. That's why we put just only put two board members at any meeting. And I believe that we talked about that in the policy meeting with Robert Sado and who else? Dr. Freeze was in that and so that's been pretty widely known. Who's been attending the finance committees and uh me and Josh have been attending. I you'd have to I think yeah I think do I don't know they send out if you check your emails they send out I think you send out the attendance on there
123right who attended I can't remember who sends out the attendance um I don't believe there's that we communicated the part about like with policy we offered it up to a third person uh but I think the policy committee was the first one we did that so we can well I think well then that was a miscommunication or lost in translation because I think when we first got on the board at that first meeting when we set set up the committees. We specifically said we're going to put two on every committee so there can be a revolving one. Correct. Right. So, we just need to communicate it out to everyone. We need to know when the committee meetings are then. Yeah, I think those go out. But again, it's a third member. That's we did it
124specifically so somebody could rove because I was not part of the committee. So, I wanted to make sure everybody had an equal opportunity to attend those and Mr. Bishop was just at our policy meeting the other day as the third because an email was sent out inviting. Other than that, that's the first time I've been invited. Well, again, we apologize and we'll make sure that the district communicates that. Mr. Bishop, we'll get the committee meetings out that are coming up. Dr. Freeze, I I got a quick question um just kind of for the financial ratings or whatever and law. um our what is our we talked about it maybe at the finance meeting that I went to um but what is the multiplier as far as months of cash on hand or fund balance that
125various agencies recommend or demand from us? Could you all speak to that Dr. Howard I think or Mr. Durham? The policy that the board has in place right now says three months. Um the state requires recommends three months. I would suggest as a a district in an oil and gas industry that we would not want to go below six months. That would be a a comfort level. I would not be comfortable going under um having been in multiple oil and gas heavy uh districts. Uh but policy says three months and one clarification. So to clarify, we're at 6.2 right now though. So So you know six and 6.2 are very close. What does the 2 equate to? Do you know that? I do not know that off the top of my head. No. And and
126one uh one item of reference on that is that 6.2 is including the recapture amount. However, it's right at eight um excluding the recapture. The reasoning why I like to um provide both of them is because in my opinion the recapture is a requirement and an obligation of the district that must be taken off the top. And that is solely driven based off tax collections. And so in one year if tax collections decrease then your overall recapture obligation also decreases with that which then fluctuates that amount and um by taking that out you get more of a applesto apples comparison. Um also one other clarification that I'll provide is um the debt service um requires 20% of the following year's um debt obligations be in fund balance. That's in policy. And so you're saying that
127the 6.2 two includes recapture. However, recapture is also built in the budget, but you like to do it that way in case recapture goes up significantly one year. That that is correct. That is correct. Anybody else? So, there any about any bond ratings or is our first rating that does this does this affect it in any way the numbers? I mean, we had really good ratings just recently. So, I just I would like to know how the fund balance andor our deficit affects that. Yes, sir. No, absolutely. So, um the the way it's written in the law is that it's it's left up to the commissioner of education to actually determine how the calculation um is is calculated. Um the way that the current first rating calculation is is it does a comparison um I
128believe of uh within three years and it makes sure that you don't have I believe it's a 20 to 25% decrease in fund balance and or you have at least 75 days of cash on hand. And so it's a it's a andor question. Um, I actually ran the calculations um based off the the assumptions of this year's um deficit along with potentially next year's deficit. Um, and and um we are still more than um capable of receiving the first rating and not getting negatively impacted by passing a deficit budget. Anyone else? Are you sure, Dr. Freeze? Nothing. Mr. Bishop, Mr. Booker, Mr. Hernandez. Moving on to agenda item 8C, strate uh strategic plan oversight committee, SBOC quarterly update. As Miss Pals is coming up, we've shifted this presentation a little bit because you've now seen
129a number of these. I think we're on six or so and we'll do that every quarter. uh but starting to shift that so we're not so repetitive in in telling you what we've been doing but starting to show you some metrics that are tied to that. Good evening President Hodgees, Dr. Howard, and members of the board. My name is Cindy Piles and I'm here tonight to provide the quarterly update regarding the strategic plan committee's work for 2425. Where do I push down? Got it. Sorry about that. To review, MISD remains in the monitoring, governance, and communications phase regarding our strategic plan, and we are in year two of this strategic plan with its three pillars, student experience, grow and develop staff, and engage and act. Tonight I will provide updates from each strategic pillar. One
130from student experience, two from grow and develop staff, and one from engage and act. As of today, Spock has reviewed and provided feedback on 22 of the total 28 initiatives this school year. To begin from the student experience pillar, goal two initiative three aims to foster a cohesive and engaging learning environment through curriculum alignment consistent across all grade levels and promote teacher collaboration to develop cross-curricular projects which deepen students interconnected understanding. This initiative is owned by Dr. Amanda Meltchure, executive director of secondary teaching and learning to enhance the student experience. work continues through teacher development and providing new and engaging opportunities for our students such as Lego robotics, UIL academics, and a STEM plus M biomed pathway. Next year, we will add third grade LEGO robotics. This will provide third through sixth graders an integrated
131experience in tier 1 math and science, allowing students access to the STEM experience, which also will lead to an increased interest in competitive robotics. We're excited to report that competitive robotics teams from Abel, Buoie, and Fannon advanced to state this year. Next year, we're also adding a seventh grade neuroscience at all four junior high schools. Nearly 100 sixth graders have enrolled in this elective, which is the first course in a STEM plus M biomed pathway made possible because of a partnership with Baylor College of Medicine. As you can see on this slide, bringing back a robust UIL academics focus this year led to several campuses earning distinctions at both UIL A+ academics for grades 2 through 8 and UIL academics in grade 9 through 12. We plan to capitalize on these successes next year by
132increasing participation in both UIL A+ academics and UIL academics. Next, I'll present an update from our grow and develop staff pillar. These two initiatives are from goal five, recruit and onboard highly effective staff. Initiative 51 concentrates on elevating our retention and recruitment tactics. This initiative is owned by Miss Emily Vogler, director of human resources. Initiative 53 focuses on implementation of a consistent and clear onboarding process for new hires. 53 is owned by Mr. Adam Portillo, director of human ser human services. Recruitment and retention are vital to our success and growth. By supporting potential candidates on application completion and new hires with onboarding, the human capital team has made significant strides. However, once we have the right people in the right seats, we must continue to provide ongoing support and job training to build capacity and
133increase retention. By March 31st of last year, the district had received 109 resignations compared to this year's 89. These numbers include certified, non-certified, and professional contract employees. And lastly, initiative 10.2 comes from the engage and acts pillar of our strategic plan, goal five, which works to empower parents to play an active role in their child's educational journey. This initiative increases family involvement by ensuring parents and guardians feel empowered to support their students educational journey through tracking their progress and facilitating communication. This initiative is owned by Mr. Adrienne Garcia, director of student information systems. Online Skyward student enrollment for the 2526 school year opened on April 1st. This year's Skyward online registration forms are more userfriendly and mobile friendly. SIS will also launch a Skyward parent survey to gather feedback on our updated registration forms. This
134feedback will be invaluable in determining how we can continue to improve the enrollment experience for our families. 2526 forms have removed unnecessary graphics so pages load faster. The verbiage has been condensed to require less reading and allow users to complete all of their steps in a quicker pace. Parent usernames and timestamps can duly serve as signatures, reducing some of the redundancy, overall resulting in a 16% less time to complete than last year. So enrollment should take under five minutes this year. We recognize that in order for families to feel connected and understand how their students are performing in school, their access to Skyward online portal is that tool. It provides live data and builds the bridge between home and school. At this time, we are on track to exceed our 25 goal of 93% of
135our families having Skyward parent portal access. In conclusion, Spock will meet May 6 to hear the final six initiatives that remain for this school year. Once the end of the year data is determined, metrics will be reviewed and next year's initiative planning and coordination will begin. For our next quarterly update, which will be in July, we'll share our priority areas for Spock and our strategic plan initiatives for the upcoming school year. Thank you, Mr. Hodgees. I would like to to point something out. the STEM plus M. She talked about the Baylor College of Medicine, but that's all made possible by the Scarbor Foundation and I know we have a representative back there from the Scarbor Foundation, so we appreciate their support. Thank you. Anybody have any Questions? Thank you very much. Moving on to agenda
136item 8D, academic update board goal progress measures. Thank you, ma'am. Good evening, President Hodes, members of the board, and Dr. Howard. My name is Andrea Messik, and I'm the executive director of elementary teaching and learning. This evening, I will provide a middleofyear update on goal progress measure 1.3, which is related to the percentage of kindergarten through 2 grade students who are reading on grade level. This data was collected from January 21st through 29th. The MClass assessment is utilized three times a year to assess kindergarten through 2 grade students literacy development. With this data, we are able to identify where each child needs additional support and we are able to determine the percentage of students who are successfully reading on grade level. MClass assesses the critical skills needed to become proficient readers and it is aligned
137with the science of reading. Listed here are the skills assessed during each test administration and this assessment measures where students are at that point in time. On this graph, you will see middleofyear data for this year and the past two years. When tested in the middle of the year, we saw that 54% of our students were reading on grade level. The state of Texas also sits at 54% at the middle of the year. This is our second year to implement phonics instruction and structured literacy in many professional learning sessions targeting reading language arts instruction have been offered throughout the school year. Additionally, we are receiving support from the CA group through the Texas Reads Texas leads grant opportunity to increase literacy instruction throughout Midland ISD. Since joining the district last summer, Aurelia Betler, the elementary
138RLA coordinator, has worked hard to support teachers through professional learning sessions, modeling lessons, and coaching teachers. To extend her reach, she has worked closely with literacy strategists and multiclassroom leaders to ensure that all teachers are receiving adequate support to grow their confidence with delivering phonics-based instruction. Action plans have been developed to support students growth in each measure of the assessment and teachers are monitoring the progress of students mastery to ensure we are providing a strong foundation to grow proficient readers. We are confident that we're on track to meet the end ofear target of 61%. The end ofear testing window will run from April 22nd through May 9th. After texting is complete, we will be identifying students who are not reading on grade level and we will provide a robust summer learning reading program focused on
139increasing the number of students who are reading on grade level. Daily lessons will be provided to teachers and progress will be measured through MClass. We will revisit GPM 1.3 in June when I will share an endofear update. If there are any questions, I'll be glad to answer those. Down here first. Anybody? Dr. Freeze. I got a quick question on the summer reading. Um, are do we have anything to incentivize kids to come just to this time? We've not planned for in an incentive, right? Is there any have we done anything in the past that's worked for that? We do engage students in some different type of lessons and games that will really get them to want to keep coming back each day. And then meals are provided for free to students who attend summer learning
140as well. All right. Thanks. Anyone else? Okay. Appreciate it. Thank you very very much. Thank you. Go ahead. I'm going to motion to take a restroom break. Five minute break. 10 minutes. We have a second. Second. All those in favor raise your right hand. What? 10 minute restroom break. The time is 7:47 and this meeting has come back to order. Moving on to agenda item nine, action items. A, discussion of and request for approval to hire the principles for Early College High School at Midland College and Barbara Yarro Elementary. Thank you very much. And the board, we're going to go to the front after she's done. Thank you. Good evening, President Hodes, Dr. Howard, and members of the board. It's my pleasure this evening to bring for you for approval the recommendation to hire the
141principles of Early College High School and Midland College at Midland College and Barbara Yarborough Elementary. Um our first candidate for you this evening is Miss Renee Odalgo. Um Renee has eight years of administrative experience. Um and she is currently serving as an assistant principal at um Early College High School. Um, Miss Adalgo has an extensive background in special education. She's pre previously held a position as a program specialist for the at the district level prior to joining Early College High School in November of 2022. She brings um areas of expertise in organizational management, instructional leadership. U Mrs. Zalgo's experience and expertise um for early college as being an assistant principal there makes her uniquely qualified to continue the growth and stability as long as as well as the momentum that early college currently has. So,
142it's our pleasure to nominate today for your approval um Renee Adalgo. Our second candidate this evening is um Kristen Goodwin. Miss Goodwin has six years of administrative experience. She's an excellent fit for the principal position at Yarro Elementary due to her strong leadership experience and dedication to student success. She's participated in the aspiring principal academy and has developed skills and knowledge to lead effectively. Her experience as an assistant principal there um has given her a deeper understanding of elementary education as well as school operations, specifically at Yarro. She's known for her hard work and instructional focus and her commitment to fostering student learning. Um her leadership and dedication make her wellprepared to guide Yarro into the future. Um we present these two candidates for your approval tonight for those principal positions. We have a motion.
143Move second. Has been moved and seconded that we approve action item 9 A. The discussion of and request for approval to hire the principles for Early College High School at Milan College and Barbara Yarborough Elementary. All those in favor, raise your right hand. It is unanimous. Congratulations. [Applause] I would like to also take a moment. Miss Arthur out in the audit um auditorium is retiring from Barbara Yarro and we have certainly appreciate all of her years of service and being here to support the incoming principal. [Applause] Stand up. Let us give you a round of applause. Stand up. Remind me how many years. 50 years of service. Thank you. 46 at MISD. And she taught me how to teach writing in in fifth grade at Fannon for our fifth graders. It was a wonderful time.
144Thank you. Enjoy enjoy whatever you're going on to do. Thanks. Moving on to agenda item nine, action item B, discussion of and request for approval of the 2025 2026 employee contract renewals and extensions. Miss Garcia, sir. Um, again, President Hajes, members of the board, Dr. Howard, we bring to you this evening the request for approval of the 2526 contracts for um our employees who are re due renewals or extensions. Um and so at this time you have the list provided in your agenda. Um we would request approval of the people who are receiving contracts for 25.6. We have a motion. I'll move. Second. It's been motioned and second that this board approve action item 9B, discussion of and request for approval of the 2025 2026 employee contract renewals and extensions. All those in favor, raise
145your right hand. It is unanimous it passes. Moving on to agenda item n action item 9 C, discussion of and request for approval of budget amendment number nine. Mr. Durham, President Hodgers, members of the board, and Superintendent Howard this evening, the administration brings budget amendment number nine before the board for approval to move budgeted funds from one function to another to better meet the needs of the district and slightly increase revenues and expenditures related to a vehicle um insurance check. Annually, school districts or school boards are required to adopt a budget based on the fund and function for the general fund, child nutrition fund, and the debt service fund. A function helps categorize expenses to indicate the purpose of each transaction. Since the board adopts a budget at the functional level if budgeted funds are
146needed to be moved from one function to another, it requires board approval. This budget amendment addresses cross functional transfers requested by various budget owners and a slight increase in revenue and expenses related to an insurance check. However, this budget amendment does not affect the overall bottom line of the budget. In the child nutrition fund, there is an increase in revenues um as well related to a donation for unpaid lunches. And at this time, the administration recommends the board of trustees approve budget amendment number nine as presented. I'll move second. It's been moved and seconded that this board vote to approve action item nine, discussion of and request for approval budget amendment number nine. All those in favor raise your right hand. It's unanimous. Motion passes. Moving on to action item 9D, the discussion of and
147request for approval of RFP number 24-226 asbesus abatement. uh projects Alamo uh Junior High, Goddard Junior High, and Midland Freshman High School. Mr. Smith, thank you, President Hodgees. Yes, this evening, we're asking for approval of RFP 24226 uh to do the asbestous abatement at Goddard Midland Freshman and Alamo. I mentioned this in the bond uh update at the first of the of the meeting tonight. Um this evening we are recommending for the Alamo project one priority abatement for $79,400 uh for the Gddard abatement project AMX environmental and for the Midland Freshman abatement Venco uh abatement for $164,770,000. Excuse me. The Gddard abatement was $170,300. Um, all of this has been budgeted and and is within budget for package four's project and package five project uh for the upcoming bond project. Anything else? We're just asking
148for approval of that this evening. Yes, sir. Anybody have any questions? Discuss. Dr. Freeze, could you just kind of give a little overview of why you picked these companies and just kind of a Yes, sir. So due to the scope and nature of this project, um we wanted to award to separate vendors here. Um so when we went out for bid, um we did not necessarily uh award to the lowest bidder for the Alamo project uh upfront. Um so we awarded that to Veno for 7 uh I'm sorry, Venko was the low bidder for $79,400. But when we looked at all of the bids, they were better suited for the Midland Freshman project uh for 164,670. So when we went back to the other vendors um that were more than qualified for this this work,
149um they've done work for the district in the past and for our environmental consultant. Um we went back to one priority for my example I was mentioning about Alamo and they matched the lowest bid. Um so the lowest bid for Goddard was from AMX Environmental. Uh so we went straight out and awarded to them again due to their qualifications and work they've done for us in the past. And then the next example would be for the Midland Freshman project. Uh AMX environmental was actually low on that project as well, but again due to the scope we want to get all this done this summer. Uh we awarded that to Veno due to them matching the matching the price for a mix. Yes, sir. Anyone else? Mr. Bishop, Booker, anyone is there motion? I move that
150we accept these recommendations for Alamo, Goddard, and Midland freshmen. Second. It's been moved and seconded. Let this board vote and approve action item D, discussion of and request for approval of RFP number 24-226 asbesus abatement projects Alamo Junior High, Goddard Junior High, and Middleland Freshman High School. All those in favor, raise your right hand. It is unanimous. Motion passes. Moving on to action item 9E. Discussion discussion of and request for approval of partial guaranteed maximum price GMP number one for bond package number three 8 elementaryaries safety scope fire sprinkler sprinkler uh system installation. Mr. Smith. Yes, sir. Thank you again, President Hodgees. So, we are asking for approval tonight. Uh approval tonight for a partial GMP. Uh this is what Dr. Finley and I referenced in the bond update again earlier uh going out for
151a partial GMP here for a uh for the fire suppression safety system um for the eight elementary schools um in package three. We want to get that work again done this summer. Uh we feel that it's important to go ahead and and and get out ahead get ahead of this work uh one due to the the safety need there. Um and two to go ahead and lock in pricing is why we're asking for the approval of the partial GMP. Um the the total project budget is just over $28.5 million and this ask is for 13 just over 13.5 um for for this project. So we are asking for approval tonight uh of that partial guaranteed max price. I'll move. Is there a second? I'll second. Is been moved and seconded that this board approve action
152item D. Discussion of request for approval of RFP um sorry discussion of and request for approval of partial guaranteed maximum price GMP number one for bond package number three aid elementary safety scope fire sprinkler system installation. All those in favor raise your right hand. It is unanimous. It passes. Moving on to action item F. D discussion of uh discussion of an action item uh that this board that we want to have a discussion about presenting the Texas Education Agency's 2025 STAR results to the school board after the release by the TEA and we just want to have an open discussion about that. Essentially, it's the same principles that you did in in 2024. before we released it. We just think that we need to have a vote on it so we all agree when they
153come out we can release them and I'll open the floor to discussion. Makes sense. Same same thing we did last time. So I wasn't really sure how to prepare but I always am going to come prepared. So I do have um some documents for you because we have a draft already of how we would um communicate things out because they flow at different times. So, the first thing you'll need a magnifying glass for, but that is the state calendar of events. And so, this is everything we do all year from a state assessment perspective. Uh, when it happens, when they release things to us, when it goes to parents, when it goes to the public, so forth and so on. Uh, the next item that I'm going to pass around, if you don't mind, this
154is like being in school, right? Is the um uh way that the state releases that. And then the third item that I'll pass around and then I'll talk through these is our um draft assessment reporting calendar. And we welcome any feedback on that. So uh like I said, the first item that you have that calendar of events, the one that's blue and colorcoded, this is uh what drives all of the work that we do. This is when the state says um you know you can go all the way back to October when we start having to submit information to the state for who will be uh testing. And then the um next document that you have the state assessment reporting the state uh reports results in three stages. They report early results, they report preliminary
155results and then they report final results. And so the early results that we'll receive for EOCC uh will happen in May 23rd and STAR May 30th. Those reports come in a format that is just literally list of students and how they did because that choose for student level decisions. So we can let students know of course for us our graduations tend to happen so early that it may not help our seniors who are retesting for EOC. Uh but it helps students know if they have summer school and then that's how we assign summer school on the three through eight. uh the next and then of course that data can change because we have a data correction window and if we're filing any appeals related to the AI grading anything like that and then preliminary results
156those will come in for the EOC on June the 5th and then uh June the 12th for STAR 3 through 8 and of course they go to parents on June the 10th and June 17th for STAR. These preliminary assessment reports included include student report cards and district and campus summaries. So that's when we start to get a better feel for that. Uh these are initial indicators of d uh district and campus accountability ratings and identify data that need to be corrected during the data correction window. And then of course there's the data correction window. I do think it's important to point out that if we submit a test to be rescored because of AI grading they charge us for that. So that's interesting. Yes, ma'am. No, I appreciate that. And the and we just we'll
157we'll let the administration come up. This is a discussion. Mhm. So essentially, this is a little I'm in a motion, so I can make the motion, but I motion that the district come up with a clear and concise and transparent form to give the school board trustees access to TEA as soon as it is reasonably responsible and bring it back to the board for a final vote. But this is just a vote to say y'all come up with when we can get it done, a transparent, easily readable thing and we'll go from there. So the motion is that we I believe the third document I gave you is that document but we so we want we need to vote we need to vote on it as a board so we can have know it precisely
158exactly the data format that it's going to be back presented to us in and things of that nature or if we want to table this for another meeting or what have you and have Miss Bolson and Mr. or bishop whoever included in it that's fine but I think it is of of my experience right that there is so much data that comes to us from a board level we it it doesn't you know it doesn't matter what I think about the star test right so as a board governance from a state that's really at our levels that that's right wrong or indifferent that's what we have to look at and all the data that comes to us is very data inensive, right? And I think that it has caused some confusion amongst the board and
159the community and just conversations in general. So I think that it is very important to come up with a framework and a system that that is clear and concise on how that information is going to be reported back to the board so we can readily understand it and have better conversations that focus on improving student outcomes instead of the noise that comes with the arguing the millions. I mean the it was a great example of what we're talking about just with just now passing the papers around and it's much more cumbersome than this. So that's the that's what we want to come up with on this motion if and the board can have a discussion. Miss Bson, I would like to have a discussion on this because we already have I don't understand why we
160need to do something different when you have all of this from the state that has to be followed and they're giving I've never not known the district to give the data that we need ever and to present it to us. It's we've we've gotten for for me specifically there is it is very it is very data confusing. There is NWA map testing. There's cross references on where we're at and it's just a matter of saying we want this standard. Please put it in what whatever y'all come up with, but just make it easily accessible and easy for someone as as a a struggling learner such as myself to understand it. So that third document that I sent out, the schoolboard state assessment reporting calendar draft, this is what we had put in place a couple
161of weeks ago getting ready for this to all ramp up. And if if we look at that over on the left, it lists all the state assessments that we give. uh when the results are released, when they provide me an executive summary, when that executive summary comes to the board. So, high level just wanting you to know before parents start talking about it. Uh when the press release goes to the board and cabinet, when the press releases goes out to the media, and then the formal reports, you know, a PowerPoint, if you will, coming to the board at the dates over on the right, uh those all comply with the timelines. The very last item on the blue page is when we're required to report to the board according to TEA. Okay. So, we're s
162we're on the same page. So, let's do this real quick because cuz I put a motion on the floor. So, it is my let's if it doesn't get a second then it dies. So, there's a motion on the floor. Is there a second? Motion dies. So, now I would like to discuss to table it. Right. It's still an action item. So my motion would be to table this for discussion because I want to talk about reports that are easily read like my I motion to table this action item. May I get a second? It's been motioned and seconded to table this item. All those in favor raise your right hand. Okay. Four motion passes. We're going to table it. Moving on to action item uh action item 9G discussion and action item administration to provide
163daily access to all communication exchanges daily to the public board. So we put this on there. We've gotten a lot of uh public information requests. They're very cumbersome. We are going to comply. I can only speak for myself, but I'm going to comply with them. We're still putting them all together. this the the the the point of doing this is to get the public to have easier access. It is a core value of mine to have open government transparency. I don't have anything to hide from anyone and so there's not a framework put in place to be able to give all our documents. There was some confusion on this. This information request has gone back and forth and so this is an opportunity to go forth. It's not something the district Dr. Howard and I
164spoke about it earlier today to focus on it. we're in the middle of star testing or what have you. But we I do think it would be beneficial to this districts. There are many districts around the same size as ours who have systems and frameworks put in place for board members to be able to send their their anything that's been foyed. So the public can have access to it without it uh taking a long time and being cumbersome on it from and I will now just use my board email address and not have any so I don't have to look all these other places to keep it keep it simple stupid for myself. But I I do think that this is some type of we we brought it just for discussion or if somebody wants
165to motion on it. But the purpose of it is to show that transparency is absolutely important to me and open government is a very very serious thing and we need to make sure that we can be open and transparent with being able to give access to our emails. And I think that this district should we get in get in the process of for the last 15 years putting everything up between board members and administrations online and going forward because it's just kind of the way of the future technology allows you to do these things and so this was just a discussion for transparency purposes and I'll open it up to the rest of the board. I do I do have a couple of questions. Uh one is we're looking at a deficit and we are
166having a reduction in people. So, one is when is communications going to have the time or the people to put these type of emails out on online for public to see? That's the first question. And then the second question is to you, Mr. Hodgees, because I we we received the uh the agenda. So, does these items that we're discussing, will they do they exceed the 14-day window from these being put on the agenda for discussion? Say say that again. I'm sorry. Ask that again. Uh agenda item 9 9 uh F and G. Do they exceed the 14-day window? Oh, for to add a to for an an item to be added to the agenda. Uh yes. No, they I mean they do, but I can add an agenda item. We can take them off within
16772 hours. So that's how I read the policy, but we'll get with the attorneys. If I was wrong on that, I apologize. But again, this is very important for transparency. So, I mean, I understand I want to be transparent about that as well, but I mean, that's the questions I'm asking and and maybe uh Mr. Leiser can help us out or or the board attorney, but those are the questions that I have from a standpoint of of put more work onto the uh to the staff when we ask them to put put emails out. I mean, that's that's two or three people from all the emails that the board or Dr. Howard or anybody in the district that's putting out there for the public to see. and and I appreciate your concerns on that, but
168there's no way that we can't comply with it. And I mean, so I I know that you're for transparency and open government. So, I mean, we don't have a choice but to to be able to to offer these to the public. And it doesn't again, it doesn't have to be done tomorrow or next week, but it's coming up with a framework or a system going forward to be able to change that process because the it has to be given out to the public. anything that's legal because all the information is is is I mean you can ask for my notes that I took here. I mean I I don't I mean I don't care if they can look at I show them my email. I don't have nothing to hide. So no I I understand
169that but there has to be a process in order to get this to to get the information over. We're talking about thousands and thousands of requests that we're that we're providing. Right. So that's not that is very cumbersome than going hey I've got to turn over five text messages or whatever. I mean, we're I'm literally turning over thousands of emails and text messages and I mean everything. And so there has to be a system put in place with technology that allows this there. There there is a way to do this and to be efficient and cost effective and not put burden undo burden on the district. But it's just unfortunately it's some something that we just have to look forward to putting together at a future time. And that's why we brought it up and
170Dr. How and I talked about it earlier. I think it might be helpful if we have Lindsay come up and talk about the platform that we have. We actually have a a platform that we pay for. So Lindsay, if you'll come on up, talk about that platform, how people request information, how we go about filling those requests. Uh we get anywhere from I would say 10 to 20 uh public information act requests a week that Lindsay's team handles. Um some of those are very simple, you know, how many juniors, you know, we want juniors information because maybe they're recruiting juniors for something, you know, and so we release those if parents have given us permission to do that. Our technology team can run that in probably a matter of five or 10 minutes if I
171were guessing. Um, and then of course when we have requests for emails, if those are um the Midland ISD email address, then our technology team also can pull all of that and none of us have to pull anything. They can pull that uh when they're not so simple and cut and dry. Uh the first thing that Lindsay does is reach out to uh Mike Leer, who's the district uh school district's attorney, uh to get clarification, make sure we're approaching it the right way, handling it the right way, or if we need to request more time, or if we need to calculate the cost involved for the school district in generating those reports. But if you'll talk a little bit about the platform we use, where people find it on the website, you know, how y'all
172work through it. Yes. So, we currently use the Next Request platform. that was a platform that was implemented um end of October, 1st of November and um that's really when um I took on the public information request and and facilitating those for the district. And so as Dr. Howard mentioned, you know, um we do get various requests of all shapes, sizes, uh topics uh very regularly. And so, um, in the weekly board update that we do provide, I do include an, uh, a tab in there for the board that summarizes those requests that have been submitted each week. And so, um, the board has, you know, um, information on that on a regular basis. And so, when those public information requests do come in, like Dr. Howard mentioned, um, we take those and, um, assign
173those out to the appropriate, um, district department. And um certainly again if it if it does include information um that is subject to FURPA um you know we definitely lean on um outside counsel for um an extra set of eyes on that and um if we need to seek an attorney general opinion um we work with them. They write the letter to uh the OAG letter for us. And so we, you know, we take every request that comes in very seriously and we want to make sure that we um are protective of the information that is, you know, um that is um that is needed to be protected such as student information um certain information like dates of birth, social security numbers that can be redacted. Um we do, you know, follow the guidelines that
174are in place for information that can be redacted. Um we stick to the timelines that are that are um instilled. And so, you know, you start with your 10-day deadline, but if there is a request for clarification from the requester, we pause that request and pick that back up um as the requesttor, you know, clarifies. And so, um lots of moving parts with public information requests, but always certainly take them very seriously and and and aim to be as timely and and comply with the law every time we get a request, no matter again the scope, um broadness, um things like that. Thank you. Any Miss Fson? Well, in the um I want to say this without being accusatory or anything, but we're probably the least transparent board that that we've ever had in MISD
175right now. So, for this to come forth and want all this done now when we've been not non-transparent with everything that we've been doing is kind of interesting to me. that um there's been many meetings with PBFR that none of us know that we were never told. We were never told who chose the force. It's not ma'am. It's this this it's not Germaine. This wasn't it's not a gotcha thing. I just got everybody on this board was invited to the same meetings. There is nothing. We're releasing tons of all like we have nothing to hide. So we just disagree with it. So we want to move on to the actual framework of this. No, I want to I want to discuss some of this because if we're going to make this done and we can
176we can discuss the framework of building it up, but we're not going to sit up here and argue and make this because that's not the point of this. We can that's that's not the point. No one is No one is saying gotcha. I disagree. I'm not saying gotcha. I disagree with subject that we have not been transparent. I I I disagree with you on that and we have and that's not the point of this. This is to come up with framework to make sure that we do have open government and we do have transparency. So, do you have a meeting tomorrow? No, I I mean I'm sure I I let me rephrase that. I'm sure I do have some type of meeting tomorrow, but I don't know. It's that I don't know what that meeting
177will be. I don't is as is. What is tomorrow? Wednesday. I don't have a schoolboard meeting. No, I have nothing to do with this business that I know of. No, ma'am. Oh, yeah. No, I have a I I do have a meeting, but that's a private meeting. It doesn't have to do with this is when you're talking about the school district. No, ma'am. We're not We're not We're not taking We're not taking We're not We're not doing state business. So, go ahead. That That's where it's muddy. There's not any Miss Burlson. I appreciate And let me I'm not trying to yell. Forget I get loud. Um there is nothing the school board cannot talk about things outside and have four people. We do those here. We don't have executive sessions. We do them here. We
178I'm held accountable. I was held accountable last month. I'm going to have my argument in the public. I'm going to take all the arrows for it just like all the other school board members are. This is absolutely all this does is take away from focusing on improving student outcomes. as the chairman of this board right now, we're going to we're going to move I'm going to respectfully move on. Mr. Gwen, do you have anything positive to say? Yes. So, first of all, to uh Mr. Bishop's point, I agree with you. I don't want to put more work on the administration or their team either. Um and Miss Berles, this isn't about being trans. They're going to find out tomorrow we're pretty transparent. I have a box with over three 3,000 documents in it. Uh text
179messages for days. Uh when I was sworn in, I really anything I talk about school related business is public record and I I'm aware of that. You're exactly right. That's that's what my comment was to Mr. Hodes about we are always school business. Yeah. So this this to me when I read this item, this isn't about putting more work on the administration. It for me I see it as how can we a I don't guess you'll ever avoid the foyer request, but how can we I don't maybe slow them down. I guess I've had five in two weeks. It does I mean it does not bother me. I get foiled and I'll screenshot, put phone records, whatever. It It does not matter to me. To me, this is just more of like, is there an
180easier way to do this than me being tied up for 2 or 3 days printing off 2,000 3,000 emails with attachments and everything else. It's a I It's hard on my time. It's hard on the administration's time because now Mr. pleaser, Miss uh Blue, they got to go through them, right? Dr. Howard has to go through them. So, it's very costly for everybody, right? And maybe if they do have access to some of this information before uh beforehand, maybe maybe that will avoid some of these longer foyer requests. Um that's just my two cents. Uh I I I don't think this is a decision or this isn't something that has to happen tonight, but I I think the discussion really does need to happen and what that looks like moving forward if there is an
181easier way. Maybe there maybe there's not an easier way. I have no idea. So, uh thank you. I think that we need a cost analysis and what it's going to cost us, Dr. Freeze. Um, I think one of the earlier commenters had a really good point about we have people that have personal issues and personal situations and um, you know, they could potentially get, you know, they they need they need some kind of degree of privacy and protection with whatever laws we have. And I I don't know if there's a way logistically to just shove everything out all the time because it still is going to need to be screened. But I mean, when we got to put out thousands, maybe even ten thousands, tens of thousands of documents out, the lawyer has to review
182them to take away private information. You know, it's like we got we have y'all saw our budget. I mean, this is this is not sustainable. We got to spend our money educating kids and uh all these petty things. I mean, they if the community wants this, I mean, we're going to we're going to you're going to pay for us to be some big pay us pay our lawyers. I mean, you know, we need to put away the pettiness, take care of our kids, and um you know, this is just just this is just completely unnecessary. I think I think you know I'm I'm almost to the point where if you make a PIA request that's going to ask for tens of thousands of documents and it's not specific at all. I think your name should
183be publicized and I think the costs of fulfilling this requirement should be publicized because it's just this is unsustainable. We're running a deficit and we got to educate our kids and this is just this is agree. Let's rein it in. This is irresponsible. Can I share something real quick? Coming back to the district, of course, being in other districts and knowing that um there's very tight parameters and laws around um when we can charge, when we can't charge, and um I guess it was about a year ago that I asked the question, you know, are we charging when we can charge? And the answer was not really. And so we have implemented that now for about a year. And so we have to of course calculate how much you know time it's going to take
184if there's programming involved things like that. Um and when that's the case then that information is provided to the requesttor. Of course they're all different. You know we get public information requests from insurance companies that know we have cameras at an intersection that might have caught an accident that has nothing to do with the school district. But we have to pull that video and release that to that insurance company. And so, you know, if there's a camera at the corner of Illinois and um a street right there and there's an accident, they're like, "Hey, you know, they have a camera on that side of Midland High, you know, and so we deal with those kind of requests, too." And Raymond's team, they have to pull that video and we release it. So, again, some of
185that is quick and easy. Um, yes, it it takes time from our team, but it is required by the law. So we have to do that. Agreed. And so Mr. Bishop, I think the P process is the process that we just need to keep doing. So wait, scoot up your other I said I think the P pir process the process we just need to stick with. Okay. Um also does this um is it just the board or is it everybody in the district that's going to be putting their emails in this? No, it would just be the board. It's a so the because I get private emails from parents all the time that's but everything. So this is not just releasing everything willy-nilly. This is coming up with a framework and a system to be
186able to make it more efficient for the community to be able to access the any the administration and the school board's emails that are that are within all like with all within again there's not a this was for discussion. It wasn't. It's to bring up the fact that we want to be transparent and I believe that there needs to be better framework and a system that allows people to go in and look at the board members emails. That's that's it because and it does not need to be taken in in account. We talked about it this morning. This is just something a general discussion amongst the board. We put it on action item in case somebody motions it. But it's it is it is there's just there's no emails. there's nothing there's nothing to hide
187from anyone. And so that's the point of trying to come up with the system uh to let everyone know that we're transparent and for open government and at the same time there has to be a more efficient way and process to be able to get these out. We we make information available all the time to people. Of course it's going to stay within the state and federal guidelines. That's an absolute non-issue. It's not just willy-nilly. So, the point of this was to bring up the discussion to see to make sure that everyone realizes that we are going to be a very transparent board. Well, one of the things that um I've talked to a couple of you about it definitely makes it easier uh probably for you. It's easier on our team, our technology team,
188if everyone's using their Midland ISD email address, that can just be pulled and you never have to to worry about it. Um, so I mean we can certainly make those adjustments. If any member of the board wants to make that adjustment, just let us know and we'll update our email list. I'm the guilty party there. Um, yeah, I I made that mistake of using the same email I ran my campaign on. And yeah, learned that lesson this past weekend. Well, you made that adjustment already. So again, this is another situation there. It's there's no motion. Does anyone have a motion? And if it doesn't, it just dies and we move on. Is this a conversation? Is there a motion? It dies. So, moving on to agenda item 10, close session. Do we have anything in
189close session? I do not. I do not either. So, u moving on now to action item 11, action arising from close session. There is no close session. So, moving on to action item 12,formational items. A, board committee monthly report. B, donations over 5,000, less than 20,000. C, human capital monthly report. Those are just information items. Um, no actions needed, but we're glad to answer any questions. Anybody have any questions on them? Seeing no questions, uh, we're moving on to Do we have a motion to adjurnn? Do we have a second? It's been motioned and seconded that we adjourn this meeting of the Midland Independent School Board. All those in favor, raise your right hand. That's unanimous. This meeting's adjourned. Thank you'all very much.