Noting that a quorum is present, I hereby call this regular morning meeting of the Board of Trustees of Katy Independent School District to order. Today is Monday, August 24, 2020, and the time is 5.31 p.m. Dr. Grigorski, will you verify that we are in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meetings Act with regard to the notice for this meeting?
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Madam President, I do confirm we are in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meeting Act for this meeting tonight. Thank you.
At this time, the Board of Trustees will give members of the public an opportunity to speak in accordance with the KDISD Board Policy BED Local. As defined by this Board Policy, the first 10 speakers who signed up by 2 p.m. on Monday, August 24, 2020, and have provided their first and last name will be called individually on the phone number they provided and allowed to address the Board through audio only. A maximum of 30 minutes has been allocated with the time divided equally among those who have signed up. However, the maximum amount of time for any one speaker is three minutes. If you are not finished speaking at the end of your three minutes, your audio will turn off. If speakers wish to share written material with the board, you must email a copy to the Secretary for Board Services for board members, the superintendent, the chief communications officer, and permanent record. If a speaker has not attempted to solve a matter administratively through proper channels as stated in board policy, the presiding officer's designee shall advise the speaker to seek resolution through the appropriate policy. Finally, pursuant to Texas Government Code Sections 551.074 and 551.8021. The board will not permit the presentation of personally identifiable information regarding a student and will not discuss the appointment, employment, evaluation reassignment, duties, discipline, or dismissal of a public officer or employee or to hear a complaint or charge against an officer or employee. Should a speaker wish to address one of these issues, they must do so through the appropriate local grievance policies, FNG local, DGBA local, or GF local. Our speakers will be called in the order they signed up to speak.
Madam President, can you hear me over here? Yes. All right, trustees, we have four speakers this evening. Our first of four is Danita Hawkins.
Hello?
May I speak with Ms. Hawkins, please?
This is she.
Ms. Hawkins, my name is Justin Graham. I'm the general counsel for KDISD. I've got you live with our board of trustees. You now have three minutes in which to address the board. You may begin.
Oh, hello. Good afternoon. I'm sorry. I didn't even know I was going to be on live. at 3 p.m., but thank you for calling. The reason, I guess, for my request to be a part of the board meeting is to address what myself as well as others believe to be a systematic problem with the recruitment process at Seven Lakes High School and pretty much just to to let, I guess, to the public record that a petition was signed by myself and 46 others, mostly parents who had students, excuse me, sons in the program to bring attention to what we believe is a systematic problem with the football program. I spoke with Ms. Decker as well as I received an email, I think the name is Bill, I can't recall the last name right now, please forgive me. And to me, I just want that to be on record, but it appears as if the foxes are watching the hen house, and I don't really even anticipate or expect this to go further than what this discussion is, because there has not even been, in my opinion, an intellectual curiosity as to why the petition was drafted, what we believe our views were. It was more just an opportunity, and I appreciate it, to state what we feel and what we believe, but I really don't believe it's going to go anywhere further than just a submission. So my hope is that they'll become a part of the public record because there will be more instances of this type of impartiality and this type of neglect for mostly minority athletes who are a part of the Southern Lakes Varsity Football Program. So that way hopefully, maybe in the days, months, years to come, this discussion can pick up from here where there are some people who are in authority who really want to make a change but from the one conversation i had with miss decker and from the response from one of you guys i just already see how there is no desire to really explore it and make any change at this time but thank you for calling yes ma'am thank you miss hawkins
Okay, trustees, our next caller will be Vanessa Vieta.
Your call has been forwarded to an automated voice message.
Okay, we'll try that number one more time.
Your call has been forwarded to an aud...
Okay, as is our protocol, if no answer is after two calls, we'll move on to the next speaker. Our next speaker is Ross Patton.
Mr. Patton. Is this Mr. Patton? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Patton, my name is Justin Graham. I'm the general counsel for Katy ISD. I have you live in front of our board of trustees. You now have three minutes in which to address the board.
Well, thank you, thank you. My name is Ross Patton. I'm an ex-student, graduate of 98 from Katy High School. I have three students that are elementary students in the district right now, and most of my concerns are regarding safety protocols and security with regards to the e-learning that's going on and taking place at this moment. First thing is regarding the face mask requirements. I do realize this is changing regularly, but my biggest concern is the main thing is the information that the parents are receiving. We're being kind of left out in the dark as far as what the requirements are. The page was updated after everybody made their decision for virtual learning. Basically on the 5th we had extensions of the 7th but you all made a change to the website. I have a cash screenshot from the 11th where the face covering is not required for pre-K through third grade. They're saying that, you know, I'm looking at the TEA guidelines from the 4th that says that you guys are required to comply with the governor's executive order for wearing the mask. Obviously there's a line underneath it that states when developmentally appropriate. I don't believe it's ever developmentally appropriate for pre-K through third grade to ever wear a face mask. I mean take the clues from a baby and their mom. You try to get a baby to smile with wearing a face mask, they don't respond because they need facial cues. Secondly, in the order of flat out says any person younger than 10 years of age, so that's pre-K through possibly third, maybe even some fourth graders who have a late birthday. So I do appreciate the safety concerns. I just what I don't like is the not being involved in the decision-making process or just being informed. I had to call and get this from the assistant superintendent secretary, called me Friday, and that's when this e-mail came out. After I spoke to her at lunch, all the new changes came out on the 21st. The main thing is information about what's going to happen when a student or a teacher is tested positive. We have no information about how schools will shut down when people go back in person. You know, when are they going to wear masks? Where are they going to wear masks? How long are they going to wear masks? Anything that says developmentally appropriate is super vague. And I do respect you guys trying to come up with guidelines. I know we're trying to follow the rules. But it's, again, the science is not there. It's just not there. There's not enough studies. Every study someone can show me that says masks are safe, I'll show them another study that was done prior to COVID that says they're not. You know, fear not is the most repeated command in the Bible for good reason. It's over 365 times, okay? Let's move into sports. I'm going to do this for a friend of mine who has a daughter that's in Tompkins High School. Flat out says in the UIL guidelines that they will not be wearing masks when actively practicing or participating. Volleyball players are wearing masks during practice right now at all levels. I have pictures on the KDIC Twitter site that show different that they are wearing masks. just let it be known that if one of these students passes out and dies because they're wearing a mask this will be on the district because they're not following protocol nothing in the Katie restart that was issued on August 14th
they are anything about mr. Patton thank you for your comments you've reached the
end of your three minutes would you like that back for response yes mr. Graham appreciate that I do I do want to clarify for our board and for the folks who might be listening at home there there is guidance out there at the state local and national level that talks about wearing the mask does help with the spread of covid19 sure there are some mixed messages out there and some conflicting information as well and we have we are following the governor's order on that you can find that on the website i will ask our team who updates our website if there's a way that they can explain developmentally appropriate a little little bit better for our community willing to do that. I don't want anyone to be confused, but we have not changed our stance on what we're doing with the youngest children, those that are under 10. If you recall the governor's mask mandate that came out and the local officials is that 10 and over. We do want our smaller ones to wear them when they're in common shared spaces, i.e. on the bus or in a hallway or in the coming into the school where the entrances could be very crowded with students but once you get into the classroom it is still that parent choice for those littlest kids for those ones under 10 if the parent thinks it's not developmentally appropriate for their child they're the ones to make that decision and the child would not be wearing that in the classroom all day long so I just want to clarify that one okay our next and last
Last speaker of the evening is Morgan Calhoun.
Hello?
May I speak with Ms. Calhoun, please?
This is her.
Ms. Calhoun, my name is Justin Graham. I'm the general counsel for Katy Independent School District. I've got you live right now in front of our Board of Trustees. You now have three minutes in which to address them. You may begin.
Thank you for the time to address the school board today. I'm coming to voice my concern over the new regulation that has been set for the children pre-k to third grade to be required to wear a mask to come back to face-to-face instruction. It is frustrating that as a parent who chose to stay in KDISD for what I believe to be the superior commitment to education in the greater Houston area, that my options are now limited to what I get to decide is best for my child based off of fear and unwillingness to approach the data from a reasoned and clear-headed standpoint. While there is data that does suggest the spread of the coronavirus can be mitigated with the help of a mask there is also data that continues to confirm that the ability for children to transmit and contract this virus is limited at best there are multiple studies that have corroborated and supported this from france australia and iceland while those are not in near contact with the u.s or katie their research is far and away more in depth and ahead than anything we have seen here what their data is saying is that children are are less likely to contract or transmit the virus. The study specifically in Australia covered secondary, elementary, and primary care facilities with cases that were true positive and at an infectious point, all with results of study pointing to negative transmission rates among young students and their peers, as well as instructors. Beyond that, we are also taking into account the negative social development that is springing up in our children the longer that they stay home, as well as when returning back to an environment that is subjugated to rigidity with mask conformity. We know that social and emotional development in children has started at the very beginning from learning how to read and imitate facial expression and cues as well as tone and actual speech. When a child is surrounded by adults who are in masks as well as peers looking the same, we have to ask what and how that development is delayed as well as impacted in the negative. Lastly, the safety aspect has come up in our household. If you are in fact requiring staff and children to wear masks, do we not run the risk of children not being able to correctly identify the adults around them? The safety implications seem to be far reaching without time or structure in place to adequately address these concerns without placing that burden on an already overburdened staff at our schools. The increasing concern that I have is that KDIC is removing the option for families to to make choices for themselves without being unnecessarily punished while being expected to take substandard education options in the form of a virtual academy that is dependent on an overworked internet system, all based in the fear of transmission and positivity rates from children that the science that we are all looking at does not support. I appreciate the clarification that you gave from the last caller, but that is not what your guidelines said in the email. It did not say that it was the parent's choice. it continued to hurt to push that it was the school's choice and that the masks are mandated for pre-k to third grade I have three children that are elementary
school age miss Calhoun that's the end of your career that's the end of your three minutes we appreciate your comments to the board madam president that's the end of the speakers this evening thank you so much mr. Graham
This concludes the open forum portion of our meeting. The board will now convene and close meeting as authorized under Section 551.001 of the Texas Government Code for the following purposes. Texas Government Code 551.071 and 551.129. The board will now reconvene in open meeting. Today is Monday, August 24, 2020, and the time is 6.32 p.m. On behalf of my colleagues, I welcome everyone to this evening's regular board meeting. Each board member received the agenda and documentation for this meeting on Friday, August 21st, 2020. The board will receive information and recommendations from the staff, administration, and the superintendent on these agenda items at tonight's meeting. Board members will be able to ask questions, receive answers, and should be prepared to take action this evening. The board has just reconvened from closed meeting in accordance with Chapter 551 of the Texas Government Code. Any action arising from discussions in a closed meeting must be taken in an open meeting. We'll start with the pledges of allegiance. I'd like to welcome Sergeant Howard of the KDIC Police Department to lead us in the pledges of allegiance.
Sergeant Howard of the KDIC Police Department to lead us in the pledges of allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which is stand one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the Texas one state under God one and indivisible.
Thank you so much officer Sergeant Howard. Next, agenda item 6.1, Mr. Chris Smith, Chief Financial Officer, Ms. Ann Feitinger, Executive Director of Finance, and Mrs. Sherry Butterfield, Director of Budget and Treasury, will give a brief presentation on the 2020-2021 proposed budget and tax rate. Afterwards, the Board of Trustees will receive public input regarding this topic.
All right, well, good evening, President Doyle, Superintendent Gagorski, and trustees. We've made it this far here in July, and of course, we're at our final meeting for adoption of the budget. Texas law or Texas Education Code requires that the Board of Trustees adopt a budget for districts like Katy ISD. We have a fiscal year-end date of August 31st to have adopted the next year's budget by August 31st. The budget is materially or is complete and ready to be adopted as far as the administration is concerned. Just as a quick reminder, we are budgeting an enrollment growth of 5.1%. That's budgeted enrollment to budgeted enrollment growth. From May enrollment growth to what we budgeted for enrollment this year, you're looking at about 3.3% enrollment growth. We ended last year or in May at 84,287 students, and we're budgeting just over 87,000 students. This is a fluid number. We recalibrated it back in May. We looked at it from October from PASA. We asked them to relook at it in May after the COVID outbreak, and it's still a number that's very fluid, and we're watching it every day. New campuses. Of course, we're open in McIlwain Elementary School and Jordan High School, and our tax base looks like it has grown 8.5%. That's significantly more growth than I used in July because of the values that came back from our three counties thus far. Salary increases, of course, we gave it 1% across the board. The M&O tax rate, I'll talk on this one on the next slide a little bit, is looking at at just under a dollar. I told you last time that we thought it would be a little bit better than a two and a half or a 2.65 cent reduction. Right now it does look like it's a better reduction than that. We are still waiting on counties, on one of our counties to get us certified values. We don't expect them to be certified until a week from today. The INS tax rate is at 39 cents again. This is what our rate looked like in the orange year, was the 19-20 school year, the total of $1.44. Looks like now it will be $1.38, again, which is a 5.43 cent reduction. The budget, maintenance and operation budget, is built on that 99.88 cents, and the service tax rate that you'll see tonight is built on the 39 cents. This is some history. This will be the third time, sorry, the fourth time in the last 15 years that we've reduced the tax rate. We did it back in the 05-06 and the 06-07 school year. Then we did it again, fast-forwarding it back to the 15-16 school year. We were able to drop it a penny. Of course, last year we dropped it by a couple of pennies. and then this year we drop where we're proposing or having a drop again I would say again House Bill 3 was big law House Bill 3 as part of that is what's buying down the tax rate so those districts like Katy who have higher value growth or higher value growth in the state average their rates going to go lower so as I mentioned before it entered tax rates will be dropping at different levels across the state. I've seen rates drop as low as or as high as 10 cents and as low as 2 cents. Ours at 5.65 cents, at least what it is right now, does appear to be one of the higher reductions of tax rates and again that's that's because of our value growth, the new value growth and House Bill 3. I'm going to turn it over to Ms. Butterfield and she's going to talk about our
general fund okay so the first first pie chart is on revenues in the general operating fund with 54% being in local revenues comprised of of course those tax collections but also things like tuitions from community ed summer school summer rec, interest earnings on our investments, athletic and concession sales, and facility rentals. The state revenues are at 45% of the revenue budget in the general operating fund, and the sliver of 1% in federal revenues is comprised mainly of indirect costs from other funds, as well as the SHARS reimbursements. The expenditure budget in this picture, this pie, emphasizes that the district's primary expenditures are in staffing, with that budget being in salary and benefits of 88%. Here's a graphic representation of budget that we anticipate spending in the classroom. at 79.5 percent and then this next graph looks very similar to the previous chart but we're adding the counseling co-curricular and transportation budgets to this number for 90.4 of the general operating fund related to student Finally, here you see the culmination of revenues and expenditures put together with total revenues at $839,000 and total expenditures at $839 million and total expenditures at $836 million and net transfers out of $2.5 million with a positive increase to fund balance or a balanced budget in the general operating fund.
And we're going to turn it over to Ann Feitinger, our executive director for finance, to talk about our next two funds. we have three funds that are budgeted the general fund uh food service fund or the special revenue fund and the debt service fund and miss feitinger is going to talk to you about the other two
budgeted funds okay the 2021 food service fund is presented with local revenues of 14.6 million and this represents payments from students for meals interest earnings and miscellaneous local revenues a small amount of state funds of 180 000 and then our federal program revenues of 17.7 $20.7 million, which is made up primarily of free and reduced lunch reimbursements that we receive from the federal government as well as federal commodities that we receive. The expenditure budget is primarily $20.7 million in supplies and materials, which is primarily food and the containers that the food goes into. And then next up would be payroll costs, which is $15.7 million, which is all of our food service workers with a small amount for purchasing contracted services and other operating expenses. expenses. There is a net change of 4.1 million on this budget. We will need to monitor this as we discussed last month as we go through the year and we'll need to monitor the fund to see how it reacts to the COVID-19 effects that we're going to have this year. So then going on to the debt service fund, this indicates property taxes of 171 million dollars and interest earnings of 500,000. You can see that we have no instructional facilities allotment, revenue, or existing debt allotment as we no longer get any help from the state in those areas. The only state money we do get is the additional state aid for homestead exemption, and that's from when the homestead exemption was raised from $15,000 to $25,000 a few years ago. Our expenditures are broken down into principal payments for the bonds, interest payments, and fees. The principal payments of $88 million include defeasances of $13 million. This fund has transfers from the capital projects fund on interest earnings that we use to offset the debt for a net change in fund balance of just over $775,000. So then we have the next two schedules bring those three funds back together, the general fund, special revenue, and debt service fund. This one takes your expenditures and looks at them by object code, so you can see that primarily our expenditures are in payroll costs, as Sherry mentioned just a little while ago with that pie chart. So you can see there's $749 million there just in payroll costs alone. The next schedule, it gives you the same information, but it breaks it down by functional category. Here again, it's kind of one of the other charts that Sherry talked about. You can see that most of our expenditures are in instruction directly in the classroom. And you can see here that we have a modest increase in the general fund and the debt service fund that special revenue fund is the one we will be watching food service as we go through the year to see how we're going to need to react as that moves forward with the
pandemic okay thank you miss fightinger and we are through all the going actually back to october but of course the the seven months that that we've we've done uh and discussed to the board uh in detail uh over these last several months we're complete as of tonight in this public hearing But from this point forward, there's a lot to do, especially in a COVID environment. I would say that historically, there are some trends that we can look forward to and kind of feel comfortable with. And this year, for everybody, not just KDISD, but for almost every entity, whether it's a private or a governmental entity, it's very fluid right now. And so we're going to closely monitor all expenditures. We're going to prepare for growth because we're going to continue to grow. We're going to continue to open campuses. In fact, next year we open junior high 17. Enrollment growth, as I mentioned earlier, we recalibrated that in May as at this point we have some growth to go. We usually do grow enrollment pretty substantially between now and Labor Day weekend and we get back from Labor Day, kind of start settling out, but we grow in Katy throughout the year. We actually grow from the beginning of school all the way to the first week in May. And that's when typically we peak is in the first week of May. Property value growth, that doesn't mean anything from the general fund's perspective any longer. It's really just the debt service fund. And again, we grew at 8.5% from one year to the next. And then I just would be remiss if I didn't say something about the uncertain economy with COVID-19 and oil and gas glut, et cetera. You know, we were going gangbusters there until March, and now, as you've heard, Comptroller Hager has said that we are now in a statewide recession. And, you know, it depends on how long this lasts and what monies the legislature has to work with. They were very generous to public education in the last session, and they're going to need to be generous again when they convene in January. That's really all I have from a budget perspective. And this is a public hearing. The budget, Ms. Butterfield will present to you all that item. And I'll just tell you from my perspective, it's ready to be adopted.
Thank you so much, Mr. Smith. Agenda item 6.2, persons requesting to speak regarding the 2020-2021 proposed budget and tax rate were required. to sign up by 2 p.m. on Monday, August 24, 2020. Mr. Graham, it's my understanding that no individuals have signed up to speak regarding this topic?
That's correct. We can consider the hearing closed.
Okay. Thank you very much. We'll move on then to Agenda Item 7.1, Discuss and Consider Board Approval of the Proposed 2019-2020 Final Amended Budget. Mr. Smith?
All right. Well, you have the final amended budget in front of you. This is what we think our expenditures are going to be. It's actually the outer side of what we are going to be. We do not expect to spend all of that 799 million in expenses in the general fund. There is underspending that we've identified. We have shorted up to make sure we don't blow a function or meaning overspend any one particular area and we won't. But I do think that when it's said and done you're seeing a $12 million increase to fund balance that it will be a higher increase to fund balance because we will not spend some money. As I mentioned the fluidity of the budget that I hope you adopt tonight, later tonight, we will be looking at it. There are expenditures that are out there now that based on supply chain issues in various areas we've we may not get it in prior to August 31st. If we don't, we'll have to amend the budget that you will adopt tonight and reflect some of those expenditures next year. We're hoping that they come in and we're hoping that that's a minimum, but I would I would say that that we can expect that this year especially. Special Revenue Fund, I did want to point out that there's a four million dollar transfer in and on top of that four million dollar transfer in, that's coming coming from the general fund. And that still leaves on that second to last line a deficit in the special revenue fund or food service fund. I don't think it will be that big a deficit, but it'll be a deficit nonetheless, and it's gonna need to be propped up by the general fund. The reason that is, and Ms. Feitinger mentioned it earlier, is food sales because of COVID-19 were down starting in March, and they continued down through the end of our fiscal year. And we do have still expenses associated with that. and so we're gonna we're gonna use that and we've got the general fund propping it up and then the debt service fund we expect to put in just over a million dollars into fund balance and that's keeps us at a good healthy fund balance of just over 60 million dollars if it's also when it's all said and done and you will be getting the final numbers on this our audit team our audit partners are scheduled to be out in October we'll prepare the report not November and in December and present that audit to you along with our audit partner in January of this year. So this will be the last you see of the 19-20 budget.
Ms. Champagne? Ms. Champagne, is your microphone on?
Is it on? It is now. Okay. All right. Thank you. Okay. Mr. Smith, thank you very much for your presentation. I have a few questions about something. First of all, I know that the teachers were given a $200 Amazon gift of some sort. I have some questions about that. So are those gift cards, I mean, I'm sure they're not gift cards, but are they going to be given to their paychecks? Are they going to be reimbursed for items?
No, in lieu of reimbursing them or giving them something that would be taxable income to them, or a gift card where we can't control what they get, we've partnered with Amazon to give them, based on their log-in credentials at KDISD, each one will have an account that they can spend up up to $200 on. They can order that immediately without the approval of the administration on their campus. But we have narrowed that down through their Amazon, our partner search engines, that they can only get K through 12 appropriate items. So they can get Scott's tape and pencils and stuff, but they can't get things that would not be appropriate to buy for the classroom. We're doing that in an effort of, I know Dr. Gorgorski and the administration administration feels that we provide a very adequate supply budget throughout all our campuses, but we still hear issues of teachers spending their own money for those de minimis supplies and so we wanted to try to fill that in where the teachers would not need to spend their personal funds or ask their students, parents to provide that. The district's trying to really make sure that we're providing 100% of what they need in their classrooms.
Okay. And I know the teachers really, really like it. I just want to also know, is that, so whatever they purchase, is that going to be district property or is that theirs, like if they move schools?
If they move schools, well, first of all, they can't buy electronics and stuff with it because the district has a standard. And we want to make sure that the standard is met. And if we did this and allowed them to buy things, they may not meet the standard and therefore the district could not support them efficiently. But what they do buy, if they move from one campus to another, they probably will take it. If they move from one district to another, we feel that they should leave it there. There's not going to be any way to control it. But with $200 and the type of things that they're going to be buying, we feel that that risk is very minimal. Most of it's just expendable supplies. And they will have spent it when they leave campus or the district.
So what happens if they don't spend the whole $200? Is that money going to come back to the district?
Yes. In the budget that we just spoke to and that Ms. Butterfield will be asking for approval here in a few minutes, that is budgeted for. They'll have from September 1, our new fiscal year, until the end of February, which is just before spring break. So that's about six months. And if they don't spend it in those six months, it will go away at that point because they won't have you been able to have enough time to use it in this year okay and is
that were we able to find the money um from the money that we saved due to some of the expenses
that we didn't have to pay for to do we started discussing something similar to this back about this time last year at the start of school year and we uh dr gregorski uh wanted to make it a priority to try to make some room to to be able to shoehorn this in and we were able to do so
And where does it, which line item is it in?
In the item that Ms. Butterfield talked about that showed you by object, which showed the number amount for supplies. Supplies. That's in the non-supplies or 6300s.
Okay.
Which is supplies, I'm sorry, it's in supplies, which is 6300s. It's that second row.
And is it just for teachers or is it for parents?
It's just for classroom teachers. Okay. Classroom teachers are identified by Roll ID 87 in PEMS, and so we pulled everybody out of the HR system that has a Roll ID 87. There are some other faculty that, like an instructional aide, that does not include speech pathologists. It's teacher, instructional classroom teachers.
So do you know what the total amount is? Is it like, I don't know how many teachers there are, is it like 1.2 million or something?
It's about 1.3 million and some change.
All right. Are there any other questions? Madam President, I have another question. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I have another question. This is my last question. I want to know, so this is part of the budget, right? So I just want to make sure that we all know that we're voting on this as part of the budget and that we have the extra money to do this. And I really thank you for your yes
It's in it's in the numbers that that we were able to show on the big screen if you're here a few minutes ago It's does those expenditures are in there and they will begin Being able to be spent on September 1 when we have that new budget adopted
Miss guest off Madam President. Thank you. Mr. Smith wonderful presentation. We're gonna miss hearing about it every month Just quick and I know you don't have a crystal ball but just wondered if there are any other things that you can identify or that you're watching vulnerabilities, opportunities, as we anticipate maybe that the state economy is not going to be great next year. I mean, I know you've only got 12% of the budget to work with other than salaries. You know, there's not a lot of wiggle room. And you mentioned that you were going to be closely monitoring it, obviously. But I just wondered, you know, that's kind of an exercise we go through looking at vulnerabilities what levers can we pull if we have to for next year what can we is there anything we can be doing this year to try to position ourselves better for that deficit sure I think I think that
our track record says that we spend money wisely and we're gonna monitor that budget and spend money wisely as we can between now and whatever fate the the next legislative session is going to bring us. There's some good news there. There's a couple of things, a couple of levers, if you will, Ms. Kessoff, that we hope to pull during this year. We have some property value audits that are from prior years that we plan on doing, which should yield some funds. There is the fact that we peeled out, I'm going to guess, a couple of million dollars, and I hope Ms. Butterfield is going like this back there, of the budget of local revenue. but we know we're not going to get, that we've taken that into account. And hopefully moving forward in future budgets that all of this stuff is behind us, and that will help. But we'll look at the growth numbers, and we'll really study it and do what we've done historically, which is to try to work it in without changing anything we're doing from a delivery method of instruction in the classroom. That's our goal, to keep that going.
You all do amazing work. Thank you so much. Thank you, Ms. Gestalt. Any other questions?
Yes, Madam President, I have one more question. Mr. Smith, is a 1% raise, is that worth about $4 million?
A 1% raise across the board is just over $6 million.
$6 million? Yes. Thank you.
Any other questions? Okay, hearing none, I will accept a motion.
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the 2019-2020 final amended budget for the Katy Independent School District.
I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Ms. Vann, that the Board of Trustees approves the 2019-2020 final amended budget for the Katy Independent School District. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. 7.2, discuss and consider board approval of a resolution to commit and assign fund balance. Mrs. Heithanger, welcome.
Ms. Okay. Item 7.2 is to consider a resolution to commit and assign fund balances. Governmental Accounting Standards Board GASB statement number 54 became effective for fiscal year starting after June 15, 2010. The statement requires us to adopt a resolution to commit a portion of our general fund unassigned fund balance if we so desire and to delegate the responsibility of assigning fund balances to the superintendent and his designee. The The resolution presented tonight commits $16 million of fund balance to unanticipated COVID-19-related expenditures, $5 million to the district's health insurance program, and a portion to the local campus special revenue funds for their intended purposes. And so that's really what you're saying is because our governmental funds are adopted on a modified accrual basis, in other words, it's available and measurable, it's really kind of a current focus. So these are things that are outside of that current focus that we want to make sure we're considering when we're adopting a budget. So we're just setting aside a portion of our fund balance to say we're setting that aside in the event that we need it. Are there any questions?
Yes, Madam President. I have a question. Thank you, Ms. Patera. Is this the only amount that is left over? No, no.
This is just a portion that we designated for these specific items.
So, but is this resolution okay for him to spend whatever's left over or just this amount?
No, no. This is, all we're doing here is earmarking these dollars to say that we're going to set this aside. We're not going to spend it for any other reason than what we're saying here. There will also be other monies left over that we will designate in other areas as we move forward.
Do you have any other questions? Anyone else? Okay. Okay, hearing that, I'll entertain a motion. Madam President.
Ms. Vann. I move the Board of Trustees approves a resolution to commit and assign fund balance. Second.
I have a motion by Ms. Vann, a second by Mr. Redmond, that the Board of Trustees approves the resolution to commit and assign fund balance. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. 7.3, discuss and consider board approval of the 2020-2021 State Compensatory, compensatory, sorry, education funding and other end-of-course assessment funding budget as required by House Bill 5. Mrs. Butterfield, go ahead.
Thank you. This we have to cover before we get to the 2021 budget and what the education code states. Education code requires a district to budget funds for accelerated instruction where students failed to perform satisfactorily on end-of-course assessments as required for graduation. The district has identified a $125,000 budget, which is in special projects in the 2021 budget that we have discussed in the open forum and will be presented in the next item. This budget is distributed in the spring by the Area Assistant Superintendents to campuses who require additional tutorial services for these students.
Are there any questions? Madam President. Ms. Champagne. Sorry. I just am curious, is this a normal amount of money, or is this about the same every year, the $120,000?
It's actually an increase this year. Last year it was $116,000. This year it's $120,000. That's not that bad.
Okay, thanks. Any other questions?
Madam President. Mr. Lacey. I move that the Board of Trustees approves the 2020-2021 State Compensatory Education Funding and Other End-of-Course Assessment Funding Budget as required by House Bill 5.
I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Ms. Vann, that the Board of Trustees approves the 2020-2021 State Compensatory Education Funding and Other End-of-Course Assessment Funding Budget as required by House Bill 5. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye all those opposed motion passes go ahead miss butterfield thank you um as
presented at the budget presentation earlier tonight we have the culmination of the past eight months of budget updates into the attached schedule for our general operating fund food service fund and debt service fund this format in fund function object format satisfies and complies with statute requiring budget disclosures pertaining to lobbying in 6214 object code and statutory required public notices in object code 6491 and for articulating our budget by fund, by function, and by object code. After the board's adoption of the budget, this schedule would be posted to the financial transparency page of the district's website.
Are there any questions? Madam President, can we tell how much we saved from last year? I mean, is there a carryover from last year from the savings due to COVID-19, like transportation costs, things like that?
I don't have a prepared statement for that.
Here comes Mr. Smith.
I would say that we have a general idea, but the specifics of it, because other budgets were used that would buy regular operating things for COVID reasons, so it's really hard to come by. And as I mentioned earlier, due to supply chains, there are things out there that we may not receive, and so it may be even further underspending in our 19-20 budget. budget. We don't know that. We won't know that until probably sometime in November. Once all those bills come and that they're paid and the accountants can put the journal entries on to be able to tell us. But right now it's just a good idea. We know we're underspending and we know there will be savings. As I mentioned earlier, the 19-20 final amended budget will
not be spent in full. Madam President, last question on this. It would be awesome if we we could find the extra savings and give it back to the teachers again. I know that we're doing that in the 1% raise and the 1% lump sum and the 200 for the Amazon, but whatever we can do for teachers I think would be awesome. Thank you.
Are there any other questions? Madam President. Ms. Phan. I move the Board of Trustees adopts the 2020-2021 official budget for Katy Independent School District.
Second.
I have a motion by Ms. Phan, a second by Mr. Lacey, see that the board of trustees adopts the 2020 2021 official budget for Katy Independent School District we will now proceed to vote all those in favor please raise your right hand and say aye all those opposed motion passes thank you so much 7.5 discuss consider board approval of June 2020 financial reports welcome back miss I came here okay item 7.5 is to
to consider approval of the District's June 2020 financial statements. The four reports included are the financial statements, two parts, representing revenues and expenditures for budgeted funds of the District, including the General Fund, Food Service Fund, and the Debt Service Fund. Expenditures are further broken down by function and high-level object for the 10 months of operation so far in the 19-20 fiscal year. June is just over 83% of the way through the year, and you'll see that most of the costs will be indicating they are running at or below that percentage. This is due primarily to COVID-19, and those adjustments were reflected in the final amended budget presented earlier. The construction report presents project costs through June for projects funded with the 2017 and 2014 authorizations, our E-rate funding, and our TURS waterfall funding that comes back. Our tax report summarizes our property taxes received through June, and our check register shows all vendor payments made in the month of June.
Are there any questions?
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the district's June 2020 financial reports. Second.
I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Mr. Redman, that the Board of Trustees approves the district's June 2020 financial reports. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Thank you so much. Next on our agenda, we have discussed and considered board approval of the TASB risk management fund interlocal participation agreement for the administration of workers' compensation claims for 2020-2021. Mr. Nauman, and you have 7.678, so I'm just going to let you, after we vote, just roll into the next one.
We'll do.
Okay.
Good evening, Dr. Gorgorski, President Doyle, Board of Trustees. Board policy states the district shall extend workers' compensation benefits to employees by entering into interlocal agreements with other political subdivisions providing self-insurance. Administrative services for the Katy Independent School District's self-funded workers' compensation program have been performed by the Texas Association of School Boards Risk Management Fund through an interlocal agreement since 2006. The scope of services to this agreement has not changed for the renewal period starting September 1, 2020 and ending August 31, 2021. Claim handling fees are flat from the expiring period with medical-only claims charged at $150 and $750 for indemnity claims, respectfully. No other fees are noted from the expiring term. The claim handling fees are the life of the claim pricing and are not subject to claim status changes. Expenditure services are based on claim frequency with an estimated cost of $400,000 for 2020-21. The cost is budgeted and paid for from an internal service fund for workers' compensation as authorized through CRE Legal. legal it is recommended that the board of trustees approves the interlocal participation agreement for administration of the workers compensation claims with tasby risk management fund for the period september 1 2020 through august 31st 2021. are there any questions board members
mr president mr redmond i move that the board of trustees approves the interlocal participation agreement for the administration of workers compensation claims with the TASB risk management fund for the period September 1st 2020 through August 31st
2021 I have a motion by mr. Redmond a second by mr. Keller that the Board of Trustees approves the interlocal participation agreement for the administration of workers compensation claims with TASB risk management fund for the period of September 1st 2020 through August 31st 2021 we will now proceed to vote. All those in favor please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Go ahead Mr. Newman. Board policy CR legal
states that a district may purchase reinsurance for a risk covered through a self-insurance fund to protect against very large specific workers compensation claim occurrences. Katy Independent School District currently purchases reinsurance for its self-funded workers compensation compensation program. The Risk Management Department seeks the renewal of the excess workers compensation reinsurance policy through Midwest Casualty. This policy has a renewal rate which is the same as the expiring rate. However, the actual premium increases as payroll volume increases accordingly. This policy is audited at the end of the term. The plan carries a retention of $550,000 per occurrence. The renewal estimated premium for the policy is $79,928. The policy term is September 1, 2020 through August 31, 2021. Expenditures for this insurance will be paid from the Workers' Compensation Fund, a budgeted internal service fund approved by the Board of Trustees. It is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the excess Workers' Compensation reinsurance policy offered by Midwest Casualty company with a $550,000 specific retention, estimated deposit premium of $85,000.
Madam President, I do have a question. Yes, go ahead. How often does that come up for renewal? Not just the annual, but when we go out and shop it?
It's on a two-year cycle. Okay. And this is year two of that deal. That's what I was trying to remember.
Thank you, sir. Yes, sir.
Any other questions?
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the excess workers compensation reinsurance policy offered by Midwest Casualty Company as recommended by the administration.
Second. I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Ms. Vann, that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the excess workers compensation reinsurance policy offered by Midwest Casualty Company as recommended by administration. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. All those opposed? Motion passes.
Go on Mr. Nowman. Board policy CR legal states that a district may procure contracts within an insurance company authorized to do business in Texas to insure its employees. Voluntary benefits made available to district employees through payroll deductions are offered to provide access to services that promote and enhance the health of employees and their dependents. The benefits are presented to the Board of Trustees on an annual basis. The current Current offerings for plan year 2021 represent no changes in design or structure, with premiums remaining flat from plan year 2020, except for life insurance. For plan year 2021, the district will utilize Sun Life for life insurance products paid for by the district and supplemental life coverage paid for by the employee. A reduction in premiums from $0.07 per $1,000 of coverage to $0.045 will be achieved. All voluntary products are fully funded by participating employees except for KDISD paid life insurance and the Employee Assistance Program. It is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the voluntary benefit products for plan year 2021.
Are there any questions?
Ms. Gassoff. Mr. Nolman, am I correct that it was flat the year before last as well, wasn't it? Isn't it two years that it's been flat?
Actually, last year we saw a reduction. Just as a reminder, we went to the marketplace and did a complete remarketing, and we saw a reduction and enhancement of coverages for our staff. This is the second year of those commitments of those flat premiums. as part of that extensive RFP process where we extended some benefits and increased coverage options for staff.
Well, I don't mean to gush, but I don't think that that's something that most companies and giant organizations are able to hang their hat on. I think that's fantastic. And quite often, you know, you give someone a big raise and then you bump their insurance premiums, so it's kind of a wash. And I think it's fabulous work that you all are doing to not only reduce the premium, but keep it flat, especially during this tumultuous time.
Thank you very much.
Any other questions?
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the voluntary benefits products for plan year 2021. Second.
I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Mr. Redmond, that the board of trustees approves the voluntary benefits product for plan year 2021 we will now proceed to vote all those in favor please raise your right hand and say aye all those opposed motion passes thank you so much next 7.9 discuss consider board approval of a resolution approving the instruments of the kd development authority kda tax increment contract revenue refunding bonds kd independent school district contract series 2020 mr smith welcome back all right well uh
This is a good news item. The partnership that Katy ISD has with the City of Katy and the Katy Development Authority essentially built that, the Merrill Center, at no cost of state funding to Katy ISD. Essentially, the properties that pay the taxes that built the Merrill Center are excluded from our property values that the state uses for state funding reasons. Because of that, we've used the tax dollars in our partnership with the KD Development Authority to pay the bonds on that building. After those bonds are paid, the money comes back to the district to spend. Most recently, this board made a decision to spend those funds on the LD Robinson Pavilion remodel so they didn't cost general fund or taxpayer dollars in order to do that. So what this is is there's still about eight million dollars in bonds to be paid back on that. There's about five or six years left but the Katy Development Authority and their financial advisor think that they can can remarket those bonds and refund them if you will, refinance them and save somewhere somewhere between $200,000 and $400,000 that would save in interest. Those additional dollars would all come back as they'd normally have. So it would be more money coming back to Katy ISD after the bonds are paid. It's a good opportunity and very appreciative of the Katy Development Authority and that partnership.
Thank you. Are there any questions?
Madam President.
Mr. Graham.
I just want to, on the coattails of what Mr. Smith said, this is a project and what Mr. Smith is talking about, this refinancing, it's in conjunction with the city of Katy. So we're very appreciative of our partnership with them. And I did not want. them to go unrecognized on this item. Thank you, Mr. Graham. Any questions, board members?
Okay, I'll entertain a motion. Madam President. Mr. Redmond. I move that the Board of Trustees
approves the resolution approving the issuance by the Katy Development Authority of its Katy Development Authority tax increment contract revenue bonds, Katy Independent School District
contract series 2020 I have a motion by mr. Redmond a second by miss van that the Board of Trustees approves the resolution approving the issuance by the Katy development authority of its Katy development authority tax increment contract revenue bonds Katy independent school district contract series 2020 we will now proceed to vote all those in favor please raise your right hand and say aye all those opposed motion passes Thank You mr. Smith 7.10 discuss and consider board approval of the district performance objectives miss natalie martinez welcome
good evening board president doyle dr gregorski members of the board each year the board is asked to review and approve the district performance objectives that guide the district improvement planning process the 34 performance objectives are aligned to the current eight district goals and are created through three different processes. Three of the proposed district performance objectives are from the legally required statute of House Bill 3. Nine of the performance objectives are from our strategic design process, and 24 are created from an extensive needs assessment process involving district departments. You received a copy of the proposed district performance objectives, and at this time, I will answer any questions that you may have about them.
Are there any questions, board members?
Madam President. Ms. Champagne. I have a question about, let's see, it's goal five, objective four. Let's see, is that the one I want to, yeah, performance objective four. The district will analyze perceptions of workplace culture and develop systems to improve and support engagement among employees. I just would like to say that I would like to hope that we can continue to improve on that. performance objective and that teachers I know want to be heard and that they're they're kind of a lot of times apprehensive to express themselves and I don't I don't really know why but they are and you know when they're sent surveys they want to know that their surveys are being heard and for example you know they got the survey about the return to work and it was a three question survey I just want to make sure that we're doing all that we can to to meet that objective. That's all.
Absolutely, thank you. And I'm taking notes and I will take that back as well. Thank you. Any other questions?
Okay.
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the district performance objectives.
I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Ms. Fan, that the Board of Trustees approve the district performance objectives. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Thank you so much. 7.11, Discuss and Consider Board Approval of an Alternate 7th Grade Reading Instruments Requirement Waiver. Welcome, Ms. Murphy.
Good evening, President Doyle, Dr. Gregorski, and members of the board. Texas Education Code requires each school district to administer a reading assessment adopted by the Commissioner at the beginning of the seventh grade to each student who did not demonstrate reading proficiency on the sixth grade star reading assessment due to disruptions from kovat 19 and the cancellation of the 2019 star exams districts may request a waiver in order to use an assessment other than one adopted by the commissioner for the 2021 school year only the waiver must be approved by the board of trustees if this waiver is approved kdisd will use lexia's rapid assessment an instrument the district already owns rapid may be administered virtually making it an appropriate assessment for students receiving virtual intermittent or in-person instruction the The assessment will be administered to seventh grade students who've been identified by their campuses as being in need of supplemental reading support.
Are there any questions? Madam President? Ms. Vann? I move the Board of Trustees approves the waiver for alternate seventh grade reading instruments requirement. Second.
I have a motion by Ms. Vann, a second by Mr. Keller that the Board of Trustees approves the waiver for alternate seventh grade reading instruments requirement. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Thank you so much. Next agenda item 7.12 discuss and consider board approval for the remote homebound instruction waiver. Mr. Graham.
Madam President, Superintendent, Dr. Gagorski and the board. I just want to briefly discuss with you item 7.12 for your consideration is discuss and consider the board approval of remote homebound instruction waiver and so let me tell you just a little bit of background on this right now we are in a model where we are teaching all kids remotely at least for the first three weeks of the school year we have a certain percentage of our population our special education children who receive services through homebound which we we actually send, for those at home, we actually send teachers out to the home to work with kids on a variety of issues, special education related. Earlier in the month, August, actually, the 13th of this month, TEA came out with some guidance and updated their guidance related to homebound instruction and waivers. Specifically, what I'm bringing forth to you, under local policy BF and your legal policy BF, waivers are required to come to this board that you're gonna send to TEA, specifically related to attendance. So all we're doing here is saying, hey board, will you give us permission to waive certain provisions of homebound instruction remotely so that we can go ahead and account them in our attendance practices for the first three weeks while we're all remote and online. I'm happy to take any questions that the board may have on this issue.
Are there any questions, board members?
Madam President? Ms. Champagne? Thank you Mr. Graham. So I'm a little bit familiar with the homebound program as it pertains to children who have cancer or something like that. But with the special ed, who can qualify? I mean what are the parameters of a child being able to qualify for that? I'm just curious.
Well, so again, every special education kiddo is governed by an individual educational plan. So we really look at what it is that may be within the student's disability or qualification that may qualify for them for homebound. Some of them will be medically related, like you would say. Some of them may be behavior related or maybe the circumstances that are required. But again, what we're talking about here is not a change in program and not a change in placement. What we're saying is, hey, Board, we'd like to allow us to seek a waiver to credit their attendance while we're doing it remotely. And, again, we anticipate being back in schools September 8th, and that will be the end of the waiver. But I did want to bring that forward to you for your consideration tonight.
Thank you. Are there any other questions? Madam President. Ms. Vann.
I move the Board of Trustees approves the waiver for remote homebound instruction. Second.
I have a motion by Ms. Vann, a second by Mr. Lacey, I see that the Board of Trustees approves the waiver for remote homebound construction. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. 7.13, discuss and consider Board approval of the Operation Connectivity Interlocal Agreement with Region 4. Dr. Alaune.
Madam President, Dr. Groski and Trustees, I recommend that the Board of Trustees approves the Operation Connectivity interlocal agreement with Region 4. Operation Connectivity is a state effort through TEA to help provide Texas students with a device and internet connection. connection. The program will provide matching funds or reimbursement for districts to facilitate the new purchases of devices and hotspots during the pandemic. To take advantage of this program and qualify for potential matching or reimbursement funds, Katy ISD must sign
this interlocal agreement with Region 4. Are there any questions, board members? Madam
Madam President, I also wanted to speak on this topic. This is an item that kudos to Dr. Arlani and his group for hopping on it immediately. It is something that required the signature of your superintendent prior to us actually being able to vote on it tonight. So I will remind the board that as you vote on this issue tonight, I'm also asking you to ratify the actions taken by your administration towards this end. so just so our public knows that your vote tonight is going to ratify your superintendent's actions previously to get the ball rolling a little sooner.
Thank you, Mr. Graham. Are there any questions, board members?
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the Operation Connectivity Interlocal Agreement with Region 4. Second.
I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Ms. Vann, that the Board of Trustees approves the Operation Connectivity Interlocal Agreement with Region 4. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. All those opposed, motion passes. Thank you, Dr. Launay. 7.14, discuss and consider board approval for the purchase of major software support services annual renewals for the 2020-2021 school year. Mr. Christofferson.
Sorry. You got it. Good evening, President Doyle, Dr. Grigorski, and board members. It is recommended that the Board of Trustees KDIC's approves a renewal of software support and services above $250,000 for the 2020-2021 school year. The total cost is not to exceed the budgeted amount of $3,662,932. The funding for these services are part of the previously approved general operating fund. The following KDIC software renewals are needed for KDIC to maintain operations of computers, student information systems, financial systems, phone systems, employee time reporting, as as well as instructional tools needed for special education and reading intervention. The products listed pertain to the contracts that exceed $250,000 and is not all-inclusive.
Are there any questions, Board members?
Ms. Pham. I move that Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the software support services above $250,000 for the 2020-2021 school year as presented by Administration.
I have a motion by Ms. Vann, a second by Mr. Keller that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of software support services above $250,000 for the 2020-2021 school year as presented by administration. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. All those opposed, motion passes. Thank you so much. 7.15, discuss and consider board approval for the renewal of the contract with American Logistics Company ALC for specific alternative transportation. Welcome Mr.
Verling, Mr. Landis. Good evening President Doyle, board members and Dr. Gorgorski. Tonight we are recommending the approval of a contract with American Logistics Company ALC to provide alternative transportation for the district's qualifying displaced students who reside outside the district boundaries as well as for students with unique transportation requirements that that are not able to be met through standard bus routing. The McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act compels a district to provide transportation for homeless children meeting certain qualifications. If the child qualifies to attend Katy ISD, the district is bound to provide transportation services even if the child lives outside the district boundaries. The district utilizes ALC for homeless students as well as students in unique situations in which the district is not able to provide transportation through the standard bus routing. This service allows the district to free up drivers to be utilized on regular routes with multiple campus runs each day. American Logistics Company is a purchasing cooperative vendor specializing in specific transportation needs and used by many area districts to provide this service. During the 2018-2019 school year the cost of this service was $644,857.50. The 2018-2019 school year is being used as a standard year benchmark as it was was not impacted by a hurricane or a pandemic.
Those good old days, right?
The last normal year.
Right. Are there any questions, board members? OK, I'll entertain a motion.
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the contract with American Logistics Company, ALC, to provide alternative transportation for the district's qualifying displaced students who reside outside the district boundaries, as well as for students with unique transportation requirements that are not able to be met through standard bus routing.
I have a motion by Mr. Lacey, a second by Ms. Vann, that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the contract with American Logistics Company, ALC, to provide alternative transportation for the district's qualifying displaced students who reside outside the district boundaries, as well as for students with unique transportation requirements that are not able to be met through standard bus routing. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor please raise your right hand and say aye. All those opposed motion passes. Thank you both. Thank you. 7.16 discuss and consider board authorization for the superintendent to form a naming advisory committee for the purpose of proposing a name for junior high number 17 per board policy CW local. Dr. Gorgorski we were asking you to, not you, sorry, authorization for the superintendent you to form this naming committee that's you yes you authorized me and we authorized you and you formed the committee i'll entertain a motion board members madam president miss van oh
sorry i have a question i'm sorry you have a question yes and dr gregor c i would like to be considered on the naming committee if it hasn't already been i've been on the board for two and a
half years and i haven't been online yet miss champaign the board president assigns the board
Okay, then I'm sorry, Madam President. I apologize about that. That's okay. And I would like to ask you then. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Vann?
I move the Board of Trustees authorizes the superintendent to form a naming advisory committee for the purpose of proposing a name for junior high number 17. Second.
I have a motion by Ms. Vann, a second by Mr. Lacey, that the Board of Trustees authorizes the superintendent to form a naming advisory committee for the purpose of proposing a name for junior high number 17. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor, please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes.
Madam President.
Mr. Lacey.
I interject here just for a quick moment. I've noticed for the last several months that we've been calling the old L.D. Robinson Pavilion the old L.D. Robinson Pavilion. And I would like to propose, if we could, to suggest that perhaps we task the superintendent at a future date, because we can't do it now, to have that renamed as well.
That, if you want to add that to the agenda, then that would be something we can look at.
Yep.
Thank you, Mr. Lacey.
Thank you.
Agenda item 7.17, discuss and consider board approval of the minutes of the July 2020 board meeting.
Madam President. Ms. Vann. I move the Board of Trustees approves the minutes of the board meeting held in July 2020.
Second. I have a motion by Ms. Vann, a second by Mr. Redmond that the Board of Trustees approves the minutes of the board meeting held in July 2020. We will now proceed to vote. All those in favor please raise your right hand and say aye. Aye. All those opposed, motion passes. Discussion 8.1, discuss and consider future board adoption of policy update 115. Ms. Ashborn, welcome.
Thank you, President Doyle, members of the board, and Dr. Grigorski. As you know, board policy BF requires that proposed local policies introduced and recommended to the board at one meeting shall not be adopted until a subsequent meeting. So tonight will serve as this first reading for update 115. This update includes policies affected by the 86th legislative session that were not included in the previous update 114, as well as many changes from revised administrative code rules. Additionally, the focus on updating and reorganizing policies address the student welfare and mental health provisions, and several policies have been updated to incorporate new Title IX regulations. These policies will be presented to you again at the next meeting for your adoption. Do you have any questions at this time?
Are there any questions, Board members? There's none. Thank you so much. 8.2, discuss the revised order calling for a regular election of the school board trustees to be held on November 3, 2020, and authorization of the administration to provide official notice of the election as required by Texas Election Code. The revision is made pursuant to the proclamation issued by Governor Greg Abbott expanding the early voting period from Tuesday, October 13, 2020, instead of Monday, October 19, 2020, through Friday, October 30, 2020. Mr. Graham.
Chair Greg Musil. Trustee's you'll see that this is a discussion slash information item for you tonight because I'm not asking you to take action. Rather you took action at the last board meeting which is the last board meeting you could have taken action on ordering the election. As you will recall members of our community will recall the election in May for trustees for three of our trustees positions was ordered by the governor to be pushed to this November. and so now that coincides with a presidential election and because it is in November we are required to contract with our counties in order to hold the election we can't hold it ourselves like we traditionally do in May so we've been working with Harris County and Fort Wayne County County and trying to work with Waller County on getting those polling locations and early voting information out. So what I've done is on the item that's posted online that anybody can go visit is publicly I'm trying to update you as quick as I can about what are the polling sites going to be, what are the hours going to be so that everybody has a copy of it. Of course this will be published in the local newspaper and posted as required by law. I just in the spirit of this is a little bit unusual of course all things are a little bit unusual when they get pushed like this in the spirit of transparency I wanted to bring that to this board's attention in case you had any questions and also so that our community could see it if if they showed if they so choose I'm happy to take any
questions madam president mr. Lacey I do have just a few brief questions just approximately how much of a difference I saw I guess we really should probably break it down about how much does it cost for us to when we run the election in May as opposed to how much we're going to be footing the bill for in November?
Okay so I've looked historically at our last three elections now. Since the creation of my office one of the duties that I took under my wing is official elections administrator from the district. We had a person and administrator in that position almost full-time. We've done away with that position and my office has absorbed it. So to answer your question, we have been able to get those fees down. We're paying last in 2019 in May we paid $93,000 but we're averaging about $100,000 of cost to run our own election in May.
And then how much is it how much are we being charged by the various counties? If we were to just take a wild, I don't want to say wild guess, but an educated guess as to about how much we are going to be incurring and I have a follow-up question with that Mr. Smith will probably be able to answer that one.
Sure so I don't have to take a guess I know those exact numbers in our 2017 bond election which is November and it was not in a midterm election so a November election that's not heavily attended we spent a hundred and forty seven thousand dollars to order that bond election that's those numbers are pretty standard. Now bear in mind that this is a presidential election so it is your most highly attended election and your governor has ordered your early voting period to be expanded. You're also going to have some additional costs related to personal protective equipment, some safety protocols that are being put in place next to COVID. So our price tag, what we're estimating it at, and this is just considering the Harris County and Fort Wayne County numbers, is about $450,000, $440,000. So that would be about three times, three and a half times the cost of 2017, about four times the cost of what it probably would have cost us to run our election in May. Now, I'll remind those who are fiscally cautious and paying attention to this that we did not have an option. If we could have held our election in May, that would have been a decision for this board to have but the governor ordered us to move it to november so the additional cost that that is on there um is something that we're ordered to do now i will tell you if i break those numbers down i looked at specifically um what did fort ben county charge us in uh 2017 for our bond and compare that out and so they charge us about eleven thousand dollars and to run this election they're gonna charge us about $24,000. So about twice the number, a little over twice the number. That seems probably that seems like a good number to me considering we're expanding early voting and we're also gonna have a higher voter turnout. I want to also compare that to Harris County. Now Harris County in 2017 they charged us $96,000. Now their estimate is $420,000. So that is a 400% increase from 2017. I think that they are really concerned about a high price tag. Now, again, those are just estimates. And we're going to go ahead and pay our deposit because we're not in a position where we can cancel it. And hopefully those numbers come in below that. But again, I will tell you that's due to an increase, a large increase in the number of early voting locations within the county and also the increase of the scope I think voter disenfranchisement is a is a large concern and so I think everybody to include our district in the counties that we're working with is is trying to pay special attention to and provide voting opportunities to the best extent that we can does that answer your
question it does as a follow-up and mr. Smith you may know this because this is and was required by the governor, and it is because of COVID, are any of those additional costs reimbursable under different federal programs or state programs?
Okay, there we go. I do not think so. So we are learning about the opportunities for reimbursements for just PP&E and the opportunities that may or may not be out there. At this point in time, if I had to guess, I would say no, they would not be reimbursable. But that's yet to be seen as everything becomes a little bit more focused as we move on down the calendar year.
I will piggyback on what Mr. Smith said. There may be an opportunity for us to recapture some pennies. the next time y'all go about setting your budget and your tax rate because we will have specific expenditures related to COVID. But my guess is that this is going to be on top of whatever number we're already going to have.
You took my thunder. I was going to ask if we could look into either the golden penny or even the copper pennies as well. Thanks a lot. I appreciate it.
Madam President, Ms. Champagne. Okay. On these early voting areas, locations, and so you have everything listed for Houston or Harris County, I should say. So obviously our school board people aren't going to be on, I don't know, Walters Road, for example.
Okay.
Are you going to provide any kind of condensed something so that our people can know where to go vote just for the KDISD?
Sure. Sure. So I think that that's a good, I think that's a very good question because you're going to see a large list of polling locations in Harris County. Number one, we will publish that and we will have it available on our website because the way that the counties work, both Fort Bend and Harris County, if you vote in any place in Harris County, you can vote in KDIC. So let's say we have an employee of ours that works in the ship channel and wants to go to can go to an early voting location Early voting location in Deer Park, for example, they'll be able to find a KDISD ballot there and check their ballot there However, I think what you're asking is what are the voting locations which are in the territorial jurisdiction of KDISD? And I do think that that is information that we are going to publish out to our voters because it's a little different, guys. And again, this is the reason I wanted to bring this item forward is just in the super interest of transparency. But I think that that's a great idea and something that we had already had our eye on publishing.
Are there any other questions? Okay. Thank you, Mr. Graham. Next, Agenda Item 9.1, Certification of Anticipated Tax Collection Rates for 2020-2021. The Board was provided information regarding the certification of anticipated tax collection rates for 2020-2021. 9.2, the Board was provided a copy of the 2020 appraisal district budgets. 9.3, the Board was provided a copy of donated items to KDISD. Agenda item 10.1, regular board meeting. The next regular board meeting will be held on Monday, September 28, 2020. There being no further business before the Board, this meeting is adjourned. The time is 7.44 p.m. Thank you.
Official documents
About the underlying data (7 notes)
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Motions and votes
Recorded actions
MOTION 001 · AGENDA 7.1
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the 2019-2020 final amended budget for the Katy Independent School District.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 002 · AGENDA 7.2
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the resolution to commit and assign fund balance.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 003 · AGENDA 7.3
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the 2020-2021 State Compensatory Education funding and other End-of-Course Assessment funding budget, as required by House Bill 5.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 004 · AGENDA 7.4
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees adopts the 2020-2021 official budget for Katy Independent School District.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 005 · AGENDA 7.5
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the District's June 2020 financial reports.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 006 · AGENDA 7.6
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the Interlocal Participation Agreement for the administration of workers compensation claims with TASB Risk Management Fund for the period September 1, 2020 through August 31, 2021.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 007 · AGENDA 7.7
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the Excess Workers' Compensation Reinsurance Policy offered by Mid-West Casualty Company with a $550,000 specific retention for and estimated deposit premium of $85,000.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 008 · AGENDA 7.8
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the Voluntary Benefits products for Plan Year 2021.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 009 · AGENDA 7.9
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the Resolution approving the issuance by the Katy Development Authority of its Katy Development Authority (KDA) Tax Increment Contract Revenue Bonds, Katy Independent School District Contract, Series 2020.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 010 · AGENDA 7.10
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the District Performance Objectives.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 011 · AGENDA 7.11
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the waiver for Alternate Seventh-grade Reading Instruments Requirement.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 012 · AGENDA 7.12
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the waiver for Remote Homebound Instruction.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 013 · AGENDA 7.13
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the Operation Connectivity interlocal agreement with Region 4.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 014 · AGENDA 7.14
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of software support services above $250,000 for the 2020 - 2021 school year. The total cost is not to exceed the budgeted amount of $3,662,932. The funding for these services is part of the previously approved General Operating Fund (GOF).
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 015 · AGENDA 7.15
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approve the renewal of the contract with American Logistics Company (ALC) to provide alternative transportation for the District's qualifying displaced students who reside outside the District boundaries, as well as for students with unique transportation requirements that are not able to be met through standard bus routing.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 016 · AGENDA 7.16
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the superintendent to form a naming advisory committee for the purpose of proposing a name for Junior High #17 per Board Policy CW(LOCAL).
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |
MOTION 017 · AGENDA 7.17
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the minutes of the Board meeting held in July 2020.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| ashley-vann | Yes |
| bill-lacy | Yes |
| courtney-doyle | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| duke-keller | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| susan-gesoff | Yes |