Good afternoon. Noting that a quorum is present, I hereby call this work-study
Katy ISD · Work Study Meeting
Katy ISD Work Study Meeting, February 17, 2025
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In this meeting
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- 0:02 to 0:32 1. Call to Order
- 0:32 to 1:18 2. Pledges of Allegiance
- 1:18 to 7:59 3. Oath of Office
- 7:59 to 13:07 4. Public Comment
- 13:07 to 13:29 5. Closed Meeting
- 13:29 to 14:19 6. Reconvene from Closed Meeting
- 14:19 to 30:39 7. Reports
- 30:39 to 32:41 8.1 Discuss and consider an Order Authorizing the Issuance of Katy Independent School District Unlimited Tax School Building and/or Refunding Bonds, as Term Rate Bonds and/or Fixed Rate Bonds in one or more series; setting certain parameters for the bonds; authorizing a Pricing Officer to approve the amount, the interest rate, price, including the terms thereof; and certain other procedures and provisions related thereto.
- 32:41 to 33:50 8.2 Discuss and consider Board approval of a Resolution Expressing Intent to Defease/Redeem Certain of the District's Outstanding Bonds.
- 33:50 to 34:57 8.3 Discuss and consider Board approval of the Resolution Declaring Intention to Reimburse Project Expenditures.
- 34:57 to 44:33 8.4 Discuss and consider Board Approval of the December 2024 Financial Reports.
- 44:33 to 45:37 8.5 Discuss and consider Board approval of the February 2025 budget amendments.
- 45:37 to 48:39 8.6 Discuss and consider Board Approval of the 2025-2026 Property Insurance Program.
- 48:39 to 53:09 8.7 Discuss and consider Board approval of the renewal of the Texas Association of School Boards (TASB) Risk Management Fund Casualty Program for Plan Year 2025-2026.
- 53:09 to 56:13 8.8 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment Two to the Stewart Builders, LLC. contract related to the comprehensive renovations at Bear Creek Elementary School.
- 56:13 to 59:27 8.9 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment Two to the Anslow Bryant LTD. contract related to the renovation at Katy Junior High School.
- 59:27 to 1:00:55 8.10 Discuss and consider Board approval of the plat for Taylor High School.
- 1:00:55 to 1:12:47 8.11 Discuss and consider Board approval of the proposal for a contracted bus driver service.
- 1:12:47 to 1:14:20 8.12 Discuss and consider Board approval of the proposed summer work schedule.
- 1:14:20 to 1:18:48 8.13 Discuss and consider Board approval to award the Request for Proposal "RFP" 2328AA Print Shop Management of Katy ISD Printing Services to meet the immediate and long-term printing and graphic design needs for the district.
- 1:18:48 to 1:20:17 8.14 Discuss and consider Board approval to award the Request for Proposal "RFP" 2329AA Maintenance and Service for Katy ISD Copier Fleet to provide maintenance and repair services for the district owned copier fleet.
- 1:20:17 to 1:23:09 Items 8.15 & 8.16
- 1:23:09 to 1:27:40 8.17 Discuss and consider the refund of Katy Rotary Endowment Scholarship.
- 1:27:40 to 2:11:31 8.18 Discuss and consider update to Board policy CW Local.
- 2:11:31 to 2:12:34 9. Information Items
- 2:12:34 to 2:12:50 10. Future Meetings
Full transcript
Automated transcript, not human verified. It is a way to find a passage, not a quotation.
1. Call to Order
meeting of the Board of Trustees of Katy Independent School District to order.
Today is Monday, February 17, 2025 and the time is 5 p.m. Dr. Gorgorski, will you
verify that we're in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meetings
Act with regard to this the notice for this meeting? Mr. Perez, I do confirm we're
We're in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meeting Act for a meeting tonight.
2. Pledges of Allegiance
Thank you.
KDFT Police Officer Sergeant Clarence Howard will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.
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.
Honored in Texas flag, I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state, under God, one and indivisible.
3. Oath of Office
Superintendent Dr. Ken Gregorski will swear in our new KDISD Chief of Police, David Ryder.
Thank you, Mr. Perez.
I'm going to read a quick bio, and then I'm going to come down there for the swearing in.
But this evening, we're looking forward to swearing in Chief David Ryder.
He's a 34-year law enforcement veteran with a distinguished career in public education and policing.
David most recently served as chief police for Fort Bend ISD, a post he held since 2010.
Prior to that, he was assistant police chief for Austin ISD, where he served for nearly 13 years.
He began his tenure in law enforcement in Kingsville, joining as a patrol officer in 1991 before being promoted to corporal, serving there until 1997.
Chief Ryder earned his undergraduate degree in psychology from Texas A&I University in Kingsville.
He also attended the Bill Blackwood Leadership Command College, and he earned a master's degree in criminal justice management from Sam Houston State.
David's extensive expertise in school-based law enforcement and leadership in large-scale ISDs is unparalleled in our region.
We look forward to his service and his work with our police department, our students, staff, and families.
So welcome, David.
Thank you.
I ask that you make out of the murder to Solomon Square,
where I will make you a duty of the U.S. Department of Defense,
Office of Chief of Police,
and Office of the State of the Independent Police,
and the U.S. Department of Defense.
I will, to the best of my ability,
reserve the right to the independent police
and the U.S. Department of Defense.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Congratulations.
Congratulations.
I don't see any scouts in the audience.
Do we have any scouts in the audience?
No?
Okay.
At this time, the Board of Trustees will give members of the public.
If I may interrupt.
Yeah, go ahead.
We missed one thing in there.
Chief Ryder, you're going to swear in a new officer tonight now?
Okay, because that's the chief's role, so come on up.
That was just another one we had.
And, Chief, I left the card right down there.
Unless you've got that memorized.
I've got it memorized.
Okay, all right.
I don't.
Okay, President Perez, members of the board, Dr. Gagorski,
I'd like to introduce our new officer, Taylor Seals.
Officer Seals is a native of Texas who was born and raised in the Houston area
until she graduated from Westside High School in 2010.
Officer Seals is engaged to Brandon Amstead
and has two children, Tylan and Jabriana.
Officer Seals and her family have called Katie home
for over 10 years now.
In 2017, after working for the Harris County Jail
for two years, she decided to join the Police Academy.
Officer Seals graduated from the Harris County Sheriff's Office
Police Academy in May of 2019.
19. Officer Seals worked as a deputy sheriff for five years before finding a home here at KDISD.
Officer Seals has a total of seven years of law enforcement experience and holds an intermediate
peace officer proficiency certificate from the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement. Officer
Seals is currently assigned as the campus officer at Taylor High School and hopes to continue to
learn and grow with the KDISD Police Department and is excited to see what the future holds.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
4. Public Comment
This time, the Board of Trustees will give members of the public an opportunity to speak
in accordance with KDISD Board Policy BED Local.
As defined by Board Policy, speakers who signed up by 2 p.m. on Monday, February 17, 2025,
provided their first and last name and signed in 15 minutes prior to 5 p.m. will be allowed
to address the Board.
Speakers who signed up to speak on posted agenda items will be allowed three minutes
to speak.
If a speaker has not finished speaking at the end of their three minutes, the audio
will turn off.
If speakers wish to share written material with the Board, please provide 10 copies to
the Secretary for Board Services before the meeting begins 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 officers designee shall advise the
speaker to seek resolution through the appropriate policy finally pursuant to
Texas government code sections five five one point zero seven four and five five
one point zero eight two one the board will not permit the presentation of
personally identifiable information regarding a student who will not discuss
the appointment employment evaluation reassignment duties discipline or
dismissal of a public officer or employee or hear a complaint or charge
against an officer or employee so the speaker wish to address one of these
issues they must do so through the appropriate local grievance policies F
and G local D GBA local CKE local and GF local our speakers will be called
forward in the order they signed up to speak and tonight we have one speaker
Tana Weiss.
Welcome.
Good evening, Dr. Grugorski and Board.
My name is Tana Weiss and I'm speaking about Agenda Item 8.18.
Thanks to Mr. Spellman of Covering Katy News, the community was able to see the concerns Ms.
Kazella and Ms. Calhoun have regarding the need for a new school district in the area.
naming process for our schools. I'd like to address those concerns. Some of our
current school board members, oh let's face it, the quad, are not part of the
school community and don't know and or don't care about the history and
legacies in KDISD. Suggested namesakes consistently have rich histories and
ties to KDISD. As you concentrate on book banning and pronouns, you have no
idea who the people in your district are. I clearly remember Kristen Harper, one
one half of the dynamic duo that serve
as the assistant superintendents
of elementary school leadership and support
was speaking and Ms. Cuzela had no idea who she was.
Cuzela's response was, excuse me, who are you?
FYI, the Weiss boys had Deb Hubbell and Kristen Harper
as principals at Roosevelt Alexander Elementary
over 20 years ago.
I assume you all at least know Mr. Alexander.
It is evident that the Quad has made no effort
to even find out who the people in this room are. The people who are responsible
for the daily operations of the district, the staff it employs, and the students it
serves. The people in this room who have to sit through two endless meetings a
month that last and last and last. You have no regard for their time and it is
embarrassing how little you seem to think of them. As someone who has lived
in this district for 33 years I am proud that our district has been able to
achieve award-winning status year after year and continues to be listed in top
schools in state and nationwide lists somehow without the micromanaging book
banning petty pronoun police quad and how did we ever navigate the naming
process in two hours because school board members actually sent their
children to our schools and knew the community and the staff involved in our
district they participated in the naming process with actual understanding and
appreciation for the history of this district and those who contributed more
years skills and time than most of you ever will naming committees are also not
not only made up of board members.
It's so interesting that now James Cross,
who is running for school board, it's a problem,
and he's running for the position currently held by Mr. Perez.
Interesting timing, and once again,
the community sees who you people really are,
who you serve, who you are beholden to.
Simply put, we are over it.
Thank you.
Thank you.
This concludes the open forum portion of our meeting.
5. Closed 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, 551.074, and 551.129.
6. Reconvene from Closed Meeting
The Board will now reconvene and open meeting.
meeting. Today is Monday, February 17, 2025, and the time is 5.48 p.m. On behalf of my
colleagues, I welcome everyone to this evening's work-study meeting. Each board member received
the agenda and documentation for this meeting on Friday, February 14, 2025. The board will
receive information and recommendations from staff, administration, and the superintendent
attended 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
the board has this reconvened from closed meeting in accordance with
chapter 551 of the Texas government code any action arising from discussions and
a closed meeting was we taken in an open meeting our first item is 7.1 which is a
7. Reports
2025-2026 budget update. Presenter is Chris Smith, Chief Financial Officer, and
Jeff Robert of Hilltop Securities. All right, well good evening Mr. Perez,
Superintendent Gorgorski, and trustees. Here to talk to you about the debt
service budget. This is an annual thing in February that we talk about. There's not
as many moving parts as our big general fund budget, so it's a little easier to
talk about and we really won't talk about it again until July as we start
bringing everything together but before I get started in that I wanted to show
this slide and talk to you just for maybe a minute about it because there's
been it's not misinformation at all it's just unclear information about the way
the state spends per student and you know I think the number that TDA's
published was 15,000 or more than $15,000 and that is a true statement but
But I wanted to show this, and that shows in the little group of numbers above with the red or the maroon is the state average.
And they spend $15,905, again, over $15,000.
But for maintenance and operations, it's only those two maroon bars or about $10,415 per student.
And that's what we have local say over when it comes to our expenditures.
The debt service fund, yes, that's a local expenditure, and we have say over that, but it's not for operations.
Federal grants are not for our normal operations.
And the state TRS, that $487, if you'll remember, I highlight that during our budget process in a certain color and say that's offset by expenditures exactly.
Exactly. That's never cash that goes in and out of our coffers.
It's just recording from an accounting standpoint,
because that is the amount the state puts in towards TRS.
We just show it as an expense.
So it's really not money that our district has say over.
What we have say over when it comes to operating our schools,
operating our schools, is on a state average $10,415.
And for Katy ISD specifically, it's less than that.
ten thousand two hundred twenty two dollars and i just wanted to clear that up uh because i know
i have people call me we spend fifteen thousand no we yes we do but not for operations when you
include everything and then not spend it's it's revenue we don't have fifteen thousand dollars
per student in revenue we we uh we get about ten thousand two hundred twenty two that includes
obviously state funding, local taxes, ticket sales to our football games, et cetera,
interest income, miscellaneous donations, those type of things are what that is at $10,222 per student.
So I wanted to start off with that.
Now I'm going to move on to our timeline.
February, here we are at the long-term debt plan.
Mr. Jeff Robert from Hilltop Securities is here and he's going to give the meat and potatoes of this presentation.
But I'm just going to lead off by kind of setting the stage for Mr. Robert.
And he's going to also reiterate this table here, which is going back to 2010-11, our property value growth.
We're a growing district.
And so we're adding new homes and new businesses that support those homes every year.
In addition to reappraisals.
So that's been, that's what those increases look like from a number standpoint.
But from a graph standpoint, that's what they look like.
And I wanted to point out with that white line that over five years we've averaged 8.3%,
and over 15 years we've averaged 8.1%.
And I wanted to show that to you because there are ebbs and flows.
There's been years where it's been less than 2% or less than 3%.
But Mr. Roberts' projections that he's using for our debt service fund is at 3%.
And I think we're trying to be conservative, and I think that just shows we're being very conservative at 3% value growth when we've averaged 8.3% over the last five years.
And, of course, we know our tax rate has reduced a large part.
Thank you to the state of Texas when they bought down the tax rate through House Bill 3 back in 2019 and again in 2021 and yet again in 2023, a 32-cent reduction in tax rate.
As homeowners, it's been great because it offsets the value of our appreciation.
And again, appreciation in our home values, we don't like, but it's also a good thing because that means that our investment in our home, most of our biggest investments, is growing like somebody's investing in the stock market, et cetera.
So that's a good thing.
But the state's using that surplus to buy down that tax rate.
It's not putting money in our classrooms, but it is helping the taxpayer out, which is important.
And I appreciate the state of Texas for doing that.
So I'm going to bring up Mr. Robert.
Again, Jeff Robert is with Hilltop Securities, our municipal advisor.
Used to be the financial advisor, and he's right behind me.
So I'll turn it over to you, Jeff.
Thank you, Mr. Smith.
President Perez, members of the board, Dr. Grigorski, Jeff Robert with Hilltop Securities.
Also with us today is Rick Witte with Jackson Walker Law Firm, the district's bond attorney,
who's prepared all of the legal documents, so I'll yield any legal questions to him.
But before we start with potential future financial information, I want to talk about
the financings that we did this past year with KDISD.
And so this first slide is a recap of the $250 million of authorization that was sold
in the summer of this past year.
Interest rate on that in red, you can see, was a 4.1269.
It's actually a good time in the market that day.
If you look at the highlights, you can see that the underwriters were able to generate
two and a half times subscription of orders, meaning that they were two and a half times
over and above that $250 million that they were able to secure, which resulted in us
lowering yields and achieving that 4.12% interest rate.
We also, late last year, as a matter of fact, it was a week of Thanksgiving, we did a refunding
in which we refunded bonds from, I believe it was the district series 2015 issues in
In blue there, you can see with the yellow,
we achieved a 7.762 present value savings percentage.
The minimum level that the order allows for is 3%.
And when you're higher than that,
that means the savings was much more efficient at a higher
level.
So we were very happy with that.
If you go to the bottom right, the total savings
on that refinancing was $27.4 million.
Initially, we were going to price the issue
in about mid-October, but rates kind of jumped on us.
And so we hit the brakes a little bit,
and we're able to to wait and be patient and achieve over and above the 27 million dollar
figure that you see there and then we also did a couple of cash redemptions meaning paying off some
of your bonds early we paid off 3 million 335 the series 2018 issue in february of this past year
and then we paid off seven million dollars of the district's variable rate issue the two
2021 c in august and you can see the the interest saved a little bit on the 2018 and then 6.6 million
on the 2021c so the total principal and interest reduction that you see there was about what is
about 17 million dollars and then if you look back to all of the redemptions the early redemptions
that we've done since august of 17 you've reduced total debt service by 112 million dollars over
that time and you can see the breakdown between principal and interest mr smith had mentioned you
know we try to be very conservative i hope you can see this all right try to be very conservative
with our tax base assumptions when it comes to structuring new debt as well as the debt that we currently have outstanding.
So in the light blue there, you can see we're assuming 3%, then 2% for a couple years, and then 1%.
The one thing I will point out there at the bottom is that, as you might be aware,
they're considering increasing the homestead exemption by $40,000, which would be good for taxpayers.
But we do need to be wary of that because that does eliminate value from the tax roll.
So while we hope these are very, very conservative, the increases in the exemption make it probably a little bit tighter than it normally would be.
So as it relates to the 2023 authorization, as I mentioned, we issued the first $250 million there in column two this past summer.
We're looking at the potential for issuing another $250 million this summer and then the remaining balance over the next two years.
You can see $250 million and then the remaining $56 million, I believe it is, after that.
Those numbers could certainly change, but that's the projection right now.
The black line on the graph shows what the projected INS tax rate would be for all of your existing debt,
including that Series 2024 issue that we did.
And then the blue represents the projected INS tax rate after the issuance of this entire authorization.
And that's, again, using those tax-based assumptions that you saw on the prior page.
On the next slide, we don't always, aren't always just looking at the next issuance or even the remaining of the authorization.
We want to kind of see where you might be in the future as it relates to a potential new authorization.
So the top line that you see above there is the same that you saw on the prior page, but we just said,
what if we hypothetically looked at an $850 million election in 2027 with those very conservative assumptions?
would we still be able to maintain that current INS tax rate?
And that green line represents that.
So you would have the ability to do $850 million without any problem
as it relates to capacity for a future issuance or authorization.
Interest rates, this has been popular.
I know a lot of folks feel like interest rates are at very high levels right now.
This is what I call the bond buyer 20-year index.
So this is a 20-year interest rate, long-term tax-exempt interest rates.
It comes out every Thursday.
And in the white graph there in the background,
that goes all the way back to the early 80s,
back when tax-exempt interest rates were actually above 13%.
And if you go over to the far right, you can see where we are now.
And you can kind of see that trough there, which I always call the COVID rates.
And we're certainly higher than what those COVID rates were
when we got down to 2% on a tax-exempt 20-year rate.
But we're still, from a historical perspective,
still at a fairly favorable time in terms of where interest rates are.
The time of this presentation when we put it together was at 4.13%.
Since then, it's actually gone down to 4.06.
So it's a little bit lower than the 4.03, excuse me, 1.3 that you see there in red.
And then the blue graph just shows what this index has done over the last year.
So the parameters that Mr. Witte has prepared, the new money issuance parameter,
We're actually talking about issuance of up to $450 million.
I mentioned $250 million, and I'll talk about that in just a second,
but the 30-year maximum term.
The refunding parameter, as we've done in the past,
any refundings would need to produce a minimum of 3% present value savings.
The redemption slash defeasance parameter, we can do up to $30 million,
which would give us the ability to pay off bonds early.
And then the reimbursement resolution up to $100 million
just gives the district the flexibility to utilize general fund monies
and then reimburse itself with bond monies depending on the timing of receipt of bond funds.
So the reason we've talked about the potential for doing a little bit more
is that that increase in the homestead exemption might result, if you go over to column six,
projected to result in about a $3.4 billion reduction in the tax base.
If it's advantageous financially for the district to issue more bonds this summer
after legislation is finished and approved then that's what we'll look to
do if not then we will look at just doing the the other 250 million dollars
so the only way we do more than the 250 that I mentioned is if it's going to be
advantageous to the district and we also wanted to make sure would we even be
able to do 450 million and so this graph shows that yes even after reducing our
tax base projections by that 3.4 billion dollar figure we can still issue 450
million and stay at the 39 cent INS tax rate. I know I flew through that fairly
quickly if there's any any questions I'd be happy to answer. Questions trustees?
Mr. Perez? Ms. Champagne? Hello nice to see you again and I really appreciate the
quick trip that you made last Tuesday and you came from Dallas and all that
and you got there just in time running two or three minutes late with me so anyway that was good
um for me anyway i also wanted to tell you i appreciate this information i guess mr smith has
provided the information it's called asa he and it's additional state aid for homestead exemption
so i know the public isn't looking at this like i i have been looking at this but what i want to
know is is this something that has to be is it a law or is it something that we have to keep voting
on and like every time i mean is this is is this a thing in our law or is this something that so it
is a law it's it's it's in the law and there's there's some different aspects to what i call
asahi that acronym for instance all authorizations prior to september 1st of 23 received asahi money
for their authorizations prior to that date and so they're talking about okay
since that time and since we're talking about a new increase in the homestead
exemption what if anything will they hold harmless for the increase in the
homestead exemption going up $40,000 so right now that's what's being discussed
at the state level and it is you know based upon the law whether or not bond
issues existing in future will qualify for that hold harmless funding so they
Do they have to rediscuss it every time there's a change in the homestead exemption?
Yes.
Yes ma'am.
Is that something that they're doing right now?
Yes.
And we won't know until?
Correct.
Until they finalize, if the bill is passed, then we'll know what the final results were.
All right.
Thank you.
It's very important information.
Yes.
So just to clarify that, the 450 versus the 250, that would depend on what the whole harmless says.
In other words, the cutoff date.
And so we may have to rush to get the 450 done so that we can get whole harmless on the entire 450,
depending upon what the new law would allow.
Yes.
If it's again if it's financially advantageous for Katie ISD
Then we'll look at it issuing the amount that makes the most financial sense for you depending on the laws written
We may just do 250 or we may have to do 450. Yes, sir. Okay
Yeah, I appreciate your meeting coming down and meeting with our Finance Committee this past week
Any other questions
Thank you very much.
All right.
And I'll just say that next month we'll be up here again to talk about it'll be the first
glance at what the 25-26 general operating fund budget looks like under current law.
That's all we'll know.
And it'll include some initial information as staffing plans start to develop.
And it may not be there yet, but what we'll be trying to do is give you all an idea of
how the landscape looks as we're starting to build.
we've already started but as we get into the middle of building the 2526 budget
thank you next we have item 8.1 our presenter again is Chris Smith
8.1 Discuss and consider an Order Authorizing the Issuance of Katy Independent School District Unlimited Tax School Building and/or Refunding Bonds, as Term Rate Bonds and/or Fixed Rate Bonds in one or more series; setting certain parameters for the bonds; authorizing a Pricing Officer to approve the amount, the interest rate, price, including the terms thereof; and certain other procedures and provisions related thereto.
discussing consider an order authorizing the issues of Katie is the limited tax
school building and a refunding bond as a term rate and or fixed rate bonds in
one or more series and these are the items that you mentioned in your
presentation setting certain parameters for the bonds authorizing a pricing
officer to approve the amount the interest rate price including the turns
are of and certain other procedures and provisions all right and this is an item
that mr. Robert mentioned that Rick Whitty from Jackson Walker our bond
One attorney's firm is here in case you all have any questions.
But item 8.1 is an order establishing the parameters of the second bond sale, the 2023 authorization.
This is the first step in a process that will take over several months until the bonds are issued.
And in your package, you have an order authorizing that sets the parameters for these bonds.
It sets Dr. Gorgorski or myself as the pricing officer to approve the amount of the sale, the interest rate, the pricing, including the terms and certain other procedures.
Again, the plan is based on our cash needs is $250 million, but it has an option in there to $450 million, as Mr. Robert just mentioned, to whatever is best advantageous to the district.
With these orders in place, we intend to select a syndicate who can help obtain the best pricing for the district and the intent to proceed with negotiated transaction.
Again, our municipal advisor, Jeff Robert, is here along with Mr. Whitty in case you have any questions.
And it would be my recommendation that the Board of Trustees approves the bond order establishing the parameters of the second bond sale of the 2023 authorization.
Thank you.
Any questions on 8.1?
8.2 Discuss and consider Board approval of a Resolution Expressing Intent to Defease/Redeem Certain of the District's Outstanding Bonds.
Move on to 8.2, which is to discuss and consider board approval of a resolution expressing intent to defease, redeem certain of the district's outstanding bonds.
Yes, sir.
In our debt plan, Mr. Robert mentioned our intent to defease up to $30 million and the success that we've had over the years defeasing those bonds as we've been able to.
We've identified more that could be defeased, but we're setting that limit at $30 million.
Again, Mr. Robert has gone through and looked at those bonds that would be best advantageous to defease should we have the ability to do so.
This has been an important part of our debt plan.
As Mr. Robert mentioned, again, we've saved $25.4 million in interest by simply paying down $87 million in principal.
Well, similar to the way we would do that with a credit card in our households, and we just save interest.
So it would be my recommendation that the Board of Trustees approve the resolution expressing the intent to defee certain of the district's outstanding bonds.
Thank you.
Any questions on 8.2?
8.3 Discuss and consider Board approval of the Resolution Declaring Intention to Reimburse Project Expenditures.
We'll move on to 8.3, which is discuss and consider board approval of the resolution declaring intention to reimburse project expenditures.
And what this is is simply there is an abundance of caution.
What we don't want to do is run out of the bond cash that we have now and then use general fund dollars
And then when we do have this transaction and we get the bond proceeds
We want to be able to reimburse the general fund those dollars
it's a technicality that gives us that ability to do so and
That way we don't have to feel like we rush a bond bond sale just to
Make sure we don't spend general fund dollars if we do spend them
This gives us the ability to pay ourselves back with those bond proceeds
And so it would be my recommendation that the Board of Trustees approve the resolution
declaring the intent to reimburse our project expenditures.
Thank you.
Any questions on 8.3?
Mr. President?
Ms. Fox?
Are any of these items time sensitive?
Do we need to approve them tonight or will next week be okay?
No need to approve them tonight.
Okay.
Any other questions?
8.4 Discuss and consider Board Approval of the December 2024 Financial Reports.
Now we move on to 8.4 to discuss and consider board approval of December 2024 financial reports.
Our presenter, Jamie Hines, Assistant Superintendent of Finance.
Good evening.
Good evening.
President Perez, Board of Trustees, Superintendent Gorkorski.
Pursuant to board policy, BAA legal and BAA local,
you have before you your financial reports for the month of December
Including your financial statements your construction report and your tax report through our fiscal month of
December as well as your check register summary for the month of December the financial statements
include expenditures
revenues and changes in fund balance through the
for all our budgeted funds as well as there's an analysis of expenditures by both function and
object included. You've also got the tax report included, which has our taxes levied, our
collections to date, and our balances yet to be collected. I'm just going to point out a few
things on our financial statements. This is through one-third of our fiscal year, so you're
looking at about 33 percent if you're comparing that to our expenditure percentages. So on that
first page of our financial statements. You'll notice we're under 33% on almost all of our functions. I just want to point out function 32, 34, and 53, which is social work services, transportation, and data processing services are the only three functions where we're above that 33%. And I just kind of wanted to walk through that really quickly. Social work services is a really small function. And so we'll be doing a functional alignment in March.
uh to bring that into alignment on a monthly basis so you'll see that um next month clear up
transportation as we've noted usually does all of its expenditures especially in payroll for the
first 10 months so it's normal for that to be one or two percent above the the normal threshold of
percentage expense and then you've got data processing services now that's at 38 percent
That's because we, as I've mentioned before, we spend most of our money in that, or we spend a lot of money on our computer contracts at the beginning of the year, our software contracts.
And so those will all kind of level out as we go from month to month.
This past month, we were 28% above the expected expenditure for that month.
This month, we're 15%.
So you can see month over month that's coming down.
In about two months, you should see it at the right level.
The other things I just kind of wanted to point out, if you, and you don't have to go to this, but I'll explain.
If you look at your overall expenditures through this month, we're at about 31.5% adjusted total expenditures, which is good.
That's under 33%.
But just everybody is aware last year we had a pretty good year in terms of expenditures.
We came in with some underspending.
So that is almost exactly in line with where we were at the exact same time last year.
We were at 31.6%.
This year we're at 31.5%.
So expenditures overall look very good.
Also, I want to just quickly bring to your attention capital expenditures.
We've got the 2021 and the 2023 authorizations there.
In the 2021, we're about $5 million to $6 million under projections currently.
and then in the 2023 authorization there's about 21 million under
projections as it stands now we've kind of talked through what what all goes
into that and there's still a lot of things going on with that but just
wanted to bring that to your attention on the tax report there's not a lot to
really go into we're only through December we're 40-something percent but
really we're in tax season now in January and February so the next two
months you'll see a lot more collections coming in and we'll start talking a
little bit more about that. That's all I have for you, but I'd be glad to answer any questions.
Any questions? Mr. President? Ms. Cuzela? Thank you. Thank you so much. The tax report,
I was looking at that. There's quite a big jump from last year to this, 2023 to 2020. Is that
what you're speaking to? Well, no, I'm actually speaking month over month, but I can explain that.
So last year, exactly what we're talking about this year, they're talking about doing another homestead exemption.
Last year, we were at the tail end of the homestead exemption, so it was voted in.
And so what happens when they do that is the tax offices don't have the constitutional amendment voted on until late in the year.
So they're actually late getting all of their tax statements out.
So it ends up we wind up getting collections starting kind of a month later this year
We didn't so you see our collections are about 15% higher at this point than they were last year
I was just really kind of stating that the next two months will be our big months for collections
Okay, okay, and and we hired and I may be misunderstanding. So please clarify
Didn't we hire a third party to help us with that process?
with our tax collecting the delinquents link collecting the Dinkins line Barger
was that going Barger Blair Gargan is our delinquent tax attorneys and then of
course we outsource tax collections for Waller and Fort Bend Waller County Fort
Bend County Tax Office collects those taxes for both Waller County and Fort
Bend County and then of course Harris County Tax Office collection for Harris
County okay so we're doing something different right we've hired someone no
No, we've always had Lime Barger.
I think they've been helping us with delinquent taxes for 30 years.
It was, I believe, an evergreen contract,
but it had come to the point that we had to do a renewal this past year.
So it seemed like it was different, but it was the same thing.
Good point, Mr. Hines.
Yes, when we redo that, we have an option to extend that, I think, three times
for three years, and that had expired.
And so we needed to kind of bring everything back to the board.
It still has that three-year deal, and so you probably won't see it again unless we're not happy with the service that they're providing.
Appreciate the clarification.
One last question on the construction report.
No, not the report.
More specifically, the construction report, the miscellaneous capital projects page.
Just the merchant's way build up. I see that now detailed and I want to make sure I understand correctly that that is the addition that it happens to be that amount 5.7 million happens to be very similar to the bond allocation in the 2023 bond.
But it is a different amount. That is the amount additional. That's the additional.
The additional amount.
The additional amount.
So we're paying for the first portion or the first about $5 million out of what the bond
committee put together back in February of 2023.
And then it didn't, we all know the story of what happened and so we needed more monies
and that's where it's coming from.
And we're using the interest proceeds from our capital, our bond sales that generate
interest earnings as we deposit those monies before they're spent.
And that's what this is.
That's what this is.
It just happens to look like the same.
I agree with you. It is confusing. It's not confusing. It's just you look at and go away. They didn't update it
Yeah, I get it. Okay. Thank you very much
I said this one quick one on the construction report. This is the report reflect the
the use of
Project savings for Bear Creek
Is that in here?
What'll be?
Upon your approval. We will bring that in in the budget amendments next month
and it'll reduce that number a little bit, the project savings.
That's why it's great to be in a position we're in
where both the 21 authorization and 23 authorization has savings,
especially because our 23 authorization has a couple of projects still to be bid,
like a junior high.
That's good to have, and it's exactly for a purpose like that Bear Creek surprise.
surprise. Okay. Yes, sir. It'll be reflected in the budget amendment next month. Okay. Thank you.
Ms. Teamey, did you have something? Okay. Yeah, I was just curious. I was understanding we had
savings on Katie Junior High, but we had an increase in Bear Creek Elementary in the cost.
Is that correct? Yes, ma'am. You guys are going to hear all that tonight. Okay. So once Lisa comes
up, she'll explain it all. But yes, we're going to have some money coming back on Katie Junior High,
But we're a little bit over on Bear Creek and she'll explain that I just didn't think we had savings on Bear Creek
I thought it no man. Yeah, no savings on Bear Creek. Unfortunately, we're gonna use some of the savings from Katie Jr
Hi on Bear Creek. Yes, and it's gonna Bear Creek's gonna be over our budget
Yes, and it may affect this total amount that you see on your report and it may not I don't remember
All right, thank you very much
8.5 Discuss and consider Board approval of the February 2025 budget amendments.
We're now moving on to
to 8.5, discuss and consider Board approval of the February 2025 budget amendments. Esperanza
Rios, Director of Budget and Treasury. Welcome. Good evening, Board President Perez, Board
of Trustees, and Dr. Krakorski. Tonight we bring forth budget amendments which are all
direct functional offsets these functional offsets include staff development interpreters truck
rentals choir risers books and update to classrooms and supplies the approval of these amendments
will result in no impact to the general fund operating fund balance and if you please note
the fund balance on the budget amendments reports have been updated to reflect the audited fund
unbalanced amounts any questions thank you any questions trustees thank you
very much and now we have a point six discuss and consider board approval of
8.6 Discuss and consider Board Approval of the 2025-2026 Property Insurance Program.
the 2025 2026 property insurance program presenter Lance Nauman director of risk
manner
Good evening, Dr. Gorgarski, President Perez, and Board of Trustees.
The renewal of the property insurance program for policy year 25-26 is attached.
Coverage is extended for the following.
Buildings, structures, and their contents.
Physical damage to buses and automobiles for catastrophic losses.
Electronic data processing equipment, mobile equipment, musical instruments, as well as boilers and machinery.
machinery. Major perils include fire, flood, earthquake, windstorm, named windstorm, and
wind-driven rain. As summarized in the attached, a current total insured value, TIV, for the
district is $4.79 billion, with an expiring value of $4.53 billion. Design and structure
changes, deductibles and coverage limits are also included. The expiring pure property
rate is .1968 with the renewal set at .1647. Additionally, a review of district-owned assets
was completed as part of the review of coverage related to contents. Building values have been
adjusted to reflect inflationary trends as well. The renewal presented was evaluated considering
adequacy of coverage, assessment of risk, availability of services, and cost. The action
an impact for 2526 general operating fund for property insurance by an estimated annual premium
not to exceed seven million seven hundred ninety nine thousand three hundred fifty one for property
and flood sixteen thousand two hundred and twenty five for terror and sabotage sixty four thousand
dollars for boiler and machinery and eighteen thousand nine hundred and eighty two dollars
for animal marine the total not to exceed premium is seven thousand eight hundred and eighty eight
seven thousand eight hundred ninety eight dollars and fifty five hundred fifty eight dollars
additional premiums will be incurred as new schools and facilities are finished during
this policy period it is recommended that the board of trustees approves the 2025-2026
property insurance program
Thank you.
Any questions, trustees?
Mr. President?
Mr. Redman?
Mr. Nauman, am I reading this right?
We had an increase in overall property value, but our rate went down almost a million dollars?
Correct.
I'll lead with that next time.
We'll take it.
Congratulations.
Yes, thank you.
8.7 Discuss and consider Board approval of the renewal of the Texas Association of School Boards (TASB) Risk Management Fund Casualty Program for Plan Year 2025-2026.
Okay, let's move on to 8.7.
Discuss and consider board approval of the renewal of the Texas Association of School Boards Risk Management Fund Casualty Program for Plan Year 25-26.
In March of 2024, the Katy Independent School District Board of Trustees approved the renewal premium, quote,
for the casualty coverage with TASB Risk Management Fund for a 12-month period.
The renewal premium provides auto liability, general liability, cybersecurity, police liability,
and school board liability coverage for the district at a cost of $510,800.
The Risk Management Department seeks to renew this program which provides casualty coverage
for the district.
Because the district continues to grow, adding more assets and employees, the renewal premium
is offered higher than the expiring term.
The increased premium is the result of increased exposures related to organic growth, inflation,
and increased reinsurance rates.
The program provides commercial auto liability coverage for vehicles owned, operated, and
leased by the district.
Additionally, the program provides general liability coverage for actions against the
district resulting from the day-to-day operation.
Next, cyber liability protection is afforded in this policy.
Lastly, the program extends school board legal liability coverage for claims related to administrative
issues.
Enhancements to the existing coverage include violent acts coverage for expenses relating
for mass incidents at district locations.
The program has been reviewed for adequacy of coverage, availability of service, and
cost.
Authority is granted to purchase the coverage through CRV Legal.
It is recommended the Board of Trustees approves the renewal of the Texas Association School
school board risk management fund casualty program for plan year 2025 2026
any questions trustees hello I asked this last year and I'll just ask again
out of for due diligence there's no one else that is close or who are the other
competitors we reached out to some other potential prospective companies and have
have not gotten any response back in terms of indications.
Interesting.
Okay, because my goal would be for the district to partner with vendors
and suppliers for certain things that are in line with the vision
and the laws of the state and the nation,
and they still ascribe to DEI in their mission
and core beliefs as an organization.
So that's why I continue to ask.
It's not perhaps very smart.
Good price, I guess, but I have nothing to compare it to.
Well, I will tell you this.
You will see in the side-by-side comparison that I've provided you that the GL coverage, the school board, and the cyber all remain flat.
In fact, I think the GL went down a few thousand dollars.
The price increase…
No, it's minor.
It's minor.
It is.
It's primarily related to the cost of repairing cars.
Correct.
Is is the driving force there? Excuse me? I meant I have nothing no one else no other provider to compare this to
I just know from year to year. It's it's small from last year at the increase
It's disappointing, but thank you
Thank you any other questions
Mr.. President this box so miss Kizilla your question is because you disagree with one of the sentences of TASB
be one of their statements that's what you disagree with not because the cost is too high or
because they provide this service for 100 of school districts in texas with the exception of
one there's one that doesn't and so they're able to get it at such a great cost because it's you
know mass quantities and you know economy of scale but because you disagree with one of their
statements you're gonna draw attention to it yes ma'am it is a core belief of
TASB who is a lobbyist so you know it's it's something we need to consider
moving forward particularly where we are this year so it's important to ask if
there are any other competitors in the space that's why I ask thank you okay
8.8 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment Two to the Stewart Builders, LLC. contract related to the comprehensive renovations at Bear Creek Elementary School.
Okay, we'll move on to 8.8.
Thank you, Mr. Nauman, and congratulations on the savings on the asset insurance.
8.8, discussing the State of the Board approval amendment number two to the Stuart Builders LLC contract related to the comprehensive renovations at Bear Creek Elementary School.
And our presenter is Lisa Kaspin, Executive Director of Facilities, Planning, and Construction.
Good evening, President Perez, trustees, Dr. Gagorski.
I have three items for your consideration this evening.
The first item is for the Bear Creek.
Unfortunately the project did go over budget.
We did try our hardest between Amendment 1 and the final to fit it in that budget, but
the roof was part of it and then also the underground plumbing.
Once we did the carrying of the lines, they were in bad shape, so we're going to have
to rip out the underground plumbing.
Any questions?
Mr. President, I have a brief question.
Thank you so much for the detail here.
I was curious because we've had some other amendments in past meetings where these things
happen.
There's certainly variances that happen.
This is about a 10% overage.
um how how do you decide which bond to pull the savings from because this is pulling from the
most current bond versus 2021 correct and how do you determine that because this is part of the
the bear creek project is part of the 23 authorization and so since it's part of the
23 authorization from an accounting standpoint it's which cash do you spend right from an
accounting standpoint it's just easier to keep it all together in the 2020 authorization okay
but but we've we've pulled from 2021 savings before for a current project right um if we did
it would be for something that that's new to the district like let's say we were going to buy an
unexpected piece of property if we could afford that piece of property we wouldn't split it
between 23 and 21 if 21 authorization would pay for it all we would try to do that just from an
accounting standpoint to keep those for being split coded when you run reports
and the fixed assets and all that it's just cleaner that's really okay thank
you mr. president miss Fox this is Cassman do you know what year Bear Creek
was built late 70 78 79 80 thank you thank you mr. president mr. Redmond did
Did you say we have to replace all the underground plumbing?
Yes.
Sounds expensive.
Yes, the sister school of Hutzel, Hutzel did not have the issue, but Bear Creek does.
So we're prepared to do that.
Any other questions on Bear Creek?
8.9 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment Two to the Anslow Bryant LTD. contract related to the renovation at Katy Junior High School.
We'll move on to 8.9.
and this is approval of amendment number two to the Ansel Bryant contract related
to the renovation of Katy Junior High School. That's correct. So we brought you
amendment one last month. This is the final GMP and this project actually came
under budget so that'll help in the accounting like Mr. Hines mentioned
earlier. What was the amount of the under budget? Pardon? What was the under budget amount?
Like 1.45 million.
Okay, great.
I had a question on, actually jumped out at me on the letter from Arcadius,
and that is where they say that they're in favor of Anselo
to authorize to receive the remainder of this money to proceed with the construction.
So if we don't we're not actually funding them all at once when it's when the letter says remainder of the money
So you 17 million and like say 18 million remaining like we're
We don't fund them like a one fell swoop or do we fund in progress payments in progress payments, okay?
So it's not we're just giving a pot of money. Oh, that's correct
Okay, all the architect is doing is saying that yes the 17 million will cover the remaining work, and they're
endorsing that not in this is a word and it caught me like they can see the
remainder yeah no it's all through a progress payment monthly okay thank you
mr. president miss Timmy okay so we had we were and we were under on Katie
junior high about one and a half million and then we're over on Bear Creek by 16
million is that correct no it's about 2.3 2.3 okay okay great so the net of
those will be what's in the budget amendment next month okay great that
would be that was my next question thanks mr. president yes I have a
question it's it's really about Bear Creek and I apologize I'm just curious
with the plumbing can that be done just over the summer I mean how are you gonna
because that seems like it's not just a money issue it's also a lot more time
involved in what you had previously thought you were gonna do the contractor
has that schedule figured out and I believe, Trey can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it's gonna take place over the summer.
Two summers.
Because I would think that, so it's not just about money, it's about
everything. Yeah. Thank you.
But remember they phase all that stuff in so it's not like we're gonna not have some
bathroom facilities and things like that. It's all, it is pretty amazing though for the lay people like myself when I see that.
It is pretty amazing. So yeah.
Do you have any volunteers to burrow under there to replace the pipe?
No, sir, but we are looking.
Mr. Graham, maybe?
For cheap work, if you have some spare time.
We've got shovels.
Okay.
No, in the past, I think there was a junior high we did,
and they divided the building into four different quadrants,
and they actually had four different teams working over the summer,
so they can do some pretty amazing things.
Well, thank you for overseeing that.
8.10 Discuss and consider Board approval of the plat for Taylor High School.
Thank you.
Okay, we'll move over to the plat for Taylor High School.
Yes.
So the county is requiring an updated plat for the project,
so we had the surveyor go,
and now we'll have a current plat for Taylor High School.
Any questions on the plat?
Yes, Mr. President.
So I was reading a little bit about this,
and is it 40-something acres?
Yeah, I believe so, yes.
Yes.
And I'm looking at the map, but I can't really understand.
where where it is where where this is at Taylor well the accessible route project
uh-huh okay so it's on the far east side by the parking garage so some parking
spaces over there and to get across the street to the softball field in tennis
that's actually gonna be a maintenance project but we ran the traps to get the
platter proof for them so we already own that property yes okay so that we're
just going to it's like a paperwork clean turn it into something else okay thank you any other
questions on the plot oh one one other question just real quick i'm sorry and you're not going
to mess with that um the covered parking thing the the garage because they really are proud of that
garage parking yeah any other questions i know that plots usually get a lot of questions
8.11 Discuss and consider Board approval of the proposal for a contracted bus driver service.
We'll move on to 811. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. And this is to consider discuss
a consider board approval of the proposal for a contracted bus service and the presenter is
Paul Landis, executive director of transportation. Welcome. Good evening President Perez, Dr.
Gagorski and esteemed members of the board. I'm here tonight to discuss the
renewal of our contract with Gold Star Transit for supplemental transportation
services. Over the past five years, Gold Star has been a reliable partner
covering up to 30 routes per day for Katy ISD. In November, we issued a
request for proposal for supplemental transportation services. Gold Star
submitted the most competitive bid among all qualified bidders, offering to cover
no fewer than 30 routes at a rate of $88,866.50 per five-hour route.
The new proposal also includes the purchase of new buses for these contracted routes.
Upon board approval, Gold Star will order these new buses,
ensuring they are delivered and operational shortly after the start of the school year.
So I'm available to address any questions you may have.
Thank you.
Mr. President.
Ms. Champagne.
So, thank you, Mr. Landis.
do you remember when we first started going with the gold star and that was a
big discussion remember that back then and then there was all this talk about
the different pay you know the gold star people got paid something and then we
paid something else are those problems ironed out and I don't think there's any
problems with things they definitely pay a slight bit more than we do but they
also don't offer benefits so that's kind of difference there if they
it kind of equals out.
It just depends.
Do you want more money, no benefits, or those kind of things.
But we really haven't had an issue between the two of us when it comes to finding.
Because there was so much discussion about it back then,
but I haven't really heard as much anymore.
No, it just kind of works out, I think.
Thanks.
Mr. President.
Ms. Cuzela.
Hi, Paul.
Clarification.
I don't know if this is a misprint or this truly is.
2025 to 2020 it says 2028 but we're talking about next school year correct
just one school year and the contract is for three years maybe it's it's a three
year contract it's a three year contract with two additional years optional years
which is what we which would what we did with them and usually that you did in
November that's an original thing was three years with option and two
additional years and we're doing that same okay it just says school year so
so it confused me.
And the $88,866 is per route?
Per route per year.
Per year?
Yes.
That includes, what is that figure?
Can you break that down for me?
That's just what we're charged for five hours a day.
Just labor?
That's the whole cost of running that route
for five hours a day.
Most of our routes go a little beyond that,
so there's a separate fee for any time beyond the five hours,
but that's the contract route for five hours a day
for each route for the year for one year for one year just seems astronomical to
me am i missing something didn't you say it has some new buses too and if it's
approved they'll order new buses for us this year we've our biggest issue in the
last couple years has been consistent AC on some of their buses that we've had so
this should resolve that issue for us so they provide the buses yes sir yes at
their cost yes sir the cost of the buses isn't in that number it is it won't cost anything it is
true they provide it okay okay um i i i spoke to a couple of best drivers who saw the agenda and
i certainly want them to be appreciated it's bus driver appreciation it was last week i think
officially but we can do that all year absolutely um some of them aren't feeling the love uh so i
I encourage any parent or teacher or administrator who knows a bus driver to continue that going throughout the year because they are
They are paid less per hour. Yes, ma'am then surrounding districts
We're about middle of the road for our surrounding districts. So I'd like to know I know we keep renewing this contract
So I'd like to know what are the things we're doing to try to keep the drivers
We have the district drivers here and lessening this contract. Is there any new I know it's very hard
but is there any new ideas?
It's fine.
I mean, our pay is pretty good.
We're middle of the road for our surrounding neighbors and districts.
We've had one that's went up significantly recently.
We'll see how that affects us.
I don't think it affects the people that we have as much,
but it may affect us getting applications in the future.
But, you know, we're there.
Obviously, everyone always wants more money,
but we also do have an attendance bonus that can give them an additional amount of money
each semester and that a lot of people definitely participate in that and get
that kind of thing so money-wise that's about the you know what we have that
that a gold star isn't a part of that or doesn't do any of that but right right
they were there was one they explained there's an HISD six-year driver makes
$30 an hour and then they said but an eight this person was an eight-year
driver makes about ten dollars less an hour just comparing so just wanting to
be sensitive to that and to keep our district bus drivers here because
gold star is a contractor right that we're spending extra money on do they
follow the district policies and rules just like a KT ISD driver does and for
the most part is when they're on routing with kids on the bus and those kind of
things yes they generally follow the same same rules and guidelines that we
have we work really closely with them on things they have cameras on their buses
we do the same things we look at their drivers they've been really good about working with us
that there's issues with their drivers while we can't tell them what to do they generally listen
to us and follow what we what we ask them to do with those things okay for example there was a
mental health training that bus drivers had to take today on president's day i know they were
paid for that right does a gold star driver take that um at this time i don't know what the answer
that would be since we're just getting started in this you know I would guess
that they probably would have to but I we haven't asked that question as far as
I'm aware of okay because to me that's a disadvantage with gold star and we do
have schools who don't want gold star drivers and and and they don't want bus
drivers from our schools I think I hear what you say there I think that's
decreased over the last couple years we've really worked on where we've had
them work with them they've had some new management that's been there the last
couple years that's really worked well with this on that I think that this year
in particular those issues have decreased greatly compared to what they
were in the first few years good good that's great do you look at other
contractors regularly for bus route and we did the RFP you got five responses on
that so I mean just regularly just when we do the RFP process okay every year
We just did just for the five years since we had the contract already. We don't relook at that every year
And so we need a new contract
This is really the first time we've done it since the initial
Okay. All right. Thank you. Just president
Thank You. Miss Fox
Linda's maybe
For some of our new people who who haven't been around for a while tell why do we you have to use a contractor in?
anyway, and mainly
originally and still continuing just not being able to get the number of drivers that we need.
Right now we currently have 38 open routes at the moment.
For whatever reason, the number stays around 40 routes, it seems,
which we cover through office staff, mechanics, and those things cover those routes that we have open at this time.
No matter how much we raised the rate, it didn't fix our shortages.
It doesn't seem to change that.
And when we raised, South Fair would raise, and then Fort Bend would raise, and pretty soon we were just, so being at the top was never the answer to the bus driver shortage.
I feel you're correct, yes.
Okay.
Thank you.
If I can jump in there, too.
As someone who's lived this since 2018, the trick for us is that we're still a growing district.
If we were built out, I think it's a little bit easier to manage that stuff, get a better idea of what you need.
we've got neighborhoods that we came back from Christmas holidays and you've
got folks that have moved into a neighborhood that's not even on Google
Maps it's not anywhere and so you know as you extend as you get bigger in the
district that's a challenge for us and then on top of that you've got special
needs routes and and we've got a lot of those and as you well know we've got a
pretty big population of special needs students and we are required to do those
routes where a bus driver you know an elementary bus driver if they can drive
an elementary route with 50 kids on it a special needs route that best gets 10 so
there's all of that stuff combined and what we don't want to do is we don't
want bus drivers having a double back and kids sitting at school for an extra
hour and things like that and there are unfortunately districts that do that the
pay thing is a challenge we always try to stay competitive as Paul said we try
We try to kind of be in the middle.
We'd love to be on the top end of that, but I can tell you, talking to transportation people at TASBO and all these other things, you're always chasing that number, and they're always chasing drivers.
But we've noticed in operations just in general that our jobs, whether it's food service or maintenance, custodial, bus drivers, it's a very cyclical thing.
It really is.
Folks kind of come and go.
We don't see as many people kind of stay in for the long term. That's all three of those
Positions we do job fairs what quarterly would you say?
If not more to try to stay on top of that and we've had some really good luck HR has been a huge help to us
So we're we try to stay on top of that and I'm but I hear everything you're saying on the bus driver piece of it
I don't disagree with you
Thank you. How many routes in total do we have and?
Approximately 400 routes.
This is 30 out of 400?
Yes, sir.
Mr. President?
Ms. Champagne?
I would like to also ask and acknowledge also that we saw that daycare program, right?
Yes, ma'am.
And so Mr. Redmond, I think, was, were you in that daycare program?
I was.
So that is a really good benefit of that.
so I remember doing when I was in the leadership Katie Katie I see leadership
and we went out there and I saw the kids at the that's really impressive and for
moms or dads with young kids that's really a good program so like you said
some of our benefits aren't really considered in the in the amount that
they're getting paid because that that babysitting is free right it's two
dollars a day two dollars a day can't beat up thank you and gold star isn't eligible for that
service that's just our drivers thank you very much i'm now picturing mr redmond in daycare like
in the drop in the drop of tot kind of thing
it was kindergarten i would i would then get on the bus and go to some elementary
thank you very much
8.12 Discuss and consider Board approval of the proposed summer work schedule.
and now we have uh we're going to 8.12 discuss and consider board approval of the proposed
proposed summer work schedule.
Welcome. Thank you.
Good evening, President Perez, members of the Board,
Dr. Kogorski. This is something that we bring to the Board
every year in February. It's our summer
work schedule, and the structure
is the same this year that
it has been in many years past.
We are requesting that we
start June 2nd this year and run through
July 25th, so that's about eight weeks.
The
The July 4th holiday will be a regular week because July 4th is a Friday,
and that is already a pre-scheduled holiday.
But as in years past, it's Monday through Thursday, 7 to 5,
and again running through June 2nd through July 25th, beginning regular work hours July 28th.
And as always, we'll make sure there's plenty of communication
so everybody knows that we're on summer hours within the district.
That's it.
Any questions?
Mr. President?
Campaign?
Yes, Mr. Schoch.
I'm just curious about that for the July week are they gonna have to work the
long days that week no ma'am it's just a regular week since it was already a week
that had a holiday in it so it's a regular week and that's and that happens
most years because you left fourth will fall within the week I'm wondering does
dr. Gorski drive around the parking lot on Fridays to see who's in any other
questions thank you thank you and now we move on to 813 which is to discuss and
8.13 Discuss and consider Board approval to award the Request for Proposal "RFP" 2328AA Print Shop Management of Katy ISD Printing Services to meet the immediate and long-term printing and graphic design needs for the district.
consider board approval to award the request for proposal print shop
management of Katie ISD printing services to meet the immediate and
long-term printing and graphic needs design needs of the district good
evening president Perez members of the board and dr. Krakowski Brenda white is
our presenter this evening i have two items to present for your consideration the first item is
rfp 2328 print shop management of kdisd printing services this contract will provide staffing at
the print shop to process the printing copying graphic design and graphic design requests from
all the campuses and facilities. The second item, RFP 2329, pertains to the
maintenance and service of the district's copier fleet. This contract
covers supplies for the copiers including toner, staples, parts, and labor
necessary to keep the copier fleet operating efficiently across the
district. The first recommendation is to award RFP 2328, Print Shop Management of
KDISD printing services to ImageNet. The total first-year contract value for
print shop management is $1,441,440. There are no annual increases
throughout the life of the contract. Over the initial five-year term, the total
contract value amounts to $7,207,200. This represents a savings of
of $1,846,800 over five years compared to the current provider.
The print shop management services will be paid from the general operating fund.
The awarded contract term would be for five years with one optional two-year renewal.
I would be happy to answer any questions pertaining to this recommendation.
Questions, cross cheese.
Mr. President?
Yes, Ms. Cuzela.
So exciting.
1.8 million dollar savings. Thank you very much. Is what's being delivered the
same? I mean this should be a seamless change for our campuses or is there
something different? So it should be the same. The new company will come in, they
will staff the print shop, everybody, all the teachers and staff will continue to
submit orders through the same ordering online portal that they're using today,
digital storefront. The staff at the print shop will process those jobs and deliver them. Our
district maintenance now delivers all our jobs out to the campuses, so that should remain the same.
Currently, we have 22 staff at our print shop right now. This proposal will have 20 staff
members, but we feel that they can continue and maintain the same level of service with the 20
staff members is that the savings or no no we have a different vendor as well
it's a different it's a different vendor okay but what's being provided is the
same correct fabulous okay thank you what is a TNC requirements what is that
what is it so integrating this is meets TSC's terms and conditions I'm sorry
okay terms and conditions so they're contractual from a contractual
standpoint their terms were better than everybody else correct yeah and also um i'm just curious uh
they have the highest grade vendors past relationship with district or similar or
similar size district do they work for some other districts in the yes um fort bend uh i have that
other districts for Ben Lamar new Caney Keller or some others that they listed that they've worked
for so they're handling it for them as well okay great well congratulations on the savings thank
you any other questions any other questions also on the uh on the maintenance part of it which is
8.14 Discuss and consider Board approval to award the Request for Proposal "RFP" 2329AA Maintenance and Service for Katy ISD Copier Fleet to provide maintenance and repair services for the district owned copier fleet.
uh 8.14 so um the second recommendation is to award rfp 2329 maintenance and service for the
kdisd copier fleet to image net the district incurs an impression charge for each black and white and
color print the impression charges cover the cost of maintenance including parts and labor
toner and supplies black and white monthly average impression cost is seventy three thousand one
hundred and fifty dollars color monthly average impression cost is twelve thousand five hundred
and seventy two dollars there are no annual increases to the impression rate the average
The average cost for the five-year term is $5,143,321.
Impression charges will be paid from the general operating fund.
The awarded contract will be for five years with an optional two-year renewal.
Thank you.
Any questions on that item?
It's fixed in terms of if we're using-
The rate is fixed.
What would be a variable would be the amount of printing that we have.
So as printing goes up that might go up or down but the rate is stable fixed. Okay?
Great. Well, thank you very much
Items 8.15 & 8.16
Move on to
eight one five
Which is discussing considered board approval of the contracts for the flooring replacement at Seven Lakes Junior High
Stanley Elementary School and Beckendorf Junior High School CTE computer lab
Good evening, President Perez, Board Members, and Dr. Gorkorski.
Tonight I have two items for your consideration.
The first item is for the flooring replacements at Seven Lakes Junior High, Stanley Elementary,
and the CTE Computer Lab at Becker Nook Junior High.
Each school will receive our district standard flooring with work scheduled over the summer
to ensure completion before the 2025-2026 school year.
These projects are identified in our 2023 bond program and are under budget.
Happy to answer any questions you may have.
Thank you, Mr. Fuchs.
Any further?
The second item for your consideration is a series of interlocal agreement between KDISD and Seacoast Southwest MUDS 1, 2, 3, and 4
to support the construction of an asphalt walking track at Wilson Elementary.
entry the four mods will collectively contribute ninety thousand dollars with the remaining costs
covered by the pta this project includes design and permitting expenses and is scheduled for
completion over the summer any questions on either one 815 or 816. let me ask you this on target usa
how were they selected so they're part of a co-op program um and they're the manufacturer so we go
directly to the manufacturer all that to save help save money but they're part of
a cooperative program choice partners okay yeah any questions on 816 816
theme regarding the Cinco Southwest mud and the PTA, the track.
This is pretty unusual, isn't it?
Or have we done this?
We've done this before.
There's a lot of muds in certain areas that would like to contribute to our campuses,
whether it's covered pavilions, whether it's tracks, various playground equipment installations.
So it's fairly common in certain areas of the district, yes, sir.
So the PTA is contributing a certain amount and then each mud is contributing to it as well
That's correct. The form was a contributing $90,000 and the PTA is picking up roughly
29,000 okay
And after after that Katie I see will own it and operate it. That's correct
Any questions, thank you very much. Thank you
8.17 Discuss and consider the refund of Katy Rotary Endowment Scholarship.
The next item is discuss and consider the refund
of Katie Rotary Endowment Scholarship.
We have as presenters Kayla Smith,
Executive Director of Finance,
and Sania Bell, Assistant Superintendent
for Teaching, Teacher and Learning.
Welcome.
Good evening President Barrez, Dr. Gorgorski and school board members.
In 2001, Katy Rotary established scholarship fund with the intent of awarding scholarships
to students with the interest that has been accrued.
However, scholarships have not been awarded by the Rotary since 2015.
These scholarships are for dual credit courses.
The Rotary is now requesting KDISD to return the funds for management and I wanted to bring
that to the Board's attention for approval.
Mr. President?
Ms. Champagne?
Yes.
Dr. Bell, I'm just curious.
So they haven't issued anything since 2015, I understand that, but is their intent to
start doing it again but we're going to give them the money back and they're going to be
the ones issuing it?
Correct.
Correct. We have basically served as the custodians of the account. It was their funds. We housed the account. They were the ones to determine who was going to receive scholarships. So the initial amount and the interest was what they were going to award those scholarships for. So we just kind of housed their money and now they want to retain that to manage those funds for those scholarships.
So Mr. President, I'd like to follow up.
So what happened?
So why did they forget about it?
I mean, obviously the money was there, but what happened since 2015 that it stopped being,
I don't know, you may not even know the answer to that question because it's their money, like you said.
We provided financial statements to them yearly, but I just don't think that they wanted to go through the process.
I don't know if they didn't want to but they didn't follow through with the process of awarding the scholarships
So we were just holding the money for them. Why don't you just wake up?
I'm just curious
But you may not know I mean you're not responsible for knowing the answer to that
I just thought maybe you might know the answer to that but
No, I don't I don't know that that answer but mr. President miss Fox
So is it my understanding that from 2001 to 2015 they issued scholarships and they used interest
to you to issue the scholarships so the
The endowment has always been stable and then whatever the interest was that's what they issued in scholarships. That is correct
Mr. President, mr. Zola does anyone here know why they chose the district to be the holders of the money it versus
versus themselves finding an account to do that?
I don't, I mean, unless anyone was here in 2001 who can answer that,
I'm not aware of why they wanted us to hold the funds for them
and be the custodian of those funds.
I'm not sure.
Mr. President, I don't claim to know much about this,
but I do know there are endowment funds, for example, at universities and such,
that the money is so, for example,
I'm part of the organization has given money to a university and it's just sitting there and it's an endowment fund that the
University is holding for us to be able to give so I don't I think that this is a fairly common
Thing that they do and if I'm wrong about that somebody can correct me, but it seems like it's it's a common
way of doing things
Did you I'm sorry mr. President you said something about dual credit
Yes. Dual credit scholarships. Only for students who take the program?
They're partnering with HCC. That's who the Rotary was targeting with this?
Yes. That's why you mentioned it. Okay.
Okay. I think we've gotten as much as we can out of that. Thank you so much.
8.18 Discuss and consider update to Board policy CW Local.
And the next item, and last item, is 818,
discuss and consider update to board policy CW local mr. president we the
policy committee I chair the policy committee together with mr. Perez and
miss Morgan Calhoun and we did identify meet recently as we promised to in
December in December most of the board here did identify some needs to tighten
this policy up and make it more reflective of our great district so that's what you see ahead of you
for us to discuss miss kazella or mr president can can y'all say for the public what the
the changes are so that people will understand what the changes are before we discuss it
you want to go ahead yeah i'll give a quick summary of what the changes reflect is that
what you're asking yes please so just to make sure that um all applicants who do apply um to have
who submit a naming application to the district get notification whether their application's
moving forward or not um it's more of a communication to make sure that's in here
that especially if people are not moving forward that they receive a reason for why
making sure our committee which is two board members per this policy the future
principal of the campus and then parents that everyone would have ample time
ahead of meeting to read these wonderful applications which are usually 30 to 50
some odd pages so people put a lot of time and effort into the letters of
recommendation the application there's news article gathering a lot of
beautiful information per application so to allow the committee to have that
ample time particularly the parents who may may or may not know who the people
are to make sure we have a voting process within that committee to make
sure we are respecting
the voice of the public the parent that's in that
Committee by making it more of a simple majority vote just
Making trying to make it be a little more uniform and
With less room for any kind of manipulation inadvertently or not
And then making sure that
How would I describe this I want to make sure the district does not seem
favoring one candidate or the other, if this strange timing were to happen again,
that the district isn't seen as favoring one candidate over the other in an election.
And overall, just to make sure that we are giving respect and provide respect for all applicants,
for the committee, for the parents and the public of who will be using this building,
that they are honored, and not just a couple of board members deciding something,
and to provide greater integrity, which is what our district is about.
You mentioned, you alluded to the quorum.
Oh, yes.
Yes, so for parents and respecting the public,
we want to write what's written here
and suggest is that we have a quorum
for any time the naming committee were to meet
that requires four parents
who would use that campus to be present.
And if that quorum's not met,
that we would try a second time to meet that quorum.
and the time to read the application so currently right now it's typically a
two-hour meeting two and a half hours but that includes the voting the time
today to read was 45 minutes to read proximity 10 applications that were
about 50 pages each that's 500 pages in 45 minutes for some people who may
already know these people maybe that's not a big deal but for parents who are her brand new maybe
to to the district um they have 45 minutes to get to know these people so we suggested um
giving them lead time about a week to that's what we wrote in here seven days to read those
applications so they're not coming in brand new mr. okay thank you mr.
president so there's there's something that she that miss Cozzella was talking
about but let me just read that part it says if the person is or chooses to be a
candidate for any position in the next subsequent school board election from
the time the naming committee meets this person's name shall not be considered
considered, recommended, or used in the naming or renaming of facilities or portions of facilities.
This person's decision to declare themselves a candidate for such school board elections
shall constitute such person withdrawing their name from consideration for the naming or
renaming of a facility or a portion of a facility.
The naming process is then transferred to the board where the public may provide input
during the public comment of a board meeting and board members vote on the name to be proposed
are recommended so I'm sure that this has come about because of like you said
our recent candidate then there's another part and this part is about the
family name it says related family members who use the family name shall
not be a current district board member and must be retired from the employment
with the district for at least five years if any related family member who
uses the family name is or chooses to be a candidate for any position in the next
subsequent school board election from the time of the naming committee meets
this family name shall not be considered recommended or used in the naming or
renaming of facilities my computer just went out okay this person's decisions to
declare themselves as a candidate for such school board elections shall
constitute such person withdrawing their family name from consideration of the
naming of a facility or portion of a facility the naming process is then transferred to the board
where the public may provide input during the public comment of a board meeting and board
members vote on the name to be proposed or recommended so this is talking about a facility
or portion of a facility may be named for a family who has made a significant contribution blah blah
the family name shall represent virtues so let me ask you something on this
Ms. Are you saying that in the naming committee that people that are currently working for
the school district cannot be named but also not their family members?
Or is it just talking about the candidates?
See your question again?
Okay, so when we're considering something, you know, a naming committee meets and there's somebody, I'm just going to use the name Smith.
I mean, it's a big name.
So Mr. Smith is brought up to be a person that's a name that's recommended for the new building.
But Mr. Smith works here, so he can't be named on the building.
But Mr. Smith's daughter who works here doesn't use that last name because she's married.
So she could, but not his son.
So the girl could.
So the woman could, but not the boy.
That doesn't seem right.
If you have a suggestion, this is the most, I would say the hardest part to write.
if you have a suggestion that the idea is we want to make sure that the
district does not show favorability for one candidate over another there's
electioneering law in the state it's on the books not a new law I'm not saying
you know we want to steer away from that we don't want anyone thinking this seems
like electioneering to me that you that you're using public sort reef what you're
You're using public resources right now to make another candidate look bad.
No.
No names are being said here.
No names are being said, but we know what this is about because why now?
So I know Mr. Perez has been on the board for a while,
so there's been other things that have been named.
Nothing's ever been brought up about this before,
and it just seems very odd that right at this particular time
is when we're going to talk about this and change a policy,
which by the way the policy committee is very very non-transparent and y'all go
have an idea you don't tell anybody else about the idea then you go and meet in
policy you treat you bring the policy it doesn't matter what the rest of the
board members think it doesn't matter what the community thinks and actually
it's a very divisive the way this policy committee is being run is very divisive
and I blame the leadership of this board making this a divisive thing.
And do you know that the way that the school board functions represents student achievement,
and this divisiveness hurts our teachers and their feeling of certainty?
Point of order.
What?
Relevancy.
This is relevancy.
You're going off on a tangent.
What does it have to do with what we're talking about?
You go off on tangents.
What is it point of order?
What does it have to do with what you said because what I'm saying is you a close land the plane
You're not the you're not the leader
Mr. Perez is the leader. So I don't have to do what you say get to it
No, you cannot tell me what to say. You are extremely rude
So I call a point of order on you because there has to be some amount of decorum on the board
Did you lack showing?
Let's stick, the whole purpose of this is to stick to the discussion is to make comments,
objections, what have you, about the policy.
Well I object to it and I've made it.
The policy was presented.
Okay.
So I've made my points and you're right, I have made my points.
I feel like that the way y'all have created this policy and I know that the four of you
can vote on it, you don't care what anybody else says, so it doesn't matter.
matter and by the way I really respect the process that we've had for years and
years and years that have been fine I had I don't think any board member has
ever voted no to a naming of a building that the committee has decided on and I
have a great deal of respect for dr. grooms and her people and I know she
works very hard on this and she's never been questioned before as far as I know
so anyway I like the way it was and I understand there could be some tweaking
about the quorum thing and all that maybe so but the rest of this i i don't agree with i i just i
just will answer you on something and that is we're doing this the way it's supposed to be
we had three board members meet we brought it before dr gorski and mr graham we discussed it
and we're bringing it now where we have two meetings for open discussion with the board
and also we have as well a second meeting next week and we have open forum
where people can chime in so it's totally transparent we're bringing this
to discuss to be discussed discussed twice and you know we've done it we can't
obviously all get together four of us and discuss or five or whatever and
discuss a policy or something we're presenting we're being totally
transparent here it is let's talk about it and talk about it again next week the
more transparent way is to do it all together an open forum so that we can
create policy together all seven of us we can't meet like you said we have to
start with something here's a draft you're giving policies you've created
doesn't matter what we think well mr. mr. president yeah go ahead miss Fox I
I just want to tag into the piece about this originally said the most senior living family member who uses the family name cannot be an employee or a board member.
Now it's been changed to related family members.
Any related family members who use the family name shall not be a current district board member and must be retired from employment with the district for at least five years.
If this were the case, Faldens have children who teach in the district.
Youngblood have a bevy of children who teach in the district.
Boudny has a daughter who teaches in the district.
All of those people would have been disqualified.
With this language, so I strongly object to this part, right? I think that's a good those are good points. I
think we discussed that because that's
Certainly respect that and understand that we did talk about that in one of our meetings
And it would be just one election to refrain from it's not like, you know the following year they could
This does not say it's a family name definition
nothing to do with school board it says this is not a lot oh the idea of related this says any
related family members who use the family name can't be a board member and can't be an employee
so now budenese feldens youngbloods many of them freeman nelson none of them would get a name of
a school because they have family members who use their family name and currently work in the school
district so you're you know when you talk about youngbloods and how many uh at the dedication
They talked about how many family members are currently working inside the school district and the same with the crosses, right?
Yeah, that's good feedback
That's the family name section on page two
All right
Do you have suggestions of how to rewrite that since you'd like to work and the most senior living related family member?
What was there?
so and that would be it like like
like Mr. Freeman or the senior living family member,
which would be the Boudinies, Alan Ann, and the Youngbloods,
the senior living ones, worked.
But if you say any related member, it would make them all disqualified.
That was already, so the district employee had already said they had to be retired.
So the fact that a district employee was already mentioned in the policy,
the family name section on page two it was just saying a current board member
could not be named a school and so then what was added to it in this edit was
they couldn't be employees of the district and so I understand the second
one as far as being named and then running but this section of the policy
didn't even refer to that it's just talking about are you qualified to be a
a namesake district employees addressed in the area before that family name at
the end is just referring to a district board member not an employee so go
taking that back to the way it was is like a definition which all are trying
to accomplish I I'd like to bring up one thing I like adding more people to the
committee I do think that makes it harder and it really just ends up with
our school board making the decision and taking that power away from the people
long-term serving on several committees you invite and you ask people to come
but we've been there when you're sitting there going are we gonna have enough
people and so I like expanding it I I would like it to go to still including
some of the district improvement committee mentioned here on the dais
that there are there are people that have a long history in the community and
are known and I think that perspective is valuable I mean that a community of
Katie is valued that a long time and when we we have some newer areas I think
it is a good mix of the old and the new and so I I'd probably say instead of six
from the new school that there'd be a three and three mix so you can have that
respect to history but also those parents that'll be at the new school
have their voice heard is what I change I'd like to see and you know no to my
knowledge in the last set of those recent committee meetings there were no
district improvement people that came they didn't come either right people invited just didn't come
so we're i think the idea was just established like okay we invite a certain number so what's
a quorum in order to have the meeting to conduct business you know i mean i do i do like including
more yes um um and so maybe it's not said like here it just says six parents from the attendant
zone it doesn't give the ability to include outside of that at all and so
you know at least six if you were say at least six parents comprised of those
from the attendance zone as well as a district improvement committee and maybe
there's some other options that we would like to choose from I mean the more the
merrier it gives it gives our team more options that she used from and and maybe
we say at least two from the new school so that we do want to make sure the new
school is represented.
But maybe there's some more flexibility there to make sure we can invite enough people so
that that committee makes, because our timetables don't have the ability to miss that week and
then go to our next board meeting.
And then, I mean, a month on naming a school as we're building the passing bonds doesn't
really jive well.
That's why I think opportunity for two meetings was put in there before it would go to the
board.
Yeah, and I'm fine with that. I just think expanding who can be included in there and not limiting it to only families or parents at the new school.
There is a time crunch, right? Yeah.
Mr. Perez, I wonder if we could ask Dr. Grooms how many people they invite to come.
Go ahead.
I want to be accurate on this. I want to give you some information, but it's at least 10. I can tell you that. Okay.
They invite at least 10 and 2K on our current one. And we do the one before was three.
If I can add to that, we do have a list of invitees for every committee. And that's why I say I want to be accurate on that. I can provide that information to at least 10. That's good enough.
Yeah, I know it's a challenge as we experience with the listening circles.
Mr. President, may I please also ask a question?
Why was the superintendent taken off as the person, as the chair of the committee and replaced with the board president?
Are you asking?
I guess anybody that's on the committee can say.
I can answer this if you'd like, Mr. President.
remember we did talk about that and i think it goes in line with the um flavor of the policy
that was already established we did not we adopted this this policy has been around but unaddressed
for a long time um and it does state at the outset of this policy that the board shall have complete
authority and responsibility for the permanent naming of district facilities so in light of that
it would make sense for us to chair that committee that the designee could be the
superintendent if the board president chose that but we should be leading this
if we have full authority over it so will the superintendent have any any sit
in on the meetings or anything not unless he's the designee right I mean
either way it's not a voting it's not a they're not a voting I understand but
but nobody votes.
But I mean, it's just input from the superintendent that you don't want.
No.
You can input at the meeting.
Mr. President, so when I was in my naming committee,
the superintendent designated Andrea, Dr. Grooms, as his sit-in.
Andrea did not give any, I'm sorry, Dr. Grooms did not give anything
other than facilitation of the meeting.
so to say that the superintendent were somehow cutting out his input is
incorrect that's a that's an incorrect statement the superintendent doesn't
give his input he facilitates you've said he would give okay so the
superintendent would not be giving his flavor or whatever he thinks about that
it's a facilitation so this would be facilitated by the board president if
the board president chooses not to do so because time constraints or whatever he
He then can designate that to the superintendent, and the superintendent can then designate
that out to the chief communications officer if he so chooses.
The board president will not designate anything other than to the superintendent.
That is not within the board president's power.
He does not have the ability to designate anyone to chair a committee other than a board
member or the superintendent.
But to that end, the superintendent does not necessarily give his thoughts towards this
other than a facilitation of the meeting.
So this just kind of clears that up in terms of who's running that.
And I agree with Ms. Gusella.
When we talked about this, this goes right in line with the very first sentence.
The board shall have complete authority and responsibility for the permanent naming of district facilities.
So it just makes it very cut and dry, black and white.
We're just sticking with that.
Mr. President.
Ms. Fox.
So when you talked about, I'm going to talk again about Mrs. Champagne's point of
when we in the past we we talked about policy changes sitting here at this
day dias all seven of us giving input like we have on many things when it's
like what should we do well let's give you input and then you give the
superintendent direction how to bring things like we're doing right now yeah
but you so you all have already brought things to us and both mr. Redmond and I
have mentioned in the past that we think that the naming of portions of
facilities could be adjusted right instead of just doing the piecemeal
whenever they come up should we do once or twice a year and we've talked about
asking booster clubs or community groups to help fund the signage of that and
none of that was addressed in here even though we'd given feedback about that so
So as you're adjusting, evidently, a policy that has needed work for a long time, or I'm not sure what your words were, Mrs. Cuzela, but it's worked for decades.
But I just am surprised that you didn't include the changes that other board members recommended when you were making changes to the policy.
To be honest with you, I don't remember that there were any pending changes that needed to be made on that part of it.
but if you want something on that part of it that you think needs to be
adjusting then absolutely I mean we talked about it right about who's gonna
pay for the signs now that we're doing this and we talked about it when we were
sitting here so I do think that the sign thing was covered was is addressed in
here already that was already addressed when we brought this up for the renaming
of portions of facilities we already discussed that here at the dais and you
I don't know what your vote was, but we've already passed that.
We did discuss that.
So, for example, because we talked about the signage, what it was for the baseball field, the cost.
It's in here.
And then the cost for the.
And then how, like, maybe once a year talk about, like, if we're going to do it in the summer, we talked about that, too.
Okay.
So maybe we should add that in.
Yeah.
So that it's not, you know, constant.
So I think, as I understand it, with the partial facility, it's when it's brought up by board members, right?
Like, for example, because you could have applications sitting there, but a couple of board members have to bring it up for us to address.
In other words, unlike a new building, there's no requirement that a partial facility needs to be named.
There's no time crunch or anything like that.
So we could gather them through the year and then do them all at once.
That's what we were thinking.
It would be more efficient.
I don't know if that's advantageous for the district or not to do them all at once.
Well, you know, I just, I was, I don't know, I can't speak for Mr. Redman.
I was thinking that once we did those two kind of quick together,
I expected to have kind of a lot more come in than we'd be doing it all the time.
We haven't, I don't think.
Mr. President.
Go ahead, Mr. Redman.
We had lots of discussion about where the funds come in to pay for these things and so as
Miss Fox mentioned putting that in there if a booster club wanted to do something bigger or smaller
I think the timing would make sense as we talk about a financial if the district is going to be coming up with that
Money it would be good to know that we've addressed those all at a certain time of year so that we could make plans
financially if there is gonna be more money coming out of our pocket for the for the booster clubs and also for the
school district
have a
months, year or so to plan those out for people. So if that did work, that'd be great.
Yeah, I think it probably has to be a budgetary item. Like, okay, let's assume that we're going
to do two this coming year and we're going to spend X amount, the district will, for the signage,
for the actual sign. Mr. President, I actually agree with this. I know Trustee Cosella has had
brought this up about the concerns of what, when we were looking at naming portions of a facility,
of what those were going to be on the district in terms of what are we doing.
And that was a concern that we had shared.
The only thing that we had kind of pushed back on that was,
I don't really like using this word,
but the inequity among booster clubs was the problem that we ran into.
And so if there's a certain limit that the district comes into to say,
hey, we're going to give this X amount of dollars,
and then whatever the booster club can come in and fund more so,
then I think we could maybe figure out a good number that the district,
when we name certain portions of that facility, that we could say, yes, we're going to do that.
And then if you want more, then the booster club is responsible for that.
Although recognizing that some booster clubs are going to be deeper in pocket than others.
And so that would then fall on that booster club to then bring that up. I know that we've had discussions and we've been presented with items before from issues with booster clubs, like specifically the robotics teams.
The robotics teams have come to us several times before about why they don't have XYZ that Morton Ranch has that Seven Lakes has.
Well, because it's Booster Club funded.
And so if the Booster Club doesn't have the funds or they're not collecting them, then they don't get the same things that Seven Lakes or Tompkins or Jordan gets.
So when we're looking at naming portions of those facilities, I think that's a hurdle that we have to recognize.
if you have a certain amount or if we could get a certain amount that looks like a
Fair number that the district is offering
Depending upon how everybody feels about that if we read we wrote that and I think that that's fair
I just I don't know what that number is what a good number is to
Blanket statement say this is what the district's gonna pay. So mr. President, I think
I've been trying to say something for okay. Well, let me let me just kind of just real quick and then I'll recognize you
So I think the way we're doing it now is that Mr. Vailing, when we talk about a portion of facility, he gives us an estimate of what it's going to cost, and they're all over the board depending upon what it is.
you know the I think the over at the field house at Cinco Ranch was you know
different than the one for the baseball field and so and so we've been relying
on new estimate and then you know we're it's long seems reasonable and sort of
de minimis if you will as far as the number we just been going with with your
cost estimate correct yes sir I mean you could a lot of certain amount of money
per year or something like that if you wanted to if you said we're only gonna
allot $40,000 a year to naming and you knew you wouldn't spend over that I
think if I remember correctly I think that's what several board members were
worried about is we're just you know we're the number is a real number and
we're and we're looking for for those to be solid but you don't know how many
are coming and I think that's the thing that concern if I remember correctly
that's what right I think good champagne thank you very much mr. Bailey so I
I do remember talking about this and Ms. Cuzzella did bring that up and if we could have like whatever
forty thousand dollars and we reach that limit then that's it for the year but what I wanted to
ask was something that Mrs. Fox was talking about that when this was brought up before and Mrs. Fox
and Mr. Redmond had things to say about this why didn't y'all decide to do you know you're in
control of the policy committee why is it only when certain people want changes is it is it
brought forward but not when other people want it it just seems like because this was talked about
i think back in october or so so now it's november december january you know so it wasn't it wasn't
taken care of then it's just taken care of now when all of a sudden there's a candidate that
has a school named after no no no mr president could i clarify just very briefly so the last
time we talked about this same policy you're correct was not with this bulk of the policy
that we're talking about right now we focused on the renaming of portions of facilities when we
last talked about it so so just to be clear i understand that but let me just but wait so so
So if you would have, if the policy committee would have listened and said, oh, you know, this is a good time to look at that policy, then at that same time, you could have looked at the whole policy and reworked it at the same time because concerns were brought up about the policy.
Like you said, it's an old policy and it was probably time to be worked on it again.
You're on the policy committee.
You could have said, you know what, we need to look at this policy and do some things.
Even you had concerns about that.
So I don't know why it wasn't done then, but it's done now.
The agenda item was for the renaming portions of a facility.
That was the agenda item.
So I wasn't aware.
Let me just chime in.
I wasn't aware that we had anything pending that didn't get resolved with regard to namings of a portion of a facility.
We brought it back in here.
Everybody voted on it.
We all approved it.
So I wasn't aware that there was anything pending that
hadn't gotten done on a portion of our facility.
So if we want to address it in connection with this change,
this revision is fine.
We can address it now.
Mr. President?
Go ahead, Ms. Cuzela.
Committee work is important.
I've said this before.
It makes for efficient systems of government.
So our state legislators meet in committee so they can get bills written well and propose to the floor.
If they work everything on the floor, right, our meetings would be even longer, right?
So the idea with the committees, I applaud President Perez for forming them so that we can work efficiently as a board.
We're not keeping anything from you.
We have the full draft presented to you and tonight is to hear from you and your input which I appreciate you giving
And we cannot have a walking quorum
We cannot talk to you about the details before we meet right we must not we must avoid
That's that's a law we work in committees three people
But but usually somebody brings you an idea and then you go to meet in your committee
So we would say as a board united, hey, that needs to be looked at by the policy committee.
Would you all please go look at that?
And then you all would say yes.
But that's not how this policy committee meets.
I have to respond.
I would say.
In December at our meeting, I know that when we talked about the renaming of facilities,
we voted the vote for the two elementaries, there were at least, I know Ms. Fox mentioned it,
maybe mr redmond myself i i know miss teaming mr prez miss cullen i don't remember if you said
anything but we identified the need to address this policy in december before anyone filed for
anything okay and we had already identified we the board that it needed to be looked at
there was a unique situation that was presented that we had never even thought about um in
december and that came about in january and we're addressing it the welfare of the district i would
I would just encourage everybody,
now that it's out in the open
and we've discussed the policy,
any changes that you want to recommend,
any wording on the family name,
on the whatever,
on the portion of the facility,
to send them in this week.
And Mr. Graham's involved in that.
Send it to me, send it to Dr. Rogorski, Mr. Graham,
and you know we'll take a look at that and present it again mr. president have
a couple of other questions before we finish did you all confer with outside
counsel no no on this policy okay and did you confer with dr. grooms no who's
the facilitator of it talked to dr. Gorg or ski and with Justin Graham we don't
direct dr grooms dr gregorski does if you'd like to do that he needs to confer not not give direction
no we no we we met no dr gregorski and mr graham okay you didn't include her in that
that's not our job i didn't i didn't i did not so the finance committee meets with mr smith
he he's not the superintendent does that mean that they give him direction
So, so, so.
Right, he's the one in charge of finance.
I'm just trying to correct, Mrs. Cuzela is mistaking confer with give direction.
So, the finance committee meets with Mr. Smith and Dr. Grooms is the one in charge of the
naming, so.
I don't, just, just, I mean, I don't.
He's splitting hairs here.
I'm not in charge of inviting administrative personnel to these committees.
committees. So, you know, if Dr. Gorski, of course, wants to include Mr. Smith and then
Mr. Smith, he includes whoever he wants to and his staff. So it's not, I don't say invite
so-and-so and we want to talk so-and-so. No. We show up for a finance committee meeting
and Dr. Gorski will be there, the committee, Ms. Teamey and Champagne, Mr. Smith,
and then he brings whoever he wants to.
Okay.
So the other piece when we say that the person being, name being considered, let's say for a school,
any facility, must be retired five years.
years. If that were the case, 21 of our heroes called Legacy Namesakes would not qualify.
Twenty-one of the people who we see everywhere who devote their lives to education, they're
retired six months or a year, and they're nominated for their names on a building. And
and they pour right back into those students and teachers,
and they would be excluded, 21 of them.
People you know, where your kids go,
all the just think of edge to edge, zip code to zip code.
It just seems like being retired five years is, what, arbitrary?
Okay.
I don't.
And I strongly disagree with five years.
you're gonna miss out on a lot of great people and this change should we vote on
it next week is for the future and has no we're no looking back this is not
about anything that decision that just happened it would be effective as of the
date it's approved so it would not affect the two recent namings no okay i i just um
because i sound like a broken record here i go once again 18 items on an agenda
zero of them about student outcomes and this is one that we're going to spend time money and
and resources on because some people are hurt, scared.
I don't know what, but we're not even naming
another school for two years.
Why now?
You know, we can do, we can walk into government
same time, right?
We can do this, we can do student outcomes.
You're on the academic performance committee,
you're on the academic performance committee
where we meet with teaching and learning personnel,
personnel, Dr. Caskey, et cetera, to emphasize, if you will, the value of student outcomes.
We can do, it's not one or the other.
And all of those agenda items that come is because of my insistence.
So yes, they come.
There isn't one tonight.
I don't build the agenda, but I do in the committee say this needs to be heard in public.
Our public needs to know this.
Our public needs to know this.
We need more and more time.
I disagree with that characterization, actually, that it's because of you.
You know, we're talking about a committee.
We're a committee, Mr. Redman, yourself, and I, on the Academic Performance Committee
to meet with the appropriate personnel on a regular basis
and to make sure that the board hears reports on certain topics.
We can go back to the video the last time you said,
I said this to you, that nothing on the agenda month after month about student outcomes,
and you said you're on the Academic Committee, you bring something.
I said, yes, sir, I will, and I built a calendar with the superintendent about what would be great items to bring to this board and to our public that very next day.
And you approved that.
I know you say it over and over again because you want to emphasize that, but as a matter of fact, that was a committee action.
And the agreement to bring certain things monthly on a schedule, and we're on a schedule, just like we heard.
recently about Miller, for example, on the schedule and fine arts.
And the fine arts.
You bet.
See, we're doing it all.
It's not one or the other.
You're welcome.
Okay.
Mr. Perez.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Fox.
Mr. Perez, may I please say something about that?
So it is a recommendation, and I know you all don't like TASB,
but that's mostly where I've gotten my training from,
that there's a certain percentage of the agenda, and it's over half.
It's more like 60 or 70% of the agenda should be student achievement based, something about students on every agenda.
And that shouldn't be something that any one of us should tell you.
This is something that is, you could look back at the agendas before you were the president and see that this is how the agendas usually were.
were. And so it's not something that I'm going to tell you or ask you to do because you're
the president. And I'm not on the academic committee, so I guess I don't really have
a place to tell you that either, but I'm just saying that that is the recommendation that's
given for building agendas.
MR. Yes, I agree with that. I agree that that's a – we should definitely be talking
more about student outcomes. And the reason we formed the Academic Performance Committee
is to influence that. So it's like if we don't have enough of academic discussion
about how we're doing as a district then the Academic Performance Committee needs
to do something about that and let's bring it forward. Let's demand more in
terms of reports and more analysis whatever. I'm totally open to that.
Mr. President may I clarify that the work we've done here tonight is all very
important and I'm not suggesting otherwise. I just hope that every meeting
we're here that we talk about student outcomes you bet i'm all for that and i appreciate everybody
in this room who's working very hard because a district runs and much of our work as a board
is oversight governance approvals of these very important contracts and in the due diligence that
we're doing on on all of those things the budgets all of it is important i i just which is why we're
having even though some people criticize us for this we're having two meetings a
month so we can discuss these things if we have a 1.3 billion dollar budget and
to me meeting once a month and basically rubber stamping the financial reports
for 10 minutes or consent agenda was not adequate and that we need to discuss
these things more rigorously over the course of a committee meeting over the
course of two meetings etc and that goes with a lot of things so uh but anyway uh thank you
very much why don't you y'all email your comments uh any changes you want to make to the policy cw
email them to me and copy dr rogorski and uh mr graham um we're moving on to 9.1
9. Information Items
we have the donated items list which was provided to the board and um are there any
request for information we capture any requests madam secretary no no I did not
I have something and I and this is not your fault I didn't mention it before
but the chart that mr. Smith showed with the breakdown of the spending for people
right it wasn't in the presentation and I would like to have I mean I think we
all should like to have I don't know I would like more Doc's now the first
slide that he presented which was very good thank you for that i couldn't read it very well but i
would like to is that in board docs now or no it is not in board docs i asked that to be added about
four o'clock okay all right great so we'll so we'll have that then yeah mr smith if you will
share that with the secretary for board services she can send that out tomorrow
10. Future Meetings
more okay we will have a regular board meeting on Monday February 24th 2025
there being no further business before the board this meeting is adjourned the
time is 748 thank you
Official documents
Motions and votes
Recorded actions
The motions and votes for this meeting have not been recorded here yet. Whether any were taken is not stated either way. The agenda and the recording above are the primary sources.