Will Clovis Unified add a board member for its new school area? Here’s what we know

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Clovis Unified School District is on the verge of several major changes, on multiple levels, in preparation to integrate its latest creation: three new schools at the officially named Clovis South Area.

Earlier this year, the Clovis Unified board voted to change how it elects members: Residents will now vote for their board representative in a district-based manner, instead of at-large. This means only people living within a designated district area vote for a representative for their area only, not for all school board candidates across the district’s areas.

To integrate Clovis South, the district has the 2024-2025 school year to prepare facilities, families and students to adapt to elementary-to-secondary and address-to-school attendance boundary changes.

Hirayama Elementary will open in Fall 2024 and Clovis High and a soon-to-be-named intermediate school in Fall 2025 in the district’s newest Clovis South district area.

Students are already enrolled for Hirayama Elementary next year, but who is representing this new district area as these changes happen? Will Clovis Unified community members living in the Clovis South area be able to elect a board representative?

The Bee emailed Clovis Unified to inquire if Clovis South will have a board representative, how they will be elected and when residents could cast their votes. Here’s what the district’s spokesperson, Kelly Avants, said:

Will Clovis South have a designated area board member for the 2025-2026 school year?

Yes, but not exactly a Clovis South-only board member.

District board areas’ boundaries don’t mirror school attendance boundaries or school areas. There’s some correlation, but not line for line, and some areas are represented by more than one board member.

“We will not be adding to the Governing Board as that isn’t how the district was set up when it unified in 1960,” Avants said. “We have a seven-member governing board whose geographic areas roughly represent the seven districts that came together to form the district in 1960.”

These regions have been updated periodically since then, Avants said, to reflect population changes over time, but still roughly fall around those founding seven school districts.

Avants also explained that Clovis school board members do not represent a single high school or school area.

“Instead, each trustee area encompasses parts of multiple high school feeder areas, meaning elementary areas that feed into several different high schools,” Avants said, “as an effort to ensure members of our school board are always interested in the needs of the district as a whole.”

So, who represents the Clovis South Area?

Creating the Clovis South Area doesn’t mean that the district physically expanded: Its district borders remain the same, it only reorganized internally to better allocate students’ attendance to school and increase their academic spaces (with the three new schools).

So, the Clovis South Area technically already has two representatives: Yolanda Moore and Deena Combs-Flores.

Combs-Flores represents the board’s Area 6 and Moore its neighboring Area 7. Depending on the side of Fowler Avenue, a Clovis Unified family lives – and school is located – they are represented by either of these two board members.

What schools will this board member represent?

Clovis South’s board members will represent:

• Boris Elementary School

• Fancher Creek Elementary School

• Hirayama Elementary School (opens Fall 2024)

• Temperance-Kutner Elementary School

• Young Elementary School

• A to-be-named intermediate school (opens Fall 2025)

• Clovis South High School (opens Fall 2025)

Because of attendance boundary changes, Boris, Fancher Creek, Temperance-Kutner and Young elementary schools will be feeding schools to the soon-to-be-named area’s intermediate school, which will later feed into Clovis South High School.

According to Clovis Unified’s board trustees’ boundaries map, Area 7 – now represented by Moore – will have all but one of Clovis South’s schools. Hirayama Elementary will be located on the East side of Fowler Ave., south of Clinton Ave., placing it in this area, too.

Moore also represents Gettysburg, Freedom, Oraze and Reagan elementary schools, Reyburn Intermediate and Clovis East High schools in the Clovis East Area.

Fancher Creek Elementary is the only Clovis South school that will be in Area 6, now represented by Combs-Flores. She also represents Miramont Elementary School in the Clovis East Area, Sierra Vista Elementary School in the Clovis Area, and Tarpey Elementary in the Buchanan Area.

When will Clovis South board members be elected to the school board?

Registered voters will be able to vote for Area 6 and 7 representatives following the already established general and midterm elections’ timeline.

This November, four Clovis Unified board seats will be up for election, including Moore’s. Areas 2, 4 and 5 – represented by David DeFrank, Hugh Awtrey, and Steven Fogg respectively – will be voted on during this year’s General Election as well.

Combs-Flores’s seat will be up for election in 2026.

Who can vote for Clovis South’s board member?

Because Clovis South will be represented by two board areas, not everyone across Clovis South will be able to vote for both board representatives.

Registered voters living in Area 6 will only be able to vote for the Area 6 representative – and Area 7 voters for its representative only – since the district adopted a district-based elections process at the end of 2023.

This means the at-large voting process is no longer happening at the school board level, meaning people can only vote for the board member for their area and not for all board members across all school district areas.

Those interested in running for this board seat, who should they approach to register as a candidate?

Elections are conducted by the Fresno County’s Clerk/Registrar of Voters office, not the school district, so those interested must approach the county.

The Bee spoke to James Kus, Fresno County’s Clerk and Registrar of Voters, earlier this year. He said those interested in running for school board representative can file their candidate applications with his office from July 15 to Aug. 9.

However, some campaign posters and messaging might be already visible across Clovis Unified, Kus said, because candidates can start fundraising if they have filed the necessary paperwork with California Fair Political Practices Commission (FCCP).

Once all candidates file their applications by Aug. 9, Kus said the county will state who is officially running for Clovis Unified’s school board a few days after the registration deadline.