Trustees to discuss bond

Oct. 10—The Ector County ISD Board of Trustees will discuss the failed bond election results and potential next steps during a workshop set for 6 p.m. today in the first floor board room of the administration building, 802 N. Sam Houston Ave.

The proposed $398,255,000 bond was resoundingly rejected by voters in May. There was controversy over where to put a new high school, the amount of the bond and there was a social media campaign against it and also signs around town telling people to vote no.

Board President Steve Brown said he'd like to have a discussion of board members to find out where the board members are, what they think, what they're hearing from the community and then determine whether or not they want to explore calling another bond issue.

Brown added that it takes a lot of preparation to call a bond.

"With that being said, we need to probably update our demographic information. What we have is about 18 to 24 months old — or older. Then we would want to put together a bond committee and all of that takes time and determine when would we want to go for another bond. Would it be November a year from now or next May? The bottom line is we're going to have to do something with our overcrowded conditions," Brown said.

He said the bond committee would mostly be made up of new people.

"It will be a whole new committee. You want to invite a good cross-section of the community. The other committee is no longer in action, so it would be a totally new committee. There may be some that would choose to come back on, but by and large, it would be a new committee. And you've got to update the facilities report. It's not going to be as intense as before because we have a good idea of where we are. There would be, I'm sure, some minor updates and tweaks to the facilities report. The demographic study, I think, is critical to the work, and if the predictions before are holding true, then certainly it would support the need for ... a bond issue to pass," Brown said.

It seemed before the May election that efforts to get the word out started too late.

"I just think for whatever reason, the public, the citizens, were not ready for that bond issue. Certainly, we have to own part of that. If we didn't get the information out in time, then there was a lot of information put out there that wasn't correct by other interest groups. You have to put that into the equation. The bottom line is we've got to get the best information out there, the most accurate information that we can, and to be honest, we need to get people to vote," Brown said.

"Certainly we'd want them to vote for the bond issue, but my goodness gracious, we need people just to vote, to take an active part in our community, and our state, and our nation," he added.

"The voter turnout for that last bond was not good at all, so I think that's an emphasis that we need to place is regardless of your position take part in the process whether it be a bond issue, a city, or a county election, or state amendments, or state offices, or federal offices our community needs to be more active and more robust in the way they participate in the voting process," Brown said.

Board member Delma Abalos said she thinks the concerns are that they need to go back out into the community and talk to people more in depth.

"Instead of them coming to us, we need to reach out to them and find out what it is that they would like to see us do. The main thing I'm hearing is that there's no doubt that a bond is needed; that we need more schools, so now what we need to come to a consensus on is where the community suggests those schools be placed, if we can get a bond passed," Abalos said.

It has seemed that people want new or revamped facilities, but they don't want to pay for them. However, Abalos said that's not what she hears.

"What I'm hearing is that they weren't happy with where we wanted to put the schools. The biggest concern was that people didn't vote. There's probably different reasons why they didn't vote," she said.

She said maybe people didn't like the options, or they didn't vote because they didn't feel informed enough. Abalos noted that the bond committee "went everywhere" trying to inform people. But it's also going to be the board's job to get out into the community and ask people what they would like, but now they're going to have to be more specific.

Abalos added that she would like to get parents involved and for "us to take our time going out into the community to different schools and talking to parents and finding out what they would like to see us propose on a bond."

Abalos said there are going to be naysayers, and "frankly I think it's going to happen again, not that we can't win; I think we can win a bond, but we're just going to have to be more strategic in going out and getting the support of the parents in the schools because I do believe that it wasn't parents saying no. Parents didn't vote and so what we're going to have to do is make sure we get their support before we even ask for a bond; so that we can find out what it is that they would like for us to ask for."

Board member Donna Smith said she has been hearing that even naysayers and those who were terribly opposed to the May 7 bond agree that the needs are still there.

"I think the strategy that we'll need to talk about is how do we do things differently this time so we can get more people to vote with what they already think is true," Smith said.

She added that she knows the tax increase is always a reason for people to vote against a bond, but people were perhaps also influenced by the conversation about where the new high school would go.

"I'm hearing that a lot of people felt like we need to pay more attention to the south and the west parts of the county and that by putting the high school in the parcel of land that the district already owns in the northeast corner we're just continuing to privilege the east side at the expense of the west side," Smith said.

But would people really vote for a bond if it was put on the west or south side?

"That's kind of the issue. When all of this started, before we made any sort of decision, I was arguing the point that we needed to locate in the south and the west and the argument against that was, No. 1, we already own the land in the northeast corner, so that using land that we already owned was more responsible stewardship of the public's money. And there was the fact that, historically, people in the northeast sections of the county vote more than people in the south and west parts of the county," Smith said.

Another argument against the bond was that the district's academic performance had been so poor.

"But to the district's credit, those teachers and administrators have really put into place structures, so that we're doing better academically than we've done in years," Smith said. "If we're doing that well with subpar facilities, it's only logical to assume that if the community will invest in us more, we can continue that arc and be even better," she said.

"I think the question that we need to consider is what's different now and what can we do differently now so that we get a different outcome. Of course the better academic performance, that's a big one, but I keep wondering can we do a better job in making sure that all of our employees are registered to vote. We can't tell anybody how to vote, nor would I want to tell anybody how to vote, but we are the biggest educational entity in the county and it's our responsibility to model civic behavior for these children. If our employees are not even registered to vote and exercising that right, I don't think we're being very good models for the kids and kids will copy what we do. So i feel like it's really important that we stress (that) everybody at least register to vote, and to the extent possible, encourage them to vote not telling them how to vote, but go out and vote," Smith said.

She hopes they can figure out a way to get students more involved, engaged and knowledgeable about district needs.

Smith recently attended a conference at the end of September and another idea she ran across was to figure out how to bring parents into the schools right before the election to tour the hallways of Odessa and Permian high schools when classes are changing.

The parents could stand in "safe pods" and watch what it looks like for students to get from Point A to Point B.

"That's got to be powerful because those schools are so crowded. I'm not advocating that we do any of these little strategies. I just hope that we talk about some creative ways to get the same information out there and I feel like we need to identify the people who are the influencers in the failure of the last bond and make sure that we're talking to them; make sure that we're listening to them; make sure that they feel like their voice is being heard and understood and ask them for help," Smith said.

She added that people in the south and west side of Ector County are angry because they feel their needs are not being represented well enough and they need to help the district figure out how to meet their needs, make them feel like they are being taken seriously and being listened to.

"I can't speak for anybody but me, but I'm really interested. I want to know what did we do wrong last time that turned you off so seriously? Why didn't you get more involved in the planning process? What are we doing in those planning processes that make you disengage. I also feel like we need new strategies for social media. Social media is a big deal. I'm on Facebook; I'm on Twitter and I'm on Instagram but ... I don't participate that much. But if we had someone designated to watch those feeds and then send out an email ok here's what's being said could you go on and here's some strategies for responding. Shoot, I would do that," Smith said.

She also asked if they were hitting all the social media they should be hitting.

"I think there's an app called Next Door that I'm not really on, but I think I remember hearing that there was a lot of negative buzz on that platform that might have given us trouble. I just want us to think out of the box. These needs are not going away and I know that there's a huge anti-tax sentiment. I get it. I understand, but there's not another way for us to meet these needs. We can't build a school out of our fund balance. It has to be financed through a bond," Smith said.

She added that she has heard that ECISD is not trusted and that it's not transparent enough.

"It's been real hard for me to figure out what people mean when they say that, so that's a question to ask and then to listen and try to figure out what's the issue, because from my perspective, we do seem transparent but I need to understand why people think we're not and let's think out of the box and figure out how to meet that need," Smith said.

A group called A Better Way Forward has continued meeting for people who didn't want the bond. Its next meeting is at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Little Ranch Party Place, 15837 U.S. Highway 385.

The May bond had two separate propositions.

Proposition A, $215,255,000 which would include:

Maintenance & life-cycle repairs/replacement for school district buildings ($130,255,000). Various projects for electrical, mechanical, plumbing, fire and life safety, and others at schools and auxiliary buildings.

Construction of a new Career and Technical Education center ($70 million); classroom and lab space for programs like welding, construction, health science, automation and process technology, HVAC, plumbing and others; estimated at 150,000 square feet. This would have included furniture, fixtures, and equipment.

Classroom technology upgrades ($15 million).

Classroom and/or campus audio, visual and multimedia refresh or additions.

Proposition B, $183,000,000 for a new comprehensive high school.

This would have included construction of a new high school designed for 2,500-2,800 student capacity; estimated at 400,000 square feet; it would have included furniture, fixtures, and equipment.

District leaders anticipated the bond would create a tax rate increase of 15 cents and, for a home with a taxable value of $100,000, would equate to a tax increase of approximately $12 per month, the website said.

There would be no tax increase on residence homesteads for taxpayers 65 and older, as state law dictates that the tax rate and the amount paid on a residence, are frozen when that person turns 65 years old, applies for the exemption and is approved by the Ector County Appraisal District. ECISD gives local taxpayers a 20% homestead exemption, which is the maximum allowed by law.

The meeting also includes a report and discussion of beginning of the year assessment data; presentation of Curriculum and Instruction science, technology, engineering and math (STEM); and presentation and discussion of 2021-22 Senate Bill 1882 partnership performance outcomes.