Spotlight on HISD

Regarding “HISD trustees OK $1.2M cost of new names” (Page A3, Aug. 12), money is being spent without just cause, transparency, oversight or in accordance with HISD’s own written policies.

From emails obtained through an open-records request, we learned Trustee Rhonda Skillern-Jones knowingly and intentionally added this item to the agenda at the last moment, and the district had not (and at last we checked, still has not) obtained bids for the work required for the renaming. Recently, by order of the judge in a lawsuit against the district, within 48 hours the board came up with an unsubstantiated figure of $1.245 million. A community group, Lanier Watchdog, obtained independent bids and found their campus alone would cost the district in excess of $475,000.

Not knowing what the Houston Independent School Board is up to is costing us personally in the form of higher taxes and/or new bond elections. In December, the HISD board approved borrowing $212 million to cover a shortfall in its $1.9 billion 2012 bond. In his official audit report submitted to the FBI, the HISD acting chief auditor stated the shortfall “points to a lack of competitive bidding and points to ‘scope creep by agreeing to work that was not in the original plan.’”

The only way to stop this abuse of power is to vote out trustees when they come up for reelection.

Eileen Portele Howell, Houston