Southside ISD set for next election
State appointee to decide who serves
Southside Independent School District’s election has three candidates and three open seats on its board — but the decision on who will fill those seats is still up to the state.
Since 2017, the school district has been operating under a sevenmember board of managers appointed by Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath, who removed the elected board after a special accreditation investigation found it unable to govern and properly handle the district’s finances.
The district’s election cycle has continued, but securing a majority of votes doesn’t secure a candidate’s place on the board. Morath decides that. He picked two winners in 2019 to join the board as the first step in a transition back into an all-elected board of trustees
This year’s election will give him more candidates to accelerate the transition.
“Given that the second phase of the transition process is set to occur in May 2021, three more elected trustees (either elected previously or elected in May 2021) will be appointed to replace some of the current board of managers,” the Texas Education Agency said in a written statement.
Running unopposed this May are Brenda Olivarez, a senior client support analyst; Esmeralda Flo
res, a retired military member; and Jesus “Jesse” Hernandez, a CPS Energy executive and one of the state-appointed managers.
Two candidates who won the most votes in 2019 but were not selected to join the board that year are Mary Silva, a retired educator, and Lisa Salazar, who at the time worked as custodian and food service supervisor.
Olivarez, 55, spent more than 20 years working in school district administration, where she specialized in Public Education Information Management System financial reports, known as PEIMS. But she recently moved to the private sector to work for Frontline Education, a company that specializes in school administration software.
Olivarez ran for the board in 2019, but was defeated by Salazar. She said she is running again because she wants to see the district conpast tinue to turn around, and to put her experience in administration and finance to good use.
“I'm very impressed with how the board is doing now. There's a lot more transparency now than how it was before,” Olivarez said. “The superintendent is also putting himself out there with the community and I really like that, because he lives in the community and has a deeper interest in the district being successful.”
Part of her career was spent at Edgewood ISD, which went through a similar takeover by the state. Too many times, Olivarez said, she has seen board members disconnected from the realities of public school administration end up making the job of running a school district harder.
“I've seen it, not just at Edgewood: sometimes the employees just want to satisfy the board,” Olivarez said.
Hernandez, 45, was appointed to the board in 2018 and is now seeking to stay on as an elected trustee. For the 10 years, he has worked as an executive at CPS Energy focusing on community engagement, a role he previously held at H-E-B for 15 years.
After moving to the United States from Mexico, Hernandez grew up in Southside ISD and attended its schools. He has a graduate degree in business from the University of Texas at San Antonio.
“It's been a really good opportunity for me to be able to give back and contribute to my own community,” Hernandez said of his role on the board. His job at CPS Energy gives him “the privilege of helping our customers that are most disadvantaged and that kind of transitions over to Southside,” he said.
During his time on the board of managers, Hernandez said, it hired the current superintendent, Rolando Ramirez, in 2020 and created a partnership to open a community clinic, now run by the Wellvana network.
If selected to stay on the board, Hernandez said, he would like to build on the current momentum with investments in academic programs like bilingual education, new avenues to eliminate the area's digital divide and a renewed push to bring healthy food options to the entire community.
Silva, 68, retired after working in Southside ISD for more than 40 years, first as a paraprofessional, librarian aide and later as attendance coordinator.
Silva herself, her children and grandchildren graduated from the school district, and decided to run in 2019 to be part of a change for the best, to do away with issues that get in the way of education opportunities and improved academics.
“Having worked in the district for so long, I don't like to see our children become the underdogs. I want them to be competitive,” Silva said. “Our children do move on, but with the shroud of low test scores. That affects them when they go to college.”
Under previous boards, Silva said, she experienced the negative side of conflicts among trustees that ended up trickling down to the superintendent, administrators and eventually the children.
Even if she wasn't selected two years ago, Silva said, she has been pleased with the changes the board of managers has implemented.
“With the new superintendent we have, I know they can't lose,” Silva said. “It would be an awesome privilege to work with him and move things along … But even if I get in or not, I know there is someone in the driver's seat that knows where they are going.”
Hernandez and Olivarez echoed Silva's assessment that the district is going in the right direction and said they hoped it can continue when it returns to a fullyelected board.
“The community is at peace now,” Olivarez said. “Before, it wasn't like that. The last election I ran, the community was angry, they were so angry.”
Flores and Salazar could not be reached for comment.
The next round of appointments to the board is expected in mid-may. The board then will have five elected trustees and two state-appointed managers, but it will still be considered a board of managers until the transition is final, the TEA statement said.
“The community is at peace now . ... The last election (in which) I ran, the community was angry, they were so angry.”
Brenda Olivarez, Southside ISD candidate