Time and takeover fears test HISD bond packages
Trustees face key vote in push for school upgrades with district in crisis
Edna Escamilla’s sixthgrader daughter often comes home wet when it rains, the result of shuffling between portable classrooms connected by uncovered walkways at Houston ISD’s Project Chrysalis Middle School.
The facilities, commonly known as temporary buildings, practically have become a permanent fixture at Project Chrysalis and Cage Elementary School, which share space on Houston’s east side. Portable classrooms housed children when Escamilla attended Cage nearly 30 years ago, and they likely will remain until the district rebuilds the campus.
“These kids are our future, and in order to be able to help them academically, we have to be able to provide the space to make them comfortable,” Escamilla said.
The future of many aging HISD schools hangs on a key decision on Thursday, when the district’s school board is expected to vote on the administration’s request to fund a facilities assessment considered essential for seeking a multi-billion-dollar bond package this November.
District administrators said the assessment, estimated to cost up to $5 million, will produce needed information about facility conditions, space needs and demographic trends as HISD seeks its first
bond since 2012, despite skepticism from some trustees about asking residents for billions more in tax dollars amid several headwinds facing the district.
HISD Chief Operating Officer Brian Busby said the full scope of the proposal will not be known until an assessment is complete, though he expects any bond request will exceed the $1.89 billion package approved by voters eight years ago.
If the assessment vote passes, trustees likely would vote this summer on whether to put a bond request on the ballot. Busby predicted the district’s property tax rate could remain flat or rise by a maximum of 2 cents per $100 in taxable value, depending on the size of the bond issue and property value trends.
“I think the 2012 bond has really whet the appetite of the community and the teachers teaching in those spaces,” Busby said. “There’s nothing about the last two bonds that we’ve looked back on and said, ‘Man, that’s not a good school.’”
While administrators and trustees agree that many HISD schools need upgrades — about half of the district’s campus buildings were deemed in “critical” condition, the worst possible score, in a 2016 facilities assessment — some board members have questioned the timing of a potential November bond election.
HISD officials are battling the Texas Education Agency in court over the state’s plans to replace the district’s elected trustees with an appointed board, largely due to chronically low performance at Wheatley High School and multiple findings of misconduct by several current and former trustees.
“We can’t compete with the schools that are taking our kids every day.” Tijerina Elementary School Principal Alesander Olaizola
Uncertainty abounds
While state law does not preclude the current board or an appointed board from seeking a bond, uncertainty about the district’s leadership could negatively influence voters. A temporary injunction preventing the state intervention remains in place amid ongoing litigation aimed at stopping the board’s ouster.
In the same vein, several HISD leaders have spoken openly about the need to rebuild public trust in the board following extensive in-fighting over the past two years and a widelypanned, quickly-reversed move by five trustees to replace Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan in 2018. Board President Sue Deigaard called this year “a new chapter in HISD” after she took over the role in January. Her appointment followed the election of four new trustees to the nine-member board late last year.
‘A team of 10’
“It’s going to be that much more important for us to be a team of 10” — a reference to trustees and Lathan — “and demonstrate to our city that we are a new board and they can trust us with more money,” Deigaard said.
The execution of the 2012 bond program, which ran about $200 million over budget, also looms over the district. A 2016 audit by the accounting firm KPMG found that HISD lacked “a number of core controls” needed to deliver a multi-billion dollar bond. A scathing districtwide performance review released last November by the Texas Legislative Budget Board said its staff “could not determine that the district has taken definitive steps to address the practices and lack of policies noted” in the 2016 audit.
Busby acknowledged that HISD officials are behind schedule for planning a bond package. In Dallas ISD, which also is planning a November bond election, the district’s resident-driven bond steering committee has been meeting for the past five months. HISD, by contrast, has not yet conducted any widespread public engagement about a new bond request.
“I’d like to settle in with my colleagues to define equity and work together and prioritize everybody’s concerns,” HISD Trustee Elizabeth Santos said.
District officials continue to push toward a bond election for one primary reason: school buildings continue to age. HISD leaders said they are making costly and inefficient short-term repairs on dozens of old facilities when money could be better spent on reconstructing or renovating campuses.
Schools aging quickly
“If we miss the window of November, that’s a whole other cycle of these schools getting a year older on us. And they’re failing faster and faster,” said Eugene Salazar, HISD’s business operations officer.
A November bond election that coincides with the presidential race also figures to produce significantly higher turnout than an election in May or November 2021, two other dates floated by HISD officials. In the past decade, large school district bonds have passed at slightly higher rates when placed on a November presidential or congressional midterm ballot, according to data compiled by the Texas Bond Review Board.
“I do know there’s a little bit of strategy behind that,” said Kirk Yoshida, who has analyzed Texas bonds for the past decade as a senior consultant for the Austin-based Strategic Partnerships. “But I tend to think the more overriding factors are how the district is viewed locally, how voters feel like the district is spending money, how well the money was used in the last election.”
At a January board meeting, about 25 parents and educators from several campuses spoke in favor of renovations at their neighborhood facilities.
“We can’t compete with the schools that are taking our kids every day,” said Tijerina Elementary School Principal Alesander Olaizola, whose east side campus enrolls about 350 students but could hold 900 children. “They go to better buildings, better facilities that are more safe. We are performing at high levels in the east, but our schools are getting old.”