BUDGET MEETINGS OF THE BOARD:

Budget meetings in Katy ISD are not like they are in any other Texas school district that I could find.  Whenever I went to Board training sessions, state conventions, et cetera, I did my best to bring to the attention of anyone I could how KISD did their budget meetings just to see their reaction. When I did that, I always got a look of surprise.  No one could believe that KISD was so clandestine in their budget planning!

For example, Spring Branch started open meetings on the budget in December of the prior year. They continued throughout the spring and came up with a viable budget together that had been discussed in open meetings where everyone could hear what they had to say.  That was proper procedure, in my opinion.

In contrast, in Katy ISD, while I was on the Board, and I imagine they still do it this way, the Board members were called in by the superintendent in groups of three or less so as not to violate the law with regard to having a quorum.  (Four board members constitutes a quorum and must always meet in public in most instances if there are four board members together discussing school business.) Obviously, it didn't take me long to figure out what they were doing.  They were hiding what they were doing from the public and they were trying to control me, keep me from discussing and hearing what the other Board members were discussing and hearing, and undermining proper procedure however they could.

In my case at first, the budget was presented by Mr. Moore (the financial administrator) to just me (as the newbie of course) and the superintendent or an assistant superintendent.  They went over innocuous items like how many movie projectors they needed and stuff like that.  It was extremely insulting that they would think I could be stupid enough to fall for the scheme.  I guess if it had worked on the other board members, they figured it would work with me.

The thing was, as this happened year after year, I was not brought in as the newbie, but just because I was smart enough to be asking good questions about how they were spending money, and they didn't want the other board members to hear what I had to say!

The last year for me of this mindless operation, I was busy attending sex education committee meetings at the behest of a mother who said that if I didn't come, the chairman of the committee ran roughshod over all the committee members, and they didn't get to say anything, so I always went.

Didn't take the superintendent long to figure out that I was tied to that committee, and so he started having budget meetings while that committee met, just so I wouldn't be able to come!  Nothing I could do about that. 

So be confident that the budgets that are presented each fall have no proper vetting done by Board members who are still legally charged with having oversight of the budget. In Katy ISD, they don't!

In about 1996, this is the copy of my Budget Meeting Notes that I gave to Larry Moore who was the President of the Board.  Needless to say, none of matters on this list were ever addressed. Most of the things are subjects that still exist and still need to be fixed!

To:  Larry Moore

From:  Mary McGarr

RE:  Budget Meeting Notes

These are the requests that I made at the part of the budget meeting in 1996 attended by Ken Leach, Jim Brasier, Dr. Merrell, Dr. Stacy, James McDonald and me.  [Jim Brasier was the new member on the Board, Dr. Merrell had been hired in March 1995.]

1.  I asked for the development of a 10 year plan for elementary, junior high and high school construction which would indicate (based upon current demographic numbers using a spread sheet technique with percentage increases) (based upon our best guess as to reliability) when and where these facilities should be constructed.  The time line should also indicate when land should be purchased, when architects should be hired, when plans should be read, when bids should be let, returned and opened, when building construction should begin and end, and when the Board should expect to see recommendations for approval on all of these matters as agenda items ready for a vote. [What is truly amazing is that the superintendent at this time had no clue about any kind of planning in this regard!  I was tired of the rule by the seat of the pants that was going on at the time. ]

2. I asked for another legal opinion on the $2.00 tax cap since my reading of Senate Bill I (and Dr. Stacy concurred) indicates that our first legal opinion might not be correct.  The Board could not move forward with any plans until it knew exactly how much money was potentially available.

3.  I asked for (after some deliberation) a vote by the Board on establishing a goal for the ultimate size of high schools in our district.  The goal would establish an ultimate parameter which when approached by verified numbers of students would cause certain activities to occur:  i.e., a review of projected plans for building additional facilities using an agreed upon set of criteria for beginning the process.  I saw in this proposal the eventual establishment of a percentage of students that the district would allow over the goal but which could not be surpassed so that the process would have to be followed.  I would think that Board policy would need to be created in this regard.

4.  I asked for a decision with regard to keeping the consultant now employed to bring us demographic information.  My opinion is that our in-house people can do as well or better than this consultant.  I also think we need some guidelines as to how often the information is updated.  I am not comfortable using statistics right now to make construction decisions that have September 1994 dates on them.  Every six months should suffice.

5.  I asked for a recommendation from the administration regarding the placement of the 6th grade and the 9th grade.  This is an educationally based but philosophical decision that the Board needs to make. [It was later made by default when the Board didn't do anything.] The decision does not need to be all inclusive, but it does need to be established as a viable option if the movement of these grades from their current placement could achieve at a more economically favorable cost a placement either permanently or temporarily.  The placement of these two grades while addressed here together, should not be considered together as the reasons for moving each are different.

6.  I asked for information with regard to the number of high school students in and projected for the 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th grades for 1997-98 and 1998-99 for all three high school zones.  It would be nice to have this information for 1995 through 2000 on a chart showing each school and as a total.

With regard to the proposed plans for Taylor, I think the amount needs to be kept under 8 million.  I think they could do without the proposed Drama facilities, [Taylor had just had a huge black box theater built in 1991 that was quite adequate for their drama program.]  but I do think the parking areas need to be included.  I also suggested that someone needed to ask how many plays were produced at Taylor last year.  With regard to KHS, I'm inclined to agree with Jim that we shouldn't demolish the old classrooms just yet [and we were right about that as they used those classrooms for quite a while after that.] 

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As the reader can easily see, I was asking for basic information that was imperative to have BEFORE talking about building new schools and making big financial decisions, and yet this new superintendent did not have such information and the rest of the Board seemed clueless. The rest of the Board members, except for Stanley Thompson and Ken Burton, never considered things at this level.  It just didn't happen.

It was very frustrating, and my frustration at the time was building daily!